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Show Reformed tieoinetry. Almost 100 years ago two men set out from Virginia to visit the Scioto valley, of the beauty and fertility of which they had heard alluring reports.. On the third night they reached Clarksburg, Clarks-burg, where they put up with a man who appeared to be honest, but old fashioned fash-ioned and illiterate. "Can you tell us how far it is to Marietta Ma-rietta and what sort of a road we shall find?" asked one of the travelers. "Yes," answered the host; "that is exactly what I can do, for I was appoint ee uue oi me viewers to lay out the road and have just returned from the performance of that duty. " ' 'That is f ortunata What do yon call the distance?" "Well, the distance on a straight line, which we first ran, was 75 miles, but on our way back we discovered and. marked mark-ed another line which was much nearer." near-er." The two travelers had each spent some years in the study of surveying and were more or less amused at the idea of a line shorter than a straight line between be-tween two given points. However, the next morning they took the route which -their informant had pronounced the shorter, and true enough they found his statement correct, for the crooked road went round the hills, while the straight one went over them, and the distance round was less than the distance over. Youth's Companion. |