Before Mr. Beauchamp Cholmondely Marjoribanks set out on his tour in the Far East, he prided himself on his knowledge of magic squares, a subject that he had made his special hobby; but he soon discovered that he had never really touched more than the fringe of the subject and that the wily Chinee could beat him easily. I present a little problem that one learned mandarin propounded to our traveller, as depicted on the last page.
The Chinaman, after remarking that the construction of the ordinary magic square of twenty-five cells is "too velly muchee easy," asked our countryman so to place the numbers $1$ to $25$ in the square that every column, every row, and each of the two diagonals should add up $65,$ with only prime numbers on the shaded "T." Of course, the prime numbers available are $1, 2, 3, 5,$ $7, 11, 13, 17,$ $19,$ and $23,$ so you are at liberty to select any nine of these that will serve your purpose. Can you construct this curious little magic square?
Solutions: 1
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