A NEW boom in conjuring commenced when conjurers began to use spectacular display as an attraction. The apparatus had to be gorgeous and well polished, while plenty of brass and tin instruments piled on velvet-covered tables loaded the stage.

This sort of thing held sway until the masterly simplicity of Robert Houdin's methods took its place. One of the pioneers of this simple apparatus school was Chalon, a Frenchman who appeared at the Odéon Theatre, Paris, in 1816. He came to England in 1820 and died here in 1825. He was a very clever performer.

A German conjurer named Blitz also distinguished himself by the feat of dancing dinner-plates, his son Antonio carrying on after his father's death. It was his performance that suggested to J. N. Maskelyne how to manipulate plates.

At this time, about 1830, there seems to have been a great sameness about the performances by the different conjurers. This was broken by the introduction of the "Suspension Trick" by Heimburger, who was apparently the first to bring it from India.

Sutton, an English conjurer, appeared at the Strand Theatre in 1838. He was probably a better ventriloquist than a conjurer. He would hold a lighted candle to his lips to prove there was no breath of air or motion to be perceived.

Then came John Henry Anderson, the Wizard of the North, a Scotsman born in Kincardine. He was a veritable prince of showmen and advertisers. He yearned to be a leading actor, and it was his ambition that ruined him. He commenced by being apprenticed to Scott, one of the smaller showmen of the day, and the date of his first performance in Aberdeen was 1831 He went on and on until he arrived at Covent Garden Theatre, which he packed to the doors at one time by his showy performances, aided by clever advertising. But he could not contend with the more refined performance of Robert Houdin, who appeared at St. James's Theatre. He had a penchant for high-sounding titles; for instance, two of his tricks were entitled "The Palengenic Cauldron" and "The Silver Cups of Herculaneum".

Anderson used to tell a story of how the great Sir Walter Scott first christened him the "Wizard of the North". This story, Mr. Clarke tells us, is untrue. It would have been impossible for Sir Walter to have seen the performance as Anderson described. The story is often quoted, and here it is refuted. Nevertheless, the name of the "Wizard of the North" will always stick to Anderson.

Anderson built himself the City Theatre, Glasgow, and here his first disaster overtook him on November 18th , 1845, when the new theatre was burnt out and he was left with five pounds only to work upon. He gave a few performances in Dundee, then visited Continental cities. He was, I believe, the first British conjurer to perform in the Russian capital, where he entertained the Czar at the Winter Palace. We find him back in London in 1846 in Covent Garden Theatre. That year he gave a performance at Balmoral before Queen Victoria.

In 1848 there were three important conjuring entertainments going on in London.

Robert Houdin, the great French conjurer, was at St. James's Theatre, while Anderson was at Covent Garden, and Carl Hermann at the Haymarket.

In 1850 Anderson went to America, returning to England in 1853. Then began a series of farewell performances. Here is a verse which he printed on his posters, doubtless considered good advertising in those days.

Farewell, Aberdeen, take a wizard's adieu!
Never more he will astonish your people and you.
Never more on your walls will be posted his name,
Never more will he ask you to add to his fame.
Far away o'er the sea to the fair land of gold
He goes to seek new friends, as true as the old.

Then, casting aside all his magical might,
In retirement he will seek rest and delight;
Nor ever more come where he's now to be found,
And where for this week he'll in wonders abound.
If you fail to behold him, no words sure will tell,
The amount of your grief that you missed his farewell.

The next disaster that happened to him was the failure of the Royal British Bank, in which his savings were invested.

After another tour to Australia, the United States, and Canada, he returned to London in 1865, and appeared at St. James's Hall, Piccadilly. He used to issue the Psychomantic Reporter, which was a weekly four-sheet journal with a circulation of 100,000 copies.

Misfortune again overtook him in New York. He returned to England, where he was made bankrupt in 1866. He died at Darlington on February 3rd, 1874, in his sixtieth year, after a career of over forty years of stage life, during which he proved himself a clever showman and advertiser. He was one of the founders of the Savage Club.

The great "Wizard of the North" suffered a good deal from copyists of his name and title. A man named Eagle, and another named E. W. Young, unblushingly copied his name and bill matter.

Jacobs was another well-known conjurer of this time, and all were influenced by the magnificent art of Robert Houdin.

Jacobs died in 1870. He was credited with being the first conjurer to do the trick of changing a bowl of ink into one of clear water in which goldfish swam.

I must not forget to mention Philippe, otherwise Talon, who was a French pastrycook who came to grief in Aberdeen. He joined a theatrical company, and, having acquired a few tricks from Anderson, made his start as a performer in 1835. He later on acquired some Chinese tricks, and made a great success of the spectacle, "A Night in the Palace of Pekin".

His opening effect was to light 250 candles by a pistolshot. In the estimation of Robert Houdin, Philippe was one of the best conjurers of the day.

MacAlister was an assistant to Philippe, who annexed his tricks, also some of Döbler's, Anderson's, and Robert Houdin's "Suspension in the Air", and then went to America, where he made money with his stolen performance. He died there in 1856.

In 1849 we had Rosenfeld, a great Polish magician. He performed at Crosby Hall in the City of London. He had his programmes printed on satin, and gave a high-class entertainment, though mostly copied from those of better performers.

Ludwig Leopold Döbler (generally known as Louis Döbler was born in Vienna. When he was about thirty he arrived in England, and startled everyone with his original performance. He also started with lighting 200 candles, and he was probably the originator of the effect.

A man of the name of Smith, who was a tailor in Bristol, copied the name of Döbler and became quite a popular performer. He died in Aberdeen in 1904.

Henri Robin, a native of Holland, is said to have been the inventor of "Pepper's Ghost", shown in London in 1862. There is some doubt about this, however, as the invention is claimed by Dircks, and 300 years before an Italian philosopher put forward the principle, and was probably the true inventor. However this may be, "Pepper's Ghost" will always remain its title. It was undoubtedly one of the most successful illusions ever presented, although it is now too well known to attract attention.

Robin appeared at the Egyptian Hall in 1861, and when he left his place was taken by Wellington Young. Young's custom was to give away free tickets for his entertainments and make a collection after the performance. His tricks were quite ordinary ones.

In the summer of 1845 a new and amazing conjurer appeared in Paris, one destined to have a great influence on the progress of the art of conjuring. This was Robert Houdin, the son of a clock-maker, who was intended to go into the legal profession, and had been educated to that end. But mechanics were in his blood, and, after spending a couple of years in a solicitor's office, he set up as a clock-maker in Tours and in Blois, and, after his marriage, in Paris. He was quite young when he started learning legerdemain from Torrine. As a mechanic, he was called upon to mend several automata, and began to make some for himself, including a flowering orange-tree which bore fruit.

He attended the performances of all the conjurers who appeared in Paris, amongst which were Comte, Bosco, and Philippe, and he gradually got together a conjuring entertainment on very novel lines. He converted a suitable room on the first floor of No. 164 in the Galerie de Valois in the Palais Royal. On July 3rd, 1845, he gave his first Soirée Fantastique de Robert Houdin. He was the first to introduce a second-sight performance, with which he created a sensation. In 1846 he was invited to the Palace of St. Cloud to entertain the King of France. Here he performed a most artistic marvel.

He borrowed several handkerchiefs, which he made into a parcel, covering them with an opaque glass bell. He then asked members of the audience to write names of places where they would like the parcel transported. The King chose the orange-tree on the balcony outside. The conjurer raised the bell, the parcel was seen to be changed into a dove which bore a little key round its neck, and a messenger, digging up the orange tree, found a rusty iron casket beneath its roots. This was carried to King LouisPhilippe, who unlocked it with the key brought by the dove, and found within the parcel of handkerchiefs and a parchment, which read:

This day, 6th June, 1766, this iron box containing six handkerchiefs was placed by me, Balsamo, Count of Cagliostro, among the roots of an orange tree, to serve in performing an act of Magic.

Owing chiefly to the French Revolution, Robert Houdin came to London and was well received by English audiences. At Hertford he had a very small audience, only three spectators, but he bravely went through the whole performance as he would have done to his customary crowded house. At the finish he invited his audience to sup with him.

He was twice honoured by invitations to appear before the Queen, and for one of these occasions he invented a new trick. Having borrowed a glove from the Queen. he transformed it into a bouquet, which he placed in a vase, and, sprinkling it with water, it became a garland of flowers arranged to form the name Victoria.

After retiring to his home near Blois, he was commissioned in 1856 by the French Government to pay a professional visit to Algeria, where he greatly impressed the Arabs with his feats, particularly the light and heavy chest and the gun trick. He gave a few farewell performances at Marseilles; then he finally retired and wrote his Confidences, and other books. He died on June 13th, 1871.

Robert Houdin made a reformation in conjuring: he firmly cut out all the draped tables and gaudy apparatus of his predecessors. His stage represented a simple white and gold drawing-room of the Louis XV period. One simple centre table without cover, one shelf of necessary pieces of apparatus--nothing suspicious, and everything of good design. He invested everything he did with a new charm and a new interest. The Illustrated London News well described him as "the sole monarch of the world of wonders; all other conjurers and wizards, from whatever point of compass they arrived, sink into insignificant imitators before him".

Robert Houdin was greatly disappointed that neither of his sons was willing to don the mantle of the magician. Emile became a watchmaker, and the other son, Eugene, was killed in the Franco-German War of 1870.

From 1850 the management of the Théâtre Robert Houdin was left in the hands of his son-in-law, Hamilton, who moved the entertainment to a new venue at No. 8 Boulevard des Italiens. In 1888 the theatre was sold to George Melies, who ran it with the aid of Duperrey, Carmelli, and Legris, all clever conjurers, still using on occasions some of the old pieces of apparatus of Robert Houdin. I myself had the honour of being present at the centenary of the great master on December 6th, 1905.

Johann N. Hofzinser was a most inventive card-conjurer. In 1853 he performed in Vienna (his birthplace) at a place called Salon Hofzinser. Fischer published a volume of Hofzinser's tricks, mostly with cards, and it has since become a classic of its sort. For some years he was in Vienna's permanent Magical Theatre, built by Cratky-Baaschik, a showman-cum-conjurer, holding the same sort of position as the Egyptian Hall did in London. It was pulled down in 1911. Fischer managed it for about twelve years, and it stood, I believe, in the Prater.

Wiljalba Frikell was born in Finland, educated at Munich and successfully performed throughout Europe and India. As the result of an accident, and losing all his apparatus, Wiljalba Frikell was forced to perform a simple show by sleight-of-hand in an ordinary dress. This was so liked by the public that he stuck to the method for the rest of his life.

Frikell came to London in the latter part of 1857, and appeared as "The Wizard without Apparatus" at Hanover Square Rooms. He soon moved to St. James's Theatre, and on New Year's Day, 1858, performed before the Queen and Royal Family at Windsor Castle. The Times gave him the following notice:

Your modem Magus generally seeks to dazzle the senses by gorgeousness and glitter of his apparatus; if he borrows a sixpence for some miraculous purpose, he plunges it into a golden vase, two feet deep; he encases a cotton pocket handkerchief in a casket of silver. But when the dust thus thrown into the eyes--gold dust though it be--has settled it ceases to affect the judgment. The spectator, quietly reflecting on an evening full of prodigies, will begin to fancy that if he has a collection of vast boxes, bottles, and goblets, all armed with double bottoms, be might be able to transform a penny into a guinea-pig, or a watch into a canary bird, as well as the merlin who has operated so strongly on his organs of veneration. Now it is the peculiarity of Professor Wiljalba Frikell that he does not use any apparatus at all. His rising curtains, instead of displaying shelves filled with the magnificent gimcracks of the nineteenth century magic, reveal nothing but a table with a couple of chairs. A hat borrowed from a visitor will yield 120 silver goblets at his command, will become whole after utter demolition, without any other envelope except a sheet of the coarsest brown paper, and thus restored will deliberately float up to the ceiling and there remain fixed until it is summoned down by the voice of the professor. From a handkerchief obtained under similar circumstances plumes of ostrich feathers would arise sufficient to stuff the bed of Ware. An egg and a lemon are both exhibited without any mysterious adjuncts, and in a trice the egg is gone, to reappear when the peel is removed from the fruit as its imbedded core. In a word, Professor Frikell's tricks are none of them mechanical, but are an performed by legerdemain in the strict sense of the term.

Frikell made a great mistake and damaged his reputation by explaining in public how some of his tricks were done. He died in Dresden at the age of 87.

Adalbert Frikell, the reputed son of Wiljalba Frikell, had a brief and chequered career in London. He performed with Madame Stodare at the Egyptian Hall, doing the conjuring entertainments invented by Colonel Stodare, including "The Sphinx" and "The Indian Basket Trick".

Another famous name in conjuring was Hermann the Great, son of a Jewish doctor living in Hanover. His real name was Comparo; he was oftener called Carl. He made various appearances in London with almost a replica of Houdin's programme until 1863, when he returned to the Princess's Theatre with a changed programme. He now appeared with feats of pure dexterity, without apparatus, or, at least, visible apparatus.

In the later 'seventies London magicians heard some mysterious rumours of a man named Charlier, who appeared and disappeared in various parts of London. His forte was card tricks, but he only appeared to show them to magicians quite privately. He would knock at the door of a conjurer's house, introduce himself as Charlier, and forthwith begin to show him some card tricks.

Bertram described him as an old man between 70 and 90. He gave Bertram many hints, but would never accept anything for them--on the contrary, he brought little presents to Mrs. Bertram each time he called. He was a veritable mystery man. He died in abject poverty, according to one report, but there was a persistent rumour that he had been seen since his supposed death, and was on his way to Naples to be married.

Bertram says: "That is the last I have heard of Charlier. I have never set eyes on him since, and am still in doubt whether he died or married--a remarkable exit to a truly mysterious man."

Among the many uninvited disciples of Robert Houdin was one who was a complete mimic and who slavishly copied Houdin's tricks and advertisements. In 1851, at 21 years of age, this man, whose name was Heller (with the real name of Palmer), actually hired the Strand Theatre in London, where he attempted to duplicate Robert Houdin's programme. As the master had only just left London, and his programme was fresh in the minds of the public, Heller naturally found the giant's robe would not fit. His season in London was very short, and after a small tour, chiefly in Kent, he went off to New York, where the public had not seen Robert Houdin.

In 1852 he appeared at the Chinese Assembly Rooms there, pretending to be French, wearing a dark wig and speaking with a Parisian accent. Still he failed, and became a teacher of music. He did not altogether give up his magical ambition, and a fortunate meeting with Edward Hingston, a clever manager who ran Anderson and Artemus Ward through the States, led to the opening in New York of Heller's Salle Diabolique. This was in 1864.

Heller now appeared as himself with a good personality and a different programme. He made an enormous success, and became a celebrated entertainer in the U.S.A. In 1868 he returned to London and appeared at the Polygraphic Hall. He now made a speciality of second sight and thought transference with his assistant Haidée Heller, and worked it up to a great pitch of perfection. They made world tours until 1878, when they returned to America. He died at the early age of 48, and is reputed to have left a fortune of between £60,000 and £70,000.

The London Times gives the following description of Robert Heller when he was at his best in 1868:

Mr. Woodin's Hall in King William Street is at present occupied by Mr. Robert Heller, an American professor of legerdemain, who gives scenes, magical, musical, and humorous. These three epithets are significant to a conjurer. In the popular sense of the word, he has, indeed, few rivals. As a humorist and conjurer combined, he certainly stands alone, shunning alike the pompous air which is assumed by some of his competitors, and the extremer vanity which is affected by others. He talks in a quiet, sarcastic tone, as if intending to convince his spectators; much as he may desire them to admire his feats, he is by no means astounded at his own proficiency. His discourse abounds in jokes, good, bad, and indifferent, all provocative of laughter, but all as free from any accompaniment of laughter on the part of the joker as those of the late Artemus Ward, whom Mr. Heller seems to have taken as a model. The new American conjurer has a mechanical trick or two, including a peacock, like that exhibited by Mr. Robin, but on the whole he may be said to belong to that severe school of legerdemain in which Frikell and Hermann are masters, and to rely rather on his own manual skill than on ingeniously constructed apparatus. His tricks, too, lie out of the ordinary routine, while at the same time they derive an entirely novel character from the unpretending manner in which they are executed. His most showy exploit is the evocation of a flock of live ducks from a large tub in which two eggs have been deposited. The next in rank comes the extraction from a borrowed hat of a lady's gown, which at first, folded up, gradually assumes a bulky appearance, and at last, on being removed, discovers a damsel of no small dimensions. But those who derive their chief gratification from the combination of skill and humour will probably prefer Mr. Heller's revelation of an expedient to pay the Abyssinian war tax: pretending that the air is charged with coins, English and American, and makes a clutch with the empty hand, in which he invariably displays a dollar or a shilling, flinging every fresh acquisition into a hat, sometimes through the crown or sides, without, of course, making a hole. There is something in the performance of this feat, in this industrious realization of something out of nothing, that belongs to the spirit of true comedy.

Hartz was another clever conjurer, although he did not shine brightly as an entertainer. On the advice of Henri Hermann, a conjurer who was then, in 1858, performing at the Cremorne Gardens, he had all his apparatus made in glass, and called his entertainment "Crystal Magic". Some years afterwards he did a marvellous trick with a hat which appeared to be inexhaustible, and smothered the bare stage with its contents. He called this "The Devil of a Hat". He now began his entertainment with nothing but a small glass-topped table. It was greatly admired by conjurers, who appreciated the work, which no other performer had ever approached. But, alack, he had no stage personality. As the Americans say, "He could not get it over."

Here are a few of the things he took from a borrowed hat, standing, it should be remembered, on a bare stage: innumerable handkerchiefs, a wig, hundreds of tin cups, a dozen coloured tumblers, a dozen champagne bottles, a dozen reticules, cigar-boxes, lighted lanterns, several large birdcages, each one far larger in appearance than the hat itself, and a large sheet, which he would spread on the floor and into which he would shake out enough feathers to make a good-sized bed; then cannon-balls, and a talking baby. Leaving the hat carelessly on the glass table, he would busy himself with the already crowded and littered stage, and behold, a large skull would slowly arise, apparently unassisted, from the hat. Removing this, he would then shake hundreds, nay thousands, of cards until the stage would be covered with them.

"It was indeed an 'inexhaustible hat'!" writes Bertram in his book called Isn't it Wonderful?

"The Sphinx Illusion", invented by William Tobin, was first offered to Anderson for the sum of £80. He, however, refused it. It was then acquired by a conjurer who called himself Colonel Stodare. He performed under the name of Jack English, sometimes alone, at others accompanied by a man named Kerray. He was taken up by Mitchel, who was Anderson's manager, and, backed by him, he opened at the Egyptian Hall on April 17th, 1865. He had two new tricks--at least, new to London. These were the "Indian Basket Trick" and a production of flowers. They were not, however, performed in the Oriental fashion. Tobin took his "Sphinx" or "Talking Head", to Stodare, who immediately took it up. It was one of the greatest successes ever made in conjuring. Stodare died of consumption at the early age of 35. For a short time the entertainment at the Egyptian Hall was carried on by his widow, with the aid of Adalbert Frikell and others. When Madame Stodare left the Egyptian Hall in 1867 she was followed by Rubini. One of his novelties was the old decapitation trick, under a some-what new guise. A young lady was seated in a luxurious easy-chair covered with a shawl up to the neck. The conjurer then proceeded to cut the head off. When the shawl was taken away, a headless trunk was the gruesome occupant of the chair. Sylvester, the Fakir of Oolu, was originally a lecturer on the marvels which were produced from time to time at the Polytechnic. He acquired an aerial suspension apparatus, which he staged well, and which was a great success. This form of suspension was one that was originated in India. A lady is standing on a high stool, when there is placed under her elbows two poles about five feet in length. When she is duly entranced, the stool is removed from her feet, and leaves her suspended an the two poles. The one under her left arm was removed altogether, and she remains poised on the other pole, depending from her extended right arm. In this uncomfortable position she is dressed up to represent a variety of popular figures, being put into a different position for each one, and finally stretched out at right angles to the pole, apparently reclining in the air. Sylvester actually took the second pole away, which was an improvement on the original Indian version.

Up to 1873 the Egyptian Hall in Piccadilly had accommodated conjurers and other entertainers; also freaks, such as Tom Thumb, educated animals, etc. There were two or three different rooms for these purposes.

Soon after Sylvester's short stay, one floor was taken by Maskelyne & Cooke's entertainments. They had a rival on the lower floor, namely the famous Dr. Lynn.

Lynn gave an imitation of Maskelyne's famous box trick. Another trick he did was cutting a man to pieces. This was entitled "Palingenesia", an invention of Tobin's. Much was made out of little by Lynn. He was a clever showman. One newspaper called him the most accomplished master of the whole art of humbug! His speciality was his marvellous patter, with which he diverted the spectators. His phrase, "That's how it's done", became the "catch" saying of London.

One of Lynn's assistants became a conjurer under the name of Dexter. He was an American from Philadelphia. He left Lynn in 1879, and for some twenty years afterwards performed in England and in the Colonies, and finally became a music-hall manager.

A list of the performers of the 'seventies would not be complete without the name of D'Alvini, the Jap of Japs, who was a juggler as well as a conjurer.

Evanion had a long career, from 1850 to 1905. He had a wonderful collection of posters of magical interest.

James Taylor was a resident conjurer at the Coliseum in Regent's Park, afterwards the Polytechnic. He claims to have invented the lost watch which is found in a loaf of bread.

William S. Norris was another minor performer of the time. The son of a conjuring-trick maker, he had a little magical theatre and workshop at the Crystal Palace from 1868 to 1885, and gave short performances as often as he could get an audience. He gave about 14,000 performances in this way.

Professor Charles Field, another veteran, had a stall in the Royal Aquarium. He was born in 1835, and continued to conjure until he was 73 years of age.

Then there was De Caston, a Frenchman; a couple called the Stacey Brothers, who imitated the Davenport Brothers; and the two Duprez, one of whom appeared at the Piccadilly Hall, London, in 1888. There were Courtois, Philip Debar, and Heymann, also Nicholay--all competent performers.

Cazeneauve, born in 1839, was a great performer, and very entertaining. He had about seventy decorations given to him by different monarchs and other notabilities. He died in 1913.

Alexander Hermann, a brother of Carl, or Compars, gave performances at the Egyptian Hall; in 1873 he was there for a long season, and gave over a thousand performances. In 1875 he went to the United States, where he made an enormous success. He was a master of patter and a brilliant actor, but he was not an inventor.

After her husband's death, Madame Adelaide Hermann continued the entertainment for a time, Leon Hermann taking the part of Hermann the Great. They soon parted company, and Madame Hermann gave a charming silent act on the halls and vaudeville stage.

Hermann suffered from many imitators of his name. Amongst these was a Carl Hermann who gave entertainments in the suburbs of London in 1885, and Henri Hermann, a German performer who played at the Cremorne Gardens.

It is not generally known that Trewey was a conjurer as well as a juggler, though he was most celebrated for his shadowgraphy and chapeaugraphy. At the age of 15 he ran away from home fired with the ambition to become a conjurer. Not liking the hardships of an open-air life, he obtained an engagement at a music-hall and bought a small travelling theatre. When at last he reached Paris he was hailed by Parisian audiences as a star of the first magnitude.

Sweden sent us a conjurer named Hartwig Seeman, who also performed at the Egyptian Hall. He had a great display of apparatus, including "Sphinx", "The Gun Trick", and "Aerial Suspension", all of which he billed in New York as his own inventions.