III.

Alexander Herrmann was born in Paris, February 11, 1844. Information concerning his family is somewhat meagre. His father, Samuel Herrmann, was a German Jew, a physician, who had come to France to reside, and there married a Breton lady. Sixteen children were born of this union, of whom Carl was the oldest of the eight boys and Alexander the youngest. Samuel Herrmann was an accomplished conjurer, but rarely performed in public. He gave private séances before Napoleon I, who presented him with a superb watch. This timepiece descended to Alexander, and is in possession of his widow. {222}

Carl Herrmann was born in Hanover, Germany, January 23, 1816. Despite parental opposition he became a sleight-of-hand artist, and was known as the “First Professor of Magic in the World.” In 1848 he made his first bow to the English people, at the Adelphi Theatre, London, where he produced the second-sight trick, which he copied from Houdin in France. Early in the sixties he made a tour of America, with great success. At his farewell performance in New York City, he introduced his brother Alexander as his legitimate successor. Carl then retired with a fortune to Vienna, where he spent the remainder of his days in collecting rare antiquities. His death occurred at Carlsbad, June, 1887, at the age of seventy-two. He was a great favorite with Czar Nicholas and the Sultan of Turkey and frequently performed at their palaces.

Here is one of Carl Herrmann’s German programmes:

Teplitzer Stadttheater

Dienstag den 8 Juni 1886
Zweite und letzte Gastvorstellung
des berühmten Prestidigitateur
Prof. C. Herrmann
aus Wien
unter der Direction des Herrn A. MORINI

PROGRAMM

I. Abtheilung

II. Abtheilung

1. Wo wünschen Sie es?

1. Der Sack

2. Die Billard-Kugel

2. Die Plantation

3. Das Schlangentuch

3. Die Tasche

4. Die fliegenden Gegenstände

4. Der Kegel

5. Der Banquier

5. Der Ring in Gefahr

6. Der Fischfang und das Gegenstück

6. Eine Improvisation

Alle oben ausgeführten Experimente sind Erfindungen des Herrn Prof. Herrmann und werden ohne jedweden Apparat und sonstige Hilfsmittel ausgeführt.

The following is one of Carl’s characteristic English programmes. I consider it of great interest to the profession: {223}

THEATRE ROYAL, HAY-MARKET.
Mr. B. WEBSTER, Sole Lessee and Manager, Old Brompton.

MORNING PERFORMANCES.

MATINÉES
MAGIQUE
Commencing at Two o’clock.

THE WONDER OF THE WORLD!
This Morning, Wednesday May 3rd, 1848,
And during the week,
M. Herrmann

(OF HANOVER), PREMIER PRESTIDIGITATEUR OF FRANCE, AND THE ACKNOWLEDGED FIRST PROFESSOR OF MAGIC IN THE WORLD,

Respectfully announces to the Nobility, Gentry and the Public in general that he will give

L’Album Hanoverien; The Hanoverian Album.
Les Chapeaux Diaboliques; The Diabolical Hats.
Le Coffre infernale; The Infernal Chest.
Le Vase d’Armide; ou, l’horlogerie de Geneve; Armida’s Vase; or The Geneva Clockwork.
La Multiplication des Indes; Indian Multiplication.
Les Mysteres de Paris; The Mysteries of Paris.

MAD^E. HERRMANN
Will also exhibit her extraordinary powers of
SECOND SIGHT; OR ANTI-MAGNETISM,

By divining, with Closed Eyes, any objects that may be submitted to this proof, which has astonished the most scientific.

Le Volage des Cartes; Illusions with Cards.
Le Miroir des Dames; the Lady’s Looking Glass.
LA BOUTEILLE INEPUISABLE; THE INEXHAUSTIBLE BOTTLE.
Robin le Sorcier (piece mecanique); Robin the Sorcerer.
La Poche Marveilleuse; The Marvellous Pocket.
Le Noces de Canaes; The Nuptials of Cana.
Satan et son Mouchoir; Satan and his Kerchief.
Les Colombes Sympathetiques; The Sympathetic Doves.
LE CADRAN MATHEMATICIEN; THE MATHEMATICAL CLOCK.
Le Timbre Isole (piece mecanique); The Isolated Clock Bell.
Le pain de sucre Magique; The Magic Sweetcake.
Plusieurs tours de Cartes nouveaux et de magie blanche; New Illusions with Cards and White Magic.
La naissance des Poissons rouges, execute en habit de ville; The Birth of Gold Fish; performed in an Evening Dress.

{224}

Alexander was destined by his father to the practice of medicine, but fate willed otherwise.

ADELAIDE HERRMANN.

When quite a boy, he ran away and joined Carl, acting as his assistant. He remained with his brother six years, when his parents placed him in college at Vienna. He did not complete his scholastic studies, but went to Spain in 1859 and began his career as a magician. He appeared in America in 1861, but returned a year later to Europe, and made an extended tour. He played an engagement of 1,000 consecutive nights at Egyptian Hall, London. In 1875 he married Adelaide Scarsez, a beautiful and clever danseuse, who assisted him in his soirées magiques. Herrmann became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 1876. He died of heart failure in his private car, December 11, 1896, while traveling from Rochester, N. Y., to Bradford, Penn., and was buried with Masonic honors in Woodlawn cemetery, just outside of New York City. He made and lost several fortunes. Unsuccessful theatrical speculations were largely responsible for his losses. He aspired in vain to be the manager and proprietor of a chain of theatres. He introduced the celebrated Trewey, the French fantaisiste, to the American public. Herrmann was an extraordinary linguist, a raconteur and wit. Several chivalric orders were conferred upon him by European potentates. He usually billed himself as the Chevalier Alexander Herrmann. His mephistophelean aspect, his foreign accent, and histrionic powers, coupled with his wonderful sleight of hand, made him indeed the king of conjurers. He had a wrist of steel and a palm of velvet. He performed tricks wherever he went, in the street cars, cafés, clubs, hotels, newspaper offices, and markets, imitating in this respect the renowned Bosco. These impromptu entertainments widely advertised his art. He rarely changed his repertoire, but old tricks in his hands were invested with the charm of newness. I can remember as a boy with what emotion I beheld the rising of the curtain, in his fantastic soirées, and saw him appear, in full court costume, smiling and bowing. Hey, presto! I expected every moment to see him metamorphosed into the Mephisto of Goethe’s “Faust,” habited in the traditional red costume, with red cock’s feather in his pointed cap, and clanking rapier by his side; sardonic, {225} and full of subtleties. He looked the part to perfection. He was Mephisto in evening dress. When he performed the trick of the inexhaustible bottle, which gave forth any liquor called for by the spectators, I thought of him as Mephisto in that famous drinking scene in Auerbach’s cellar, boring holes in an old table, and extracting from them various sparkling liquors as well as flames. In his nervous hands articles vanished and reappeared with surprising rapidity. Everything material, under the spell of his flexible fingers, seemed to be resolved into a fluidic state, as elusive as pellets of quicksilver. He was indeed the Alexander the Great of Magic, who had conquered all worlds with his necromancer’s wand—theatrical worlds; and he sighed because there were no more to dominate with his legerdemain. One of his posters always fascinated my boyish imagination. It was {226} night in the desert. The Sphinx loomed up majestically under the black canopy of the Egyptian sky. In front of the giant figure stood Herrmann, in the center of a magic circle of skulls and cabalistic figures. Incense from a brazier ascended and circled about the head of the Sphinx. Herrmann was depicted in the act of producing rabbits and bowls of gold fish from a shawl, while Mephisto, the guardian of the weird scene, stood near by, dressed all in red, and pointing approvingly at his disciple in the black art. In this picture were symbolized Egyptian mystery and necromancy, mediæval magic, and the sorcery of science and prestidigitation.