Solution

(related to Problem: Pheasant-shooting)

The arithmetic of this puzzle is very easy indeed. There were clearly $24$ pheasants at the start. Of these $16$ were shot dead, $1$ was wounded in the wing, and $7$ got away. The reader may have concluded that the answer is, therefore, that "seven remained." But as they flew away it is clearly absurd to say that they "remained." Had they done so they would certainly have been killed. Must we then conclude that the $17$ that were shot remained, because the others flew away? No; because the question was not "how many remained?" but "how many still remained?" Now the poor bird that was wounded in the wing, though unable to fly, was very active in its painful struggles to run away. The answer is, therefore, that the $16$ birds that were shot dead "still remained," or "remained still."


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References

Project Gutenberg

  1. Dudeney, H. E.: "Amusements in Mathematics", The Authors' Club, 1917

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