One card puzzle we have often tried, and with which most persons are familiar, is that of the cross. You cut out of card or stiff paper, five pieces similar in shape and size to the following, viz. one piece of fig. 1, one piece of fig. 2, and three pieces of fig. 3.
These five pieces you put together so as to make a cross like Figure 4.
If you cannot solve the problem, look at the following cut, and you will cease to be puzzled.
Now we will try another card puzzle. Cut a piece of card or paper in the shape of a horse-shoe, and mark on it the places for the nails as represented in the subjoined sketch.
The puzzle is with two cuts to divide it into six parts, each part containing one nail.
Of course you cannot do it; we could not do it ourselves, and had to get the white mice to show us the way.
Somehow or another we never can find out anything with half a dozen taper fingers fluttering before our eyes. They bewilder us terribly, getting between the feet of our ideas, so to speak, and tripping us up; as young lambs might serve an awkward shepherd.
Well, the mystery is solved thus: you cut off the upper circular part, containing two of the nails; then by changing the position of the piece, another cut will divide the horse-shoe into six portions, each containing one nail.