Published 1800-1899 in Magic & Conjuring: page 1

For magicians most interesting is a section with arithmetic tricks and another with legerdemain featuring effects such as letting a pen-knife jump out of a goblet, some card tricks, coin tricks, and chemical tricks.

• Of Astrological Influence
• Lives Of The Most Eminent Magicians, Astrologers, Conjurers, &c.
• On The Interpretation Of Dreams
• Apparitions, Witchcraft, &c.
• Philolosphical And Ingenious Amusements
  • A person having fixed on a number in his mind, to tell him what number it is
  • Another method of discovering a number thought on
  • A quantity of eggs being broken, to find how many there...

• CONJURING TRICKS
  • The Certain Guesser
  • The Disappearing coin
  • Money Makes Money
  • A Good Variation
  • The Magic Coin Box
  • Catching the Falling Pile
  • The Flexible Watch
  • Coin and Bottle Trick
  • Needle Dart
  • The Magic Double Ring
  • The Magic Ribbon
  • The Burnt Handkerchief
  • The Vanishing Ball
  • The Wand and Ring Trick
  • Swallowing the Knife
  • The Vanishing Coin
• EASY CARD TRICKS
  • Telling a Selected Card
  • A Wonderful Discovery
  • The Twenty-one Card Trick
  • Naming all the Cards in the Pack
  • Forcing the Choice
  • The Chosen Card
  • Divination
  • Further Divination
  • The Seven Heap
  • Spelling the Cards
  • Changing...

At one point it was believed that only one copy of this book existed. This and other myths are addressed in the introduction by Frank Lehmann, who has studied this book in detail.

The book exposes various ways in which the game of Faro was crooked. It was a very popular betting game in the United States and usually was rigged in one way or another. It was published by Richard K. Fox, the proprietor of the Police Gazette.

• Introduction
• Part I
  1. The Game Of Faro
  2. The Cards In Faro
  3. Dealing The Cards
  4. Keeping The Game
  5. Technical Terms Used In Faro
  6. Laws Of The Game
  7. The Chances Of The...

Containing over fifty of the latest and best tricks used by magicians. Also containing the secret of Second Sight.

Excerpt from the introduction:

A collection of simple and effective experiments illustrating chemical, physical, and optical wonders.

Published by the Offices of the Chemist and Druggist. 42 Cannon Street, London.

• ANCIENT AND MODERN CHEMISTRY
  • 'The Four Elements'
  • Collecting Gases
• EXPERIMENTS WITH THE GASES
  • Oxygen
  • Nitrogen
  • Hydrogen
  • Experiments With Hydrogen
  • Composition Of Water
  • Making Gas From A Bottle
  • A Model Gas Manufactory
  • Inextinguishable Flame
  • Gas Balloons
  • Musical Flame
  • Musical Tubes
  • Carbonic Acid Gas
  • Carbonic Acid Gas From The Lungs
  • Combustion And Respiration
  • Decantation Of Gases
  • Weighing...

Containing over one hundred highly amusing and instructive tricks with chemicals.

• Chemical Affinity
• Sympathetic Inks
• Alum Baskets
• Easy Crystallizations
• To Make a piece of Charcoal appear as though it were Coated with Gold
• To Give a Piece of Charcoal a Rich Coat of Silver
• Combustion
• Chemistry of The Air
• Amateur Air Pump
• Asphyxia
• Balloon in Vacuum
• Boiling Cold Water
• A Sucking Tube
• Cupping
• The Barometer
• A Novel Barometer
• Compressed Air
• Noiseless Bell
• The Bursting Bladder
• Weight of the Air
• Spoons which will Melt in Hot Water
• Effect of Compression
• To Cover Iron with Copper ...

A humoristic manual about swindling, how to become a successful swindler, as well as why it is such a good thing - featuring the late captain Barabbas Whitefeather.

• Preface Of The Editor
• Chapter I. The Reader Is Introduced To Captain Whitefeather's Relations.
• Chapter II. Captain Whitefeather Takes An Enlarged View Of Swindling - Social Evils And Their Remedy.
• Chapter III. Of The Face Necessary To A Swindler - (An Incidental Speculation On The "Division Of Property") - And Of The Use And Abuse Of Mustachios.
• Chapter IV. Of The Parentage And Name Of A Swindler - Of His Equipage - Of His...

Judge's Library was a satirical periodical published in the USA from 1881 to 1947. It was a rival magazine to Puck founded among others by cartoonist James Albert Wales, dime novels publisher Frank Tousey and author George H. Jessop.

This issue No. 79 of Judge is all about poker. It provides a wonderful glimpse into how ubiquitous poker was in the US that such a successful periodical would dedicate an entire issue to it.

Also noteworthy, particularly for Erdnase scholars, is the fact that pretty much all the funny dialogs in this issue are in various national slang and ebonic. Thus the few lines...

A dissuasive to the young against games of chance.

• DIALOGUE I. On Playing Pins.
• DIALOGUE II. On Playing Marbles.
• DIALOGUE III. On Pitching Coppers.
• DIALOGUE IV. On Matching And Tossing Coppers, Throwing Heads And Tails, &c.
• DIALOGUE V. On Sabbath Breaking - Telling Lies - Disobedience To Parents, &c.
• DIALOGUE VI. On The Use Of Tobacco.
• DIALOGUE VII. On Playing Various Games.
• DIALOGUE VIII. On Gamblers, Lotteries, &c.
• Death Of A Boy On A Race Course.
• Social Card-Parties.
• The Gambler's Victim.
• The Ruined Family; Or, A Warning To Those Who Play For Amusement.
• The Charm Of Gambling. ...

Instructions for games, magic tricks, model building, giving shows, and more.

• Games Of Skill
  • Draughts
    • Laws Of The Game
    • Games For Practice
    • Concluding Observations
  • Dominoes
  • Chess
    • The Chess-Board And Chessmen
    • Value And Moves Of The Pieces
    • Laws Of Chess
    • Technical Terms Used In Chess
    • Opening The Game
    • Games For Practice
    • General Observations
    • Conclusion
  • Morrice
  • Fox And Geese
• Conjuring
  • Legerdemain And Simple Deceptions
  • To Lift A Bottle With A Straw
  • The Tobacco Pipe Jug Stand
  • To Break A Stick Placed On Two Glasses
  • The Bottle Conjuror
  • The Mysterious Wafers
  • Advantageous...

A translation of Les Trickeries des Grecs by M. Robert-Houdin, one of the most valuable and interesting works on the subject of card sharping.

Excerpt from the preface:

Being an explanation of the game, and a warning against its dangers.

Excerpt from the preface:

A nicely illustrated article explaining some of the popular pseudo-strength demonstrations made popular for example by Lulu Hurst and others.

200 years ago demonstrations of this kind created a sensation. Nobody could explain them. Many believed these were manifestations of some yet unexplained force. Today they are relegated to party stunts. Nevertheless, some are quite surprising demonstrations you can try out in your living room.

1st edition 1928, PDF 6 pages.

Barton-Wright, one of the first Europeans to study Japanese martial arts, explains eleven pseudo-strength tricks in words and photos. Forty years before this publication Lulu Hurst created a sensation demonstrating similar stunts as manifestations of 'unexplainable forces'.

The tricks explained in this article are:

1. How to Master a Man with Two Fingers
2. How to Hold a Chair in the Palms of your Hands, and to Defy Anyone to Pull it through your Hands
3. How to Lift from the Ground a Chair in which a Person is Seated
4. How to Lift a Chair with Four Men Packed upon it
5. How to Defy Anyone Standing in Front...

Life and adventure on the prairies, mountains, and Pacific coast.

Beyond the Mississippi is a travel log of Albert Richardson from a few years before and after the American Civil War. As the title suggests, he traveled west of the Mississippi through states and territories such as Missouri, Kansas, Colorado, Texas, New Mexico, Montana, Wyoming, Iowa, Oregon, California, Nevada, etc. He describes nature, people, politics, and commerce. It includes exciting adventures as well as fairly dry facts such as how many bushels of grain a particular area produces. Overall it is quite readable and the...

For the first time explains and demonstrates the great secret of her marvelous power.

In this autobiography, Lulu Hurst tells her rise to fame and fortune by performing acts of incredible strength on stage. She does this with personal recollections as well as quoting from various newspaper reports. At the time she performed many attributed her strength to some as of yet unknown or unexplainable force. But she had no unusual strength or the aid of any special force. She cleverly used mechanical principles as well as showmanship to make it appear she had super-human strength. In the second...

As produced in the spectre drama, popularly illustrating the marvellous optical illusions obtained by the apparatus called the Dircksian Phantasmagoria being a full account of its history, construction, and various adaptations.

Henry Dircks was the first who came up with the stage illusions that later became known as Pepper's Ghost. He had an arrangement with Pepper, they took out a patent in both their names, and Dircks did not want any monetary remuneration for it. John Henry Pepper improved the configuration to make it more practical and successfully staged it earning quite a lot of money with it. However,...

John Henry Pepper took a projection invention of Henry Dircks, called The Ghost, with his permission, and made it practical so that it could more easily be performed. He earned a lot of money staging it. Even though Dircks did not want any payments from Pepper, there was a falling out between the two because the invention became known as Pepper's Ghost. Dircks wanted to have his name associated with it. This prompted Dircks to write The Ghost. Pepper's answer to that publication and dispute came almost 30 years later in this work The True History of the Ghost.

He also includes the history and working of Metempsychosis...

This is a lovely old-school children's story about a pig named Grunter Growler, his life on a farm, his animal as well as human friends, and his success winning 1st prize as the most beautiful pig in the country.

The interesting part for conjurers is that Grunter meets Toby the Learned Pig which includes a description of a typical performance of Toby. Those who study and research learned pigs might find it interesting. All learned pigs in England were named Toby. It is therefore not clear which Toby was the model for this description.

• Preface
• Chapter I. Introductory
• Chapter II. Our...

100 tricks for the drawing room.

Containing an extensive and miscellaneous collection of conjuring and legerdemain; sleights with dice, dominoes, cards, ribbons, rings, fruit, coins, balls, handkerchiefs, etc. All of which may be performed in the parlor or drawing room. Without the aid of any apparatus; also embracing a choice variety of curious deceptions which may be performed with the aid of simple apparatus.

• PART I. TRICKS OF LEGERDEMAIN, CONJURING, SLEIGHT OF HAND, AND OTHER FANCIES, COMMONLY CALLED "WHITE MAGIC"
  • Preliminary Observation
  • Palming Coin
  • The Magic Coin
  • To Untie a...

An account of the author's professional life; his wonderful tricks and feats; with laughable incidents, and adventures as a magician, necromancer, and ventriloquist.

Excerpt from the Preface:

Reminiscences of the life of humorist Artemus Ward (Charles Farrar Browne) and pictures of a showman's career in the Western world.

A wonderful account of show business by the example of the humorist Artemus Ward during the 19th century. In particular, it describes how performers had to travel through the US during the 1860s, how they had to advertise and promote their shows, including the characters they encountered and the situations they had to master.

For conjurers most interesting is chapter 25: Spiritualism And Conjuring. This tells of how Hingston and Browne helped a conjurer by...

Familiar and scientific explanation of legerdemain, physical amusement, recreative chemistry, diversions with cards, and of all the minor mysteries of mechanical magic, with feats. As performed in public by Herr Alexander, Robert Houdin, "The Wizard of the North," and distinguished conjurors of all ages and nations.

• PUBLISHER'S ANNOUNCEMENT.
• PRELIMINARY INSTRUCTION.
• PART FIRST. MINOR TRICKS FOR SOCIAL COMPANY.
  • SECTION FIRST. Arithmetical ingenuities.
    • I. How to divine the numbers remaining in a sum which some person has thought of.
    • II. How To Find 6 Times 13 In 12
    • III. A comic dilemma.
    • IV....

A collection of graceful arts, merry games, and odd tricks, intended to amuse everybody and enable all to amuse everybody else. Full of suggestions for private theatricals, tableaux, charades, and all sorts of parlor and family amusements. With nearly 150 illustrative pictures.

In the days without the Internet, TV, or even radio, people entertained themselves. This book covers all kinds of things one can do from arts and crafts, little plays, simple conjuring tricks, and other activities.

1st edition 1866, 302 pages; PDF 157 pages.