THE CHRISTMAS-BOXES.
(
Money Puzzles)
Some years ago a man told me he had spent one hundred English silver
coins in Christmas-boxes, giving every person the same amount, and it
cost him exactly L1, 10s. 1d. Can you tell just how many persons
received the present, and how he could have managed the distribution?
That odd penny looks queer, but it is all right.
Answer:
The distribution took place "some years ago," when the fourpenny-piece
was in circulation. Nineteen persons must each have received nineteen
pence. There are five different ways in which this sum may have been
paid in silver coins. We need only use two of these ways. Thus if
fourteen men each received four four-penny-pieces and one
threepenny-piece, and five men each received five threepenny-pieces and
one fourpenny-piece, each man would receive nineteen pence, and there
would be exactly one hundred coins of a total value of L1, 10s. 1d.
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