Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1869-11-10
Mathematical Geniuses.
From the Manufactnrer ana Bnilder

Mathematical Geniuses. 4
From the Manufacturer ana Builder. i
On the Sd of July, 1889, some Of the en-
inent members of the Academy of Science,
at Paris, including NM. Arago, Lacroix,
Lebru, and Sturm, met to examine q re-
markabie boy whose powers of mental cal
culation were deemed quite inexplicable.-
The boy, named Vito Managiamele, Sill
clan, was the son of 81 shepherd, and Was
about II years old. The examiners asked
him several questions which they knew,
under ordinary circumstances, would be
tedious of solution-such as the cube root
of 3, 796, 49, and the tenth root of 282,-
ATS, 249. The first of these he answered in
half minute, the second in three minutes
One question was of the following compli-
Gated character: What number complies
with the following propositions, that if its
cube be added to five times its square, and
then 10 times the number, and the num-
Der AZ be subtracted from the result, the
number is equal to or zero?
M. Arago repeated this question a Sec
ond time, but while he was finishing the
last word, the boy replied, "The number
five" ..
Such cases greatly puzzled ordinary
mathematicians Buxton, Colbourn and
Bidder have at different times exhib-
tied this unaccountable power of account
ing. Jedediah Buxton, although his grand
father was clergyman and his father
SchO0lmaster, was so neglected in his edu :.
cation that he could not even write: his
mental faculties were slow, with the one
wonderful exception OF his power of men,
tai arithmetic. After hearing sermon he
rememberedand cared for nothinG. concern
ing it except the number OF words, which
he had counted during their delivery. IF
period of time, or size of an object were
mentioned in his hearing, he almost uncon-
sciously began to count how many hairs
breadths there were in it. He walked from
Chesterfield to London on purpose to have
the qualification of seeing George H., and
while in the metropolis he was taken much
notice OF by members of the Royal Society.
On one occasion he went to see Gar1ick in
Richard III, but instead of attending to
the performance III the usual way, he found
occupation In counting the number of
words uttered by each performer.
After stridIng over q field in two or three
directions, he would tell the number of
square inches it contained. He could num-
Der all the pints Of beer he had drank at
all the houses he had ever visited during
half a century. He once set himself to
reckon how much tarthing would amount
to if doubled 140 times; the result came
out in such a stupendous number of
pounds sterling as required twenty-nine
places OF figures to representa-
In 1850, this problem was put to him: To
find out how many cnbical eighth of an in
ch there are in quadrangular mass which
measured 231, 145, 789 yards long, 5, GAP, 732
yards wide, and 54 965 yards thick, He
q, Ill L,
one occasion he made himself what he
called "drunk with reckoning the follow
ing: '1n 200 000,0 900, 600 cubic miles how
many grains of eight different kinds of
corn and how many airs an inch long?"
He ascertalned by actual counting how
many of. each kind of grain and how many
hairs an inch long would go to an inch
cube, and then set himself about his enor-
nous self-imposed task. He couldsuspend
any OF his problems ior any length of time
and resume at the point he left off and
could converse on other subjects while thus
employed. he could never give anv ac
count of the way in which he worked out
his problems; nor did his singular but ex-
ceptional faculty bring any other advantage
than that of being invited to the house of
the gentry as kind of show.
Zerah Colburn, who excited much inter
est in London in 1912, was native of Yer
mont. At years old he suddenly showed
extraordinary powers of mental calculation
By processes which seemed to be almost
unconscious to himself, and were wholly so
to others, he. answered arithmetical ques-
tons of considerable difficulty.
i When eight years old, he was taken 20
London, where he astonished many learned
auditors and spectators by giving correct
solutions to such problems as the follow
ing: Raise to the sixteenth power; give
the square root to 106 929; give the cubic
root Of 26S 336, 1876; how many seconds are
there in 4S years. The answers were al
ways given in few minutes-so sometimes
in q few seconds. He was ignorant of the
ordinary rules of arithmetic, and did not
know how Or why particular modes of pro-
cess came into his mind On one occasion
the Duke of Gloucester asked him to null
tiply 81, 734 by 543; sometimes in the boys
manner induced the Duke to ask how he
did it, from which it appeared that the boy
arrived at the result by multiplying IS, 2O2
by l61, an equivalent process; but why he
made this change in the factors neither he
nor any one else could tell.
Zerah Colburn was unlike other bows
also in this, that he had more toes and
fingers; a peculiarity observable also in his
father and some of bis brothers.
! An exceptional instance is presented in
the case of Mr.. Bidder, Of this faculty cul-
tivated to highly useful purpose. George
Parker Bidder, when six years old, used to
amuse himself by counting up to 100, then
to 1000, then to LOCO, 600; by degrees he
accustomed himself to contemplate the re-
lations of high numbers, and used to build
up peas, marbles, and shot into squares
and cubes, and other regular figures. He
invented processes of his own, distinct
from those given in books on arithmetic,
and could solve all the usual questions
mentally more rapidly than other boys with
the aid of pen and paper. When he be-
came eminent as civil engineer, he was
won't to embarrass the parliamentary coun-
Gil on contested railway bills, by committing
their statements of figures almost before
| the words were out their mouths. In 1866
he gave the Institution of Civil Engineers
an interesting account of this singular arith-
metical faeulty-so far, at least, as to show
! that memory has less to do with it than is
generally supposed; the processes are actu-
ally worked ont seriatim, out with rapid
1ty almost incOnceivable.