Mr. Morgan G. Bloomgarten, the millionaire, known in the States as the
Clam King, had, for his sins, more money than he knew what to do with.
It bored him. So he determined to persecute some of his poor but happy
friends with it. They had never done him any harm, but he resolved to
inoculate them with the "source of all evil." He therefore proposed to
distribute a million dollars among them and watch them go rapidly to the
bad. But he was a man of strange fancies and superstitions, and it was
an inviolable rule with him never to make a gift that was not either one
dollar or some power of seven--such as 7, 49, 343, 2,401, which numbers
of dollars are produced by simply multiplying sevens together. Another
rule of his was that he would never give more than six persons exactly
the same sum. Now, how was he to distribute the 1,000,000 dollars? You
may distribute the money among as many people as you like, under the
conditions given.

17.--THE PUZZLING MONEY-BOXES.

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; only, as the boxes were not very
large, they first changed the money into as few coins as possible. After
they had done this, they told one another how much money they had saved,
and it was found that if John had had 2s. more in his box than at
present, if William had had 2s. less, if Charles had had twice as much,
and if Thomas had had half as much, they would all have had exactly the
same amount.

Now, when I add that all four boxes together contained 45s., and that
there were only six coins in all in them, it becomes an entertaining