Part 26

PUPIL--“I don’t know.”

TEACHER--“It’s simple enough if you only would learn how to cultivate artificial memory. Remember the twelve apostles. Add half their number to them. That’s eighteen. Multiply by a hundred. That’s eighteen hundred. Take the twelve apostles again. Add a quarter of their number to them. That’s fifteen. Add to what you’ve got. That’s 1815. That’s the date. Quite simple, you see, to remember dates if you will only adopt my system.”

A GLOBE TROTTER.

138. Everyone knows that in a race on a circular track the competitor who has the “inside” running has the least ground to cover, hence the great desire of cyclists, jockeys, &c., to “hug the fence.”

Now a gentleman, six feet high, starts walking round the Earth on the equator; his feet, therefore, have the inside running. Find out how much further his head travels than his feet in performing this wonderful journey? taking the circumference of the globe at the equator to be 25,000 miles.

PRECOCIOUS JUVENILE--“Mamma, it isn’t good grammar to say ‘after I,’ is it?”

HIS MOTHER--“No, Georgie.”

PRECOCIOUS JUVENILE--“Well, the letter J comes after I. Which is wrong--the grammar or the alphabet?”

139. There is an island in the form of a semi-circle; two persons start from a point in the diameter; one walks along the diameter, and the other at right angles to it; the former reaches the extremity of the diameter after walking 4 miles, and the latter the boundary of the island after walking 8 miles. Find the area of the island.

140. There is a certain number consisting of three figures which is equal to 36 times the sum of its digits, and 7 times the left-hand digit plus 9, equal to 5 times the sum of the remaining digits, and 8 times the second digit minus 9 is equal to the sum of the first and third. What is the number?

141. A bottle and cork costs 2½d.; the bottle costs 2d. more than the cork. What is the price of each?

A Cure for Big Words.

Here is a good story of how a father cured his son of verbal grandiloquence. The boy wrote from college, using such large words that the father replied with the following letter:--“In promulgating your esoteric cogitations, or articulating superficial sentimentalities, and philosophical or pscyhological observations, beware of platitudinous ponderosity. Let your conversation possess a clarified conciseness, compacted comprehensibleness, coalescent consistency, and a concatenated cogency. Eschew all conglomerations of flatulent garrulity, jejune babblement, and asinine affectations. Let your extemporaneous descantings and unpremeditated expatiations have intelligibility, without rhodomontade or thrasonical bombast. Sedulously avoid all polysyllabical profundity, pompous prolixity, and ventriloquial vapidity. Shun double entendre and prurient jocosity, whether obscure or apparent. In other words, speak truthfully, naturally, clearly, purely, but do not use big words.”

142. With a pair each of four different weights, 1 lb. up to 170 lbs. can be weighed. What are the weights?

143. A man going “on the spree” spends on the first day 10s. 5d., the second 18s., the third £1 8s. 7d., the fourth £2 2s. 8d., and so on at that rate of increase until he has spent all he had--£183 6s. 8d. How many days was he on the spree?

144. Divide one shilling into two parts, so that one will be 2½d. more than the other.

COMPLIMENTARY, VERY!

EDITOR--“Did you see the notice I gave you yesterday?”

SHOPKEEPER--“Yes, and I don’t want another. The man who says I’ve got plenty of grit, and that the milk I sell is of the first water, and that my butter is the strongest in the market, may mean well, but he is not the man whose encomiums I value.”

145. A vintner draws a certain quantity of wine out of a full vessel that holds 256 gallons, and then filling the same vessel with water draws off the same quantity of liquor as before, and so on for four draughts, when only 81 gallons of pure wine is left. How much wine did he draw each time?

146. A man has 4 horses, for which he gave £80; the first horse cost as much as the second and half of the third, the second cost as much as the fourth minus the cost of the third, the third cost one-third of the first, and the fourth cost as much as the second and third together. What was the price of each horse?

The Divided Pound.

147. A father wishes to divide £1 between his four sons, giving one-third to one, one-fourth to another, one-fifth to another, and one-sixth to another; in doing so he finds he has only disbursed 19s.; the balance, 1s., is then divided in the same proportion. What amount does each receive in full in the proportion named?

RAILWAY-SHUNTING PUZZLE.

148. A locomotive is on the main line of railway; the trucks marked 1 and 2 are on sidings which meet at the points, where there is room for one truck only and not for the locomotive. It is desired to reverse the position of the trucks--that is, put 1 where 2 is, and 2 where 1 is, and yet leave the locomotive free on the main line. This must be done by means of the locomotive only, either pulling or pushing the trucks--it may be between them, thus pulling one and pushing the other--but no truck must move without the locomotive.

In working this puzzle out, it would be best to draw the diagram on an enlarged scale, and have articles to represent the trucks and locomotive.

149. In a public square there is a fountain containing a quantity of water; around it stand a group of people with pitchers and buckets. They draw water at the following rate: The first draws 100 quarts and one-thirteenth of the remainder, the second 200 quarts and one-thirteenth of the remainder, the third 300 quarts and one-thirteenth, and so on, until the fountain was emptied. How many quarts were there in the fountain?

ENGLISH FROM A GERMAN MASTER.