[for the Richmond Dispatch.]
the Numerical Combinations.
Richmond, June 2, 1863.
In your issue of this date you say, ‘"we make the following extract from the Paris Nord:" "An ingenious arithmetician has made the following calculations, in virtue of which he proposes to call the year 1863 the year of nines,"’ and concludes with the announcement that "this year is essentially one of revolutions." [Italics my own] Why did this "ingenious arithmetician" wait for the year 1863?
For example, if he had gone back to the year 972, he would have found that, subjected to similar tests, (which any of your readers can do,) it would give like results.
The truth is that any number, such as "1863," "972," &c., or 2754, (should it ever come.) the sum of whose digits, taken two and two from the right, is divisible by nine, will develop nearly all (if not all) of the peculiarities ascribed so ominously to 1863.
As I have often seen similar articles going the rounds of the press, by giving this an insertion in your paper you will promote the interests of true science. A Subscriber.
