Problem: Here is a problem which Sam Loyd figured out during a ride from Bixley to Quixley astride a razor-back mule. Let’s hear his narrative:
I asked Don Pedro, a native guide who walked ahead of me pulling the mule forward by its reins, if my steed had another gait. He said it had but that it was much slower, so I pursued ma journey at uniform speed. To encourage Don Pedro, who was my chief propelling power, I said we would pass through Pixley, so as to get some liquid refreshments; and from that moment he could think of nothing but Pixley. After we had been travelling for forty minutes I asked how far we had gone. Don Pedro replied: “Just half as far as it is to Pixley.” After creeping along for seven miles more I asked: “How far it is to Quixley?” He replied as before: “Just half as far as it is to Pixley.”
We arrived at Quixley in another hour, which induces to me to ask you to determine the distance from Bixley to Quixley.
From Mathematical puzzles of Sam Loyd, Selected and Edited by Martin Gardner, Dover Publications, Inc., New York, 1959
