T
he "pass" is the most important of the various artifices employed in the performance of card tricks. The student should, therefore, seek to acquire this sleight before proceeding to any other.At the outset the task may appear difficult, but with steady perseverance the novice will soon find that he begins to improve. An hour a day for a fortnight should be long enough to attain fair dexterity in the needful movement. But whether this be found the case or not, it is useless to attempt to shirk the necessary labour, for without the pass card-conjuring is simply impossible.
The pass is performed as follows :
Preparation.--Hold the pack of cards (face downwards) in the left hand, and divide it by means
of the little finger into two pretty nearly equal portions, as in Fig. 15. 1.
Cover the pack with the right hand, and grip the ends of the lower packet between the thumb and middle finger of the same hand, as in Fig. 16.
2.
The Pass.--With the aid of the little finger and middle finger of the left hand, draw away the
upper packet and make it "pass" lightly and noiselessly under the lower packet. 3.
The movement last above described may be analysed as follows:-
At the moment when the fingers of the left hand draw away the upper packet, those of the right hand, pushing the lower packet into the "fork" of the thumb, cause it to make a hinge-like movement on that point, which movement facilitates the passage of the upper packet below the other.
By removing the right hand, which serves, in practice, to mask the operation (see Fig. 17), the reader will be enabled to see the
To Make the Pass
position which the cards should occupy at the moment when the two packets change places, and will understand the manner in which the packet, which was originally undermost, passes above the other.
These different movements, though described separately for the purpose of our explanation, should be executed with such rapidity that they, in effect, form but one only. Steady practice will enable the student to perform the whole in less than a second of time.
By way of giving an example of the utility of the pass, I will suppose that after having had a card drawn and replaced in the pack, you desire to find it again with ease. You will proceed as follows:-
As soon as the card has been taken from the pack, separate the cards into two packets, which you hold at a very minute distance, the one above the other. (See Fig. 18.)
Have the card replaced on the packet in the
left hand, and cover it instantly with the packet in the right hand.* But, in so doing, you take care to secretly introduce the little finger beneath the upper packet, thereby dividing the pack, though imperceptibly to the spectators, into two portions, as shown in Fig. 15.
*Unless it is absolutely necessary, as sometimes happens, to have the card replaced at a particular part of the pack, it is far more artistic merely to spread the cards fanwise, and allow the drawer to replace the chosen card wherever he pleases. immediately slipping the little finger of the left hand above it, and closing the "fan." I have seen Professor Charlier (referred to previously) driven to the verge of lunacy by artistic anger and disgust upon being invited by a pupil (who shall be nameless) to replace a drawn card between the upper and lower halves of the pack as above described.-ED.
If you now make the pass, following the instructions already given, the chosen card will be found on the top of the pack.
We shall see further on how, by means of a false shuffle, you may make believe to mix this card with the others, though in reality you never lose sight of it.
N.B.--You should never make the pass immediately after having had the card replaced in the pack, but should wait to do so until the suspicions which are sure to suggest themselves at this particular moment have passed away; unless, indeed, you have arrived at such a pitch of perfection as to be able to make the pass in an absolutely invisible manner.*
*This is by no means so difficult as would at first sight be imagined. If covered by ever so slight a movement of the hands, either upwards, downwards, or horizontally, the pass should be absolutely invisible. The novice should, however, use small-sized cards (the ordinary English playing cards being inconveniently large, save in the hands of an adept), and limit the pack to the piquet number, thirty-two.--ED.
Practice and observation will suggest little artifices which may be used to render the pass as little noticeable as possible; any further explanation I might give on the subject would only tend to
To Make the Pass
complicate the instructions I have already given. Suffice it to say, that the movement of the pass, however deftly executed, should be masked by the back of the right hand, and merged, so to speak, in some gesture appropriate to the language used by the performer.
The mode of making the pass with one hand only will be described further on.
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To Make the Pass
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