“The date is 1-2-2-0, one thousand two hundred and twenty of the Hegira, or Mohammedan year, which corresponds to 1805 of the Christian era.”
Salvos of applause greeted the performers at the conclusion of the scene.
Mr. Fred Hunt, Jr., who was Robert Heller’s assistant for many years, wrote the following exposé of the trick for the London Times, soon after Heller’s death:
“In the years we were together, Heller was constantly enlarging and perfecting his system. He is now gone and has solved a greater mystery than that which puzzled so many thousands while he was on earth, and I believe that his sister, Haidee Heller, and myself are the only living persons in whom Robert Heller’s second sight is vested. Heller had so simplified this system as to embrace every variety of article classified in sets; one question, with a word or two added, sufficing to elicit a correct answer for ten different articles.
“The student must be first posted in a new alphabetical arrangement, with which he must familiarize himself as thoroughly as a boy in learning his primer. This is the most difficult part of the business, but when mastered thoroughly, it comes as easy as if the question were plainly propounded.
“This alphabet is as follows:
| A | is | H |
| B | is | T |
| C | is | S |
| D | is | G |
| E | is | F |
| F | is | E |
| G | is | A |
| H | is | I |
| I | is | B |
| J | is | L |
| K | is | Pray |
| L | is | C |
| M | is | O |
| N | is | D |
| O | is | V |
| P | is | J |
| Q | is | W |
| R | is | M |
| S | is | N |
| T | is | P |
| U | is | Look |
| V | is | Y |
| W | is | R |
| X | is | See this |
| Y | is | Q |
| Z | is | Hurry. |
| Hurry up— repeat last letter. | ||
“For example, you want the initials or name in a ring. Say it is ‘Anna.’ By the alphabetical arrangement H stands for A, D for N. The explanation ‘Hurry up’ always means a repetition of the last letter, and again H will give the answer when put as follows:
“‘Here is a name? Do you see it? Hurry up. Have you got it?’
“Attention is paid only to the first letter of every sentence, and it will be perceived that the name of Anna is spelled.