Democratic Sentinel, Volume 10, Number 37, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 October 1886 — SLEIGHT-OF-HAND. [ARTICLE]

SLEIGHT-OF-HAND.

Way a Prestidigitator Foiled a Party of Loungers—Something Very Uioch Like Bflud-Beading. “How much can you influence any one?’' “I will show you the whole extent of my power, or any other man’s, in this respect,” said the professor, taking a pencil from his pocket. He borrowed a visiting card from one of the party, held i f unde’ - the table and wrote a Agere on it. Then he folded it up until it Hire a hall and tossed it across the table to the writer. “Put that piece of paper in your pocket, please, and button your coat over it. Now I'll tell you what I propose to do. Give me another card. Observe, I write on this card a series of □umbers. It doesn’t make much difference how many. Thev are: 5,1, 3,6, 2,4, 7, 9, 8. “Now, I propose, by an effort of my mind, to make you select the number from this list which is written on the folded card in your pocket, and which you have not seen. Take the pencil and card,” tossing them across the table, “and cross out one of those numbers. Look me in the eye for a moment. Now!”

The writer deliberately chose the figure 4, and was about to cross it out when he suddenly resolved to taka .die 7. He changed his mind again, and abruptly drew the pencil through ihe figure 2. “Take the card out of your pocket, please, and open it.” When the card was unfolded the figure 2 was written in the middle. “I don’t claim that I can do that every time,” said the professor, taking no notice of the amazement of the others, “but it seldom fails. Sometimes I nave the subject cross out three figures at a time. This done twice, and leaves three more if nine are written. Then let him cross out two more, and the one left standing is the one in his pocket. There is small trickery about it.” He then, at their request, tried the experiment on the other five members of the party. He was successful in every instance. “That is all there is of spiritualism or mind-reading,” said he; “the rest is simple trickery like this,” As he spoke lie stretched one hand across the table, gently took as 2 bill,from the hand of a waiter who was handing it in change to one of the party, and crumpled it up in his hand, which he still held over the table. Then he showed it to the man, and it whs changed to a S2O bill. Goldberg tossed it to him, and he at once thrust it into Lis j>°eket with the remark that ho was $lB winner. “Are you sure?” asked the professor. “Of course. I know when I put a S2O bill in my pocket.” “It’s a $1 bill,” said the professor, quietly. “The original $2 bill is in the celery glass.” The man pulled out the bill, found it was sl, threw it across to the professor, pulled the $2 out of tho celery glass, and gasped: “Where’s that twenty ?” “Here in my hand.” “Well, motion' is quicker than sight.* “Wrong again. Motion cannot be quicker than sight. The reason you don’t see me substitute one of those bills for another is because I distracted vour attention at the instant I made the change. Show us a poker hand if you’ve got cards with you.” “I haven’t auy. I left mine at the club." A pack was procured by the waiter, who regarded the magician with awe, as he said: “Very many poker players, men of the world at that, do not believe that one expert card sharp could go into a party of four or five honest players and cheat them without discovery. Now I’ll deal four hands.” He shuffled the cards in a number of ways, but always, so far as appearance wept, very honestly. He then asked the men on his right to cat them, and had them cut once more “for purity’s sake* by another player. Then he dealt them around, one at a time, to four players, including himself, and the other picked np their cards. “Gad! I'd like to play this hand," muttered the first man. * I could down you,” said the second man, with an important soowl. The third was the expression of a man who looks down upon his fellows, as he remarked: ‘Td bet everything I could win on this.” Meanwhile the professor had slipped into his top coat and was drawing on his gloves. The first had three kings and a pair of queens, the second four aces and a king, and a third a straight flush, nine high, an almost invincible hand. “What’s yours, professor?” The magisian turned up the winning hand a ten high straight flush.