A TRICK WITH DOMINOES
Take a full set of dominoes—twenty-eight pieces—turn them face downward on the table; shuffle them thoroughly; 75 then tell the company to turn them over and match them in the ordinary way, while you take a seat at the other end of the room with your back to the table. They can blindfold you if they wish. As soon as all the pieces are matched you call out the numbers shown at the two ends of the row. Return to the table, turn the dominoes over again, shuffle them as before with the right hand; again turn your back, and call out the end numbers. You can repeat this any number of times without detection, unless some one should count the pieces and find only twenty-seven. Each time you have shuffled them you have dropped a piece concealed in your right hand, and extracted and palmed another. One piece taken from a set of dominoes invariably indicates by its numbers the numbers at the two ends of a row when the pieces are all properly matched.