The Life of the Fly 



Those terrible logarithms, when I happened 

 to open a table of them, made my head swim, 

 with their columns of figures; actual fright, 

 not unmixed with respect, overwhelmed me on 

 the very threshold of that arithmetical cave. 

 Of algebra I had no knowledge whatever. I 

 had heard the name; and the syllables repre- 

 sented to my poor brain the whole whirling 

 legion of the abstruse. 



Besides, I felt no inclination to decipher the 

 alarming hieroglyphics. They made one of 

 those indigestible dishes which we confidently 

 extol without touching them. I greatly pre- 

 ferred a fine line of Virgil, whom I was now 

 beginning to understand; and I should have 

 been surprised indeed had any one told me 

 that, for long years to come, I should be an 

 enthusiastic student of the formidable science. 

 Good fortune procured me my first lesson in 

 algebra, a lesson given and not received, of 

 course. 



A young man of about my own age came to 

 me and asked me to teach him algebra. He 

 was preparing for his examination as a civil 

 engineer; and he came to me because, ingenu- 

 ous youth that he was, he took me for a well 

 of learning. The guileless applicant was very 

 far out in his reckoning. 



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