Place twelve plates, as shown, on a round table, with a penny or orange in every plate.  Start from any plate you like and, always going in one direction round the table, take up one penny, pass it over two other pennies, and place it in the next plate.  Go on again; take up another penny and, having passed it over two pennies, place it in a plate; and so continue your journey.  Six coins only are to be removed, and when these have been placed there should be two coins in each of six plates and six plates empty.  An important point of the puzzle is to go round the table as few times as possible.  It does not matter whether the two coins passed over are in one or two plates, nor how many empty plates you pass a coin over.  But you must always go in one direction round the table and end at the point from which you set out.  Your hand, that is to say, goes steadily forward in one direction, without ever moving backwards.

[Illustration]

232.—­CATCHING THE MICE.

[Illustration]

“Play fair!” said the mice.  “You know the rules of the game.”

“Yes, I know the rules,” said the cat.  “I’ve got to go round and round the circle, in the direction that you are looking, and eat every thirteenth mouse, but I must keep the white mouse for a tit-bit at the finish.  Thirteen is an unlucky number, but I will do my best to oblige you.”

“Hurry up, then!” shouted the mice.

“Give a fellow time to think,” said the cat.  “I don’t know which of you to start at.  I must figure it out.”

While the cat was working out the puzzle he fell asleep, and, the spell being thus broken, the mice returned home in safety.  At which mouse should the cat have started the count in order that the white mouse should be the last eaten?

When the reader has solved that little puzzle, here is a second one for him.  What is the smallest number that the cat can count round and round the circle, if he must start at the white mouse (calling that “one” in the count) and still eat the white mouse last of all?

And as a third puzzle try to discover what is the smallest number that the cat can count round and round if she must start at the white mouse (calling that “one”) and make the white mouse the third eaten.

233.—­THE ECCENTRIC CHEESEMONGER.

[Illustration]

The cheesemonger depicted in the illustration is an inveterate puzzle lover.  One of his favourite puzzles is the piling of cheeses in his warehouse, an amusement that he finds good exercise for the body as well as for the mind.  He places sixteen cheeses on the floor in a straight row and then makes them into four piles, with four cheeses in every pile, by always passing a cheese over four others.  If you use sixteen counters and number them in order from 1 to 16, then you may place 1 on 6, 11 on 1, 7 on 4, and so on, until there are four in every pile.  It will be seen that it does not matter whether the