Collins, A Frederick: Mirth and Mystery ©1931 Coward-McCann, Inc, NY Hardcover, no dj, 312 pages

Image courtesy eBay seller Herwoldallas

Comments: A nice book of simple magic tricks and puzzles

Contents:

ii A Word to You

1 I Fun with Your Hands
3 Fun With Your Hands
3 The Perfection of the Hand
4 Making Hand Shadowgraphs
6 The Flyaway Blackbirds
8 The Miser’s Chinking Gold
10 Here’s the Church, etc
11 Getting Rid of Your Thumb
12 The Knuckle Knocking Stunt
14 The Eleven-Finger Deception
16 An Impromptu Ventriloquial Act
17 The First and Original Megaphone
19 Telling Time with Your Hand
21 Your Hand as a Star Finder
23 A Hand-y Calendar
25 Talking with Your Hands
30 Reading Hands for Fun

35 II Fun with Paper
37 Fun With Paper
38 Fire-Resisting Paper
40 Secret Writing Methods
41 Seeing Through a Veil Darkly
43 The Elastic Paper
43 A Striking Experiment
45 A Scientific Trick
47 The Fourth Dimensional Bands
50 Experiments in Stability
51 An Airplane Glider
52 Making a Parachute
55 Hot Air Balloons

61 III Fun with Thread and String
63 Fun With Thread and String
63 Thread as a Drawing Tool
64 How to Draw a Circle
64 How to Draw a Spiral
66 How to Draw an Ellipse
66 Imitating Big Bells
68 How to Make a String Telephone
70 A Little Reminder
71 The Magnetized Cane
73 When a Knot Is Not a Knot
75 A Fourth Dimensional Knot
77 The Magically Appearing Knot
78 The Pull and Pull Again Trick
80 Modified Cats’ Cradles
81 The Spirit String Release

87 IV Fun with Cards
87 Fun With Cards
90 Making a Card Chain
92 Making a Box of Cards
93 A Couple of Card Paradoxes
93 - The Card You Can’t Blow Over
94 - The Card and Spool Paradox
96 A Pretty Card Trick
97 The Nine Card Alignment
98 The Royal Families, Including the Jacks
101 Making the Odds Even
104 La Houlette or the Rising Cards
104 - First Method
107 - Second Method

113 V Fun with Coins
115 Coins as Implements
116 The Bottle and Coin Stunt
117 Taking Away Its Support
118 The Jack-Be-Quick Coin
119 - With a Paper Ring
120 - With a High Hat
120 The Explosive Toothpicks
121 A New Way to Count Old Coins
123 How to Square the Circles
124 Bounding the Coins
125 Dividing the Pennies
126 Centering the Heads Trick
128 A Cute Little Coin Riffle
129 The Clothes Brush Catch
130 The Vanishing and Reappearing Coin
132 The Magic Match Box
133 The Coin, Glass and Hat Trick
136 A Very Obliging Coin
137 The Spiritualistic Coin

141 VI Fun with Dice
143 The Common Origin of Dice
144 Catching the Dice
145 The Dice and Barrel Puzzle
147 A Novel Pair o’ Dice
148 Mental Magic With Dice
149 The Changing Dice Spots
151 The Color Changing Die
154 The Color Transformation Die

157 VII Fun with Dominoes
159 What Dominoes Are
159 Building with Dominoes
160 A Domino Arc de Triomphe
161 The Balanced Dominoes
162 A Double Arch Experiment
164 A Domino Magic Square
166 An Interchangeable Domino Magic Square
168 A Domino Construction Problem
169 Geometry With Dominoes
171 The Transformation Domino Puzzle
172 A French-English Domino Puzzle
174 Word Making Dominoes
175 Domino Double Dealing
176 More Domino Duplicity
177 The Delphian Domino Oracle
180 Line-End Domino Divination
181 Second Sight With Dominoes

185 VIII Fun with Rings
187 Fun With Rings
188 The Ring and the Dominant Idea
192 The Ring and Egg Trick
194 The Most Obedient Ring
196 The Hong Kong Gesture
199 The Mysto Linking Rings
199 - Passing a Ring on a String
201 The Entangled Scissors
202 The Appearing and Disappearing Ring

207 IX Fun with Handkerchiefs
209 The Origin of the Handkerchief
210 The Agile Rabbit
211 The Spinning Handkerchief
213 The Self-Untying Knot
215 The Crystal Cylinder Handkerchief Vanish
217 The Ghostly Handkerchief
220 The Match That Can’t Be Broken
221 The Enchanted Handkerchief
224 Cluck! Cluck!! or the Invisible Hen

229 X Fun on a Checkerboard
231 How a Checkerboard is Made
232 A Couple of Knock-out Blows
234 Sorting the Checkers
235 Checkers in a Jam
236 An Easy One for the Kiddies
237 No Two in a Line
239 The Other Way About, or Vice Versa
240 A Pentagonal Line Layout
241 A Rectangular Line Layout
242 Changing a Hexagram Into an Equilateral Triangle
242 The Blind Abbot
245 The Funning Game of Solitaire
246 The Kangaroos Play It
248 The Cannibal King and the Missionaries
249 Second Sight With Checkers

253 XI Fun on a Chessboard
255 The Noble Game of Chess
256 The Chessboard and the Pieces
257 Tours of the Pieces
258 The Castle’s, or Rook’s, Tour
260 The King’s and Queen’s Tour
262 The Knights’ Tours
263 A Short Knight’s Tour
263 An Imperfect Knight’s Tour
264 Another Imperfect Knight’s Tour
265 A Perfect Knight's Tour
266 The Windmill Knight’s Tour
268 The Hour Glass Knight’s Tour
269 The Marble Arch Knight’s Tour
269 The Star Knight’s Tour
270 A Lazy Tongs Knight’s Tour
270 Some Chess Diversions
271 A Knight’s Tour Proverb
272 Another Knight’s Tour Proverb
273 Guarini’s Famous Chess Problem
274 Dudeney's Chess Puzzle
278 The Puzzle of the Knight’s Revolving Square
280 A Cute Little Chess Puzzle
281 An Example of Chess Arithmetic

283 XII Fun on a Billiard Table
285 What Spoofs and Straights Mean
286 A Couple of Damp Spoofs
287 Billiard Ball Magic
288 The Lung Tester
288 Braking a Spinning Ball
290 A Spoof Hand-Carom Shot
291 Hitting a Coin From Balk
292 Putting the Ball in the Hat
293 Knocking Down a Sulphur
295 A Collision Shot
295 To Pocket Three Balls in Two Shots
296 Beating Newton’s First Law
297 A Coin Experiment
298 A Billiard Ball Experiment
299 The Jumping Coin
300 To Pocket Three Balls With One Shot
302 The Game of Billiard Deck Quoits

305 Index