Later Day Tricks
A. Roterberg
Previous | Next | Contents
Invisible Journey of Two Canaries
THE performer introduces a shallow oblong glass dish, which after showing empty he covers with a sheet of paper previously shown empty from both sides. Out of another sheet of paper he next forms a cone into which he places two live canary birds. At the word of command the birds leave the cone, which is opened out and shown empty, and appear in the glass vase. As the disappearance of the birds is effected by means of a prepared cone, illustrated and described on page 21 in "The Modern Wizard," it will be unnecessary to go into details of this part of the trick.
To cause the appearance of the birds in the empty glass dish, the conjurer must provide himself with a prepared paper, which is constructed as follows: an oblong sheet of paper is folded once in the center, thus forming two halves; on the inner side of one is pasted a cloth pocket or bag, containing two canaries. This pocket is open at the end which for the time being, is closed by inserting two needles in the upper hem of the bag; fastened to each needle is a thread which is led to the corner of the paper and glued down at that place. To be able to unfold the paper and to show it from both sides, an extra layer of paper of the same size as the folded paper, is inserted between the latter, its edge being glued to the inside crease like a patent sheet in a newspaper. In opening the paper and showing it, the conjurer holds the extra sheet in place, dropping it when ready to cover the dish. For this purpose the outside of the paper is turned towards the audience, the performer at the same pulling out the needles, causing the cloth pocket to open, whereby the birds drop into the dish, which by this time is covered.
The cone is then made, the birds placed into it and made to disappear by the method known to my readers and upon removing the paper from the glass dish, the birds are found in the latter.
Previous | Next | Contents