Modern Magic: A Practical Treatise on the Art of Conjuring

We may here mention a little expedient which will be found of great assistance where the performer desires to introduce into a hat a bundle of goblets (or any similar article) from either of his secret pockets. We will suppose that the article in question is in the right-hand profonde. Taking the empty hat in the opposite hand (the left), he stoops a little, and holding it down near the floor, with its mouth toward the company, gently moves it round and round in circles, gazing at it intently, as though anticipating some important result. This draws all eyes to the hat, and enables him to drop his right hand to the profonde, and bring out, under cover of the hand and wrist, the article to be introduced. Continuing the motion, he gradually brings the mouth of the hat upwards, so that the company can no longer see into it, and suddenly plunges his right hand into it, as though merely to take out the article or articles which he, in fact, thereby introduces. This may be repeated from the profonde on the opposite side; and thus two successive packets of articles may be produced without even going near the table. A DOZEN BABIES FROM A HAT.--Among the various objects available for production, may be enumerated dolls, of which a dozen, each eight or nine inches in height, may be produced from a borrowed hat. The dolls for this purpose are of coloured muslin, stretched over a framework or skeleton of spiral wire, after the fashion of the multiplying balls (see Fig. 140), and may be compressed vertically to a thickness of about three-quarters of an inch. A dozen of them may be packed within the hollow cannon-ball, described above, resuming their shape as soon as they are released.