SPORTING AND SCIENCE

Inangahua Times, Volume VII, Issue 1070, 5 April 1882, Page 2

SPORTING AND SCIENCE

♦ Mr Proctor, has recently started in London a weekly publication called. Knowledge, an illustrated magazine of science, plainly worded — exactly described. In the number for December 16th, he commences a series of papers on betting and mathematics, and he thus pleasantly discourses about a New Zealand betting man : — •" A curious instance of the loss of all sense of honor, or even of honesty, which betting begets occurred to me when I was in New Zealand. A bookmaker — 'by profession,' as he said — as genial and good- natured a man as one would care to meet, and with a strong sense of right and justice outside betting, had learned somehow that ten horses can come in — apart from dead heats — 3, 328,000 different way. This curious piece of information seemed to him an admirable way of getting money from the inexperienced. So he began to wager about it endeavoring — though it will be seen he failed — to win money by wagering on a certainty. Unfortunately, he early come across a man as ' cute as himself and a shade ' cuter "( a brigand, brigand et demi)," who worded the question on which the wager turns, thus : "In how many ways can ten horses be placed T Of course, this is a very different thing. Only the first three horses can be placed, and in the sets of three which can be made out of ten horses number only 120 actual sets of three, but each set can be placed in six different ways). My genial, but whatever he thought himself) not quite honest friend, submitted the matter to me. Not noticing at first the technical use of the word ' placed,' I told him there were 3,28,000 different arrangements. He rejoiced as though the money wagered were already in his pocket When this was corrected, and I told him his opponent had certainly won, as the question would be understood by betting men, he was at first depressed, but presently recovering, he said — 'Ah! well, I shall win more out of this little trick now I see through it, than I lose this time. 1 "