Rensselaer Republican, Volume 17, Number 14, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 December 1884 — Indian Juggers’ Wiles. [ARTICLE]

Indian Juggers’ Wiles.

The one class who interested me particularly in India were the jugglers. My investigations lead me to state positively that the most remarkable stories told about them are fictions, based upon the flimsiest foundation of fact. Let us take, for instance, two performances, the mysterious basket and the mango-growing tricks. I have seen both of them over and over again, and have found the same easily-detected frauds to exist in every case. The baskets are bell-shaped have a false bottom, between which and the exterior wall of the basket there is ample room for a very small child to stow itself away. The spectators are not allowed to touch or even to come very near to the basket, and in a causal glance at the interior one is not apt to detect the false bottom. The basket is placed over the child, who squats upon the hard ground, and after sufficeut time has elapsed for the youngster to crawl into its place of concealment, the juggler horrifies .the audience by passing his sword through the basket, and then upon upsetting it shows that the child has dissapeared. Meanwhile, a duplicate child, that closely resembles the first one, enters upon the Beene from the background, and the wonderful trick is completed. The famous mangogrowing trick is even sillier than this.. You have, of course, read how a man of mysterious arts plants a mango seed in a flower pot, and then makes a dwafed fruit-bearing tree spring up from that seed. The facts of the case are simply these: The seed is planted and the pot is then placed under a Bort of tent, whose voluminous folds must not be touched by any but the juggler. The latter then waters the earth in the pot

and does a lot of manipulating while his hands are concealed in the tent. Meanwhile a fellow juggler is performing a series of tricks to amuse and distract the attention of the spectators. When juggler number one has had time to changdHhe pot for another that is hidden in the folds of the tent, he opens one side of the canvass a little and the second pot can be seen with a halfgrown mango tree in it. After another interlude of the same sort, the tent door is again opened and a third pot is disclosed. which contains a little tree bearing a mango. —San Francisco Call.

The Arabs of Sahara are very particular as to the color of their horses. White is the color for princes, bat does not stand heat The black brings good fortune, but fears rocky ground. The chestnut is the most active. If one tells you he has seen a horse fly in the air, ask of what color it was; if he replies “chestnut" believe him. In a combat against a chestnut you must have a chestnut The bay is the hardiest and most sober. If one tells yon a horse has leaped to the bottom of a precepice without hurting himself, ask of what color it was, and if he replies “bay,* believe him.