Quotation from: The Cruise of the Snark

Written by: Jack London


But this was my eight o'clock longitude. Since then, and up till
noon, I had made 23.7 miles of westing. What was my noon longitude?
I followed the rule, turning to Traverse Table No. II. Entering the
table, according to rule, and going through every detail, according
to rule, I found the difference of longitude for the four hours to
be 25 miles. I was aghast. I entered the table again, according to
rule; I entered the table half a dozen times, according to rule, and
every time found that my difference of longitude was 25 miles. I
leave it to you, gentle reader. Suppose you had sailed 24 miles and
that you had covered 3.5 miles of latitude, then how could you have
covered 25 miles of longitude? Even if you had sailed due west 24
miles, and not changed your latitude, how could you have changed
your longitude 25 miles? In the name of human reason, how could you
cover one mile more of longitude than the total number of miles you
had sailed?

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