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HANKY PANKY
A Book of Conjuring Tricks.

BY THE AUTHOR OF “THE SECRET OUT.”

EDITED BY W. H. CREMER, JUN.

Very Easy Tricks and very Difficult Tricks, Diversions with Dice, Conjuring with Cards, Jugglery with and without Assistants, Gamblers’ Deceptions Exposed, &c.

WITH 250 PRACTICAL ILLUSTRATIONS.

LONDON.

JOHN CAMDEN HOTTEN, 74 & 75, PICCADILLY.

PRELIMINARY.

The great and deserved success of “The Secret Out; or, One Thousand Tricks in Drawing-Room or White Magic,” edited by W. H. Cremer, Jun., of Regentstreet, has suggested an entirely new Edition of the same Author’s world-famous “Hanky Panky: Very Easy Tricks and Very Difficult Tricks, Diversions with Dice, Conjuring with Cards, Jugglery with and without Assistants, Gamblers’ Deceptions Exposed.” The Publisher has again secured the services of Mr. Cremer—the gentleman whose wonderful display of the Toys of the World attracted so much notice in the recent International Exhibition—and an eminently entertaining, but, at the same time, thoroughly practical, book is now before the reader.

The present work, therefore, may be considered in the light of a supplement or addition to the Author’s well-known “Magician’s Own Book.”

The Publisher will, he trusts, be pardoned for here directing attention to another book of this class, “The Art of Amusing,” a Collection of graceful Arts, Games, Tricks, Puzzles, and Charades, considered by The Athenæum as being “the best and most entertaining work of the kind with which we are acquainted.”

A companion volume, under the title of “The Merry Circle: A Book of New Games and Intellectual Amusements,” with nearly Two Hundred Illustrations, has just been issued by Mrs. Clara Bellew.

Piccadilly.

CONTENTS.

HANKY PANKY.

I.—SIMPLE TRICKS.

Fig. 1.—Mr. Hanky Panky.

FLY AWAY, JACK!

Take two pieces of white paper, about the size of a sixpence, and moisten them well on both sides. Put one on the first joint of each forefinger, just at the root of the nail, and place these fingers on the edge of the table, straight out, while the rest are closed up under the hands.

Then say:

“Two little dickey birds sat on the sill,

One named Jack—t’other named Jill!

Fly away, Jack!”

Close the right forefinger, and with the middle finger remove the paper and retain it there, while the forefinger is quickly replaced in the first position to show the veritable flight of Jack. Then say,

“Fly away, Jill!”

And repeat with the left forefinger. Then say:

“Come back, Jack!”

And take the piece of paper from the right middle finger upon the forefinger as at first, and replace it on the table.

“Come back, Jill.”

The same with the other hand. Then conclude:

“The two little birds are sitting there still!”

Fig. 2.—The Perplexed Spectator.

DANCE, BOATMAN, DANCE!

(From the German.)

Herr Professor Bobine von Rhumkorff amuses little children by holding up his hand, with the thumb and finger thus posed:—

The thumb is made to spring up and down to a lively air and to the words “Dance, de Boatman, dance!” Then the thumb stops while the fingers are set leaping, to the words:

“Boatman’s piccaninnies dance, ’cause fader dance all alone by heself!”

Then leave the forefinger capering and sing:

“Eldest son of de Boatman, dance!”

Then all the fingers but the first leap about to the words:

“De whole family dance, ’cause him eldest son he dance all alone!”

So on with the other fingers, the little one being the baby, and the middle one Mrs. Boatman.

Some put on a black glove and make four chalk spots on the fingertip to represent eyes, nose, and mouth.

BUY A BIRD.

Fold each finger over the next, the forefinger undermost upon the thumb, and say:

“Who will buy my birds?”

On one saying he or she will make the purchase, you quickly open your hand and cry:

“They all have flown away!”

LITTLE WATCHMAN.

(For Children):

Hold up the left hand, open.

“This is the thumb!”

Touch the three principal fingers.

“This, this, this a plum!”

Put down forefinger.

“He eats this one!”

Put down middle finger.

“He takes his brother!”

Put down third finger.

“And grabs the other!”

Hold up little finger and wag it sadly.

“And little Watchman’s left alone!”

TO ADD FIVE TO SIX AND YET MAKE BUT NINE.

Having drawn six-straight lines, by adding five more, as in figure 3, only Nine is seen.

Fig. 3.

TO CARRY HOT COALS IN THE HAND.

Cover the palm with sand, ashes, or any non-conductor, and calmly put the live coals on it. Which ancient “sell” will be found in the first German mediæval play, entitled “The Burning Iron,” by Hans Sachs, “performed for the first time in Nuremberg in the year 1531.” A peasant woman suspects her husband of some crime, and she arranges with her mother that he must pass under the ordeal of the “burning iron”—that is, a piece of iron made red-hot must be picked up with his bare hand, and carried round the room. If his hand remain unscathed, he is innocent; if he be burnt, then he is guilty. The husband promises to undergo the ordeal; but before doing so, manages to place, unseen by his wife, a flat piece of wood upon the hollow of his hand, and with this deception he passes through the ordeal successfully. Mr. Hanky Panky believes this gentleman to have been his “long-lost brother.”

II.—TRICKS WITH COINS.

Fig. 4.

THE COIN TRICK, FROM AN HIBERNIAN POINT OF VIEW.

Our brother magician, Signor Blitz, tells us the following tale, which is useful as a warning:—

While conversing in a grocery store with the proprietor, an Irishman came in to make some purchases. The trader was extremely anxious for me to astonish him by performing some feat, which I complied with. Before concluding I requested the loan of a quarter of a dollar from the Hibernian, which he at first refused, and even when the storekeeper pledged himself responsible for it, he reluctantly gave it to me. I desired him to close his hand, and hold the money secure, and I would change it into a five-dollar gold piece.

“Faith!” he muttered, as he grasped the quarter, “it is just as I would like to have ye after doing, but I don’t believe you can coin money so aisy. Let me see if you can do it!” he exclaimed.

“It is already done,” I said. “Open your hand and see.”

The man cautiously relaxed his fingers, and, at the first glimpse of the gold, jumped and hurrahed wildly, as an Irishman only can; but when his curiosity was entirely satisfied as to its reality, he carefully deposited it in his pocket, with many thanks, declaring me to be the most wonderful man in the world.

I here desired him to replace the money in my hand, and I would again convert it to the original quarter.

“Sure, afther Mike being rich, would ye make him poor again?”

“But you know it is only a trick,” I answered.

“A thrick? Divil a one! Sure, man, it is a rale piece of goold,”—thrusting his hand into his pocket to protect it from any sudden or unperceived effort on my part to extract it.

“You know it is but a joke,” I repeated. “Return me the gold, and I will astonish you by transforming it into silver once more.”

“By St. Patrick, you had better not do that.”

“Yes, you must give me back the gold.”

“I would not part with it if Priest McDermott bid me.”

Finding my efforts to procure the money a failure, I resorted to artifice by exciting his fears of my power to do good or evil. I assured him that unless he returned the piece of gold, he would be a miserable man all his life; for it was Satan’s coin, who was always in search of his own, and would take him away with the gold.

“Och, shure, yer honour, the Holy Father will save Mike, and if ye want any more silver quarters to change into goold, come to Michael MacCarty. He is the man for you.” And with these consoling words he walked rapidly away, leaving me minus my half-eagle, while the storekeeper laughed immoderately at the magician being outwitted by a son of the Emerald Isle.

All Louisville became cognizant of “the joke,” as they called it, and hugely enjoyed it at my expense; but I could not see it.

THE NEW TRICK OF MELTING MONEY.

In our former works have been given revelations by means of which the disappearance of coins can be accomplished. The present act of prestidigitation is quite new, and never before discovered by magicians to their audiences.

Performance.—A drinking-glass having been passed around amongst the audience, that the absence of mechanism may be generally manifest, Mr. Hanky Panky borrows a half-crown and a handkerchief, and pours some pure water (which may be tasted) into the glass, held by one of the company. Though this essence of the New River has no corrosive properties perceptible to the tongue, Mr. Panky confidently asseverates that it is bewitched into the power of annihilating silver.

He then places the coin in the centre of the handkerchief, and puts it over the mouth of the glass, where the volunteer holds it by its edge through the silk, so that the pendent corners hide the coin and glass.

Fig. 5.

The person is notified that Mr. Panky will count three, at the last of which numbers he is to let the piece fall into the glass, as the sound will betoken.

One, two, three, chink.

The coin is distinctly heard to fall, so that there can linger no doubt whatever of its presence in the glass.

Nevertheless, Mr. Panky, with his usual assurance, announces that—without his approaching—he has the power to attract the coin to him, and, in truth, he suddenly holds it up in plain sight. The person takes away the handkerchief, and is even more astounded than the most impressionable amongst the spectators, to see nothing but the water in the glass—of which the magician relieves him by swallowing it.

Fig. 6.

Explanation.—The bottom of the glass is of the same dimension as a half-crown. A disc of sheet-glass is cut of the same size exactly. This is substituted for the coin, and is felt within the handkerchief. When it falls, the sound is so like that of metal that all are filled with error. When the cover is removed, the water prevents the glass piece being seen at the bottom even by the operator himself.

The coin wand can be used in connection with this trick, for which see a description following.

TO REDUCE A SHILLING TO A SIXPENCE.

Take two pieces of fancy paper with one side in colours, patterns, or marbling, about seven inches square, put the coloured sides together, and cut them at the same time in the shape of Fig. 7.

Fig. 7.

The success of the trick depends on their being exactly alike in size. Place a sixpence in the centre of one of the pieces at the place marked A, then fold it carefully over at the crease on the side marked B, and also again at the side marked C. When you have done this, turn down the end marked D upon the centre A and again fold over on E. You have thus formed a small parcel the shape of Fig. 8, with a sixpence in the middle. You must then put a shilling in the centre of the other piece of paper, and fold it up exactly the same size and shape as the first piece. When you have done this, paste the two parcels together at the back of the ends marked F in Fig. 8, and the sides will be so even that both will appear as one. You can then open the side of the paper containing the smaller coin, and show it to your audience, at the same time informing them that you are going to open a mint on a small plan, and coin a shilling from a sixpence. Dexterously turn over the side containing the shilling, and upon opening the paper, to the general astonishment, instead of a sixpence they will behold a shilling.

Fig. 8.

THE UNCRUSHABLE FLOWER.

At the time of the amusing warfare between the perennial Charles Mathews (“the Younger!” what happy augury in the title!) and the Great Wizard of the North, the former, who was assisted by Mr. Cremer in many of his diversions, created much surprise by the exhibition of a flower, as fragile as a rose, which could not be lastingly injured.

He would pluck this flower from his button-hole, and, in sight of the audience, who wondered “What he Would Do with It?” would dash it to the stage, stand on it, shut it up in a book, and martyrise it in various other modes.

In spite of this, he had but to take it up and tenderly wave it in the air, and gently breathe a tender sigh on it, and kiss it for its mother, when it would resume its pristine fulness of bloom—not a pistil broken, not a petal injured.

Explanation.—The flower is artificial, and carefully made of choice Berlin wool, which material will bear much ill-usage without injury to its elastic filaments.

Fig. 9.—The Victim of this Mystification.

THE FLYING COTTON REEL.

Wind off a ball of cotton cord (piping) upon a tin tube six inches long, and of the diameter of a half-crown or florin, or rather a trifle wider.

Borrow a coin which you have had marked, and change it by means of the magic salver.

Fig. 10.

Pass the marked coin off the stage to your confederate, who puts it down the tube into the ball of cotton, and leaves it there in the centre; on withdrawing the tube the hole can be completely covered up by pressing the cord around it.

Thus prepared, the ball is brought to you in a glass cup, having a hole in the rim through which you pass one end of the cotton. Fasten this to a winding-off wheel (broad-tired), and as your assistant winds off the cord, you pretend to throw the coin into the ball. Immediately, the marked piece falls into the bottom of the vessel, in which it is taken to the owner.

Fig. 11.—The Owner of the Coin.

THE OBEDIENT SIXPENCE.

Fig. 12.

Lay a sixpence between two shillings on a table-cloth, and cover them with a tumbler, and offer to remove the middle one without touching the others or the glass. To do so scratch the cloth with the finger-nail, and the lesser coin will move out towards you, the others being held by the tumbler.

THE INVISIBLE TRANSIT.

(Le Vase aux Grains.)

Mr. Panky borrows a half-crown, which he politely requests some one in the party to mark, and having had a fruit examined, such as a shaddock, melon, marrow, &c., he puts it in a box.

Then holding a large cup or vase full of seed or corn, as he proves by taking a pinch out of it, and casting the grain amongst the audience, he sets it on a table.

At a word, the coin vanishes to enter the fruit. Next, the fruit is commanded to cross and bury itself in the vase filled with seed, without displacing its contents, which is assuredly remarkable. Indeed, on plunging the hand into the vessel, the fruit is produced, and in its centre is found the marked coin. The seed has disappeared.

Fig. 13.

Explanation.—The vase is of metal with a secret bottom or with a trap in the stand, by which the contents, in this case seed, will run down out of it and down through the hollow leg of the table on which it is placed. The box in which the fruit is put is that called the Box of Disappearances.

Fig. 14.—The Box of Disappearances.

It is a case with a double drawer, into the inner of which an object is placed and both shut up; only the outer or false drawer is pulled out, and the disappearance is performed.

As for the fruit, the coin is placed in it beforehand, or introduced by means of the coin knife.

Performance.—The marked coin is passed to your agent, who pushes it into a fruit by a cut made in it while you are letting a duplicate fruit be examined. The prepared one is buried in seed in the vase which is brought in upon the stage. The second fruit is put into the disappearing box and made away with. A touch to the spring releasing the trap of the vase makes all the seed run off, and the fruit containing the coin is triumphantly opened.

THE DIE AND DOVE TRICK.

You have the double die described in The Secret Out, composed of a hollow tin case, painted like a die, and a die in solid wood.

You hold up a borrowed hat and say that you will visibly pass that die (both being as one) into the hat. Upon the crown you leave the cover and the solid cube you put inside the hat—or you say—“Now you see this die, and now you do not see it!” and pass it down on the secret shelf behind your table. Or, again, you exchange it for a hollow die holding a live bird, and opening with a sliding side.

Fig. 15.

You place this die on a plate, and, in covering it, and turning it over, open the slide, so as to have the now open face down on the plate.

You have a small cage containing another bird, on which you set a handkerchief, in the centre of which is sewn a square plate of metal of the size of a cage, at top. Your table trap takes in the cage, and you hold the handkerchief by the square plate at the proper distance from the table, so that the way the folds fall from its edge will resemble their draping the cage.

Now, say—“I shall make that die pass into the hat and this bird take its place!”

You shake the handkerchief and show that the cage has departed—a most effective illusion.

You pick up the mock die in the case, and, of course, the liberated bird flies away.

You lift the hat and push the solid die so as to make it fall.

Then you put into the hat a set of cups, Chinese lanterns, dolls, or other objects made for that purpose, to fit inside each other, and so take up little space—and express your astonishment that the owner should fill his hat with anything but brains.

THE COIN WAND.

Let your ebony wand be hollowed out at one end and bored clear through for a movable rod to work in it. In the space at the end have a half-crown cut into three pieces, thus—

Fig. 16.

with a simple mechanism worked by a spiral spring at the end of the rod, by which these three pieces, overlapping one another when drawn into the wand, unfold upon the same plane like a perfect coin when the spring is liberated.

You can by its means appear to draw a coin by the mere tap of your wand from any place whatever—the wall, a table, a person’s ear, nose, or pocket—and as often as desirable, since you pretend to remove the half-crown each time that it is shown, and actually show a real one in your hands.

THE GARLAND OF ROSES.

You have borrowed three or four coins from the company, changed them for the ones used in your juggling, and passed them to your assistant.

Then you have as many cards drawn out of a prepared pack (see “How to force a Card,” page 43, The Secret Out.)

Your attendant brings in a wreath of flowers, which is suspended from the ceiling by two silken cords.

You lay the coin on a little glass table, and only let one piece slide off at a time.

The coin wand can be used in connection with this stand, and rings and other objects can be substituted for the coin top, set on an iron frame.

On crying out, “I now take these sovereigns and throw them into the centre of that garland!” a chink of coin is heard, and on the instant the money is seen, held by invisible means, in the wreath.

Next you stuff the cards into a pistol, and, on firing at the garland, they appear within it.

Explanation.—This magnificent trick is simply but requires electrical appliances.

The action of a battery makes the duplicate coin on the table fall into a recess in its edge, while the real ones and the chosen cards, by the same power, are thrust out from the wreath by secret wires with pincer heads.

THE BEWITCHED PICTURE FRAME.

(Le Cadre à l’Assiette.)

Did you ever see such a lovely bit of Sèvres as this plate? Observe the delicacy of the tints and the dainty outlines of the floral decoration.

If I were in the musing mood, I might form quite a lecture on the scenes which this piece of porcelain conjures up: the rise of Dubarry; her downfall—Oh! the plate has slipped through my fingers, and I take it up to find it broken.

Let me see: what is smashed china fit for? I forget—but I wonder, now, if it would not make excellent wadding for a pistol! Let us try. Here is the firearm, which I will load—on the powder I put the fragments of the plate—Time severs many a beauty from her mate—Plenty of room yet. I must add these rings, with which my obliging auditors have furnished me, and this ribbon. A very formidable charge!

Boy! a target!

Call that a target?

Why, it is a black board in a frame. Never mind; it will do, unless I make a butt of you! [Exit the Attendant.]

Click! bang!

When the smoke clears away, there is seen in the middle of the framed black space the ribbon, rings, watches, or whatever was used for cartridges, and the plate restored except for one small fragment. It seems that I left a piece out of the barrel. Oh! Is it not here under this obliging young lady’s fan? I thought so; thank you.

I will throw it into its place.

Fig. 17.

One, two, three, and an off! I mean on!

You will observe that Richard is himself again—as rich and hard as ever.

Fig. 18.

Explanation.—For the appearance of the entire objects, the enchanted target described on page 194, The Secret Out, is used, with the following additional contrivance for the china plate restoration, namely:—The duplicate plate is covered, as are the other articles, with a black blind, made to disappear into the frame by an electric shock, or the action of a piston-rod, while a scrap of black cloth to be pulled away by a wire leading secretly to your assistant, gives it the semblance of a broken one.

THE GUERIDON AND GOLDEN RAIN.

By the orders of Mr. Hanky Panky, his attendant brings out before the audience a small round table (guéridon), a more guileless means of mystification being impossible, with its thin, flat top, slender leg, and general simplicity of outline.

Half a dozen florins or half-crowns being borrowed from the audience, they are marked by one of them and placed in a pile upon the table, whence they disappear one by one.

This is, perhaps, not so very astounding, for no fellah ever yet clearly understood how money goes. But, to really make the deception a startling one, Mr. Panky puts a hat, a scarf, or a handkerchief on the table, and commands the money to return from its refuge of nothingness. The half-crowns—a great deal more eager to be restored to their owners than whole crowns now-a-days are—are heard to fall upon the table, without a trace of their passage through the hat or handkerchief.

On removing the cover, indeed, the attendant has but to go to the table to fill a salver with the money, and distribute among the rightful proprietors.

Explanation.—The table-leg is hollow and a rod works in it, on the head of which the bottom coin is placed; when the rod is lowered, which is done by simple mechanism (for which see “Grand Magic,” in The Secret Out), the coins gradually vanish. The reappearance is managed by the reverse action, and the rod may be fitted with a joint a few inches from the top, so that the pieces will fall off on one side, the more noisily the better.

When the coins are to drop audibly into a metal or glass vase set on the table, the rod may terminate in a tube to contain the money.

Fig. 19.

Fig. 20.

III.—WITH ROPE AND STRING.

THE SKIPPING-ROPE TRICK.

(Hamilton’s l’Entente Cordiale.)

Provide a skipping-rope, and, having had your wrists firmly bound together, let the person who thus tied your hands pass one end of the rope between your arms and join its ends, by which act the cord and your united arms will form two endless links or rings, to separate which, and instantaneously, will seem materially impossible.

However, it can be done.

Pull at the cord as if to make sure it is held fast, and, while so doing, catch between the wrists the part of the rope that happens to be there, and work the rope up so as to get the looped end through the handkerchief in your hands. Through this loop pass your left hand. Turn slightly to the right and jerk the rope a little, when it will fall to the floor, while your hands remain attached.

In the couple of seconds which this feat requires, move your hands up and down mysteriously, to baffle the attention of the bystanders on what you are doing.

TO RESTORE A CUT STRING.

(Decremp’s Garter Trick.)

Having a piece of string, with the ends tied, run one hand through each end, twist it once round (Fig. 21), and put both ends into the left hand. Draw the right hand quickly along the double strings to where the strings cross, and conceal the join with the right thumb and forefinger (Fig. 22).

Figs. 21 and 22.

Hold the strings in the same way with the left hand, and let some one cut the string between them. You show that the string has been divided into two pieces, and assert that you can join them by mastication. Put all four ends into your mouth, and remove with your tongue the little cut off loop.

When you take the string out of your mouth no one will notice the absence of so small a portion of its length, and will fancy that you really have joined them. Take an opportunity of getting rid of the fragment you retained in your mouth.

TO CUT THE BRAID OF A BUTTONHOLE WITHOUT LEAVING A MARK.

Fig. 23.

Tie the ends of two feet of string together. Put it through a button-hole of your coat (or the ring of a key in the door); stick one thumb in each end, and each little finger in the upper string of the other hand. Draw out the hands, and present the figure traced in the illustration.

Let go with the right thumb and left little finger, and thrust your hands quickly apart, when you will seem to have pulled the string through the braid of the button-hole, and yet there will be no trace of the passage. It is best, when you let go with the right thumb, to change the string from the right little finger to it.

THE DEMON CORD.

Fig. 24.

Saw a tube in half lengthwise, and at one end mount a grooved wheel, over which passes the bight of a cord, with its two ends passing out of the hollow cylinder at the sides of the other end. Tint one half of the cord a different colour from the other, close it in; varnish well to hide the crack, and your trick is complete.

The cord seems to have the chameleon property of changing its hue.

TO TIE A KNOT ON ONE WRIST WITHOUT THE TOUCH OF THE OTHER HAND.

Fig. 25.

Take a yard of whipcord, or stout fishing-line, one end in each hand, and with the right throw a loop over upon the left hand. Instantly draw back the right hand to tighten the loop, and let go both ends the moment the knot has been made.

Fig. 26.

TO CUT YOUR NOSE OFF WITH A STRING.

Tie the ends of twelve or fifteen inches of string together, and make a loop, as shown in the illustration.

Fig. 27.

Place the loop in the teeth at A. Put the right forefinger in loop B, holding the other bight (or bend), C, on the left forefinger, as in the second illustration.

With the right forefinger remove the loop B, by raising it over the string D, and carrying it under that string. Put the top of the forefinger (the loop B being on it) on the tip of the nose.

Fig. 28.

THE MARVELLOUS RELEASE.

(Le Captif Emancipé de M. Cleverman.)

A ponderous ladder, composed of three uprights and crossbeams, is drawn in upon the stage, and inspected, as well as a new rope, by one of the company, and pronounced solid. The Magician’s assistant is then bound to the centre post, and all the knots are sealed by one of the spectators. A light basket-work shade, covered with canvas, is put on over all, and in a few seconds the man is found tied as before, but without his coat. On being concealed and discovered again he is found completely freed, and the rope on the stand without a seal being broken.

Explanation.—The centre post is apparently quite firmly bolted into the cross pieces, but in reality the screw heads have no pin attached except one, which is withdrawn by the tied man, who has his hands bound behind him just where he wishes to use them. On being unpinned, the beam drops down into a socket in the stand, and the rope can be pulled through the open space. The sealing of the knots keeps the ropes in their place.

A chair can be constructed in the same manner, and, if the deception be practised in a dark cabinet, one of the Davenport Brothers’ feats can be imitated.

THE MAGIC UNTYING.

Give one end of a yard of strong, stiff, smooth twine to a person to hold, while you retain the other in your right hand. Put your left hand under the twine, half way between the ends, and make a single tie (or, in sailor phrase, a half hitch) over the string between your left hand and the end A in the illustration.

Fig. 29.

Fig. 30.

Fig. 31.

Draw the tie close but not tight over the left hand, B being the tie. Open out the left hand so that, when closed, the loop will be loose on the hand. Pass the end in the right hand over the left palm on the inside of the string already there, and make another single tie over the string at the same place as where you formed the first one, closing your left hand, which loosens the strings around its fingers. After the tie, pass the twine under the back of the left hand, between the strings C and D (in the second illustration) Fig. 30.

The dotted line E is the string A. Take that string up on the left hand fingers as in the third illustration.

By practice this can be done unseen by the lookers on. Draw the end tight till it reaches B. Pass the end A under C and D strings, which cross the palm, drop the whole string off the left hand and pull gently and steadily the end A with the right hand, and the string pulls out straight.

ROBERT HOUDIN’S FAMOUS RABBIT TRICK.

Preparation.—Have a small white, long-eared rabbit hidden in a secret pocket inside the right breast of your coat.

Performance.—On requiring a rabbit for a trick, you select a simple-looking member of the company. On his rising, you stand behind him so as to cover your body with his. Take his right wrist in your right hand as if to keep him steady, by which act you open your coat out naturally to the right. Now flourish your left hand with the arm extended, and bring it round to the level of the back of the party’s neck. Then, at the same time that you forcibly thrust your three last fingers well down within the simple gentleman’s coat collar, you seize the rabbit’s ear or ears between your forefinger and thumb. Now lift up the rabbit, and the simple gentleman will be too much confused by the shock to perceive how the deception was managed. The audience will be equally astonished.

THE MAGIC PICTURE FRAME AND VANISHING PLAYING CARDS.

The magician Bosco, of Milan, numbered among his acquaintances the negro prima donna whose advent as “the Black Malibran” caused quite an operatic warfare in our fathers’ time, from a certain opposition being waged against a Desdemona of Othello’s colour presuming to darken the stage.

One afternoon previous to Signor Bosco’s performance at the Rooms at the back of the Princess’s Theatre, which veteran playgoers will remember, he took tea with the lady.

It was his habit, a pleasant one, of experimenting with his really remarkable inventions upon his friends before unveiling them to the public.

On this occasion he produced at the tea-table a pretty little picture frame. It was simply a border of wood around a square of quite clear glass, with coloured paper pasted over the back to keep out the dust.

Taking up a pack of cards, he had one drawn by the lady—let us suppose the ten of diamonds. This he made to vanish in the air.

Then he again had the picture frame observed, that it might be beyond doubt that nothing but the clear glass in the front, and the coloured opaque back, were visible. And over the frame, held in the lady’s hand, he lightly threw a handkerchief.

He uttered a magic phrase or two, took the frame, still in the handkerchief, waved it in the air, and made a pass or two over it. Then removing the handkerchief he held up the frame to the lady, who, to her astonishment, perceived a card in its centre—the card she had drawn.

Again covering the frame with the handkerchief, Bosco once more bewitched it. On taking away the handkerchief this time, the picture frame was found to have resumed its original condition; in other words, the card had vanished, and there was nothing visible but the border, the clear glass, and the opaque back.

Explanation.—The frame is hollow at top and bottom, so that these two places are receptacles to contain a quantity of sand. This sand is dyed of the same colour as the paper used to cover the back of the frame. Two pieces of glass are placed in the frame, a little apart.

SIDE-VIEW OF PICTURE FRAME.
A, the plain glass. B, card corresponding to that which the spectator has been forced to draw. C, the front side of the second glass. D, the other side, over which is pasted coloured paper.

To prepare for performance, fill the receptacle at the top part of the frame with the sand dyed the same colour as the paper at the back, and let it run down till it fills the space between the two panes of glass, and consequently, conceals the card, and is itself unnoticeable, from looking exactly like the paper.

After the handkerchief has covered the frame, and you take it into your own hands, reverse it unseen, so that all the sand shall run down into the receptacle.

On showing it now, the card will appear.

By turning the frame again so that the sand shall run out, and once more hide the card, it becomes invisible, as at first. The trick can be repeated at pleasure.

THE MAGIC FLOWER, APPEARING AND BLOOMING AT COMMAND.

(The Invention of M. Robert Houdin, and as Improved by Mr. Cremer.)

Mr. Hanky Panky, attired in a faultless evening dress, has presented himself to the audience with the air of being quite perfect in his appearance, when he suddenly becomes confused. By his nervous glances, and their direction, it is perceived that he has omitted an indispensable article of costume, and that is, the flower in his button-hole.

However, quickly recovering from his surprise and trouble, he smilingly observes that this misfortune, irreparable without a certain delay to ordinary members of society, is easily rectified by a conjuror.

To make good this assertion, he takes up his wand, and waving it gracefully three times, the company is startled to see a beautiful rose appear instantaneously in his button-hole.

Explanation.—This charming little deception is as simple as effective. A child can perform it, and at the cost only of a few pence.

You must have twelve or fifteen inches of common elastic cord, fine but strong, covered with thread of the same colour as your coat. To one end firmly fasten an artificial flower, or it may be a real one if you strengthen its stalk by the insertion of florists’ wire. The place of fastening is close to, and just under, the flower.

Punch out a small hole in your coat, on the point corresponding to that button-hole in which a flower is usually worn, and just under the button-hole itself.

In this hole insert a metal “eye,” such as is put in boots for the laces to run through, and fasten it there. It is for the cord to run smoothly through. This eye is not visible, even to yourself.

On the other end of the elastic make a small loop.

When ready for the performance, take your elastic cord, to which is attached the flower, and pass the loop end through the button-hole from the outside. Then pass it through the eye in the same direction, and bring it down along inside the coat to the button on your trousers, at the left side, or you may have a button sewn on your vest about the same place. There fasten the end of the cord by the loop.

The elasticity of the cord now draws the flower up to the button-hole.

Pull the flower back, just a little behind the left armpit, and let the left arm hang loosely by the side. As long as the upper left arm is kept close to the side, the flower must remain secure, and concealed at the back of the shoulder.

But, on opening out the arm, the flower must be drawn by the elastic cord up to the button-hole, through which it cannot pass, from its size.

Therefore, in entering the room where the audience await you, you have nothing to observe but to keep your face to the company. No one can perceive the cord, even at a little distance.

You take up your wand with your left hand, still keeping the left upper arm by your side; move your left hand and wand across the body to the right, then take the wand with your right hand, while your left hand remains across the body, with the hand on a level with the button-hole. Wave the wand to the left, and take it with the left hand again. Now wave the wand to the left, and on extending the left arm fully, you of course open it out, and the flower—under cover of the arm—is made to appear suddenly in the button-hole.

These three movements should be gracefully done, and with the happy medium between hurry and slowness.

IV.—WITH HANDKERCHIEFS.

THE MELTING EGG AND THE BEWITCHED HANDKERCHIEF.

A glass is shown, and can be examined by the company. Into it is put an egg, and the whole is covered with a handkerchief. To prove that the egg is really within the vessel, it may be heard striking its sides.

Mr. Hanky Panky stands at a distance and rubs a small coloured handkerchief up into a ball in his hands, when it is suddenly seen to become an egg.

Returning to the holder of the glass vase, the handkerchief is taken away, and, instead of the egg, a coloured handkerchief shown. The handkerchief can be examined.

Explanation.—Run a fine black thread through a perforated egg, and fasten the other end of the thread to the middle of an ordinary handkerchief. (If you are skilful of hand, you can have a bent pin at the end of the thread and perform with a borrowed white handkerchief.)

You only pretend to put the egg within the glass vessel, and really place a small coloured handkerchief therein, while the egg remains attached to the large handkerchief.

You have an egg made of enamelled tin in your hand, which you conceal with a duplicate coloured handkerchief, as you state your intention of executing the double change of egg into handkerchief, and vice versâ.

As you speak, you dexterously stuff the little handkerchief into the egg, and in holding up the latter hide the aperture with your thumb. When you quickly lift the white handkerchief you carry away the egg, and discover the coloured one.

With practice, this is a most effective hanky-pankian feat.

TO UNDO A KNOTTED HANDKERCHIEF BY A SHAKE.

Mr. Panky takes up a soft silk handkerchief, and holding the ends in his hands throws the right hand end over the left, and pulls it through as if tying a knot. Again throwing the same end over the left, he passes the latter to one of the company to pull it.

Fig. 32.

His left thumb holds the handkerchief just behind the knot, while he is pulling the right hand end against the person. He facetiously begs the pull to be hard, as the handkerchief is a borrowed one.

In the same way he seems to tie knots, really tying the right hand end round the silk, but this is not remarked, because he makes a great to do of drawing the knots hard, and—since the right hand decreases in length by thus enwrapping the rest—works up the slack to shorten the left end proportionably to the other.

The company is allowed to test the security of the knots.

On regaining the handkerchief, Mr. Hanky Panky covers the knots with the loose flap in the centre, and has one end held again.

The knot can be felt through the silk, but still, on seizing the loose end and the assistant letting go, Mr. Panky shakes the handkerchief out as one snaps a whip, and proceeds to find a rabbit or bottle of wine in the folds.

THE HANDKERCHIEF AND EGG TRICK.

This is a modification of the above.

An egg is passed round for free examination. A handkerchief is held up in the performer’s hands by any two of its corners, and flourished to and fro to prove its innocency. It is then spread out on the table, the egg laid in its centre, and the handkerchief taken by its four ends, so that the audience cannot doubt that the “hen-fruit” is really in the middle.

Fig. 33.

The Magician undertakes to fling the egg by this impromptu sling farther than David did the stone that slew the giant, and, what is more, make it alight in any place previously searched and found empty.

Then, taking the handkerchief by one corner, it is shaken about, and the egg, mysteriously vanished, is found in the designated spot.

Explanation.—The egg is a small one, hard-boiled. There are two handkerchiefs alike sewn together at the edge all round. The one considered as the outside has a slit in the middle, through which the egg glides as into a bag, when the handkerchief is lifted with it in the middle. The egg is let slip into one corner, which is that held by the performer, while the handkerchief is shaken in the air, and thus proven to be empty. A second egg is presently deposited in the place where one was to be found.

V.—WITH RINGS.

Fig. 34.

THE PENETRATIVE RING.

Fasten one end of a needleful of silk, of the colour of a handkerchief, to the middle of the handkerchief, and to its hanging end tie a brass ring. Always keep the ring on your own side, so that no one can see it while you shake and rumple the handkerchief. Offer to send a ring through a cup and saucer and the table they are on.

Take the borrowed ring in your left hand, and keep it there; pretend to pass it to the right hand, and ask one of the party to step forward and hold the (mock) ring in the handkerchief. Now that the cup and saucer are empty, place the cup in the saucer at the centre of the table, and ask the person to hold the ring in the handkerchief over the cup. The party will hear the ring fall into the cup, yet at your command it passes into a hat, which you hold under the table. In so doing, you put the real ring into the hat. Cry out some cabalistic words, and negligently take the handkerchief. The party may inspect the cup and saucer, but there the sorcery does not lie. The hat has but to be held upside down for the ring to fall out on the table.

Fig. 35.

Variation.—By using a stocking instead of the handkerchief, and letting the mock ring in the toe be tied up by a string a little farther up around the foot, the feat may be likewise executed.

Variation.—Borrow a silk handkerchief from a gentleman, and a plain gold ring from a lady. Request some one to hold two of the corners of the handkerchief, and another to hold the other two, keeping them at full stretch. You next exhibit the ring to the company, and announce to them that you will make it pass through the handkerchief. You have substituted for the ring one made by bending a piece of wire into a circle of the same size, with one or both of the ends finely pointed. Placing your hand under the handkerchief with this duplicate, you press it against the centre of the handkerchief, and desire a third person to take hold of the ring through the handkerchief, and to close his finger and thumb through the middle of the ring, which proves that the ring has not been placed within a fold, as may have been hinted when you performed a similar trick. The holders of the corners of the handkerchief let go, while the holder of the ring retains his hold. Another person now grasps the handkerchief as tight as he pleases, three or four inches down, so tightly that the ring cannot possibly pass, and you request him to permit you to take the ring in your fingers. Cover your hands with a hat to prevent the company from seeing your operations, and pull the mock ring open, draw it through the handkerchief, and, putting the handkerchief through the real ring, which you have ready in your hand, you remove the hat and the piece of brass together. Rub out the hole marks with the false ring in a purse or stocking. The trick becomes still more easy, since it readily can be passed through the meshes without a trace of its passage.

THE RING AND GLOVE PILLAR.

(La Colonne au Gant.)

Mr. Panky introduces to the company his Magic Sportsman, of which there is an extended description in The Secret Out, “The Marvellous Musket Shot.” The automaton salutes the audience, and makes ready to fire his gun.

Several rings are borrowed and placed in the gun, with a lady’s glove.

Fig. 36.

For a target there is brought in a stand with an ornamental pillar, on the summit of which is a golden ball. At the signal, the miniature marksman fires, the globular casket splits open, and the glove appears on the top of the pillar, as if containing a hidden hand, and with the rings on the fingers.

Explanation.—When the rings and glove are borrowed, others are instantly substituted for them, which are put into the gun. The real ones are taken out of the room and arranged, the rings on the glove inside the ball on the pillar. This pillar is hollow, and is in connection with a gutta percha tube leading down within the table into the confederate’s room. At the proper signal, the piston-rods work, and the sportsman discharges the gun, and a strong current of air forces the ball to open and inflates the glove. For the table, see The Secret Out.

VI.—SIMPLE TRICKS WITH KNIVES.

THE OBEDIENT KNIFE.

In a former work (The Secret Out) the secret spring literally to make a knife leap out of a cup at the conjuror’s call, was revealed. We give here several other modes of compassing the same end, that the performer may have several strings to his bow.

1. “You have objected,” says Panki-pan-ki, the Fakir of Hanki, “that I have executed this trick by hidden mechanism. Very well. At present I lay these three knives on the edge of the mouth of the cup, and yet at the instant named, that one which is chosen shall leap off in obedience,” and it does so.

It is answered, truly, that a magnet under the table is made to attract the knife, which is delicately poised on the rim, thanks to an unseen confederate.

2. “As you please,” proceeds the magician, taking the table up and setting it down in the centre of the room, to make it manifest that there was no wire of complicity attached. I now repeat the experiment with the same result. This being done, only the readers of our works—being the most intelligent body of perusers existent—could have seen that in lifting the table a thread of communication was snapped asunder, and that this second obedience of the knife was owing to the magnet again, set in motion by a wire acted on by a treadle.

3. Mr. Panky hastens then to show how ludicrous is the supposition that a magnet has anything to do with the feat, by doing the same on a chair. Few or none remark that the chair being shaky, a wedge of wood had to be put under the cup to steady it. A large watch movement, with a bit of magnetized iron at the end of the second-hand, which coming round under the knife in a minute, produced the desired effect.

4. Mr. Panky shrugs his shoulders in deprecation of such absurd solutions of the problem, and employs a glass table, mounted on glass legs. But the apparently unprepared transparent board is made of two sheets of glass, set a little apart so that the air, blown in between by one of the legs being hollow, shall go out by a minute hole in the upper plate, just under the cup, which is also perforated at the bottom. The magician in walking about, treads on one plank of the flooring, where a bellows is concealed. The wind goes up into the cup, and as the selected knife is delicately poised on the edge while the others rest on little interior cleats, it falls off at the first puff.

Observation.—The knife must be marked so that it can be placed exactly on its balance without delay. Also, the rim of the cup should be flattened a little so as to be the twenty-fourth of an inch broad.

5. With borrowed knives.—As these cannot be prepared, there must be a drop or two of mouth glue or other sticky substance, at a couple of places on the cup rim, on which the knives not to be moved are laid.

6. With pretendedly borrowed knives.—Let the audience furnish the knives, but to a great number, amongst which you mix three of your own, prepared for the performance. On taking up these, each owner of the knives will imagine that his remains on the table and his neighbours’ are being used. Even if he suspected a substitution, that would not account for the trick.

Ingenious Variation.—One knife is laid on the cup with its handle outside to maintain the balance; a long knitting-needle, fastened to the knife-handle with a lump of sealing wax, while a leaden bullet at the other end and knife point serves as counterpoise. The glass table is used, and the Magician withdraws to a distance. All of a sudden though, the knife leaps off from the cup.

Explanation.—The column of air is again employed, for which the cup is set a little way from the hole in the glass plate, and the knife-handle bearing the sealing wax is adjusted over it. The air is heated this time, and on melting the wax the released needle is dragged into the cup by the bullet, and the knife falls.

7. Instead of the glass table, have a sheet iron case in the shape of a book, and painted and gilt to resemble one. This is put on top of two or more real books, on which the cup is placed, to be the better seen by the audience. One end of the mock book contains a lamp, which heats the iron above it, and the rays of caloric act on the wax as before.

8. With a Silver Cup.—The knife is poised, as before, on the rim of a silver cup, and leaps out at command. Mr. Panky had stuck the point in a lump of tallow, and a lamp in the base of the cup had no sooner melted it, than the loss of its weight made the knife-handle bear itself down.

9. Mechanically.—The knife is again laid on the cup, to show that there is no machinery attached to it; a candle is placed each side of the cup, fully illuminating it. Nevertheless the same result follows.

Fig. 37.

Fig. 38.

Explanation.—One of the candlesticks is hollow, and contains in the upper part, A, some fine sand, which escapes by the hole, B, to run down into the receiver, C. When the latter is full up to D, it runs out by that hole, and falls on the blade of the knife to destroy its equilibrium. As the time of the sand reaching the level of the outlet is regulated by the dimensions of the receptacle, C, its bottom, E, is made movable, and consequently by fixing it at certain points the moment of action can be timed to one, two, or three minutes.

10. The Loaded Knife.—The handle is hollow, and divided into three compartments.

In the section A, is quicksilver, running by a hole, B, into the division, C. So far the knife remains balanced, but when the mercury rises as far as D, it overflows into the part G, when the end being overweighted, the knife must fall.

Fig. 39.

VII.—FORTUNE TELLING TRICKS.

CATCHES AND QUIBBLES.

For a wager, two men ate nuts: the one ate ninety-nine, the other a hundred and won [one], how many did the winner eat more than the loser?—One.

A specimen of that noble animal, the horse, having been paraded before a company enthusiastic upon its faultlessness, modestly but firmly insist upon it, that—without pretending to any great veterinary knowledge—you can see with a quarter of an eye that the gorgeous steed has “the lifts.” The name of this mysterious complaint being somewhat analogous to that of the “heaves,” a torrent of indignation will doubtlessly burst upon you. On being forced to give an explanation, you can, with the fearlessness of truth, explain that if the creature did not have “the lifts,” could it move its feet off the ground.

How to Push a Lady’s Head through a Wedding Ring.—Run your finger through the ring and touch the lady’s head with the tip.

How many Bank of England notes will weigh down a sovereign? Only seven will more than equal the coin in weight.

How to Make a Lady Stick out Her Little Finger.—The best way of securing this effect is to put on the finger a diamond ring. The mere desire to display the diamond to the best advantage is sure to make the lady stick out her little finger in the most charming manner possible. When the effect begins to fail, substitute another ring of greater brilliancy.

Addendum.—A ring at the door-bell has been known to make a lady stick her head out of the window.—Hanky Panky.

One of the company having related a story which lauds his moral excellence, observe that, spite of his pretentions, you know what will hang him! At the end of his indignation—answer, a rope!

Squaring Accounts.—A day or two since an inveterate joker met his friend, Hanky Panky, Esq., in the street, whom he knows to be a great dog fancier. With a twinkle in his eye and an inquiring look in his countenance he anxiously asked him if he had seen the new breed of imported dogs, the “Sooner.” Professor Panky replied that he had not, and wished to know the peculiarity of the breed.

“They’d sooner stay in the house than go out of doors,” was the reply, as the joker cautiously moved away, shaking his sides and winking.

The prestidigitateur determined to be even, and the next time he met the joker he seriously remarked:

“You’ve been to Smith de Brown’s, haven’t you?”

“No, why?”

“I thought you knew he had got back his tray of diamonds.”

“No, is that so? How did he get it?”

“He took it with the four ‘spot.’”

The playful youth suddenly remembered a very pressing engagement and hurried away, remarking, “I—I—I’ll see you again, Doctor Hanky, I—I—I don’t quite understand.”

A lady occupying a room, letter B, at an hotel, wrote on the slate as follows: “Wake letter B at seven; and if letter B says ‘let her be,’ don’t let her be, nor let letter B be, because if you let letter B be letter B will be unable to let her house to Mr. B., who is to call at half-past ten.” The porter—a much better bootblack than orthographist—after studying the above all night, did not know whether to wake letter B or let her be.

A young man asked a young lady how old she was, and replied “6 times 7 and 7 times 3 added to my age will exceed 6 times 9 and 4, as double my age exceeds 20.” The young man thought she looked much older.

What is the difference between twice twenty-eight and twice eight and twenty?—Twenty; because twice twenty-eight are fifty-six, and twice eight and twenty are thirty-six.

One of 10 loves what 1028.

ADDRESS ON A LETTER.

W O O D

J O H N

H A N T S.

Answer.—John Underwood, Andover, Hants.

ALGEBRAIC SQUARING OF THE CIRCLE.

C I R C L E

I C A R U S

R A R E S T

C R E A T E

L U S T R E

E S T E E M

A BUNCH OF ANAGRAMS.

A good anagram was once made from the translation in the Vulgate of Pontius Pilate’s last question to our Saviour, “What is truth”—“Quid est veritas?” The anagram answers, “Est vir qui adest”—“It is the man who is before you.” This example complies with the conditions of a perfect anagram. It employs all the letters—does not depend on pronunciation—and makes the anagramatised sentence an answer to the direct form.

Wilkie Collins.—We coil in skill.

Guiseppe Garibaldi.—Gape Pig! as I re-build.

Eugénie Imperatrice.—Mere Peace! I intrigue.

THE GRAMMATICAL WORD.

There is a word of 14 letters of which the 3rd and 14th form an article; 6, 10, 5, and 1 a noun; 12, a pronoun; 6, 10, and 2, a verb; 4, 13, and 11, an adverb; 8, 9, 7, and 6, an adjective; 14, 13, 9, a conjunction; 3, 11, a preposition; and the 13th an interjection: thus the word contains in itself the whole 8 parts of speech, and its meaning is in accordance with its anagrammatic changes. The word is

T R A N S M I G R A T I O N

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

3, 14 = an; 6, 10, 5, 1 = mast; 12=I; 6, 10, 2 = mar; 4, 13, 11 = not; 8, 9, 7, 6 = grim; 14, 13, 9 = nor; 3, 11 = at; 13 = O.

HANKY PANKY TO HIS NIECES, WITH A SET OF CHESSMEN.

The box now presented to you, my dear Nieces,

Start not! contains Men, though in thirty-two pieces.

But may each of you meet with one perfect and whole,

For a partner through life, with a heart and a soul;

May you each in life’s Game e’er successfully move,

And all conquests achieved prove the conquests of love;

May you ever be able—on banks—to give check,

And may Bishops and Knights bow down at your beck.

May Castles surrender whene’er you attack ’em,

And staunch prove your Men, with your good Queen to back ’em;

May your fortunes permit you to dwell in the Squares,

And enjoy life’s delights without tasting its cares;

May you each find a Mate, life’s journey to sweeten,

And if mated oft,—may you never be beaten!

COMIC FORTUNE TELLING.

Zadkiel: I foresee that you have had a misfortune with one of your legs. It will never happen again.

THE ALPHABETICAL FORTUNE TELLER.

The Moslems have recourse, to determine them when they are in doubt as to any action, to a table called Zairgeh, divided into a hundred squares, in each of which is written some Arabic letter. The person who consults it, repeats three times the opening chapter of the Koran, and 58th verse of the sixth chapter. “With Him are the keys of the secret things: none knoweth them but him. He knoweth whatever is on the dry ground or in the sea; there falleth no leaf but He knoweth it; neither is there a single grain in the dark parts of the earth, nor a green thing, nor a dry thing, but it is written in a perspicuous book.” He places his finger at random upon the table; he then looks to see upon what letter his finger is placed, writes that letter, the fifth following it, and the fifth following this, until he comes to the first which he wrote, and these letters together compose the answer. The construction of the table is thus:—

For example, suppose the finger to be placed on the letter s, second in the fourth line, we take from the table the letters:—

s—i—t—w—i—l—l—d—o—w—r—o—n—g—w—a—i—t—a—n, which forms the answer:—“Wait an(d) sit will do wrong,” an incentive to action quite clear.

The sentence always commences with the first of the letters taken from the uppermost line. It will be seen that the table gives only five answers, one of these with whatever letter of the alphabet we commence. The framer of the table, knowing that men very frequently wish to do wrong, and seldom to do what is right, and that it is generally safer for them to abstain when in doubt, has given but one affirmative answer, and four negative.

It was by this means that the dishonest Arab found out that Livingstone was dead and did not want the goods he was taking to him, which shows how reliable a forecast can be thus made. (See The Finding of Livingstone.)

A Chinese Puzzle.—A Chinaman died, leaving his property by will to his three sons, as follows: “To Fum-Hum, the eldest, one half thereof; to Nu-Pin, his second son, one-third thereof; and to Ding-Bat, his youngest, one-ninth thereof.” When the property was inventoried, it was found to consist of nothing more nor less than seventeen elephants, and it puzzled these three heirs how to divide the property according to the terms of the will without chopping up the seventeen elephants, and thus perhaps injuring their lives. Finally, they applied to a wise Neighbour, Y-sa-cur, for advice. Y-sa-cur had an elephant of his own. He drove it into the yard with the seventeen, and said, “Now, we will suppose that your father left these eighteen elephants. Fum-Hum, take your half, and depart.” So Fum-Hum took nine elephants and went his way. “Now, Nu-Pin,” said the wise man, “take your third, and remove!” So Nu-Pin took six elephants and travelled. “Now Ding-Bat,” said the wise man, “take your ninth, and begone.” So Ding-Bat took two elephants and absquatulated. Then Y-sa-cur took his own elephant and drove home again.

Query: Was the property divided according to the terms of the will?

TO GUESS THE POINTS THROWN WITH DICE.

While I turn away my head, let some one throw a pair of dice and count the pips, and add to this sum the amount on the bottom face of either one of them. Now, throw again and add these new points.

I now turn and look, and tell the whole number thrown.

Explanation.—When you look, you count the faces seen, and add seven. This is a pretty little trick.

Arithmetically speaking, would not the world be happier if all were 2 B 1 0 0 1 5 1 5 0.
C  I   V   I  L 2 1 another.

Fig. 41.—The Fair Arithmetician.

ARITHMETICAL FORTUNE TELLING.

Dates of important events in the lives of eminent men are supposed to have a mysterious meaning of a prophetical tendency.

The process of forecasting is to take the number of years between a man’s birthday and that of his marriage or first notable occurrence, which number added to the second date should give the year of his next distinguished action. For instance, by comparing the dates of special significance in the life of Pius IX. we discover that the figures of each sum up to 19. Thus Mastai Ferretti was born in 1792, ordained in 1819, chosen pope in 1846. The next year distinguished by the same peculiarity is 1873, when consequently some great event will again happen to him. What this is to be, time will show.

VIII.—SIMPLE TRICKS WITH BOXES.

Fig. 42.

THE MAGIC TABLE AND SEALED CASKET.

The magician’s bottle is shown to the company, and a little wine poured from it to prove it is not empty. A handkerchief and ring are borrowed, and put into the bottle.

A borrowed casket is then held up in view, fastened with sealed thread, and Senor Don Hanquey y Panquey announces his intention to break it open to see the contents, but previously will return the borrowed articles. Out of the bottle, then, he pulls the handkerchief and ring, dripping with wine, and places them upon the sealed box, in plain view. The bottle is taken away.

The wine-soaked handkerchief is crammed into a pistol and fired at the box. On opening it there is found a second box within, which being also opened, discovers the handkerchief, ironed and perfumed, and the ring.

Explanation.—The table is made with a hollow leg as usual, but with a larger aperture, closed with a double trap, through which a piston rod may push up a box deposited at its base.

The borrowed ring and handkerchief are put into the secret compartment of the bottle (see The Secret Out, and The Magician’s Own Book), where they remain until the bottle is taken out of the room. The wine-saturated handkerchief and ring put upon the sealed box are duplicated. When the assistant receives the bottle, he takes out the real ring and handkerchief, which latter he places in a box going into the casket, which has no bottom, the better for the two to be pushed up within the gueridon. The table has the double in its base when it is brought on the stage, and the duplicate handkerchief is fired at it. Consequently, you are sure to find the borrowed articles in the casket when it is opened.

THE 100 RINGS OF SMOKE.

Take six playing cards and turn up half an inch of the ends of each, the same side. With them form a hollow cube or box by the arrangement here depicted:

Fig. 43.

In the centre of one side cut out a small circle.

After filling this box with tobacco smoke, you can make a ring of it issue from the aperture by giving a tap to the opposite side, just as the pressure of the flexible bottom of an oil-can makes the fluid spurt out.

TO INTRODUCE CIGAR SMOKE INTO AN AIR-TIGHT VASE.

Certain old dames of Mr. Panky’s acquaintance are prejudiced upon the subject of tobacco smoke. To believe them, you would become of the impression that cigar vapour penetrates the thickest curtain, wall, or any partition whatever.

I beg to show you that these estimable ladies are not so far wrong.

I have in my hand a glass cup with a cover of the same material, as transparent as possible.

I put on the lid, and let this volunteer hold it at a distance from me, whilst I puff towards it the smoke of this perfumed cigarette.

Keep your eyes on the covered cup, for you will see that the smoke enters it, though hermetically sealed. To convince you that there is no ocular illusion, let my obliging Ganymede lift off the cover.

There, away flies the smoke caught in it.

Again close it, while I again despatch more smoke to it. Shall I repeat the experiment, for I warn you I am prepared to continue till morning. Three or four times will suffice, eh? So much the better for your patience.

Explanation.—Into the cup put a few drops of alkali, and move the vessel about so that the inside is coated with the liquid; treat the cover with chloridric acid, in the same way. When these two are brought into contact by the junction of the cover and vase, a thick vapour is produced, which resembles tobacco smoke. Take care not to cover the cup until just when you wish the vapour to appear, as its formation is instantaneous.

Fig. 44.

IX.—SIMPLE TRICKS WITH HATS.

Fig. 45.—The Gentleman who Lends his Hat.

THE MAGICIAN’S BIRDCAGE.

(Les Oiseaux Ranimés.)

There is an universal exclamation of sorrow from the ladies when the inmates of the pretty cage—suddenly produced from a gentleman’s hat, as a conclusion to a trick—are found to be lifeless.

Participating in the distress, Monsieur Hanky Panky seeks to remove its cause, and for that purpose borrows from the audience a pocket handkerchief.

Fig. 46.

Hardly has he drawn it two or three times over and around the cage, than the pitying faces are seen beaming with wonderment and joy, for the inanimate birds have been resuscitated, and are flying and chirping within the gilded bars.

Fig. 47.

Explanation.—Some wondrously scientific gentleman will probably descant upon the marvellous effects of training of canaries, or, perhaps, of the administering angels, ether and chloroform. Let him do so, for you will learn on an inspection of the cage, that it has a double bottom, in the receptacle of which, at first, the live birds are kept unseen, and, on the pressure of a spring in the knob at the top, the stuffed ones descend, thanks to the false bottom sinking in the middle, if its halves are on pivots at each side; or, one half sinking one side and the other opposite, if they turn lengthwise.

An egg can be made to transform itself into a live bird or mouse, and other changes can be wrought by this same apparatus.

Fig. 48.—“And when the Pie was opened,” &c.

THE GARDEN HAT; OR, FLOWERS GROWING VISIBLY IN A HAT.

A hat being about to be returned to the owner from having been shockingly maltreated in the concoction of an omelette, it occurs to Herr Harngy Barngy, that, while it is unfit for adorning the human head, it may be available for other purposes.

“Hang it!” says the Professor, with his genial smile, which is never so sweet and placid as when he is working his will with borrowed property, “I see such a resemblance in it to a flowerpot, that flowerpot it shall be. So I will hang it here—on this little shelf—hanging from the ceiling by three cords.”

For seed, a few rose leaves; for mould, some shreds of handkerchief, &c., which are put into the hat.

Then Mr. H. B. retires in amongst the audience. At the wave of his wand, a tender stalk is seen to peep over the edge of the hat, and by degrees a bush of flowers rise out of this novel jardinière, whilst a perfume as of newly blooming flowers pervades the air.

Fig. 49.

Explanation.—In our former works will be found full directions to manage the miraculous birth of flowers by mechanical means. In the present case the result is brought about by a less complicated method.

You have a tin vessel of the size and shape of a hat, to fit inside it. In it is a bush, with natural flowers attached, mounted on a large cork, the whole to move upwards without impediment.

In going up to the hanging shelf you slip this prepared vessel into the hat. When the whole is in its place, your signal to your confederate sets him to turn on perfumed water, which runs into the vessel through one of the suspending cords, which is a gutta percha tube covered with silk. As the water enters, the cork is floated.

Fig. 50.

TO RUN THE FINGER THROUGH A HAT AND YET RETURN IT INTACT.

Having concluded a performance in which a borrowed hat was employed, you pretend to hesitate about handing it to the owner, and, in fact, whilst you are mumbling excuses, reveal that, by some bungling, you have made so large a hole in the crown, that a finger—yours, for instance (suiting the action to the word), can go through it, to do which you thrust a hand within the hat.

The forefinger is seen issuing through the top of the hat, where it wags in an amusing manner. Nevertheless, on instantly giving the hat to the owner, not the slightest trace of the fracture can be perceived.

Fig. 51.

Explanation.—The finger shown is one made of gutta percha, with a little cup valve at the base, from which the air is exhausted by a simple pressure, when the adhesion is perfect. To remove it, pick up the edge of the valve with the thumb-nail. This little diversion causes that hilarity always befitting a magical entertainment.

X.—AMUSING TRICKS WITH VARIOUS ARTICLES.

“The mind of man, like a bow, if always bent would in the end lose its elasticity, and become useless; by giving it occasional freedom you preserve its tone, and it will serve your purpose.”—Æsop.

TO TAKE A PORTRAIT IN THREE MINUTES.

Draw on coloured paper with another coloured crayon the likeness of a confederate, and dust the lines with a powder of the same hue as the paper.

Fig. 52.

In your pencil-case have a hard brush, and when you appear to draw, remove the coloured powder.

This trick is used in connection with disappearing feats, where you undertake to make the drawing of a card, a flower, or any vanished article, which you are not supposed to have seen.

A REMBRANDT ETCHING IN FIVE MINUTES.

Smoke a glazed card over a tallow candle till the surface is completely blackened. With a needle scratch out a landscape with a moonlight effect, or a figure in shadow, except on one side, where a strong light falls, after the fashion of the photographs by Solomon, Kliemeck, &c. The weird aspect will be quite like a Doré or Van Schendel.

THE ONE-EARED HARES.

Draw three hares, so that each shall appear to have two ears, while they really have only three ears between them.

Fig. 53.

Fig. 54.
THE SHADE OF NAPOLEON VISITING HIS TOMB.
A full-length Portrait of Napoleon I. may be traced in the above Engraving

DOING A GOOSE IN THE TURN OF A HAND.

(Story and Drawing Lesson.)

There was once upon a time a farmer who built a house with one window and two doors. A path led to a pool adorned with sedge. But up to the pool, by two crooked paths, came a gang of robbers, who caught a goose.

Fig. 55.

VAPOURGRAPHIC PICTURES.

Write on glass with a quill full of hydrofluoric acid. After two minutes’ action of the mordant, wash in clean water, and polish with silk or soft dry cloth. The bitten away lines are invisible, but will appear on the plate being exposed to the breath or steam from a kettle.

CHANGEABLE PICTURES.

Paint any subject on thin paper slightly with light colours, so arranged that by painting the paper stronger on the other side, it may be disguised. Then cover the last side with a piece of white paper to conceal the second subject, and frame the whole. It may even be put between two pieces of clear glass.

On holding up this picture to the light, a different scene is presented to what is usually beheld.

MAGIC DRAWING.

Take a box about 18 inches long by six deep, and remove the lid and one side. In the centre set a square of glass at right angles to the bottom, and parallel with the plane of the ends.

Place a picture which you wish to copy on the left of this upright glass, and a sheet of paper on the right.

On holding the head on the left of the glass, and looking into it downwards, the reflection or spectre of the picture will be seen on the paper, where the lines may be traced.

TRANSPARENCIES.

Put a chafing-dish or gas-stove under a wooden frame on which you strain, that is, stretch, a piece of strong linen or silk, while you do it over with a solution of wax in oil of turpentine. It will then be equally diffused.

Paint with oil colours mixed with spirits of turpentine.

MOVABLE TRANSPARENCIES.

Mount the transparency on a light circular frame, on an axis easily turned. Close the upper end of the hollow cylinder with a disc of tin, cut into inclined planes like the ventilator let into window panes (fanlight).

A lamp placed inside the cylinder will illuminate the transparency at the same time that it makes it turn round by the current of heated air striking the tin plate.

Vary the subject of the pictures as you please. Mr. Panky’s represent hideous serpents twisting round a column, and other delicious spectacles.

Fig. 56.

To make the above magical figure without taking the hand off, begin at A, thence to B, to C, to D, to E, and so on.

TO WRITE ON WOOD.

Rub the wood with powdered resin, and ink will not spread or run when you write upon it.

THE PIG’S-EYE GAME.

Shut the eyes and draw the figure of an animal without taking the hand off. Still not seeing it, remove the hand and try to put the eye in its proper place.

The ludicrous outline made, and the absurd position of the eye in most attempts, are remarkable.

EVERLASTING WRITING ON GLASS.

After covering a sheet of glass with visible colour or colours, write or scratch the inscription so as to remove the pigment in those places where the pen touches. Put the glass in the furnace for the colours to set with running so as to obliterate the marks, and after the proper cooling, the writing will be unalterably fixed. Designs of transparency for a tinted ground can be thus made.

MOSS PICTURES.

Take a board with a smooth face, and stripe it lengthwise with three bands of colour sky-blue and grass green, with a pale blue or pale yellow between, which will be the sky, the middle distance and horizon, and foreground of a picture. With coloured moss, varying in tint from yellow to deep brown, form trees, bushes, hedges, foliage, &c., by glueing the sprigs. The effect is often charming.

THE PUNCTUATION PUZZLE.

Whoever writes this on the wall has ten fingers on each hand; five and twenty on hands and feet; guess who this may be.

OIL PICTURES.

If you drop oil or fat on water it spreads and breaks into variegated patterns as beautiful as snow-flake figures.

Have a vessel of pure cold water, still as possible. Let one drop of oil fall on the surface from about four inches height.

Lay a piece of glazed surface paper on the oil pattern, take it instantly off, place it on the surface of a plate of ink for a moment, remove and wash off the excess of ink, and you will have a black picture closely resembling a photograph. For red use cochineal or the aniline reds.

Pure sperm oil takes a minute to form a pattern; green rape oil is slower; Lucca oil three minutes; green olive one minute, &c. Oils can be mixed and tried.

The formation can be shown by the magic lantern, from which is removed its nozzle pipe for a shorter one, so as to form the oleographs properly, and yet leave room enough for a small pipe to be thrust between the nozzle and the trough containing the water on which swims the oil.

The lantern is turned back so that the chimney is horizontal; the hole is then perpendicular; on it is set a trough made of two plates of glass joined together, the upper, which has a hole in it, to be filled with water. On the nozzle is placed a prism, which reflects the picture on the screen.

XI.—AMUSING TRICKS WITH VARIOUS ARTICLES.

TO DIVIDE A HORSESHOE INTO SEVEN PIECES BY TWO CUTS.

Make a horseshoe of a slice of pear or apple, potato, &c., and cut off the long arms at A B. Range all in a row, and cut them across into seven pieces.

Fig. 57.

TO MAKE AN ANTI-MACASSAR OF A SHEET OF PAPER.

Take a newspaper and fold one end transversely, so that the edge is parallel with one side, by which a square is obtained.

Fold this square to make a right-angled triangle; fold this to make another triangle, and so on until the last shape is an acute triangle.

The end A is just half as thick as the rest of the paper. Tear this off at the dotted line, by which the square of paper becomes a sixteen-sided figure, nearly circular.

Fig. 58.

To make the pattern, tear off the point of the folded mass, by which a central hole will be made in the whole piece. Then tear from the sides and the broad edge small pieces, varying in size, by which a certain pattern will be made. Once having found the proper points whence to remove the ground, such counterparts of lacework can be so rapidly and bewilderingly done that the spectators will be amazed upon your unfolding the paper completed. It is needless to say tearing of a common newspaper makes the trick apparently more difficult than the most elaborate cutting out of coloured tissues with scissors.

Fig. 59.

SYMPATHETIC CURRENTS OF DIVINATION.

A brother philosopher of mine (says Hanky Panky) has written about sympathetic atoms of communication. Descartes, as he is named, maintained that any one could put himself in correspondence with another so as to read in his mind as in a book, by aid of connecting atoms. Ahem!

I will now (continues Mr. H. Panky) apply to a lady and a gentleman, to whom I give each a sealed letter, with the request for them to take the best of care of them, and not to open them until permission is given.

I have here a pack of ordinary playing cards, which may be freely examined, from which are excluded all below the value of seven, being what is known as a piquet or euchre pack.

I make eight piles here on the table of four cards each, and number them. The gentleman holding the letter will kindly point out which one he selects. Observe that the gentleman has taken the third pile. I beg to offer it to him while I pick up the other cards.

I now spread out a set of dominoes on the table, of which I form four rows of seven each, face down on the table. I part the four rows into two ranks, separated by the empty domino-box between them.

The gentleman will please choose one of the rows, and then one of the piles in it. I give him that pile and turn up the dominoes to show that no two are alike.

I present to the lady a pencil, and ask her to mark one of the three flowers painted on the board held out to her.

The lady has marked the lily.

The gentleman can now open the letter, when he may read as follows:—

“Sir—The four cards chosen by you are the king of spades, the eight of diamonds, the ace of hearts, and the knave of hearts.

The pile of seven dominoes contains the blank-two, three-two, double-four, four-five, deuce-ace, cinq-three, double-one, in all thirty-seven points.

“Signed Hanky Panky.”

On opening the lady’s letter, she may read:—

“Madam—You were destined to choose the lily.

“Signed H. Panky.”

And I shake the envelope out to produce a lovely lily, which was the flower the lady preferred.

Explanation.—The cards were eight sets of four, which were respectively the spade king, the eight of diamonds, ace of hearts, and knave of hearts. Consequently, wherever the choice fell it was sure to light on the cards which were named in the letter previously prepared.

The dominoes were placed in the box face up, as usual, but the bottom row was composed of the series which you wish to come out. On putting them on the table place the prepared lot on your left hand. If the right-hand lot should be chosen, quietly remove it, saying that you put it out of the way, and we will use the other (for it seems perfectly fair that the choice should as well exclude as include the lot). In the same way deal with the other rows so as to have the prepared set in any case.

The three names of flowers, or the flowers themselves, painted on a board, have the one to be selected somewhat prominent, and, with a little art, you can always induce a lady to mark the desired one. (See directions to “force a card,” in The Secret Out.)

THE TURNING SHEARS.

Take a large pair of scissors or shears in your hands, which you hold out, palms upwards. Hang them by their rings on the little fingers. Close the hands with a slight inclination towards the scissors, so that the finger tips only are in the rings, and the blade is supported on the inner fleshy part of the palms.

As you turn your closed hands, the scissors will turn, and on bringing the knuckles upward the point will be forward, and you can open and shut them freely.

THE SIMULACRUM.

Ladies and Gentlemen: One of the superstitions of the Middle Ages made it credible that if a person hating another bought of a regular magician an enchanted doll, resembling that object of enmity, any treatment of the representative, say, the insertion of pins into its wax, the twisting of its limbs, and so on, would be felt by the living being.

This was acting upon a person through his likeness.

On this principle I—Signor Hanchio Panchio, at your service—have succeeded in opening locks without going near them with the key.

I have a facsimile of my front door lock in my own study, and on hearing a knock I merely turn a key in the duplicate lock, when the door flies open so mysteriously that the visitor believes the agent an electric medium of mine.

I am going to perform this most curious experiment before the present company, by aid of the massive padlock which I take out of its box.

There never was a more simple padlock. I shall lock it here under your eyes, and yet engage to open it without turning the key.

It is now locked, and any gentleman may test its security. I can even hang it on my wand by the ring to prove it, and in that way my friend by my side can hold it for a moment whilst I make a drawing of it on a sheet of innocent white paper.

Open.
Fig. 60.

Closed.
Fig. 61.

Once more let me show that the fastening holds firm. All are satisfied.

I will now apply the key to the hole in the drawing, and turn it once—twice—and cry:—

“Open, Sesame!”

The padlock is open!

For your kindness in assisting me, sir, you may retain the drawing. You have watched me so closely that I see you have imbibed the art, and henceforth all the doors of society are open to you.

We borrow from The Magician’s Own Book the illustration of a magic padlock. In the present case, the instrument contains a powerful spring which forces the key-bolt back out of the socket of the pin, and is set in action by pressure on one of the nail heads adorning the plate. This is done when the second testing of the lock is made. You keep up the chatter as long as the time required for the spring to work.

PRIMITIVE WOLF TRAP.

A double circular stockade, or palisade, is erected too high for a wolf to leap over, with one entrance, closed by a gate.

Fig. 62.

This is open, and the animal, hearing a tied-up sheep bleating in the centre, passes in and goes the round, seeking the entrance to the prey, when he pushes the gate to, and is imprisoned till morning.

THE CELEBRATED HONEY-BEE TRICK.

Get possession of the queen bee, and confine her by a hair or fine silken thread by a running noose fast around her corslet.

Explanation.—Be Wise in Time.

The bees, attentive to her movements, will surround her, and go to and fro, as if in obedience to the will of the captor of the mother bee.

A swarm can be made to pass from one hive to another at pleasure.

TO PROTECT A HOUSE FROM RATS AND MICE.

The Japanese, from time immemorial, have manufactured china cats, with open eyes, so faithfully copied from nature that one of these toys, with a rush-light inside, will protect a whole house during the night.

The image might contain a clockwork by which an intermittent sound would still farther alarm the rats.

TO SHOW THE FUTURE IN A PAIL OF WATER.

Bid the person desirous of seeing his or her future partner’s face look into a pail of water.

The reflection will certainly be of their own features, but as marriage makes each the other’s, you can safely maintain your credit as a soothsayer. “That face will be your husband’s when you marry.”

THE INTELLIGENT PARROT.

Have a parrot, or other bird, carved and painted, with simple springs to make the head turn and the mouth to open, mounted on a hollow shelf against the wall.

Through its body, one leg, the hollow shelf, and thence through the wall, into an adjoining apartment, where your confederate can overhear, run a tube with a mouthpiece, to which the lips or a bellows can be applied.

On pretty Polly being addressed, she will whistle, sing, scream at command, and answer to sensible questions.

CLOVES.

Cloves are the unopened flowers of a small evergreen tree that resembles, in appearance, the laurel or the bay. Each clove consists of two parts, a round head, which is the four petals or leaves of the flowers rolled up, enclosing a number of small stalks or filaments. The other part of the clove is terminated with four points, and is, in fact, the flower-cup, and the unripe seed-vessel. All these parts may be distinctly shown if a few leaves are soaked for a short time in hot water, when the leaves of the flowers soften, and readily unroll.

DANDELION RING CHAINS.

Pull some dandelions with long stems and cut off the flowers. As the stems are hollow, the upper or smaller end can be bent round to enter the other, so making a link, of a number of which a chain can be formed.

IMMORTELLES.

When fresh, scrape the flower leaves with a blunt knife to make each petal curl.

Fig. 63.

For a green hue, dip the flower, but not the stalk, or the former will fall off, in a brass or copper vessel full of vinegar and salt, for half a day, or not so long in oil of tartar; wash in water, and dry them, keeping the stem up. For a straw-yellow tint, keep them two days in oil of tartar. For yellow, or another shade of green, in quick lime, slightly liquefied with water. For grey, in vinegar, milk with a little black dye. For jet, put the stems through holes in a plate of metal fitting a vessel by which the flowers can be exposed to the fumes of sulphur. They will be blanched at first, but will then redden, and finally become black. To varnish: Melt down some Flanders glue, strain it, and brush it on thoroughly. Put them away to dry where no dust will fall on them. Perfume at pleasure.

Fig. 64.

THE POLITICAL TEETOTUM.

(No personal allusion intended to H. Panky, Esq., M.P.) Cut the edge of a teetotum into six faces, and put on them the letters D, R, C M, &c., standing for Despotism, Republic, Constitutional Monarchy, and any other form of government which may visit a country. The game is to pretend to tell the future rule by the first face which comes up three times.

ORTHOGRAPHICAL DICE.

Paste or paint upon four cubes of wood, metal, stone, or bone, the vowels and consonants. Attach a value to them, and play with them in the same manner as if they were dice. The whimsical words which the upturned letters will often produce occasion laughter, and the compulsion to name them will help slow juveniles on with their alphabet.

THE HEXAGON.

The six-sided figure is to be cut through the lines, and re-made.

Fig. 65.

THE MAGIC OCTAGON.

Upon a piece of cardboard draw

The three designs below;

I should have said of each shape four,

Which when cut out will show,

If joined correctly, that which you

Are striving to unfold,—

An octagon, familiar to

My friends both young and old.

Fig. 66.

Fig. 67.

THE PARALLELOGRAM.

A parallelogram, Fig. 68, may be cut into two pieces, by which two other figures can be formed.

Fig. 68.

MOCK LACES.

Take a piece of linen or “long-cloth” and stamp, or paint gum on all the parts of a pattern which is to remain intact, and soak it in a potash-bath at 22° Centigrade. In a short time the process of felting, analogous with that of skeletonizing leaves, will act exclusively on the ungummed places, and eat away about a twentieth. Only the experienced eye can tell it from embroidery. Shirt-fronts are thus worked.

TO CUT OUT A CROSS.

Fig. 69.

Fig. 70.

Fig. 71.

To cut out of a single piece of paper, and with one cut of the scissors, a perfect cross, and all the other forms here shown, take a six-inch length of a piece of foolscap two inches wide, and fold the upper corner down, as shown in A, Fig. 72; then fold the upper corner over the first, in B. Next fold the paper in half lengthwise, as in C. The last fold is made lengthwise also, in the middle of the paper, to form D. Cut this through with the scissors lengthways, for the forms shown in Figs. 69, 70, 71.

Fig. 72.

THE MAGICIAN’S SPELL.

A B R A C A D A B R A

B R A C A D A B R

R A C A D A B

A C A D A

C A D

A

CHERRY-STONE BASKETS.

Secure a cherry-stone in a vice, and having traced a line around it the longest way, and another at right angles, file out the space, both sides of the latter, down to the surrounding mark. There will then be left a miniature basket with handle complete.

Fig. 73.

HANKY PANKY BURGLAR ALARM.

(Diablotins.)

Exploding crackers are used for awaking a sleeper by the detonation when any one attempts to enter the room without permission. They are fastened across the crack of the door, as if to seal it.

These explosive papers are made by taking strips of half an inch to an inch wide, and of a convenient length. By means of a little gum-water or paste a small quantity of coarsely pounded glass is attached to one end, on one side of each strip about one-fourth of an inch. A little fulminating powder is spread over the glass and the moistened end of the paper, and it is dried in the air: two of these strips are then laid with their covered surfaces nearly in contact, and so that their uncovered ends may project different ways. A narrow strip of paper or parchment is then wrapped round the coated ends and fastened to one of them, but not binding them so tightly as to prevent their being drawn, by taking hold of the projecting ends, one over the other. The friction occasions their detonation.

The quantity of fulminating powder must be proportioned to the effect intended.

MOCK TURTLE.

Take a piece of paper stained or painted like tortoiseshell, and cut out a piece of the shape of a turtle’s upper shell; make claws and head, and paste them on. Bend up the middle and put on a bottom, which you also push up in the centre, where with a drop of shoemaker’s wax you secure a large live fly. The efforts of the latter to escape will cause him to carry the paper shape about the table. Except for the fright—and the absence of mental emotions in such low animals debars much fear of that—the creature need suffer no hurt.

MYSTIC CHANGES IN COSTUME.

We are all familiar with the excellent surprises in quick dressing shown by Woodin, Love, and the latest polyphonist, Mr. Maccabe. An American entertainer has carried this address in dress to its climax. He comes upon the stage attired in a black dress coat, black trousers, having in his hand a high opera crush hat, and sings a collection of songs, at the end of each one of which he, without leaving the stage, and while standing in full view of the audience, makes several changes in his costume, as follows:—Upon the coat, which is closely buttoned, in place of the black buttons there suddenly appear and disappear double rows of gilt buttons. Closing his crush hat and affixing it to a rear button on his coat, he produces from a pocket a small cap, with wig attached, which he places upon his head; quickly turning his trousers up above the knee, to give them the appearance of knee breeches, we find his lower limbs encased in neatly fitting white gaiters, and, producing a telescopic cane, we are presented with an excellent portraiture of an old man in the full costume of years gone by. By a sudden movement from the neck the entire costume is changed to full female attire. He then sings “Tassels on her Boots,” and at the conclusion of the first verse, as he slightly raises the skirt of his dress in front, we see that the gaiters have disappeared, and that his feet are encased in neatly fitting ladies’ boots with tassels thereon. Succeeding this he makes several entire changes of costume, all being, however, of female attire, differing materially in style and colour. He wears a jaunty little hat upon his head, which is changed in colour and style to suit the various costumes, without removing it: also, different wigs are seen upon his head after the latest fashion of ladies’ hair dressing.

THE ANIMATED CRYSTAL.

Alum put into a tumbler of water, as it dissolves will assume the shape of a pyramid. When the solution has nearly terminated, you will find the mass covered with geometrical figures, cut out, as it were, in relief upon the mass. This experiment having succeeded, take up a crystal quartz which has six sides, and cut accurately from each face to a perfectly convex surface, and place it on a piece of plate or common window glass, a china or glazed plate, or any smooth surface, perfectly clean, as grease or a particle of dust would impede its motion. Wet the surface, and give the plane a slight inclination, when, if properly managed, a rotatory motion will commence, which may be kept up for any length of time by giving alternate inclinations to the plane surface, according to the movements of the crystal; to heighten the pleasing effect of which, a variety of paper figures, harlequins, waltzers, &c., may be attached. The first trial of the experiment had better be made by giving a slight rotatory motion to the crystal.

THE SPINELESS GIANTESS.

In The Merry Circle a full explanation was given of the mode of manufacturing a giant or giantess. A slight yet telling modification has occurred to us.

Let the skirts of a dress be fastened with its waistband around a boy’s chest just under his armpits., He forms the body of the Colossus. Half open an umbrella and secure it in that position. Tie a shawl to the ferule so that it will fall over the umbrella and conceal the boy. On the top fasten a muff or bale of cloth, which serves as a head on which a coal-scuttle bonnet may be fitted, with a thick veil to hide the absence of countenance. If the umbrella has a hinge in it, as parasols are often made, the animating principle of this “ten footer” may execute a bow with the upper part of the contrivance which a courtier could never surpass.

Fig. 74.

TO COLOUR AGATES.

Brown.—Soak the stone in a solution of silver in spirits of nitre, dry in the sun, then put in a damp place, and on again exposing it to solar light, the colour will appear. Repeat to deepen shade.

Light Brown.—A solution of gold.

Gray.—Add to the silver solution a quarter of its weight of lard and red tartar.

Deep Violet.—Add to the silver solution some plumose alum.

White.—The action of bismuth bleaches it so that it looks white; it will appear pale brown in the shades.

To draw Figures on the Stone.—Rough it, write with a quill, and the silver solution will dry it quickly.

CARD CASTLE.

With a pack of cards make houses in this manner. Place two on their narrow ends, fixing the tops level.

Fig. 75.

On each side of the opening stand a card longwise.

And place two other cards at the end of the last pair, to form a square surrounding the triangle.

Fig. 76.

Fig. 77.

Each side of the central cards lay two more, flat upon the outward pair, like a roof.

Fig. 78.

On this platform rear cards like the first pair, and continue till the whole pack is used; with care many of the under cards at the side can be removed to continue the structure.

Fig. 79.

XII.—INTERLUDES, PUZZLES, &c.

PUZZLES.

The best material for these geometrical puzzles is hard wood about an eighth of an inch thick; but pasteboard, cardboard, and stiff paper are efficient substitutes.

TO FORM A SQUARE.

To cut a card of the shape and in the proportions of Fig. 79, into three parts, to form a perfect square, you must cut through the lines of the obtuse angle, and it will then be an easy task.

Fig. 80.

A SQUARE OF FOUR PIECES.

In a square card punch twelve holes, or make them with a pencil, and then cut it into four equal-sized pieces, each of the same shape, and containing three holes or marks.

Fig. 81.

The Puzzle of Five Pieces.

Find the centre of one side of four out of five squares, and cut them from that point to the opposite corner; place them around the perfect square, and they will form the figure here presented.

A
Fig. 82.

B
Fig. 83.

Another of Triangles.

With the five triangles make a square.

Fig. 84.

Another.

Dot a square card in eight places, which dots are to be divided by straight lines, so as to cut the cross into five pieces, two dots to each piece except the centre one, which must comprise eight.

Fig. 85.

A SQUARE OF SEVENTEEN SQUARES.

Fig. 86.

To divide a square into seventeen squares, begin by dividing each side of the square into four portions, drawing lines across each way to these points to make sixteen squares. Unite the points of the diamond, within which is a square one-quarter the size of the first. A second diamond within this quarter-sized square, cut by a Saint Andrew’s Cross—gives the points for the seventeenth square.

Another of Four Triangles and a Square.

Cut the card first into a ten-inch length, two inches wide; and then of the pieces form a square.

Fig. 87.

Of Four Squares and Eight Triangles.

Fig. 88.

Of Nine Pieces.

Fig. 89.

Of Ten Pieces.

Fig. 90.

First cut the square into pieces of the three shapes shown, four of A, four of B, and two of the small one C. The formation of a perfect square with them will be a difficult task.

Of Twenty Triangles.

Begin by placing four triangles at the sides of a square of four triangles, when the rest of the shape can be filled in readily.

Of Eleven Pieces.

Fig. 91.

Cut up a square into four sets of two each, A a square, B and C a triangle; three of the triangle D, and one each of E and F. Begin at the left lower corner with A, to its top and right side place two of D, then a large triangle C; a square is now made, one quarter of the large one. The second square to the right requires but the two pieces, E and B. The other half, from there only being five pieces to fit, will take but little time and trouble.

THE OVAL PUZZLE.

Fig. 93.

Fig. 92.

Fig. 94.

Hanky Panky has to make two oval boards: but it so happens that the area, exclusive of hand-holes in the centre, and the circular piece, are the same. To cut his stuff, on finding the centre of the circle, he strikes a second circle, half the diameter of the first, with the same centre. Then he cuts the whole into quarters, by means of two lines drawn at right angles to each other, then cuts along the inner circle (Fig. 92) and puts the pieces together, as in Figs. 93, 94.

CHECKER PUZZLE.

Fig. 95.

The puzzle is as follows:—After placing three red wafers in the squares Nos. 1, 2 and 3, and three blue wafers in Nos. 5, 6 and 7, you are to move the three blues into the squares occupied by the reds and the three reds into the squares occupied by the blues (keeping within the squares), the reds moving towards the right, and the blues to the left, not being allowed to move back after once moving forward. You are to jump only one at a time, and have the privilege of moving either card into a vacant square adjoining. The first move, of course, is either from 3 or 5 into 4.

Explanation. Move blue wafer from 5 to 4; red wafer from 3 to 5, jumping 4; red from 2 to 3; blue 4 to 2, jumping 3; red from 6 to 4, jumping 5; blue from 7 to 6; red from 5 to 7, jumping 6; red from 3 to 5, jumping 4; red from 1 to 3, jumping 2; blue from 2 to 1; blue from 4 to 2, jumping 3; blue from 6 to 4, jumping 5; red from 5 to 6; red from 3 to 5, jumping 4; and blue from 4 to 3, which performs the puzzle, having changed the three blue wafers from their former places into those of the red, and the red into those of the blue. This may be shown to a person a number of times, and if done quickly not one in ten will be able to perform it.

THE UNDETACHABLE CYLINDER.

Cut a slit close to one edge lengthwise of half a playing card, and of the other piece make a cutting in the following shape:—

Fig. 97.

Pass the thin long ends through a button, a perforated disc of paper, or a piece of pipe-stem, after having taken the slip of card in its loop, and unfold the large square wings.

If the bands are not shown, the way to get the little cylinder off is truly undiscoverable.

Fig. 98.

It is done, of course, by doubling the flat card till the slip can be pulled through the pipe-stem, when one of the square wings will go through it, and the release follows naturally.

TRIUMPHANT COLUMN.

Take a number of smooth true cylinders, of metal or hard wood, and, by carefully placing one upon another, rear a slender column. If the ground is firm and level, such a pillar may attain a somewhat astonishing height.

A PRETTY TRICK IN BALANCING.

Put an orange, apple, or other tempting object fifteen inches from the wall, and present it to any one who can pick it up while standing against the wall, or rather while keeping his legs against it. Or, again, challenge whoever has been distinguishing himself in agility to keep upright on the inner leg while sidewise against a wall.

Then—as probably you will be asked to perform some feat yourself after having thus set impossible tasks to others—put a cork in a bottle. Drive a large pin into it horizontally, and, having previously stuck two steel forks opposite each other in a second cork, with their handles inclining downwards, and run the head of a needle into the bottom of this cork, set the needle point on the pin’s head, when the forkified cork will be delicately balanced, and may even be turned round without falling.

THE ANGULAR PUZZLE.

Cut a piece of cardboard into the form of, and of equal proportions to, the figure given here, after which, produce, with the same, three successive pyramidal or angular boxes, alternately bearing the respective numbers of 7, 6, and 5 corners, still keeping the cardboard in one piece. After cutting the card half through at the dotted lines, so that it will bend more squarely, bring the ends of 1—2 and 3—4 together; bend the whole in the middle at 5—6: fold 1—2 and 3—4 over one another, and the six-cornered box is formed. By again placing the angular sections inwards, the box will be finished. If larger, gum the parts as you fold them, and a curious box will be the result; if covered with Dutch metal so as to conceal all the seams, it may be a puzzle-box indeed.

Fig. 99.

THE POSTS AND PADDOCK PUZZLES.

I have a paddock found, which is neither square nor round,

But an octagon; and this I have laid out

In a novel way, though plain in appearance, and retain

Three posts in each compartment; but I doubt

Whether you discover how I apportioned it, e’en though

I inform you ’tis divided into four.

But, if you solve it right, ’twill afford you much delight,

And repay you for the trouble, I am sure.

Fig. 100.

THE LANDLORD TRICKED.

Twenty-one persons sat down to dinner at an inn, with the landlord at the head of the table. When dinner was finished it was resolved that one of the number should pay the whole score; to be decided as follows. A person should commence counting the company, and every seventh man was to rise from his seat, until all were counted out but one, who was to be the individual who should pay the whole bill. One of the waiters was fixed upon to count the company out, who, owing his master a grudge, resolved to make him the person who should have to pay. How must he proceed to accomplish this?

Explanation.—Commence with the sixth from the landlord. You illustrate with counters.

THE DIVIDED ORCHARDS.

To a house where dwell four persons, (see the windows to their rooms) is an orchard; each man wishes to enclose his two fruit-trees in a space equal to his neighbour’s. The dotted lines show the position of the hedges.

Fig. 101.

THE OBLONG PUZZLE.

Fig. 102.

Having cut up a square of card by the lines shown, reform it. By remembering how to form one quarter of the figure, the whole will be so simplified that you can perform it under the spectator’s eyes with a rapidity which will bewilder them.

THE ONE-QUARTERLESS SQUARE.

To divide a square less one-quarter, triangularly shaped, into four parts of the same shape and size, follow the lines here described.

Fig. 103.

COUNTER PUZZLE.

Place eight counters as here given:

The puzzle is to play them in twos, taking up only one at a time, and, each time, skipping two with the one in your hand. Answer: Put 4 on 7, 6 on 2, 1 on 3, 8 on 5; or, 5 on 2, 3 on 7, 8 on 6, 4 on 1, &c. For ten, put the 4th on the 1st, the 6th on the 9th, the 8th upon the 3rd, the 2nd on the 5th, and the 7th on the 10th.

XIII.—TRICKS IN THE WATER.

THE FANE OF AQUARIUS.

Make a stand with a box upon it, having the roof and front of an ancient temple, the front of the stand being in steps leading up to the porch. This conceals a simple apparatus of glass tubes, receivers and siphons.

Fig. 104.

The four tubes are shown just above and below the bends, so as to appear to be solid glass pillars. The water from the upper reservoir fills them in running to find its level in the other container. Little figures are made of wax and pith, two having cork in their heads, two leaden feet, and they are placed in the tubes alternately. A valve below prevents them sinking, and a fine hair prevents them rising into the bends. On the water being let flow, the figures are imbued with motion, and their rising and falling will greatly puzzle the spectators, for the fluid is not seen to run.

Fig. 105.

WATER RISING ABOVE ITS LEVEL.

Take two panes of common window-glass, about six inches square, set them together at one side, and at the other side prevent them exactly joining by a little wax, so that the two planes form a very small angle, as one or two degrees. Then place the bottom edge about an inch down into a dish of water, when the water will rise between the panes in the form of a hyperbola.

WATER IN PERPETUAL MOTION.

There is shown to the audience a singular instrument composed of glass, two bulbs connected by two tubes.

Fig. 106.

Water, which may be tinctured with indigo for the better effect, flows from the bulb A very slowly into the bulb B, whence it quickly and plainly runs up by the tortuous tubing, so thin as to scarcely let a hair pass through it back into the bulb A. The drops of ascending water are separated by air bubbles, so that the current can be clearly studied.

Now, though the laws of nature forbid that water can by any power in itself lift itself up to the height of the reservoir originally holding it, here seems a contradiction. For a time, friction and the resistance of the air appears to be done away with. But this paradox is readily accounted for after close watching.

It will be found that the descending liquid does not ascend from ball B into the winding tube without part of it being left in that ball. It is this filling the space which gradually forces the air upwards (since it cannot go down through the column of water from A). The only cause of the liquid rising beyond B is its being filled, and once it is full the movement must stop.

The same appearances of drops of water divided by air bubbles is shown in the windows of filter-dealers, who use great lengths of bent glass piping for the purpose of display; but a small force-pump is the active agent as regards their apparatus.

TO PLACE TWENTY SHILLINGS IN A WINE-GLASS.

Full to the brim, without spilling one drop.—Take care that the edge of the glass is quite dry: pour the water into the glass gently, until it is quite full; then drop the shillings in one by one very gently, and on their edges. If you act otherwise, the water will run over the edge of the glass.

THE HYDRAULIC DANCER.

Shape out a doll, A B, of light material, and paint or dress him prettily, as your fancy suggests, and between his legs set the cone, C, made of thin sheet-copper.

Fig. 107.

On placing this aquatic Blondin on a perpendicular jet of water, it will balance itself on the top, while rising and falling divertingly.

A hollow copper ball, an inch in diameter, will balance itself in the like manner, turning continually round its centre, and casting the water from its surface.

XIV.—TRICKS WITH MUSICAL AND OTHER SOUNDS.

HINTS FOR PUBLIC SPEAKERS.

In a large room, nearly square, speak from one corner to the other corner, diagonally. In ordinary rooms, the lowest pitch that will reach across the room is best. In the same, speak along the length. Low ceilings carry sound better than the high.

THE MERIDIAN ALARUM.

There are other ways of utilising the burning-glass to give a signal than to adjust it so that the rays, at noon, shall fire off a cannon, as at the Palais Royal, Paris. For instance, let the action of the focussed light and heat operate on a delicate spring retaining the hammer of a bell, the valve of a chamber of compressed air, with its outlet forming a whistle, &c., &c.

MUSICAL WATER.

A jet of water, passing through a hole in a brass plate fixed at the end of a glass tube will emit a musical sound, in consequence of the intermittent flow of the liquid through the orifice. Again, a slender vein of water, some twelve inches long, on being allowed to fall vertically from a vessel, will break at the lower end of the vein into drops. This vein of water should be brightly illuminated from above by a beam of light sent through it from an electric lamp, so that the thread of water will look like a line of light, from the end where it breaks into drops to the orifice from which it issued. A musical note of constantly-increasing pitch being then set up by means of the wind instrument known as a “syren,” when the note reaches a sufficiently high pitch, the sound will act upon the luminous column of water, which will shorten itself by four or five inches, in response to the one particular sound to which it was sensitive. The same jet of water will respond to the beats produced by two organ-pipes, &c.

THE ÆOLIAN WHISTLE.

The Chinese fasten a whistle to their kites, so that the mouth always faces the wind, and the sound is almost continuous.

SIMPLE ÆOLIAN HARP.

Fasten the ends of a length of waxed saddler’s silk to pegs or nails, which insert in the crack between the two sashes midway in a window, so as to stretch the cord well. The entering air will call out the musical vibrations.

TO PLAY ON TWO WHISTLES AT ONCE

Double a length of gutta percha tubing, say two yards long, and cut a slit in the centre, where you insert one end of another piece of tubing, of the same or a greater length.

In the two end openings put whistles, and make the whole air-tight. Place the free end of the long piece around the nozzle of a bellows, and on forcing the air from which into this novel instrument a double succession of sounds can be produced. The whistles should be pitched differently, and more than two can be used.

ECHOES.

A good ear cannot distinguish one sound from another unless there is an interval of one-ninth of a second between the arrival of the two sounds. Sounds must, therefore, succeed each other at an interval of one-ninth of a second in order to be heard distinctly. Now, the velocity of sound being eleven hundred and twenty feet a second, in one-ninth of a second the sound would travel one hundred and twenty-four feet. Repeated echoes happen when two obstacles are placed opposite to one another, as parallel walls, for example, which reflect the sound successively.

Fig. 108.—Miss Echo.

A certain river has a bend in it, avoided by every one, as it was supposed to be haunted. At a certain hour in the evening, for many years, terrible curses were distinctly heard. Suddenly they ceased. Hearing an account of the strange phenomena, Mr. H. Panky determined to ascertain the cause, and carefully examined the river on each side for about a mile above and below the bend. He ascertained that at about the time the sounds ceased an old fisherman, who had lived on the opposite side of the river, full a mile from the spot where the curses where heard, had died. He was told that the fisherman was in the habit of crossing the river to a village, where he found a market for his fish, and where he spent his money for liquor; and that after drinking freely on his way home, while rowing across the river at night, he would swear terribly. This gentleman then persuaded a friend to go down the river to the place where the curses were formerly heard, while he remained in a boat on the river at the point at which the old man usually crossed. He then played on a bugle and sang several songs. His friend soon returned, and with eager delight exclaimed, “O, Hanky, such glorious music fills the air, just where the oaths used to be heard!” The neighbours came rushing down to hear it, and some fell on their knees, praying. They said, “The angels have driven the devil away.” Mr. Panky then asked what were the songs they heard. His friend described them correctly, and said he understood even the words, one of them being the famous Marseillaise, another a German song. The foreign words made the ignorant more sure that the sounds were supernatural. The magician then played on the bugle, and sang again the same songs, while his friend stood by; but his friend said the music was not equal to that he had heard below, where the sounds had really seemed heavenly.

The peculiar configuration of the river-banks had concentrated the sounds, and the distance and the water had softened them.

WHISPERING GALLERIES.

As a rule a smooth-walled room of an elliptical shape will be found most probably gifted in this mysterious way.

THE INTELLIGENT ECHO.

Find a building, with a wall at an angle where an obstacle will send the voice from the one side around to the other instead of reflecting it as an echo. Then have a friend able to imitate voices concealed round the corner, so that, when your victim calls out, “Who are you?” the answer will come, apparently from echo, in the questioner’s own voice, “I, A or B, of course.”

TO SHIVER GLASSES BY SINGING.

It is known that glasses may be broken by the note, powerfully sounded, which is that given when it is struck, or the octave of that note. Thin and convex glasses are best. But, to make sure, nick or scratch the object with a diamond to start the fracture. A trumpet will not succeed while a violin will.

THE WOODEN HARMONICON.

On a firm stand erect a three-inch soft wood board, a yard high and half a yard broad, in which stand twenty deal rods. The longest should be about five feet. The ones representing semi-tones should be painted a different colour from the others, which can be left plain.

Rub the fingers in rosin-dust and set the rods vibrating with friction, and you will have a manageable instrument, sweet and expressive.

THE STONE HARMONICON.

Stones must be found which, when freely suspended, are sonorous when struck, and those giving out the notes and half-notes of the diatonic and chromatic gamut are to be hung in a frame in proper order.

They are played upon with blows of a little hammer.

Hard wood can be also employed, mounted on a frame, and struck at one end, being the “bones” of the African under another phase.

THE LYRE WITH A GOOD MEMORY.

A proverb assures us that a teller of untruths should be skilled in mnemonics.

We exclaim, quite apropos of this remark, that we have a mystic harp which retains for our pleasure the airs which it has heard or played.

Amidst the murmur of incredulity, take the lyre and hang it to a wire luckily pendent from the ceiling.

On the unbeliever placing his ear close to it, the air is heard as of a whole band, at a distance, brilliant in its minuteness.

Explanation.—In the upper room is a piano, a square or grand being preferable: a wire runs directly from its sounding-board to the room below where the lyre is suspended. For convenience, the wire can be bent or formed of several portions overlapping where the join occurs.

THE TARTINI FIDDLE TRICK.

Granting any two sounds are drawn from two instruments at the same time, there will be heard a third sound, the more perceptible as the listener is near the middle of the distance between them.

If the two sounds are succeeding ones in the order of consonance, as, for instance, the octave and the twelfth, the double octave and the seventeenth major, &c., the sound resulting will be the octave of its principal.

THE DEMON VIOLIN.

Hang a fiddle behind a partition, and, on striking a note on a second instrument on the other side of the wall, the unseen one will sound in unison.

PRACTICAL JOKES IN THE ORCHESTRA.

Andy Andy’s adventure with the trumpet will be remembered. Hardly less amusing experiments are practised in the orchestras of theatres, especially when a play has run its hundred nights and time hangs heavy.

A handful of bluebottle flies inserted within the bass-vial, or the greasing the fiddle-bows to make the instrument play a perpetual mute, may be numbered among them. A little lather put into a cornet will be blown out into soap-bubbles when it is played.

THEATRICAL THUNDER.

Suspend a sheet of iron, five feet wide by six or seven feet long, from the centre of one end by a cord. At the lower end, about five feet from the ground, fasten a handle. On seizing this, and shaking the sheet so that it shall wave in horizontal rolls from your hand upwards, the sound of thunder will be heard, and you will say, with Gainsborough, “Our thunder is decidedly the best.”

Another Way.—Make a square drum-head of wood, a yard long by half as much wide, over which you spread and firmly glue a sheet of parchment, rather thick, wet on being put on, so as to dry very tight. Hang this up, and, on tapping it with your fingers, the reverberation will imitate a thunder-peal closely. Thus, in the theatre, a tap on the big drum often serves for this purpose.

TO IMITATE THE CRASH OF A THUNDERBOLT STRIKING.

Fig. 109.

It may have happened to you to have been present when a servant’s awkwardness has let a Venetian blind come down by the “run,” when you surely cannot have failed to notice the terrific noise resulting. By a similar fall of slats, of which the sudden contact gives a number of sharp clatters, blended by the rapidity of their succession into one crash, the semblance of a thunderbolt’s fall is given.

A A, stout iron rods, to which is fastened, at the lower ends, a board C; they rise perpendicularly, and are fastened above, being about 10 feet in length. B B are ropes, to which, at E E, are fastened firmly the slats D D (of which but two are represented, but there are as many as will cover the whole space enclosed in the rods, set 6 or 10 inches apart). These slats slide freely up and down the rods. The ropes, when drawn up taut, retain the slats apart, but, on being released, the slats fall, each striking the under one, and all coming down on C with a fearful crash.

THE CRASH BAG.

To excite a laugh, you may pretend to be angered by the stupidity of your assistant, whom, at the end of your recrimination, you thrust out of doors. Suddenly a frightful sound is heard, a clatter of broken glass, and you exclaim in horror, “He has gone clear through the window!” (He shows his face at a door or window at the other side of the room, and laughs.) This illusion of a broken window is made in two ways; one by an enlarged watchman’s rattle, the ratchet-wheel of which is turned rapidly by hand; and by your letting a stout bag, partly filled with old metal and glass, suspended by a rope, fall a few feet, and be abruptly checked in its descent.

TO IMITATE RAIN AND HAIL.

Out of stout pasteboard cut twenty circles, five inches wide, and cut them all from the edge to the centre, as marked.

Fig. 110.

Bore a hole through them an inch wide. Join them together by glueing the cut side C of circle A to the cut side D of circle B, and so on, till all the circles form but one piece, which, being thus lengthened, has the shape of a screw. Let them dry. Through the hole run a wooden rod to thread them, and set them three or four inches apart; glue them in that position. Cover them along their outer edge, and at one end with parchment-paper, wet, so as to dry tight, like a drum-head. When dry, put in about a pound of fine shot, more or less, according to the size of the instrument, and close the open end with strong paper.

The lead being at one end of this case, horizontally, if you lift it up gently by the end with the shot, they will run slowly to the other end in the road formed between the circles, and their strokes against the paper cover will closely imitate the patter of rain. If the case is tilted up suddenly, the much louder sounds will resemble hail. By alternately depressing and elevating the case, to keep the shot in motion, the effect can be made continuous.

XV.—TRICKS WITH WIND AND AIR.