Modern Magic: A Practical Treatise on the Art of Conjuring

The mechanical pieces worked by the agency of these pistons vary greatly in construction, but they are alike in one particular, viz., that they are set in motion by one or more vertical rods passing up the shaft or column on which they stand, and each terminating in a flat metal disc, or pedal, which receives the upward pressure of the piston. Fig. 280 shows the arrangement of the foot of a mechanical piece worked by one such rod only. Another specimen will have been observed in the case of the pedestal for the animated money. (See page 186.) Where three or four pedals are necessary, they are generally enclosed in a square wooden base, as in the case of the “Demon’s Head,” described at page 458. Before quitting the subject of the tables used upon the stage, we must not omit to say a few words as to what is called the “bellows” table, though it is now comparatively little used. It was formerly (say forty or fifty years ago) the fashion among conjurors to use tables with drapery hanging to within a few inches of the floor. The table being, say, two feet seven inches high, this gave room for a box-like arrangement, of two feet deep, or thereabouts, within the body of the table. In this box, which was open at the back, was hidden an assistant, who worked the pistons, managed the traps, effected necessary substitutions, etc., etc. Conjuring under such circumstances was very easy work. In 1845, however, Robert-Houdin gave his first public performance, and one of the earliest of his reforms in the magic art was the suppression of the too suggestive drapery, and the substitution of tables of light and elegant form, allowing no possible room for the concealment of an assistant. A reaction set in in favour of the new fashion, which has ever since maintained its ground. The “bellows” table combines the apparent simplicity of the undraped table with the internal capacity of the old-fashioned draped article. There is a trick, formerly very popular as the wind-up of an entertainment, which consists of the magical disappearance of a youthful assistant, male or female.