Modern Magic: A Practical Treatise on the Art of Conjuring

The performer palms in either hand a second florin (No. 2), and advancing to his audience, borrows from one of them a florin, first marked by the owner. (This last we will call No. 3). He invites special attention to the fact that throughout the experiment he is about to perform, the coin is never removed from their sight, and he accordingly places it (really substituting, by one or other of the changes, florin No. 2) in full view on his table. He then goes out to fetch an orange, and takes the opportunity of slipping the marked florin (No. 3) into the vacant one. He brings forward this orange publicly, and places it on his table at his right hand. (The other orange he has meanwhile placed in his secret pocket on the right side, ready for palming at a moment’s notice.) He then says, “I think, by the way, it would be as well to have two oranges. Can any gentleman oblige me with one?” No one responding, he looks about him, and presently stepping up to one of his audience, pretends to take from his hair, hat, or handkerchief this second orange (which contains, it will be remembered, florin No. 1), and places it on the left hand side of the table. He now (standing behind his table) asks into which orange, the right or the left, he shall pass the florin. As the right of the audience is his left, he is at liberty to interpret the answer in whichever way he thinks proper, and he does so in such manner as to designate the orange containing the non-marked florin, No. 1. Thus, if the audience say “the left,” he answers, “On my left? Very good!” If they choose “the right,” he says, “On your right? Very good!” Not one person in a thousand will detect the equivoque.