Can you count the number of lines in the below picture?

It is a six-letter word.
The first four letters are me.
The second and last letters are the same.
The fourth second and last letter is payment.

Who is it?

You see a boat filled with people, yet there isn’t a single person on board. How is that possible?

Can you replace the X (both small and big x) with the numbers between 1 to 19 such that all the rows of 3 numbers between X (big x) sum to 23?

A boy collects white seashells from the sea and brings them home every night. When he has enough of them, he decides to sell them to a trader.

The trader is ready to buy the shells and he asks the boy about the quantity. At this, the boy starts calculating. He has a giant box that contains 3 mini boxes. Two of them have another mini box inside. If the giant box can hold 50 shells, how many brown shells can he sell to the trader?

You can hear me, but you can't touch or see me.

What am I?

During which month do people sleep the least?

A father's child, a mother's child, yet no one's son.

Who am I?

Birbal was jester, counsellor, and fool to the great Moghul emperor, Akbar.
The villagers loved to talk of Birbal's wisdom and cleverness,
and the emperor loved to try to outsmart him.
One day Akbar (emperor) drew a line across the floor.
"Birbal," he ordered, "you must make this line shorter, but you cannot erase any bit of it."
Everyone present thought the emperor had finally outsmarted Birbal.
It was clearly an impossible task.
Yet within moments the emperor and everyone else present had to agree that Birbal had made the line shorter without erasing any of it.
How could this be?

Can you find out what is missing?

1 3 5
2 4 ?

Hint: It's not six. Think out of the box.