The Sharper Detected and Exposed

BY ROBERT-HOUDIN.
Éclairez les dupes, il n'y aura plus de fripons.
Montesquieu.
LONDON: CHAPMAN AND HALL, 193, PICCADILLY. 1863.
LONDON: BRADBURY AND EVANS, PRINTERS, WHITEFRIARS.

Having often been requested by different magistrates, to investigate cases of sharping, I have often been struck, while doing so, with the obstacles and embarrassments which a judge's own honesty must oppose to his elucidation of matters of sharping and cheating at play.
How is it possible that he can penetrate the subtile web, with which the sharper surrounds his dupes,—how can he be able to detect the tricks of these rogues,—if he does not understand the manœuvres of sleight-of-hand?
By a singular reversal of the ordinary conditions of justice, the magistrate finds himself most powerless, when the rogue has committed the most daring, and artfully cunning, frauds.
A great portion of my life having been devoted to the study of sleight-of-hand, and having, as yet, only made use of my knowledge for the amusement of my fellow-creatures, I felt that the time had arrived, when I ought to give to the public, who had so honoured me with their favour, an unequivocal mark of my gratitude, by consecrating my leisure hours to their service.
I have therefore written this work, the moral and end of which may be summed up in this incontestable truth:
Éclairez les dupes, il n'y aura plus de fripons. Enlighten the dupes, and there will be no more knaves.