ALGEBRA FOR URCHINS
We wish we weren’t so rusty in our mathematics. One of our favourite projects has always been to write an algebra book for the use of the Urchin when he gets a little older. This algebra would be in the form of a story in which the problems would be introduced naturally into the movement of the tale, and each one would be (if we could persuade him to do it) illustrated by Fontaine Fox.
The problems, moreover, would deal with facts and topics familiar to the Urchin. One problem, for instance, would run something as follows:
Riding in Dame Quickly along the North Hempstead turnpike, the Urchin notices that a man is walking on the sidewalk but at just such a pace that a telephone pole prevents him from being recognized. Attempting to see who the pedestrian is, and foiled by the fact that the simultaneous motions of Dame Quickly and the man on the sidewalk keep the pole constantly in the line of sight, the Urchin becomes interested in the problem. He notes that the speedometer indicates 22 miles an hour. He persuades his father to stop the car and measure the width of the road and the sidewalk. Dame Quickly stops opposite the pole and the measurements are taken. It is 24 feet from the Dame to the pole. The line along which the man was walking, down the middle of the sidewalk, was three feet from the pole. How fast was the man walking?[B]
[B] The answer, if you care to work it out, seems to be 2¾ miles per hour.
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A MODEST SCAFFOLD FOR PHILOSOPHERS
We have been meditating on the dissimilar conduct of cats and dogs, since we added a kitten (named Pepys) to our household roster.
The dog, plainly, is a boob, for he tries so hard to please and ingratiate the Masters of the Event, his deities. Whereas the cat, while calmly recognizing the paramountcy of the gods, goes ahead in every way within his power to circumvent and outwit their control. The dog, poor honest simpleton, shows his genuine and unselfish affection for his deities; the cat never makes up to them unless he wants something from them, or feels that a little friendly caressing would be agreeable. The cat is 100 per cent. pro-feline. The dog, we reckon, is at least 30 per cent. pro-human. You open the back door. If the cat wants to go abroad, he will streak through without an instant’s hesitation; but the dog will wait, politely, until he is sure whether you wish him to go out. Question, then, for philosophic ruminators—Do not the domestic gods secretly respect the cat a little more because they know he is inwardly hostile and contemptuous and a perfect ego? A whole rationale of heaven and hell may be quizzed out of this matter.
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