As we all know by experience, considerable ingenuity is often required in packing articles into a box if space is not to be unduly wasted. A man once told me that he had a large nu...
Tommy Smart was recently sent to a new school. On the first day of his arrival the teacher asked him his age, and this was his curious reply: "Well, you see, it is like this. At th...
We have here a stop-watch with three hands. The second hand, which travels once round the face in a minute, is the one with the little ring at its end near the centre. Our dial ind...
A guest asked some one to favour him with eleven pennies, and he passed the coins to the company, as depicted in our illustration. The writer says: "He then requested us to remove...
The Reve was a wily man and something of a scholar. As Chaucer tells us, "There was no auditor could of him win," and "there could no man bring him in arrear." The poet also notice...
A joiner had two pieces of wood of the shapes and relative proportions shown in the diagram. He wished to cut them into as few pieces as possible so that they could be fitted toget...
A stonemason was engaged the other day in cutting out a round ball for the purpose of some architectural decoration, when a smart schoolboy came upon the scene. "Look here," said t...
Can you cut this piece of linoleum into four pieces that will fit together and form a perfect square? Of course the cuts may only be made along the lines. VARIOUS GEOMETRICAL PUZZL...
Strolling into one of the rooms of a London club, I noticed a position left by two players who had gone. This position is shown in the diagram. It is evident that White has checkma...
During a visit to the seaside Tommy and Evangeline insisted on having a donkey race over the mile course on the sands. Mr. Dobson and some of his friends whom he had met on the bea...
"Mother, I wish you would give me a bicycle," said a girl of twelve the other day. "I do not think you are old enough yet, my dear," was the reply. "When I am only three times as o...
Four brothers--named John, William, Charles, and Thomas--had each a money-box. The boxes were all given to them on the same day, and they at once put what money they had into them;...
[Illustration: ( I ) ((N)) ( M ) ((A)) ( H ) ((T)) ( E ) ((W)) ( C ) ((K)) ( ) ] In the illustration we have eleven discs in a circle. On five of the discs we place white counters...
"Speaking of perplexities--" said Mr. Wilson, throwing down a magazine on the table in the commercial room of the Railway Hotel. "Who was speaking of perplexities?" inquired Mr. St...
This puzzle is based on one by Captain Turton. Remove three of the queens to other squares so that there shall be eleven squares on the board that are not attacked. The removal of...
A charitable gentleman, on his way home one night, was appealed to by three needy persons in succession for assistance. To the first person he gave one penny more than half the mon...
Once upon a time there was a Grand Lama who had a chessboard made of pure gold, magnificently engraved, and, of course, of great value. Every year a tournament was held at Lhassa a...
Edwin: "Do you know, when the Timpkinses married eighteen years ago Timpkins was three times as old as his wife, and to-day he is just twice as old as she?" Angelina: "Then how old...
Here is an interesting little puzzle suggested to me by Mr. W. T. Whyte. Mark off on a sheet of paper a rectangular space 5 inches by 3 inches, and then find the greatest number of...
Here is a slab of chocolate, indented at the dotted lines so that the twenty squares can be easily separated. Make a copy of the slab in paper or cardboard and then try to cut it i...
A correspondent asked me to supply him with the solution to an old puzzle that is attributed to a certain Betsy Ross, of Philadelphia, who showed it to George Washington. It consis...
Mr. Gubbins, a diligent man of business, was much inconvenienced by a London fog. The electric light happened to be out of order and he had to manage as best he could with two cand...
In the illustration we have eight toadstools, with white frogs on 1 and 3 and black frogs on 6 and 8. The puzzle is to move one frog at a time, in any order, along one of the strai...
If prisons had no other use, they might still be preserved for the special benefit of puzzle-makers. They appear to be an inexhaustible mine of perplexing ideas. Here is a little p...
On Friday, April 1, 1898, three new clocks were all set going precisely at the same time--twelve noon. At noon on the following day it was found that clock A had kept perfect time,...
Into how large a number of different pieces may the chessboard be cut (by cuts along the lines only), no two pieces being exactly alike? Remember that the arrangement of black and...
A man left instructions to his executors to distribute once a year exactly fifty-five shillings among the poor of his parish; but they were only to continue the gift so long as the...
A man went recently into a dairyman's shop to buy eggs. He wanted them of various qualities. The salesman had new-laid eggs at the high price of fivepence each, fresh eggs at one p...
The five Spanish brigands, Alfonso, Benito, Carlos, Diego, and Esteban, were counting their spoils after a raid, when it was found that they had captured altogether exactly 200 dou...
Having examined "Noughts and Crosses," we will now consider an extension of the game that is distinctly mentioned in the works of Ovid. It is, in fact, the parent of "Nine Men's Mo...