Northern Wisconsin advertiser. [volume] (Wabeno, Wis.) 1898-1925, 1901-07-04

ucituSA Tic uONSlty uoA Tie SplSuuOT
of the show, nor the exhibition of
passion, made any visible impression
on him, and he occupied himself in
counting the number of words which
Garrick uttered during the perform.
ance. The Gentleman's Magazine for
June, 1854, informed the public that
Jedediah had returned to the place of
his birth without regretting anything
which be had left behind in London,
cheerfully returning TO his customary
work, and quite convinced that a slice
of rusty bacon afforded more delici
Gus repast than anything to be OBJ
tanned in the great city.
Another untaught arithmetical
genius, Zerah Colburn, whose abaor.
NAL development raises an interesting
problem, was the son of an American
peasant. He was brought to London
BY his father in 1912, when eight
years old, when he was examined and
his peculiar powers were tested by
Francis Baily and other skillful math-
ematicians. 1t was found that al.
though he was sc ignorant of the ordi-
nary rules of arithmetic that he could
not perform on paper simple sum in
multiplication or division, yet that he
could mentally multiply any number
less than ten into itself successfully
nine times, aud give the results faster
than the person appointed to record
them could take them down. He
multiplied eight into itself fifteen
times, or, TO use technical terms,
raised it to the sixteenth power, and
the result, consisting of fifteen digits,
was found to be right in every figure.
This was astonishing enough, but he
wa able to do things even more Won
derful. When asked what number,
multiplied by itself, gave 106,929, he
answered before the original number
could be written down, that it was
number, multiplied twice into Itself,
S27. And again, when asked what
ly what was the cuberoot of that ar
ray of figures he replied with equal
facility and promptness that it was
GAS.
The mathematical experts who
were examining the boy found that it
was impossible to find the cube root
of these nine figures in the shortest
and most convenient way, in less than
three or four minutes. But what most
surprised the mathematicians was
that he could almost as readily an.
swer questions for which they had not
been able to provide any systematic
procedure themselves. For instance,
he was asked to name two numbers
which multiplied together, would give
the number 247,4S3 land he immedi.
ately named GAL and 263, which are
said to be the only two numbers
which will do So And when asked
to name number which would divide
36,0S3 exactly, he unhesitatingly re
piled that no number would do so. II
any of our mathematisally minded
readers will address themselves tc
this problem, they will find that i,
will give them at least quarter of an
hours stiff calculation before they
can assure themselves that 36,0S3 is
what is called a prime number, or a
number only Invisible by itself and
unity. solution which this child was
in some mysterious way, able TO see
Immediately the question was pro.
pounded to him.
Colburn, like Buxton, seems to have
had a method of his own, but he con.
stantly declared that he did not
know how the answers came into his
! mind God put these things into
my head" he said on being pressed
for an explanation, land l cannot put
them into yours" Jedediah lived to
the age of sixty-five with no more gen.
eral knowledge or stock of ideas than
a child of ten, and he kept his extra.
ordinary calculating faculty to the
end; but Zerah, as the generSl Gull
ture of his mind improved, found
his special power to fade away
Francis Baily was of opinion that
Zerah Colburn's feats indicated the
existence of certain properties of num-
bers which mathematicians had not
yet discovered. But it is perhaps
equally possible that they indicate
capacities of the human mind which
have hitherto been undreamed Of
London Globe