TO BRING A PERSON DOWN UPON A FEATHER
This is a practical pun:—You desire any one to stand on a chair or table, and you tell him that notwithstanding his weight you will bring him down upon a feather. You then leave the room, and procuring a feather you give it to him, and tell him you have performed your promise, that you engaged to bring him down upon a feather, which you have done, for there is the feather, and if he looks he’ll find down upon it.
THE APPARENT IMPOSSIBILITY.
You profess yourself able to show any one what he never saw before, what you never saw, and what no one ever saw, and which after you two have seen, no one else ever shall see. After requesting the company to guess this riddle, and they have professed themselves unable to do so, produce a nut, and having cracked it, take out the kernel, and ask them if they have ever seen it before; of course they answer no; you reply, “Neither have I, and I think you will confess that nobody else has ever seen it, and now no one shall see it again;” saying which, you put the kernel into your mouth and eat it.
THE TURNED HEAD.
Let a lady be invested with as many wrappings as possible, but cloak, shawl, scarf, &c., must be put on wrong side before, so as to present the appearance of a “Turned Head.” She should be furnished with a muff, which she must hold behind her as nearly as possible in the usual manner, but her bonnet must be put on the proper way. Thus equipped she must enter the room backwards and pass around it in that manner. This can be used as a forfeit.