Page:Memory; how to develop, train, and use it - Atkinson - 1919.djvu/149

Rh accounts of the bank, which had been destroyed in the great fire in that city, and his account which was accepted by the bank and the depositors, was found to agree perfectly with the other memoranda in the case, the work performed by him being solely the work of his memory.

Bidder was able to tell instantly the number of farthings in the sum of £868,42s,121d. Buxton mentally calculated the number of cubical eighths of an inch there were in a quadrangular mass 23,145,789 yards long, 2,642,732 yards wide and 54,965 yards in thickness. He also figured out mentally, the dimensions of an irregular estate of about a thousand acres, giving the contents in acres and perches, then reducing them to square inches, and then reducing them to square hair-breadths, estimating 2,304 to the square inch, 48 to each side. The mathematical prodigy, Zerah Colburn, was perhaps the most remarkable of any of these remarkable people. When a mere child, he began to develop the most amazing qualities of mind regarding figures. He was able to instantly make the mental calculation of the exact number of seconds