We are indebted to Sam Loyd, the famous American problem composer and puzzle king, for the following very practical curiosity, which is so closely akin to a puzzle that it is well worth giving for the benefit of our readers when they are out on holiday. If you are uncertain as to your bearings, lay your watch flat on the palm of your hand so that the hour-hand points in the direction of the sun. The point exactly midway between the hour-hand and the figure 12 will be due south at any time between 6 in the morning and 6 in the afternoon. During any other hours our rule will give the north point, and in the southern hemisphere the rules will be reversed.
In the days of Pope Pio Nono someone extracted from the Papal title “Supremus Pontifex Romanus” an anagram, which cut at the very foundation of the faith. It ran thus: “O non sum super petram fixus”—“O I am not founded on the rock.”
This held its place as a clever topical anagram, until in a moment of happy inspiration a son of the Church discovered that if the first words are recast and rearranged, a splendidly appropriate motto for the then reigning pontiff leaps to sight, “Sum Nono, super petram fixus,” “I am Nono, founded on the rock!”
No. LXVI.—A MYSTIC SQUARE
This is an arrangement of numbers in 9 cells, so that no cell contains the same figure as appear in any other, and the two upper rows, the two side columns, the two long diagonals, and the four short diagonals all add up to 18:—
| 1 + 1 + 1 | 5 + 5 + 5 + 55 | 2 + 22 |
| 3 + 3 | 6 | 4 + 4 + 44 |
| 7 + 7 + 77 | 9 + 9 + 9 + 99 | 8 + 88 |
Though not, strictly speaking, a Magic Square, this is a most ingenious fulfilment of the conditions of the puzzle.
UP-TO-DATE ANAGRAMS
Good up-to-date anagrams are:—Chamberlain, “Rich able man,” and Pierpont Morgan, “Man prone to grip.”