Silence settled down upon them, broken occasionally by a murmur of this sort: “Ptolemy I was followed by a series of monarchs—by a series of monarchs—what are you going to wear, Dotsie?”
“That old brown gingham—the cube root of xy—364/2—”
Dolly burst into laughter. “X square plus seven X plus fifty-three equals eleven thirds!” she quoted.
Dotty laughed back and quoted their favourite “Hunting of the Snark.”
“Taking three as the number to reason about —
A convenient number to state —
We add Seven and Ten and then multiply out
By One Thousand diminished by Eight.
The result we proceed to divide, as you see,
By Nine Hundred and Ninety and Two: