T
RANSFORMATION and transposition tricks, which come under the third heading of effects, are generally much more complicated than those tricks which I have already described. Sometimes in a transformation trick you produce an article and transform it by making it vanish and by causing another article to appear in its place. Possibly you may have to reproduce the first article in the course of the trick, in which case you partly expose your own trick. A more finished way is to make the transformation complete by disposing of the first article altogether.You may have a chemical transformation. The ink-and-water trick is done in this way. This is a simple and effective trick, which can be performed by anyone who will exercise reasonable care in its preparation. The effect is as follows: The conjurer takes four empty tumblers and places them in a row. He then brings forward a large glass jug filled with clear water. To show that the glasses are not prepared in any way, he fills one glass with water and pours it back into the jug. He then pours enough water into each glass to make it half full, but as he does so the audience are considerably surprised to notice that, although the jug from which the performer is pouring contains clear water, two of the glasses receive a black fluid and two clear water.
The secret lies in the preparation of the glasses. My own method is as follows: At the bottom of the first glass I have a teaspoonful of a saturated solution of tannin. The object of filling this glass with water and then pouring it back into the jug is to impregnate the whole of the water with tannin. If this were done before the trick was commenced, the water might have turned cloudy. The second and fourth glasses contain a few "steel drops" or a saturated solution of perchloride of iron. Into the third glass is placed a small quantity of a saturated solution of oxalic acid. When the glasses are thus prepared, the trick is simple. When the water with the tannin is poured into the second glass, the combined liquids turn black. The same thing happens with the fourth glass. The third glass--containing the oxalic acid--appears to be only water.
So far we have described only half the trick. After the four glasses have been half filled, the first and second glasses are mixed together, and the liquid is
seen to be black. Then the contents of the third and fourth glasses are combined, and the result is a clear fluid. Then the mixture of the first and second glasses is poured back into the jug, colouring its contents black: but when the contents of the third and fourth glasses are poured into the jug, the oxalic acid transforms the black liquid into what is apparently clear water. Directly the contents of the last glass are poured into the jug the hand should be passed over it for a second, because the change is not quite instantaneous. Directly the trick is finished, the tray with the glasses and jug should be taken away, as the water will rapidly become cloudy. Oxalic acid is poisonous, and therefore the jug and glasses should be thoroughly cleansed before they are used for ordinary purposes. The chemicals for this trick are very inexpensive, and if the directions are carefully followed the trick cannot fail.
This trick should always be rehearsed before the conjurer gives it in a town in which he has never before performed it, because the quantities of chemicals that will work the trick properly with the water of one locality will not
produce the right results with the water of another. For instance, if the amateur did the trick in Buxton or Harrogate with the same quantities of chemicals that he used in London, he would probably get some effects that would surprise even himself!
Tricks of transformation are often performed with the aid of mechanical devices. One well-known trick is that in which a candle is changed into a bouquet of flowers. The candle is really a hollow tin tube, painted white to resemble a candle. At one end is a piece of real candle, which can be lighted. The bouquet is made of artificial feather flowers, constructed in such a way that they can be folded up and put inside the candle. When the candle is pulled off, under cover of something, the bouquet appears.
Sometimes the transformation is effected by means of a brass cover, which is put over the article with which the trick is to be performed. One can have a small brass cover fitted with a little mechanical arrangement by which an article is concealed in the cover although it is apparently empty. The cover can then be placed over another article, and the mechanical contrivance will pick that article up and hide it in the cover, and at the same time will release the article that has been concealed in the cover. One of the best-known tricks performed by means of mechanical covers is the coffee-and-beans trick. Three vases, which are first shown to be empty, are filled with coffee berries and white beans. Covers are put on the vases, the conjurer waves his magic wand and, taking the covers off again, discloses the three vases filled with hot coffee, hot milk and sugar. This is an elaborate trick, depending for its
effectiveness chiefly on the mechanical arrangements in the vases and covers. Some of the card tricks, in which a card is transformed into a different card, or into another object, are performed with mechanical cards.
find that many of the best transformation tricks can be performed by means of sleight-of -hand alone.
Next come tricks of transposition, in which one object seems to travel invisibly from one place to another. As an example of such tricks, I will describe one which I used to perform frequently when I first commenced conjuring. I always found that it made a capital impression on an audience, and I have no doubt if it was done now it would be equally well received, although perhaps some conjurers, who are always reading up tricks which they never perform, would consider it out of date.
I came upon the stage with what appeared to be an ordinary champagne bottle in one hand and an ordinary tumbler in the other. Near the front of the
platform were two small tables, on each of which was an ordinary
dinner-plate; on the right-hand table was also a small thin funnel. On another table were two cylindrical covers made of cardboard. There was no trick about these, but one was slightly larger than the other, for a reason that will
presently be apparent.
I began the trick by telling the audience that I would show them a curious trick with water, and I apologized for my water-bottle, which was the only one I could find handy. I could generally manage to work in a few small jokes about the bottle. For instance, if I was performing in a temperance hall, I would tactfully say that if champagne bottles never contained anything more dangerous than the fluid which I was about to pour from mine the world would be a happier place than it was: I then filled the tumbler with water and put the bottle on the right-hand table. There was only sufficient water in the bottle to fill the tumbler. Then, advancing to the front of the stage with the glass of water in my right hand, I explained that the trick consisted in my throwing the glass of water round the room. I informed the audience that if they would keep still they would not be splashed, and the glass would fly round the room like a pigeon--a tumbler pigeon-and eventually come on to the table at my left hand. I then made a great show of pretending to throw the water, but hesitated each time, because someone was moving. Finally I said that perhaps it would be safer if I attempted the trick with a little less water in the glass, and so I would pour some of the water back into the bottle. Tricks with water, I explained, were always difficult. I knew only one man who could do a good one, and he was a milkman. The glass was then half filled with water, and again I assured the audience that if they would only keep still I should be able to throw the glass round the hall. After a few feints at
throwing the glass away from me, I told the audience that I was afraid they were too nervous for that experiment, and I should have to perform it some other way. Taking up the plate on the table on my left hand, I put the glass upon it, and then put them both on the table. "Now," I said to the audience, "I will endeavour to make the glass travel invisibly to the table on my right here, and the bottle on my right hand shall stand in the position now occupied by the glass. To do this, however, I must first render the bottle and glass
invisible, and so I will cover them both with these two thin cardboard covers, which I will first pass round for examination, so that you may see for
yourselves that there are no secret pockets in them which can contain water, bottle, or glass."
I then passed the cardboard covers round for examination, and after getting a little "rise" out of my audience by pretending to slip something into one of the covers while I was passing the other round for examination, and by leading them to believe that I slipped the article into the cover they examined after it was returned to me, I eventually worked them up to such a pitch of enthusiasm at having caught me in introducing something into the covers that they usually clamoured to have both covers shown to them at once. Then, of course, I handed both covers at once to the audience and thus convinced them that the covers were quite empty. When the covers were returned to me I showed that both of them would fit the bottle and glass, which, my readers will remember, was half filled with water. Having dropped both covers alternately over the bottle and the glass, I left one cover on the bottle and the other on the glass. Making some appropriate action with my hands, I commanded the bottle and the glass to change places. I then lifted the covers, showing the bottle where the glass had been and the glass, half filled with water, in the place occupied by the bottle.
"So far," I would say to the audience, "the trick has been fairly simple.
Anyone who has a bottle and a glass can do that. All you have to do is to get a bottle of champagne, empty it--or get somebody to help you to empty it--and then put in a little water. You then get a kitchen tumbler and a couple of cardboard cylinders. In case all of you haven't followed the movement, I will repeat the trick by making the bottle and glass return to their original places." I then covered the glass and the bottle once more, lifted the covers, and
showed the bottle on my right hand and the glass on my left. The covers I threw at once to the audience for their examination.
That was the effect of the trick to the audience. This is the explanation: The trick was performed with two bottles and two glasses. The bottles were made of tin, japanned to represent ordinary glass bottles. One of the bottles was divided into two compartments--that is to say, the bottom of the bottle was really in the middle. Thus the upper part could contain water, while the bottom half, being hollow, formed a cover for a tumbler. A small tube ran from the mouth of the bottle through the partition in the centre, and had an outlet just underneath it, so that water poured through the little tube ran into the tumbler underneath.
The second bottle was a shell of tin that exactly fitted over the first bottle. Both the bottles had a small hole, just large enough to admit my finger, about two inches from the bottom. The bottles were exactly like each other, and the two holes were in the same position. Thus by putting my finger through the
two holes I could press the glass which was under the inner bottle against the side and hold it there Thus holding this combination of two imitation bottles and a solid tumbler, I came on the stage. The imitation bottles had imitation champagne labels on them (I believe these can be obtained from any cheap Italian restaurant.) I first emptied the whole of the contents of the bottle into the glass on my left hand, but when I pretended that I had got too much water, and that I should have to pour some back, I used the little funnel, and thus really poured the water down the little tube and into the glass concealed under the inner bottle. While this was going on, I took care to keep the side in which the holes were away from the audience.
It will be seen that when I poured the water into the bottle I really half-filled the glass below. Here I knocked the bottle on the plate, to prove indirectly that it was of solid glass. What I really allowed them to hear was the knocking of the tumbler under the bottle on the plate. I practised another deception when I first put one cover and then the other over the bottle to show that both fitted. I really put the larger of the two covers over the bottle, and when I took it away I gripped it tightly, and so took away with it the shell bottle. This cover I put over the glass on my left hand. When I moved this cover again I took hold of it very lightly, and thus left the shell bottle over the glass. The other
cover--over the bottle that had contained the water--I gripped tightly, and thus took it away, showing the glass that had been underneath it. It will be obvious that to make the bottle and glass return to their original places all I had to do was to grip the left-hand cover tightly, and thus pick up the shell bottle that had been placed over the glass there, and take the other cover up lightly, thus leaving the other bottle over the glass. It will be seen that the shell bottle was then in one of the covers. This cover I dropped over the bottle--in a careless way--and thus got the shell bottle over the other bottle again, and the trick was finished. The covers could, of course, be given for examination.
Another excellent trick of transposition--invented, I believe, by Conradi--is that of the flying lamp. A lighted lamp is taken from a shelf and put on a small glass-topped table. A pistol is fired at the lamp, which immediately vanishes from the table and reappears at the same moment--still alight--on the shelf. This trick, however, is quite beyond the reach of the amateur.
There should be an element of surprise in all transposition tricks, otherwise they are apt to fall rather flat. For instance, it is not enough to say that you are going to make a card leave the pack and fly invisibly through the air into the pocket of a man seated at the other end of the hall in which you are
performing. Say that by all means, and carry out your intentions, but do something else as well. It may be remembered that in my well-known rabbit trick I make a watch disappear from a paper cone held by a member of the audience and reappear in the pocket of another member of the audience, but then, in its invisible flight, the watch had got tied round the neck of a rabbit. A pretty transposition trick with a ring is done in this way. Borrow a ring, hold
it in the right hand, and ask a member of the audience to tie your hand up in a serviette. It will then be apparently impossible for you to make the ring pass from the right hand to the left. However, to make the trick still more difficult, you invite a member of the audience to tie your left hand up in a serviette. You then ask anyone to say to which finger of the left hand the ring shall invisibly travel; and when the serviettes have been removed the ring is seen on that particular finger.
The trick is performed with the aid of a little tape-measure, which you have sewn on to the left-hand side of your trousers in such a position that it is concealed by the coat. The measure has a spring in the centre, and after the tape is pulled out to any length it immediately flies back again when the spring is pressed. Before the performer commences this trick he pulls out the measure, passes it diagonally across the back of his waistcoat, carries it down to his right sleeve, and hooks it to his cuff. At the end of the tape is a small swivel hook. When the performer takes the ring he slips it on to this hook, using the serviette as a cover to hide the movement. Then he waits until the member of the audience is about to tie his right hand up in the serviette, and then presses the spring on the left-hand side of his trousers. The ring
immediately flies up the sleeve, and so to the measure on the left-hand side of the performer's trousers, where he can easily get possession of it before his left hand is tied up.
Next in order come those tricks in the performance of which there is an apparent defiance of natural laws. Many of these are most effective because they completely mystify the audience. A conjurer can pick up a pistol, load it with powder and a marked bullet, and have it fired at him without hurting him. One secret of this trick is to exchange a real bullet for one made of blacklead, which is then smashed up in the pistol while the performer says that he is ramming it home. The performer slips a real bullet into his mouth, and when