> -----Original Message-----
> From: David Alan Black [mailto:dblack / candle.superlink.net]
> Sent: Sunday, December 31, 2000 1:49 PM


> I wonder whether this has something to do with the conversion from
> Fixnum to Bignum as the number gets bigger?
> 

I have some supporting evidence for your analysis. I ran the following 3
variations of my prime3,
with the word list you sent me.

with {|s| key *= asc2prime[62]} # asc2prime[62] = 5
unpack      0.902000   0.000000   0.902000 (  0.901000)
prime3      0.791000   0.000000   0.791000 (  0.791000)

with {|s| key *= asc2prime[84]} # asc2prime[84] = 97
unpack      0.912000   0.000000   0.912000 (  0.911000)
prime3      1.382000   0.000000   1.382000 (  1.392000)

with {|s| key *= asc2prime[s]} # straight run
unpack      0.922000   0.000000   0.922000 (  0.922000)
prime3      1.161000   0.000000   1.161000 (  1.162000)

Thanks for the feedback!