Transcriber's Note

This book is actually three volumes in one, each complete in itself. The page numbering starts at the beginning for each new volume.

The rest of the Transcriber's Note is at the [end] of the book.

Merry’s
BOOK OF PUZZLES.

EDITED BY ROBERT MERRY.

NEW YORK:

THOMAS O’KANE, PUBLISHER,

130 NASSAU STREET.

PREFACE.

The innumerable readers of Merry’s Museum will here meet with many familiar faces, lighted up by pleasant smiles, and hear the same old jovial laughter that greeted them in the olden time.

Our motto is that of our noble State—“Excelsior!” Our readers will see that we have not buried the talents of our contributors in napkins—but seek to bring them out into the bright day: For Genius—like the lamp of Aladdin—needs constant polishing to bring out its lustre and full effect.

Our object has been to instruct by smiles—not frowns; to cheer the dear hearts of the young girlhood and boyhood; to strew flowers among the necessary thorns of existence. In a word, we try in these pages to make the sad happy—the happy still happier.

Hence, pure fun will be found as beautiful in these pages, as honey amid the flowers of Hybla.

Robert Merry.

Robert Merry to his friends

A kindly greeting sends,

With a general assortment of questions,

Conundrums, Charades,

Puzzles, Riddles of all shades,

And Rebuses, as aids

To intellectual and social digestion.

If the young Merry host

Acquaintance should boast,

Or kindred, or authorship pat,

With some of our jokes,

We confess—(’tis no hoax)—

To amuse other folks,

We have riddled the Museum “Chat.”

Now we beg you will show,

If you happen to know,

Why the Editor, painstaking soul?

Is like the cold storm

Which, in climates bright and warm,

Where gallinippers swarm,

Come shivering down from the pole?

Merry’s BOOK OF PUZZLES.

1.

2.

3. Who prolongs his work to as great a length as possible, and still completes it in time?

4. Why are young ladies like arrows?

5. Why is a philanthropist like an old horse?

6. How can five persons divide five eggs, so that each man shall receive one, and still one remain in the dish?

7. How many soft-boiled eggs could the giant Goliah eat upon an empty stomach?

8. What fishes have their eyes nearest together?

9. Two fathers have each a square of land. One father divides his so as to reserve to himself one-fourth in the form of a square; thus—

The other father divides his so as to reserve to himself one-fourth in the form of a triangle; thus—

They each have four sons, and each divides the remainder among his sons in such a way that each son will share equally with his brother, and in similar shape. How were the two farms divided?

10.

11.

12. What is that which is often brought to table, often cut, but never eaten?

13.

My first is four-sixths of a step that is long,

My second is a person of state;

My whole is a thing that is known to be wrong,

And is a strong symptom of hate.

14. Why are your nose and chin always at variance?

15.

Without my first you can not stand,

My second beauteous fair command;

Together I attend your will,

And am your humble servant still.

16. Why ought a fisherman to be very wealthy?

17. Why is a man in debt like a misty morning?

18. Who was the first that bore arms?

19. There is a word of seven letters; the first two refers to man, the first three refers to woman, the first four signifies a great man, the seven a great woman.

20. I am a word of five letters. Take away my first and I am the name of what adorns the estate of many of the nobility of England. Take away my first and second, and I am the name of a place where all the world was once congregated. Take away my last, and I am the name of a beautiful mineral. Take away my two last, and I am the name of a fashionable place of resort. I am small in stature, but capable of doing a great deal of mischief, as I once did in London in the year 1666.

21. Spell eye-water four letters.

22. Why is swearing like an old coat?

23. Why is a thump like a hat?

24. Why is an inn like a burial-ground?

25.

26.

27. If a fender cost six dollars, what will a ton of coal come to?

28. What word is that to which if you add a syllable, it will make it shorter?

29.

My first is a very uncomfortable state,

In cold weather it mostly abounds.

My second’s an instrument formed of hard steel,

That will cause the stout foe to stagger and reel,

And when used, is a symptom of hate.

My whole is an author of greatest renown,

Whose fame to the last day of time will go down.

30. What is the longest and yet the shortest thing in the world; the swiftest and yet the slowest; the most divisible and the most extended; the least valued and the most regretted; without which nothing can be done; which devours every thing, however small, and yet gives life and spirits to every object, however great?

31.

My first is found in every house,

From wintry winds it guards.

My second is the highest found—

In every pack of cards.

My whole, a Scottish chief, is praised

By ballad, bard, and story,

Who for his country gave his life,

And, dying, fell with glory.

32. Why are handsome women like bread?

33. Why is an avaricious man like one with a short memory?

34. What river in Bavaria answers the question, Who is there?

35. Why is a man with wooden legs like one who has an even bargain?

36.

37.

38. Why is a parish bell like a good story?

39. What belongs to yourself, yet is used by others more than yourself?

40.

In camps about the centre I appear;

In smiling meadows seen throughout the year;

The silent angler views me in the streams,

And all must trace me in their morning dreams,

First in the mob conspicuous I stand,

Proud of the lead, and ever in command.

41. The head of a whale is six feet long; his tail is as long as his head and half his body, and his body is half of his whole length. How long is the whale?

42. A hundred stones are placed, in a straight line, a yard distant from each other. How many yards must a person walk, who undertakes to pick them up, and place them in a basket stationed one yard from the first stone?

43.

My first is a part of the day,

My last a conductor of light,

My whole to take measure of time,

Is useful by day and by night.

44. I am a word of three syllables, each of which is a word; my first is an article in common use; my second, an animal of uncommon intelligence; my third, though not an animal, is used in carrying burdens. My whole is a useful art.

45.

There was a man who was not born,

His father was not born before him,

He, did not live, he did not die,

And his epitaph is not o’er him.

46. Why is a nail, fast in the wall, like an old man?

47. Why does a miller wear a white hat?

48.

49.

50.

My first is a letter commanding to wed,

Or to lift your sole till it reaches your head;

Nothing worth as a whole, it is plain to all men

That divided in halves, it is equal to ten;

My second, though nothing, compared to the other,

Is worth more as a partner than its double-faced brother;

It moans and it sighs, and when joined to my first,

Pronounces the doom of the sinner accursed.

My third, you will find his whole value depends

On the worth and position of neighbors and friends,

And, when both the other two following fair,

Changes doom to desire, and a curse to a prayer.

My fourth, though it formeth no part of a hundred,

Shows where it can justly and evenly be sundered;

’Tis found in the elements everywhere present,

’Tis found in all seasons, unpleasant or pleasant,

’Tis the chief of all lands, and yet can not wait

On continent, hemisphere, empire, or state.

Though ne’er in Great Britain suspected to lower,

’Tis the heart of each quarter of that mighty power;

It always belonged to the animal race,

In the mineral kingdom they gave it a place,

And, being impartial, they could not deny,

The vegetable order its virtue to try;

And yet, since creation, it never was known

In beast, bird, or fish, root, branch, stem, or stone.

My whole you’ll find growing in pasture and barns,

Or grown in coats, carpets, warm blankets, and yarns,

In England, in Saxony, France, and old Wales,

And in sundry more places it always prevails.

Of quadrupedal origin—still it is known

In bipedal families oft to be shown;

But the strangest of all its strange forms, and conditions

Is seen in the covering of sage politicians.

51.

52.

53. What is that which is invisible, but never out of sight?

54. When is a boat like a knife?

55. What part of London is in France?

56. How many black beans will make five white ones?

57. Why is a dandy like a haunch of venison?

58. What kin is that child to its father who is not its father’s own son?

59. Why is a rose-bud like a promissory note?

60. What biblical name is there which expresses a father calling his son by name, and his son replying?

61. Why is an orange not like a church bell?

62. Why is the largest city in Ireland likely to be the largest city in the world?

63.

Three-fourths of a cross, and a circle complete,

An upright where two semicircles meet,

A rectangle triangle standing on feet,

Two semicircles, and a circle complete.

64. What smells most in a drug shop?

65. Why should doctors attend to window-sashes?

67. What is that which every one can divide, but no one can see where it has been divided?

68. Spell hard water with three letters.

69. What letters of the alphabet come too late for supper?

70.

71.

72.

Pronounced as one letter, and written with three,

Two letters there are, and two only in me;

I’m double, I’m single, I’m black, blue, and gray,

I am read from both ends, and the same either way,

I am restless and wandering, steady and fixed,

And you know not one hour what I may be the next.

I melt, and I kindle—beseech, and defy,

I am watery and moist, I am fiery and dry.

I am scornful and scowling, compassionate, meek;

I am light, I am dark, I am strong, I am weak.

I’m piercing and clean, I am heavy and dull;

Expressive and languid, contracted and full.

I’m a globe and a mirror, a window, a door,

An index, an organ, and fifty things more.

I belong to all animals under the sun,

And to those who were long understood to have none.

My language is plain, though it can not be heard,

And I speak without even pronouncing a word.

Some call me a diamond—some say I am jet;

Others talk of my water, or how I am set.

I’m a borough in England, in Scotland a stream,

And an isle of the sea in the Irishman’s dream.

The earth without me would no loveliness wear,

And sun, moon, and stars at my wish disappear.

Yet so frail is my tenure, so brittle my joy,

That a speck gives me pain, and a drop can destroy.

73. What vessel is that which is always asking leave to move?

74. Translate the following into Latin—

42, 8 rocks, e e e e e e e e e e, 46. 2. 14. 8. 0.

75. How is it that you can work with an awl, but not with a forceps; while I can work with a forceps, and not with an awl?

76.

77.

Add, was the word the master gave to Dick,

Dick scratched his head, and looking rather thick,

Replied, “Hereafter it would make it stick.”

“Dick,” cried the master, “rudeness is a sin;

Behold the stocks, I’ll surely put you in.”

“That,” answered Dick, “won’t alter it a feather,

Hereafter it would make it hold together.”

“Dick,” said the man, “if you insult me so,

Your shoulders and my rod I’ll put in Co.”

“ ’Tis all the same,” said Dick, “my worthy master,

Hereafter it would make it stick the faster.”

78. Why is France like a skeleton?

79. Why is a woodman like a stage actor?

80. Why is the hour of noon on the dial-plate like a pair of spectacles?

81. Why is the best baker most in want of bread?

82.

Whether old Homer tippled wine or beer,

Julep or cider, history is not clear;

But plain it is—the bard, though wont to roam,

But for one liquid, never had left home.

83. Why is a coward like a mouse-trap?

84. Why is green grass like a mouse?

85. What two reasons why whispering in company is not proper?

86.

My first is found on the ocean wave,

In the spring, the pit, and the mine;

My second below earth’s surface you have,

Where seldom the sun can shine.

My whole your dinner-table must grace,

And seldom fails to obtain a place.

87. Why is a gooseberry pie like counterfeit money?

88.

89. Why does a fisherman blow his horn?

90. Why is there no danger of starving in a desert?

91.

Take half of the needle

By which sailors steer

Their ship through the water,

Be it cloudy or clear;

Do not really break it—