Modern Magic: A Practical Treatise on the Art of Conjuring

You may also reveal a chosen card with very good effect in the following manner: A card having been freely drawn, open the pack in such manner that it may be placed, when returned, immediately under the long card, which, by the way, should in this instance really be a wide card, though the term “long card” applies, as already mentioned, to both kinds of card. The pack may be moderately shuffled, with very little risk of the two cards being separated, the greater width of the long card tending to shelter the card beneath it, and making it very unlikely that that card will be displaced. If after the shuffle the long card does not happen to be tolerably high up in the pack, you should cut the cards in such manner as to make it so. Holding the cards in a horizontal position, face downwards, above the table, the thumb being on one side and the fingers on the other side of the pack, you say, “Ladies and gentlemen, I am now about to drop the cards, a few at a time, in a number of little heaps upon the table, stopping when you tell me to do so. It will be equally open to you to stop me when I have made one or two heaps only, or not until I have made seven or eight, but, whenever it is, the card at the top of the heap last made will be the identical card which was just now drawn, and which has since, as you have seen, been thoroughly shuffled in the pack.” You now drop the cards, four or five at a time, on various parts of the table. When the word “stop” is pronounced you let go all the remaining cards below the long card, which, from its greater width, a very slight pressure suffices to retain. The card chosen having been next below the long card, is now at the top of the last heap. You ask the person who drew to name his card, and, touching the back of the top card with your wand, turn it over to show that it is the right one.