A case came to court in Sunderland, England, earlier this week, that caused, or reflected, quite a stir -- such a stir, in fact, that its ripples have been felt far beyond England. Why is this?

Partly it is because of the charm of the defendant and the novelty of the charge: a 36-year-old fruit and vegetable trader accused of the heinous crime of selling bananas in pounds and ounces instead of the kilograms now mandatory in Britain under the European Union's law on weights and measures. Mr. Steven Thoburn, the offending grocer, had already shown he had the right stuff to become a populist hero, with his general air of insouciance and his no-nonsense quotability. "My interest is me customers," he said. "If somebody comes into me premises and says, 'Come on, luv, give us a kilo of bananas, I'd sell it to her. But nobody ever [does].' "

This is classic little-man-against-the-government dialogue, and it never fails to get hearts beating. Sympathetic Britons have dubbed Mr. Thoburn and his fellow rebel, a Sunderland fishmonger, "the Metric Martyrs," and declared Mr. Thoburn's first day in court last Monday National Banana Day. But there is more to the case than colorful characters and banana jokes.