[271.] If it takes three minutes to boil one egg, how long will it take to boil two?
“PUNCH’S” MONEY VAGARIES.
The early Italians used cattle as a currency instead of coin (thus a bull equals 5s.) and a person would send for change for a thousand pound bullock, when he would receive 200 five pound sheep. If he wanted very small change there would be a few lambs amongst them. The inconvenience of keeping a flock of sheep at one‘s bankers’, or paying in a short-horned heifer to one’s private account led to the introduction of bullion.
As to the unhealthy custom of sweating sovereigns, it may be well to recollect that Charles I., the earliest Sovereign, who was sweated to such an extent that his immediate successor, Charles II., became one of the lightest Sovereigns ever known in England.
Formerly every gold watch weighed so many carats, from which it became usual to call a silver watch a turnip.
The Romans were in the habit of tossing their coins in the presence of their legions, and if a piece of money went higher than the top of their Ensign’s flag it was presumed to be “above the standard.”
“MARCH ON! MARCH ON!”
[272.] An army 25 miles long starts on a journey of 50 miles, just as an orderly at the rear starts to deliver a message to the General in front. The orderly, travelling at a uniform speed, delivers his message and returns to the rear, arriving just as the army finishes the journey. How many miles does the orderly travel?