Modern Magic: A Practical Treatise on the Art of Conjuring

The star may, in the absence of a mechanical table, be placed on the hand, the disc being pushed up by the fingers. Some stars have a moveable stud at the side of the pillar, connected with the rod within, to facilitate this mode of working the trick. THE CARD BOUQUET.--This is a trick very similar in effect to that last described, though differing a little as to the manner of the appearance of the cards. Six cards are drawn, and placed in a pistol, as in the last case. A vase (apparently of china, but really of tin, japanned), containing a handsome bouquet, is placed upon the table, and, at the instant of firing, the six cards appear ranged in a semicircle above the flowers in the bouquet. (See Fig. 285.) In this instance, the cards are attached to the branches of a sort of fan, so constructed as to open of its own accord, unless forcibly kept closed. The cards having been duly placed in position, this fan is shut, and pressed downwards through a narrow opening in the lower part of the vase, the pressure of whose sides keeps it, for the time being, closed. When pressed upwards by the action of a piston, the fan rises above the level of the flowers, and at the same time opens and exhibits the six cards. The vase is sometimes made with a second pedal, to produce a second series of six cards. In this case twelve cards are drawn; six of these first appear, and then, at the command of the performer, these six suddenly change to the other six. This is effected as follows:--The twelve cards are pasted back to back in couples. Each of the six arms which hold the cards is so arranged as to be capable of being turned half round (after the manner of the centre of the “watch target”), in which position it is retained by a catch, flying back however to its old position as soon as the catch is released. The six arms are each turned round in this manner, bringing what are naturally the hindmost cards in front. The movement of the first lever exhibits these cards; that of the second lever releases the six catches, when the arms instantly fly round and reveal the other six cards, into which those first exhibited appear to have changed.