Magical Originalities
Ernest E. Noakes
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Cigars and Decanter TrickAN ORIGINAL trick in which neither cones, flowers, silks, cards, coins, nor balls are used, caused me to produce the following trick in which cigars and a decanter should be the "chief" movers in the plot. A box of cigars is handed for inspection and sampled.
A glass decanter is likewise subjected to an examination, and these items being of the "Caesar's wife" class, it is quite safe. The idea of the decanter is for a home for the cigars, as the performer "needs the empty box for use." The cigars are placed into the decanter one at a time "or separately," and the stopper placed in the decanter, which is then placed upon the table. The empty cigar box is used to collect several borrowed items from the audience, such as purses, keys, or handkerchiefs. When the articles are placed in the cigar box, the box is placed upon the table without being covered in any way. A serviette is thrown over the decanter, the necessary patter pattered, and the serviette whisked away, showing the decanter is full of smoke. The cigar box is now lifted up and handed to the audience, who find the cigars have returned, and from a borrowed hat or any other receptacle the loaned articles are discovered. There is one great advantage in this trick, that there is no need for an assistant.
The mechanism of course lies in the table. The table top has a square trap in it held in position by a bolt. Over this trap the square decanter is placed when it is filled with cigars. At the other side of the table is a trap, to vanish one cigar box and produce a second box with cigars in. This trap I now explain for the first time, although I made up the trick some years ago. The trap is a revolving one. It revolves on a pin running through the middle from side to side. The action to cause the revolve is the rack and pinion method, as used in a camera. One end of the pin has a small pinion-wheel fixed to it, which lies in the rack. When the rack is pulled forward, it causes the wheel to revolve the flap. On each side of the flap is a small pair of guides, arranged slightly conical; one end they are wide enough apart to permit the performer to naturally place the cigar box between the guides, but on pushing the box along, the guides clamp the bottom of the box. This "flap" has the duplicate box of cigars in position beneath, with the lid fixed down with the small nail usually found in a new box of cigars.
When the performer obtains the borrowed items in the cigar box that has been emptied, he takes good care to see that the "noisy" items are enclosed in the "quiet" ones. The box is then placed on the revolving flap and pushed home, with the nail "apparently" tapped in to keep the box closed, but the hole is large enough for the performer to pick it out again easily. The box is so placed that when the flap revolves, the box lid will open underneath the table, and acting as a shoot will quietly deposit the items in a padded shallow box ready to receive them. To cause the revolve of the flap, the performer picks up the serviette from the table, and for a moment stands in front of the table. Having likewise picked up the thread and button attached to the head of the rack, he, whilst opening and showing the serviette, pulls on the thread. Having heard the click of the safety catch, he knows that the revolve is safely accomplished, and comes forward with the serviette. At this moment the audience only see the decanter full of cigars and the box with their borrowed items in apparently just as it was placed down on the table.
The performer now proceeds to cover the decanter with the serviette and places the "box of borrowed articles" on a chair, in full view of the audience. In covering the decanter up he raises a wire shape hinged to the sides of the square trap, upon which he drapes the serviette. He now pulls on a ring attached to a cord which releases the bolt of the trap that is fixed to the table underneath, and the decanter glides down into a partition (A) on a carriage (F) ready to receive it. The next move is to pull on a small projection (C) which brings the carriage back until the duplicate (B) decanter full of smoke is registered under the trap, and by pulling on another ring (D) he causes the decanter to rise up the guide, and the piece of wood at the bottom of the guide upon which the decanter rests makes good the trap, see drawing. These moves can be made quite naturally whilst adjusting the serviette, and only take a second or two. The performer now draws back the serviette from the decanter, and in so doing the wire shape is folded down again on to the table.
As the serviette is drawn off, the load of borrowed items can be obtained from the interior of the table, and placed where desired. Showing the decanter full of smoke (which should be tobacco smoke, to be in keeping with the trick), the performer requests a number of the audience to examine it and test the smoke. The performer regrets that he has lost his cigars, but it is a lucky thing he had not yet started to experiment with anyone else's property. He goes to the cigar box, picks it up, forces up the lid, and is quite surprised to find that the borrowed items have vanished and the cigars have returned to the box. He, of course, allows all to be examined, and a cigar or two tested. Nothing now remains, but to produce from the hat or elsewhere the borrowed articles and return them to their owners.
The descending decanter glides down into the well by means of a counter-balance, just a shade lighter than the decanter when full of cigars. The most interesting point is, I think, the changing of the cigar boxes, and the revolving flap with rack and pinion is a method that could be adapted for many other exchanges. The guides into which the cigar boxes are ran need only be one-sixteenth of an inch higher and longer than the cigar box, and are best made out of "angle brass" with the perpendicular side cut or filed down. To set the guides ready for screwing on, turn the ends of them, into which the box is to be pushed, slightly outward to receive it easily.
Now place the box on the flap and screw one side guide in position. Having screwed this guide on, place a piece of thin metal, say a sixpenny piece, between the guide and the box, at the outer end. Lay the other guide firmly against the box and screw it on. Now if the sixpence is removed, the box will easily enter into the guides, and by pushing the box along an inch it becomes clamped in the guides. To release the box, pull towards you and upwards. This "trap" could be used for switching a pack of cards in the case, nest of boxes, and the like, and if the top is covered with black velvet or a complicated pattern, it is quite safe for drawing-room work.
All the tricks I have chatted about, are selected because my desire was to describe fakes and tricks that could be worked by the greatest number of the followers of the Art of Magic. My two methods of levitation, one in which the performer can walk all round and underneath the suspended person, and which I christened "Ilia," and the other method whereby the whole gear could be carried in a basket 5 feet long, and so arranged that "a child could work it" these, If ear, are not suitable far general work; neither is the illusion in which a person is placed in a box at full length, the box hoisted into the air, and box and person vanish.
This illusion was so well liked by the illusionists that they either paid me for the idea, purchased the illusion, or just "adapted it." One "illusionist" actually rung me up one Sunday morning just after the illusion had been produced at the London Hippodrome, asked me all the details and effects, and a few weeks later he "produced" it as "his latest original invention." In the original version, a table that had been on the stage throughout the show was run forward. A box, much deeper than the table and cover, was placed on the table. The person to be vanished was laid down in the box, the lid was fixed on and the box covered with a cloth. A rope from above, with hook upon it, was lowered down, and the "box, man, and cover" raised up. The table was run back out of the way, and when the pistol was fired the cover collapsed and fell, but the box and man had vanished. The sides of the box were telescopic, and when the performer pulled a lever after the covering up and the rope from above had been attached ready to hoist them up, the box and man were "servanted" into the table, the top of the box of course making good the table top. I simply describe this illusion roughly in case any of my readers care to adopt any of the wheezes and use them on a smaller scale. However, I must return to the line of description in which I commenced and intended to proceed, and in order to change the subject I shall now devote a little space to some effects with "silks."
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