This is an unusual mix of contents including magic card tricks, card games and how gamblers cheat at those games, other swindles and scams, a section on dice and cheating at dice games, as well as moralizing against the evils of gambling.
Jonathan H. Green was a reformed gambler, who made a career exposing cheating via lectures, presentations and books.
An earlier shorter edition of this book was published under the title Games and Tricks with Cards.
If you are looking for an edited version and somewhat modernized rendition of this book you can find it here.
- Chapter I
- Invention Of Cards
- Mysterious Trick Of Thirty Six Cards; Telling The Card You Look At Without Seeing The Pack
- To Tell A Card Thought Of
- Three Jacks As Thieves, Caught By A King As A Policeman
- To Burn A Card And Find It In A Watch
- How To Shift Cards
- The Four Associates
- To Make A Card Jump Out Of The Pack
- How To Change Cards To Pictures
- Chapter II
- All Fours
- Deceptions Used In The Game Of All Fours
- How To Hold Four Kings In Your Hand And By Words Seem To Change Them Into Four Aces And Afterward To Make Them All Blank Cards
- Chapter III
- Dog Loo, Or The Way They Play It On Red River
- A Trick Played By The Peter Funk Brokers Of New Orleans
- How To Nail A Card To The Wall By A Pistol Shot
- The Way To Change A Card By Words
- To Make A Card Which A Person Has Drawn Dance On A Wall
- To Change A Card Locked Up In A Box
- To Tell The Names Of All The Cards In The Pack Before You See Them
- Chapter IV
- Chapter V
- Gamblers' Pretended Witchcraft Exposed Or The Way To Tell The Card You Think Of
- The Forced Card Trick Exposed
- Bending, Shifting, Turning, Stealing, &c.
- The Three Jacks "In A Horn"
- The Game Of Thimbles, Alias Little Joker, Or The Best Two In Three
- The Trick Of Thirty-One, Or The Fascinating Game Or Trick Invented And Played By Dr. Bennett Alias Charles James Fox, Of England
- Dropping The Pigeon
- Chapter VI
- Eucre
- The Ten Duplicate Cards
- Tricks In Horse-Racing, Or The Gourd Game As Played In Kentucky
- How To Make The Card Chosen Catch In A Man's Teeth
- Jack Tar's Prayer Book, Or The Pack Of Cards
- Chapter VII
- Peter Funks
- The Old Grandmother's Trick - Pug Ugly, Or The Man That Told Ages
- The Card In The Egg
- The Charmed Twelve
- To Tell The Card Thought Of In A Circle Of Ten
- Chapter VIII
- Examples In Three-Handed Poker
- Two-Handed Poker
- Cutting, Shuffling, Dealing, Stealing, &c., &c.
- "Signs," Or "Itoms"
- Table With The Hollow Egg, &c.
- Spring Tables, Pulleys, &c.; Theor Biters Bit
- General Remarks
- Pop-Gun Trick With Cards
- Chapter IX
- The Game Of Thimbles
- Patch-Coat; The Gentleman's Game, Or, Diamond Cut Diamond.
- The Mysterious Wafers
- Advantageous Wager
- Gambling Law Of Kentucky
- Chapter X
- Reflectors
- The Longs And Shorts
- Sauter La Coupe, Or Slipping The Cards
- Convex And Concave Cards
- Handling The Cards
- Garretting
- Slipping The Cards
- Walking The Pegs
- Pricked Cards
- The Bridge
- Skinning
- Shuffling Or Weaving
- The Gradus, Or Step
- Slipping The Fives
- Saddling The Cards
- Dealing From The Bottom
- The Telegraph
- Marking Cards
- Chapter XI
- The Dice Board, Dice And Dice-Boxes
- Loaded Dice
- Cogging, Now Called Securing
- Scratched Dice
- The Doctor Dice-Box
- Unequal Dice
- The Dangers Of A Gaming Table
1st edition 1868; PDF 67 pages.
word count: 34633 which is equivalent to 138 standard pages of text