Hoffmann, Walter J. Juggling Tricks among the Menominee Indians. United States Bureau of Ethnology; fourteenth annual report, 1892-93. Part I, pp. 97-100.
Holden. A Wizard’s Wanderings. London, 1886.
[Hurst, Lulu]. The Revelations of Lulu Hurst, the Georgia Wonder. —. 267 pp.
Jastrow, Joseph. Psychological Notes upon Sleight-of-Hand Experts. Science, vol. iii. pp. 685-689. Reprinted in “Scientific American Supplement,” vol. xlii. p. 17488.
Professor Jastrow, at his psychological laboratory, subjected the conjurers Herrmann and Kellar to a series of careful tests to ascertain their tactile sensibility, sensitiveness to textures, accuracy of visual perception, quickness of movement, mental processes, etc. In “Science” he details the results obtained by him in his experiments, the first of the kind ever made with magicians as subjects. Read in conjunction with the highly interesting series of articles on the “Psychology of Deception,” Robert-Houdin’s memoirs and magical revelations, and Max Dessoir’s fine papers, these studies of Herrmann and Kellar are of great interest to all students of experimental psychology. There are no finer illustrations of mental and visual deception than the tricks of prestidigitateurs.
—— Psychology of Deception. Popular Science Monthly, vol. xxxiv. pp. 145-157; 721-732.
Kellar, Harry. High Caste Indian Magic. North American Review, vol. clvi. pp. 75-86.
In this entertaining paper, Kellar the conjurer describes some of the magical performances of the Hindu fakirs and Zulu wizards. They not only out-Herod Herod, but out-Haggard Rider Haggard, the prince of[543] romancers, for weirdness and improbability. The article reads as if it had been “written up” for effect, being the product of an elastic and brilliant imagination, though Kellar claims to have been an eye-witness of all the marvels he describes. Some few of them, hypnotic in character, such as the feat of “imitation death,” are unquestionably true, as witness the evidence of Sir Claude M. Wade and other eminent Anglo-Indian investigators. The magician Herrmann, who traveled over India, had but a contemptuous opinion of Hindu fakir tricks. Modern theosophists have done much to exploit the so-called miracles of Tibetan and Indian necromancers. Madame Blavatsky’s works are full of absurd stories of Oriental magic. See her “Caves and Jungles of Hindustan,” “Isis Unveiled,” etc., for example. But also see Arthur Lillie’s work, “Madame Blavatsky and her Theosophy,” London, 1897, for amusing revelations of theosophical marvels.
—— Magic among the Red Men. North American Review, vol. clviii. pp. 591-600.
Kunard, Prof. R. Book of Card Tricks for Drawing-Room and Stage. London, 1888. 8vo.