Cremer, W.H.: Magic no Mystery ©1876 John Grant, Edinburgh Hardcover, 333 Pages

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Inside page

9 Part 1: Modern Magic by Sleight of Hand and Mechanism
11 A Capital Rope Trick: Even though the hands are tied by a handkerchief with a clothes line entrapping the performer, he escapes.
12 The Little Golden Head on Three Rings: a head in a glass jumps in answer to questions, and three rings in another glass dance in sympathy
12 A Simple Bird-Scarer: how to make a glass bell to scare off birds
13 The Magic Wand and Sandalwood Sandals: a suspended wand
13 The Newspaper Mask: ripping a quick child's mask out of newspaper
14 Parachute and Dart: making a parachute in which to return the spectator's ring
15 The Wondrous Restoration: a vanished ring in lemon presentation
17 The Conjurer's Illumination: three methods for flashy lighting
17 The Coloured Flames: mixing chemicals for blue, crimson, orange, and other colored flames. I would wonder how safe these concoctions were...
19 Japanese Paper Matches: making colorful flaming matches
19 Japanese Day Fireworks: description of Japanese smoke bombs
19 Luminous Bust: making a glow in the dark ventriloquist head with phosphorus
20 The Wonderful Ascending Globes: a clever optical illusion box
22 Improved "Sphinx" Table: for the illusion of the decapitated speaking head
23 The Automaton Statue of Memnon: music comes from a statue when placed in the sun
24 The Sympathetic Execution or The Paracelsus Trick: When the shadow of a puppet is cut, the puppet's head falls off
26 The Inseparable Head: a false head is cut through with an examined knife and yet does not fall off
26 The Conjurer's Candles: preparing a candle for a restored handkerchief
27 The Telescope of Power: magician determines the contents of a box with a telescope, and when the box is opened the contents are gone
29 A Handkerchief Trick: a borrowed handkerchief is dowsed in water yet restored pressed and dry
30 The Destroyed Handkerchief Restored: a cut and restored trick
31 The Paradox of Ascension: a clever apparatus that seems to defy gravity
35 The Davenport Cabinet as Improved by Miss Fay: a spirit cabinet
35 The Gordian Knot Unloosed: Assistant is tied inside a cabinet, and yet is able to remove her coat and fling it out of the cabinet. When the cabinet is opened, she is still tied.
38 The Conjurer's Fan - A Lady's Trick: a broken and restored fan trick
40 Magic Traps for Horizontal and Perpendicular Appearances: introduction
41 The Vampire Trap: a trap through which a man can pass without trace of an opening
42 The Star Trap: for vanishing an object; briefly described
42 The Trap for Secret Appearance: for the magic table
45 Lulu's Leap Explained: how Lulu leaps 20 feet into the air
47 Catching a Cannon Ball: a dangerous stunt!
48 Professor Anderson's Magic Portfolio: many items are produced from a too-small book, including children!
50 The Conjurer's Canary: a selected egg dances to music on a cane, then is broken to show it is real. A second egg is broken to reveal a live canary, but then the canary is shown to be dead. The dead canary is placed under a glass, and then restored to life
51 The Conjurer's Orange-Tree (Robert Houdin's Invention): explanation of this fascinating machinery (do an Internet search on Robert-Houdin and Orange Tree to find some videos showing this intricate device).
52 The Conjurer's Post Office: letter vanishes and is replaced with a reply
53 The Dice of Revelation: Magician's dice match those thrown (mechanical apparatus)
56 The Impenetrable Sealed Box Trick: brief description of an escape
57 The Conjurer's Clock (Mr. Stewart): clever apparatus
58 Musical Box Mechanism: explained
59 The Mechanical Tumbler: figure in box turns without apparent cause
60 The Mechanical Leotard: automaton trapeze performer
62 The Mechanical Harlequin: similar to above
63 The Mechanical Ship: a living picture
65 The Bewitched Palanquin: a vanishing illusion for stage briefly explained

69 Part II Magic with Cards and Gamblers' Tricks Exposed
69 The Three-Card Trick: three card Monte explained briefly
70 The Trick of Thirty One: mathematical "game", method not disclosed
71 The Card That Changes to a Flower At the Word of Command: mechanical card
72 The Old Grandmother's Trick - Pug Ugly, or The Man That Told Ages: Another ruse
75 Euchre, or Youker: German origin card game
77 Pricking the Garter: trapping, or not trapping, a belt loop
78 "Dog" Loo: wager on a dog's weight
79 Dropping the Pigeon: engaging a stranger in a wager he can't win
82 The Conjurer's Card Case: cards change to bran in the card case
83 To Make a Card Which a Person Has Drawn Dance On a Wall: briefly explained
83 To Change a Card Locked Up in a Box: false bottom box
84 Gamblers' Pretended Witchcraft Exposed: Which way to tell the card you think of
86 The Forced Card Trick Exposed: one method of forcing
86 Bending, Shifting, Turning, Stealing, &c.: explained
87 The Three Jacks: jump to the top of the deck
88 The Self-Restoring Card: torn and restored with gimmicked card
90 Playing In Partnership: confederacy in card cheating
90 Playing By Signs: similar
90 Big Hands: making the mark think he has a great hand
92 Three Up: another cheating ruse
94 How to Hold Four Kings in Your Hand and by Words Alone seem to Change Them Into Four Aces and Afterwards to Make Them All Blank Cards
95 To Change a Card By Words
96 Working the Telegraph: confederate
96 Whist: Introduction
96 - Stocking: method to get desired cards
99 - Coming the Change: getting stock from lap
99 - Stocking to Change the Packs
101 Playing Three Against One
103 Deceptions Used in the Game of All-Fours
104 - Stealing Out: another All-Fours ruse
105 - Stocking
105 - Watching the Tens
106 - Turning Jacks Every Deal
106 - Changing Packs
107 The Conjurer's Card Changing From a Five to a Four: mechanical card
108 The Obedient Cards and the Wreath of Flowers
109 The Mysterious Bouquet: cards appear at end of wand

111 Part III Deceptions With Dice, Thimblerig, &c.
113 Loaded Dice: explained
113 Cogging, Now Called Securing: holding back a die
115 Despatcher: improperly marked dice
116 Scratched Dice: slightly altered dice
117 The Doctor Dice Box: a gimmicked dice box
118 Unequal Dice
119 Table With the Hollow Leg, &c.
120 Spring Table: to produce cards
121 The Pulley: another method
121 The Biters Bit: a ruse discovered, a man recovers his wages
122 The Game of Thimblerig: shell game briefly described
123 A Story In Illustration: a story of a loss to the game
125 All Fair Above Board: the game of "loo"

129 Part IV Miscellaneous Magic
131 Instrument to Imitate the Voices of Animals
131 The Musical Kaleidoscope
131 Echo Lines on an Unpopular M.P.: a poem
132 Curious Problems: a wolf and sheep riddle
132 Freezing Water In a Red-Hot Vessel: Chemical Trick
133 Practical Puzzles: drawing puzzle
133 How to Make a Magic Mirror: using "gum-water"?
134 Of Women (Jans Bifrons): poem
135 The Everlasting Soap Bubble: glycerine, water and soap
137 Sensational Piano Playing: a comedy stunt
138 A Natural Timepiece: using a cat
138 Riddle: in rhyme
138 Anagrammatical Fans: idea for reversable words
139 A Curious Love Letter
139 Curious Song of a Lover to His Sweetheart: can be read in different directions
140 Curt Letters: witty letter
140 A Pugilist's Love-Letter
141 A Grammatical Love-Letter
142 S.A. to L.N.: poem
143 Coined Words
143 Maybe You Doubt It: a sort of riddle
144 Condensed Readings: three riddles
144 How to Win a Spider Race: with real spiders
145 The Alphabet of 1800
145 The Obedient Courier: jumping stones
146 The Year of Ill-Omen: a date coincidence concerning King Louis Philippe
146 How to Cut a Hair: making a smoother cut
147 Dioramic Pictures: idea for art-work
147 Storm-Glasses: weather predictors
148 The Artful Soldiers: a puzzle with draughts
152 To Tell the Weight of an Ox by Measurement: using a measuring tape
152 Ambiguous Poem on the Ladies
154 To Tell Any One's Age: using a magical table
155 The Comic Platoon-Fire: being shot without being killed
156 Magic Balls Found in a Cannon-Ball in a Hat: one ball to many
156 To Be Invisible to the Audience, Though Unmasked and Bearing a Light
157 Wonderful Appearance of Marks Upon the Hand, Sent Through a Table: chalk transfer
158 Multiplication of Flags: production
159 The Acrobatic Feather: with quill-pens
160 The Ring Found In an Egg: borrowed ring
161 Spontaneous Growth of a Flower: apparatus
162 Robert-Houdin's Watch Trick: a watch hour matches predictions
164 The Siamese Dollar and Creese Trick: coin balances on sword blade
166 Magician's Bottles for Holding Birds, &c.: bottle needs to be smashed to get the animal
167 Card-Printing on a Handkerchief with a Pistol Shot
168 The Card Studded With Pins: pins shot at a deck results in a card with the predicted number of pins in it
168 To Stand Before a Cannon-Shot: an 1820 stunt
169 Tricks at Dominoes: some con approaches
169 Restoration of a Torn-Up Coat: with confederate
171 The Taglioni Card: rising cards
172 The Card of Revelation: a card detection method for a new deck
172 The Marvellous Lemon-Tree: cards found in lemons on a tree
175 The Magic Card-Bottle: card flies to the top of a bottle
176 Comic Magnetism: a needling practical joke
177 Writing in Snuff the Name of a Chosen Card: snuff sprinkled over paper reveals a card
178 The Celebrated Ring, Glove, Nut and Egg Trick: borrowed ring and glove end up inside the others
180 The Biter Bit: story of a wager

183 Part V Mysterious Magic
185 Illusions of Touch: with a compass on the cheek
187 The Juggler and the Painter: story of Clevermann
188 Comus's Champion Card Trick: cut to the card named
190 A Simple Coin Trick: change one coin to another
192 Curious Napoleonic Prophecy: word puzzle
192 Comicalities of Sound: a story of the Montague House Museum
194 Mysterious Revolving Disc: optical illusion
195 The Bewitched Handkerchief: cut and restored
197 A Magician's Adventure, With Explanations: Professor Gringnon and the Astonished Natives
210 Chinese Magnetic Chariots: on the invention of the compass
211 Artificial Magnets: with a needle
212 Top And Bottom Dice Trick: throwing 21
212 To Break a Stone With a Blow of a Fist: physical stunt
213 The Observant Conjurer: reading lips
214 The Magic Dutch Balls  (Courtola): mechanical ball and vase trick
216 The Elephant Trick in Siam: Story of snake, to fox, to other animals, and finally to elephant, which vanishes
217 The Physiognotype: making a plaster of your face
218 The Incomprehensible Indian Trick of Animated Dolls: story of clay figures coming to life
223 Animal Mesmerism: hypnotizing animals
225 Magical Trick With a Gaslight: doubling the light of a gas-light
226 The Magic Double Globe: stage illusion briefly described
226 A Wonderful Sleight-of-Hand Feat: a pea shooting stunt
228 The Famous Oliver's Coin Trick: coin appears in spectator's pocket
230 Magical Way to Tell the Distance of Thunder: 5 seconds per mile
231 The Mysterious Dancers: electrostatic dancers
231 Bullock's Automaton Soothsayer: described
233 To Spin India-Rubber: making a thread of rubber
233 Robert-Houdin's Automata: described
236 Tricks With Words: Anagram making
237 Tautological Tribute: poem
238 Numeral Epitaph: some old ones
238 Barnum the Showman's Trick: reversing the charges story
240 Peculiarities of the English Language: poem
241 The Undecided Question: hangman put in a dilemma
242 How to Raise a Laugh: a joke
242 Triumph of Alliteration: every syllable with an L
242 Abbreviated Business Letters: lots of abbreviated words in this letter from 1872
243 Weather Wisdom: using a leech
244 Catching the Conjurer: a coin anecdote
244 A Spiritualistic Concert: explanation of a supposed medium's session
247 Sport With Coloured Wafers: story about Chantrey
248 How the Amateur Conjurer Juggled Away a Man: story of a clever soldier
249 The Conjurer's Last Joke: his statement when sentenced to death
250 Can You Guess? Quick riddles
250 To Judge of Weights: a better method than comparing in two hands
250 Horticultural Trick: making a rose grow blue
251 Turtle Cloves: making a food animal

253 Part VI The Mystery of Magic Writing
255 The Mystery of Secret Writing: on cryptography
260 Vergennes' Wonderful Cards (J.F. Opitz): using a card system
261 The Trithemean Systems: Messages using a cypher-text substitution
264 Porta and Cypher Writing: systems described by John Baptist Porta
266 Circular Cyphers: one letter can represent several others
266 Musical Circular Cipher: another approach
267 Porta's Indecipherable Alphabet: using dots to signify position
267 Ciphers of Blaise De Vigenere
267 - The Bead Telegraph: writing aslant and using bead colors for letters
268 Lord Bacon's Ciphers: using permutations of a & b
269 The Cipher of Luneburg Selenus: unusual substitution cypher
269 Cardan's Cryptograph: card with holes punched
270 The Mnemonic Cipher (John Henry Dobel)
271 The Cipher of Mirabeau
271 Cipher in Punctuation Marks
272 Vigenere's Method: a less cumbrous means
273 Cipher Dictionary: words for words
273 The Ciphered Cipher: cypher text embedded in normal letter
275 The Slow But Sure Cipher: using a chart
277 Cipher by Books: using two identical
277 Tennysonian and Shakespearian Ciphers: variation on above
278 Cipher by a Pack of Cards
279 Decremps' Ribbom Writing: using a ribbon and a peg
280 Intermixed Cipher and Null Words
281 Hermann's Impenetrable Cipher: a cipher cracked
282 Pasigraphy: writing to others in different languages
283 Hieroglyphical Ciphers: on picture languages
284 A Curiosity in Cipher: poetical works of Lord Lacharnais
284 Variation
284 The French War Cipher: about a cipher used by France
286 Cipher in French
287 Ciphers in English: Edgar Allen Poe
293 Ciphers in Italian
293 Ciphers in Spanish
294 Ciphers in German
294 The Unravelment of Ciphers: how to solve them
297 Invisible or Sympathetic Inks: some suggestions
298 Ink to be Wetted With Water
298 Invisible Inks: 7 examples
300 Ingenious Concealment of Writing: disappearing overlay
300 Floral Ciphers: symbols

303 Part VII The Mystery of Training Animals
305 The Mystery of Training Animals
307 The Trick of Telling the Age, the Hour, &c.: horse scratching a number
309 Toby and Other Learned Pigs: stories and possible explanations
312 Dogs of Montargis and Other Canines: dog recommendations
313 The Dog of Montagris: a story
317 Training of Wild Animals
319 Trained Monkeys
322 Trained Deer
323 The Training of Birds to Sing
325 Teaching Birds to Talk
325 Taming and Trick Teaching
328 The Industrious Fleas: story of Mr. Kitchingman's flea circus
330 Trained Elephants and Other Wild Fowl

337 A List of Books Published by Chatto & Windus, Piccadilly, London