WINE AND WATER.
(
Measuring, Weight, and Packing Puzzles.)
Mr. Goodfellow has adopted a capital idea of late. When he gives a
little dinner party and the time arrives to smoke, after the departure
of the ladies, he sometimes finds that the conversation is apt to become
too political, too personal, too slow, or too scandalous. Then he always
manages to introduce to the company some new poser that he has secreted
up his sleeve for the occasion. This invariably results in no end of
interesting discussion and debate, and puts everybody in a good humour.
Here is a little puzzle that he propounded the other night, and it is
extraordinary how the company differed in their answers. He filled a
wine-glass half full of wine, and another glass twice the size one-third
full of wine. Then he filled up each glass with water and emptied the
contents of both into a tumbler. "Now," he said, "what part of the
mixture is wine and what part water?" Can you give the correct answer?
Answer:
The wine in small glass was one-sixth of the total liquid, and the wine
in large glass two-ninths of total. Add these together, and we find that
the wine was seven-eighteenths of total fluid, and therefore the water
eleven-eighteenths.
