The secretary of the Gun Club was a remarkable calculator. The solution of the most complicated problems of mathematical science was but sport to him. He laughed at difficulties, whether in the science of magnitudes, that is algebra, or in the science of numbers, that is arithmetic; and it was a treat to see him handle the symbols, the conventional signs which form the algebraic notation, whether letters of the alphabet, representing quantities or magnitudes, or lines coupled or crossed, which indicate the relation between the quantities and the operations to which they are submitted.
Ah! The co-efficients, the exponents, the radicals, the indices, and the other arrangements adopted in that language! How the signs leapt from his pen, or rather from the piece of chalk which wriggled at the end of his metal hook, for he preferred to work on a blackboard. There, on a surface of ten square yards—for nothing less would do for J. T. Maston—he revelled in all the ardour of his algebraical temperament. They were no miserable little figures that he employed in his calculations. No; the figures were fantastic, gigantic, traced with a furious hand. His 2’s and 3’s waltzed like shavings in a whirlwind; his 7’s were like gibbets, and only wanted a corpse to complete them; his 8’s were like spectacles; and his 6’s and 9’s had flourishes interminable!
And the letters with which he built up his formulæ! The a’s and b’s and c’s he used for his quantities given or known; and the x’s, y’s, and z’s he used for the quantities sought or unknown, and especially his z’s, which twisted in zigzags like lightning flashes! And what turns and twiggles there were in his π’s, his λ’s, his ω’s! Even a Euclid or an Archimedes would have been proud of them!
And as to his signs, in pure unblurred chalk, they were simply marvellous. His + showed the addition was unmistakable. His -, though humbler, was quite a work of art. His × was as clear as a St. Andrew’s cross. And as to his =, so rigorously equal were they, as to indicate without a chance of mistake, that J. T. Maston lived in a country where equality was no vain formula. His <, his >, and his ≷ were really grand! And as to his √, the root of a quantity or of a number, it was really a triumph, and when he completed the horizontal bar in this style
√‾‾‾‾‾‾
it seemed as if the indicatory vinculum would shoot clean off the blackboard and menace the world with inclusion within the maniacal equation.
But do not suppose that the mathematical intelligence of J. T. Maston was bounded by the horizon of elementary algebra. No! The differential calculus, the integral calculus, the calculus of variations were no strangers to him, and with unshaking hand he dashed down the famous sign of integration, the shape so terrible in its simplicity, the
f
that speaks of an infinity of elements of the infinitely little.
And like it was his Σ which represents the sum of a finite number of finite elements; like it was his ∝ with which mathematicians indicate the variant; like it were all the mysterious symbols employed in this language so unintelligible to ordinary mortals. In short, this astonishing man was capable of mounting the mathematical ladder to the very topmost rung.