Modern Magic: A Practical Treatise on the Art of Conjuring

The salver is generally used somewhat after the following fashion:--A little round brass box, say an inch and a half in diameter and an inch deep, is handed to the audience, with a request that they will place any small article (such as a coin, a ring, a watch-key) in it. All necessary precautions are taken to prevent the performer knowing what the articles in question are, and the box is, for still greater security on this point, wrapped by the performer in a handkerchief, and handed to one of the audience to hold. The reader, with his present knowledge of the little faith that is to be put in the acts of magicians, however apparently straightforward, will readily conjecture that at this point there is a substitution. The performer, apparently wrapping up the box which has just been handed to him, really substitutes another of similar appearance, sewn in one corner of the handkerchief. This latter, which contains two or three metal buttons, or other objects adapted to cause a rattling when shaken, is so arranged that when the lid is pushed home a piece of cork within is pressed down upon the buttons, and they are made silent; but if the lid be raised ever so little, and the box shaken, they rattle. This latter is the condition in which the box is wrapped in the handkerchief.