"When I was a young man," says a well-known civil engineer, "I was surveying the route of a proposed railway. An old farmer, with whom I stopped for a time, admitted one day when he saw me figuring in the field, that mathematics always seemed a wonderful thing to him. Being young and enthusiastic, I began to enlarge its wnders, telling him how we could measure the distances to different plants, and even weigh them; how we could foretell accurately the coming of a comet or an eclipse year in advance of its actual occurrence; determine the velocity of the fiercest projectile; ascertain the height of mountains without scaling them; and many other things which I meant should astonish him. You can imagine how he set me back when he replied to this brilliant array of facts by saying" "Yes, yes, them things does seem kinder cur'us, but what allus bothered me was to understan' why you have ter carry one fur ev'hy ten. But, if you don't the durned thing won't come out right." ____________________________________________________________________