Page:The Steel Flea.djvu/82

 The Englishmen exchanged glances and said: "This is astounding!"

But the left-handed man replied: "That's the way with us everywhere."

"But," they inquire, "what sort of a book in Russia is that 'Polusonnik'?"

"That," says he, "is a book concerned with this—that if there is anything touching on fortune-telling which King David has not clearly set forth in the Psalter, then people are able to divine the completion in the Polusonnik."

They say: "That's a pity; 't would be better if you knew at least the four ordinary rules of arithmetic,—they would be far more useful to you than the entire Polusonnik. Then you would be able to grasp the fact that in every machine there is a calculation of powers, and although you are very clever with your hands, you have not taken into