Modern Magic: A Practical Treatise on the Art of Conjuring

The wand may also be effectively introduced in the trick of the Shower of Money, which next follows. After having caught in the ordinary manner such number of coins as he thinks fit, the performer perceives, or pretends to perceive, that the audience suspect that the coins are in some manner concealed in his right hand. To show that this is not the case, he offers to catch a few coins on the top of his wand instead of in his hand, and finishes the trick by producing two or three on the wand accordingly. Wherever you can, as in this instance, produce the same result by two wholly different methods the effect on the audience is most bewildering. Their conjectures as to the explanation of the first method being inadmissible as to the second, and vice versâ, the more they puzzle over the matter, the further are they likely to be from a correct solution. THE SHOWER OF MONEY.--The magical phenomenon known under this name surpasses the philosopher’s stone, in the pursuit of which so many of the wise men of old expended their lives and fortunes. The alchemist’s secret aimed only at producing the raw material, but the magician’s quick eye and ready hand gather from space money ready coined. Unfortunately, the experiment is subject to the same drawback as the more ancient process--viz., that each twenty shillings produced cost precisely twenty shillings, leaving hardly sufficient profit to make this form of money-making remunerative as a commercial undertaking.