Modern Magic: A Practical Treatise on the Art of Conjuring

Having filled the coffer, and remarking, “Pray observe that it is quite full,” he (before removing it from the box) covers it with the lid, and then lifting it out, again places it behind the box in such manner as to go neatly over the bottom and the orange upon it. (Of course, in the act of lifting the coffer, all the contents run back again into the box.) Having now got the second orange within the coffer, and having, by a gentle pressure, again settled the bottom in its place, the performer places the coffer on a second table or a chair close in front of the audience. He then says, “I am about to order the bran with which this coffer is filled” (here he raises the lid without the false top, and the coffer therefore appears full of bran) “to pass back again into the box from which it was taken, and this orange” (here he passes behind his table, and holding up the orange, replaces it six or eight inches from the hinder edge) “to pass into the coffer in place of it. Now, first for the bran. One, two, three! Pass! Did you see it fly from the coffer into the box? You didn’t? Well, at any rate, you shall see the orange pass. I take it up so” (here he places his two hands round it, and rolls it on to the servante in manner described at page 294, coming forward with the hands together, as though still containing it, and holding them over the coffer at a few inches’ distance), “and squeeze it smaller and smaller, in this manner, till it becomes small enough to pass right into the coffer, as you see.” Here he separates his hands, showing them empty, and immediately taking off the cover with the false top, rolls out the orange, and shows that the coffer is otherwise empty.