ABSTRACT
The title of Muhammad ibn Musa al Khwarismi's book Al jabr w'al muqabila can be read in two different ways. It can mean the Art of Balancing and Completion, as it is often translated. Or it can mean the bringing together of things which are far apart. His book was a major step in the direction pointed out by Brahmagupta of separating and abstracting mathematical operations from the quantitative numbers that they operated upon, that is, paying attention to the pure operations rather than the quantities operated upon. While the Macmillans prepared for their voyage, the firm began negotiating with Henry Sinclair Hall of Clifton School near Bristol for the publication of a school algebra which Hall was preparing in collaboration with Samuel Ratcliffe Knight. In the new year Maurice decided to try to beat the 'notebook' compilers at their own game, and urged Hall to complete the Key to his Euclid Books I to IV for sale in India.
