The Wassail Bowl

One Christmas Eve three Weary Willies came into possession of what was to them a veritable wassail bowl, in the form of a small barrel, containing exactly six quarts of fine ale. One of the men possessed a five-pint jug and another a three-pint jug, and the problem for them was to divide the liquor equally amongst them without waste. Of course, they are not to use any other vessels or measures. If you can show how it was to be done at all, then try to find the way that requires the fewest possible manipulations, every separate pouring from one vessel to another, or down a man's throat, counting as a manipulation.

H. E. Dudeney, Amusements in Mathematics (1917) · No. 362