Magical Originalities
Ernest E. Noakes
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"A New Aerial Treasury"IN this method, I do away with the hat, and only use a small "silver" pudding-tin "from the penny bazaar." The tin is examined and thrown down upon the table. The performer commences to catch the coins, every one of which he shows, and, either openly drops into the tin, or, standing at some distance, he commands the coins to pass into the tin. When he has caught the desired number of coins, any person can pick up the tin and count the coins, to see they all have actually arrived. This effect is really "uncanny." When the performer bids a coin leave his fingers and travel across the stage and drop in the tin, not only does the coin vanish, but it is seen and heard to fall in the tin! There is one drawback to the trick (there is a weak point in most good tricks!), You must have a concealed assistant, and he must know what a "thread" is.
The "fake" is in the table. Suppose your table top is 15 inches by 10 inches, and it is attached to an upright folding stand by a flange; from the front edge about 4 inches and from the side about 6 inches you make a circular hole of, say, an inch. You now obtain a piece of steel spring about 1/2 inch wide and of the thickness of a thin playing card. To one end you fix a cork (by making a hole in the spring and placing the cork, which must be about 5/8 inch wide and a little thicker than the thickness of the table, on one side, and a small screw-eye through the hole in the spring into the cork). In the other end of the spring you make two holes side by side, and screw this underneath your table, so that the cork nicely reposes in the hole cut through the table. The table must have a cloth on. When a thread is attached to the screw-eye and led down to a screw-eye in the floor, the assistant has only to pull on the thread and suddenly release the same to cause the "hammer" to work. When a few coins are dropped into the tin, and the tin is placed over the hammer, on releasing the hammer the coin which happens to be over the hammer (inside the tin) will jump up and fall back, creating a perfect illusion of being thrown in by the performer at a distance, see drawing.
To get the correct number of coins into the tin the performer would openly place in, say, five, and the sixth coin he would keep to manipulate with, and the fake would be worked for several coins. This would give an opportunity to get a number of coins into the hand of the performer, who next time he openly places a coin in the tin would also load in the correct quantity to make up the total at finish. He would then continue to catch some and fake some, as would be arranged of course with assistant. After all the coins have been shown in the tin, the performer requests a member of the audience to select one of the coins and mark it. All the coins are shot on to the table, and yet the marked coin jumps right up and is caught in the tin by the performer, who hands the coin in the tin to be identified.
This is accomplished by having one coin held under the tin, and switching it for the marked one, which the audience see dropped into the tin with the other coins. You shake up the coins and then shoot them on to the table just in front of the hammer and you lay the selected coin over the hammer. When you give the assistant the cue, up flies the coin, and you catch it in the tin, in mid-air.
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