A boy, recently
home from school, wished to give
his father an exhibition of his precocity.
He pushed a large circular table into the corner of the room, as shown
in the illustration, so that it touched both walls, and he then pointed
to a spot of ink on the extreme edge.
"Here is a little
puzzle for you, pater," said the
youth.
"That spot is exactly eight inches from one wall and nine inches
from the other.
Can you tell me the
diameter of the table without
measuring it?"
The boy was
overheard to tell a friend,
"It fairly
beat the guv'nor;" but his father is known to have remarked to a City
acquaintance that he solved the thing in his head in a minute.
I often
wonder which spoke the truth.