Modern Magic: A Practical Treatise on the Art of Conjuring

CHAPTER IX. TRICKS WITH WATCHES. TO INDICATE ON THE DIAL OF A WATCH THE HOUR SECRETLY THOUGHT OF BY ANY OF THE COMPANY.--The performer, taking a watch in the one hand, and a pencil in the other, proposes to give a specimen of his powers of divination. For this purpose he requests any one present to write down, or, if preferred, merely to think of, any hour he pleases. This having been done, the performer, without asking any questions, proceeds to tap with the pencil different hours on the dial of the watch, requesting the person who has thought of the hour to mentally count the taps, beginning from the number of the hour he thought of. (Thus, if the hour he thought of were “nine,” he must count the first tap as “ten,” the second as “eleven,” and so on.) When, according to this mode of counting, he reaches the number “twenty,” he is to say “Stop,” when the pencil of the performer will be found resting precisely upon that hour of the dial which he thought of.