HENRY ERNEST DUDENEY


In Mathematicks he was greater
Than Tycho Brahe or Erra Pater:
For he, by geometrick scale,
Could take the size of pots of ale;
Resolve, by sines and tangents, straight,
If bread or butter wanted weight;
And wisely tell what hour o' th' day
The clock does strike by algebra.

BUTLER'S _Hudibras_.


1917




PREFACE


In issuing this volume of my Mathematical Puzzles, of which some have
appeared in periodicals and others are given here for the first time, I
must acknowledge the encouragement that I have received from many
unknown correspondents, at home and abroad, who have expressed a desire
to have the problems in a collected form, with some of the solutions
given at greater length than is possible in magazines and newspapers.