Then, again, we have the case of the man who gave a boy sixpence and promised to repeat the gift as soon as the youngster had made it into ninepence.  Five minutes later the boy returned.  “I have made it into ninepence,” he said, at the same time handing his benefactor threepence.  “How do you make that out?” he was asked.  “I bought threepennyworth of apples.”  “But that does not make it into ninepence!” “I should rather think it did,” was the boy’s reply.  “The apple woman has threepence, hasn’t she?  Very well, I have threepennyworth of apples, and I have just given you the other threepence.  What’s that but ninepence?”

I cite these cases just to show that the small boy really stands in need of a little instruction in the art of buying apples.  So I will give a simple poser dealing with this branch of commerce.

An old woman had apples of three sizes for sale—­one a penny, two a penny, and three a penny.  Of course two of the second size and three of the third size were respectively equal to one apple of the largest size.  Now, a gentleman who had an equal number of boys and girls gave his children sevenpence to be spent amongst them all on these apples.  The puzzle is to give each child an equal distribution of apples.  How was the sevenpence spent, and how many children were there?

37.—­Buying chestnuts.

Though the following little puzzle deals with the purchase of chestnuts, it is not itself of the “chestnut” type.  It is quite new.  At first sight it has certainly the appearance of being of the “nonsense puzzle” character, but it is all right when properly considered.

A man went to a shop to buy chestnuts.  He said he wanted a pennyworth, and was given five chestnuts.  “It is not enough; I ought to have a sixth,” he remarked!  “But if I give you one chestnut more.” the shopman replied, “you will have five too many.”  Now, strange to say, they were both right.  How many chestnuts should the buyer receive for half a crown?

38.—­The bicycle thief.

Here is a little tangle that is perpetually cropping up in various guises.  A cyclist bought a bicycle for L15 and gave in payment a cheque for L25.  The seller went to a neighbouring shopkeeper and got him to change the cheque for him, and the cyclist, having received his L10 change, mounted the machine and disappeared.  The cheque proved to be valueless, and the salesman was requested by his neighbour to refund the amount he had received.  To do this, he was compelled to borrow the L25 from a friend, as the cyclist forgot to leave his address, and could not be found.  Now, as the bicycle cost the salesman L11, how much money did he lose altogether?

39.—­The Costermonger’s puzzle.

“How much did yer pay for them oranges, Bill?”

“I ain’t a-goin’ to tell yer, Jim.  But I beat the old cove down fourpence a hundred.”

“What good did that do yer?”