To put a Sixpence into each Hand, and, with Words, bring them together.
He that hath once attained to the faculty of retaining one piece of money in his right hand may show a hundred pleasant deceits by that means, and may manage two or three as well as one. Thus, you may seem to put one piece into your left hand, and, retaining it still in your right, you may, together therewith, take up another like piece, and so, with words, seem to bring both pieces together. A great variety of tricks may be shown in juggling with money.
To put a Sixpence into a Stranger’s Hand, and another into your own, and to convey both into the Stranger’s Hand with Words.
You take two sixpences evenly set together, and put the same, instead of one sixpence, into a stranger’s hand, and then, making as though you put one sixpence into your own hand, with words, you make it seem that you convey the sixpence in your own into the stranger’s hand; for, when you open your said left hand, there shall be nothing seen, and he, opening his hand, shall find two sixpences, which he thought was but one.
To show the same Feat otherwise.
To keep a sixpence between your fingers serves especially for this and such like purposes: hold your hand, and cause one to lay a sixpence upon the palm thereof, then shake the same up almost to your finger’s end, and putting your thumb upon it, you may easily, with a little practice, convey the edge betwixt the middle and fore-finger whilst you proffer to put it into your other hand (provided always that the edge appears not through the fingers, on the back side); take up another sixpence, which you may cause another stander-by to lay down, and put them both together, either closely, instead of one into a stranger’s hand, or keep them still in your own hand, and, after some words spoken, open your hands, and, there being nothing in one hand, and both pieces in the other, the beholders will wonder how they came together.
To throw a Piece of Money away, and find it again.
You may, with the middle or ring finger of the right hand, convey a sixpence into the palm, with the same hand, and, seeming to cast it away, keep it still, which, with confederacy, will seem strange: to wit, when you find it again, where another has placed the like piece. But these things cannot be done without practice; therefore. I will proceed to show how things may be brought to pass with less difficulty, and yet as strange as the rest, which, being unknown, are much commended; but, being known, are derided, and nothing at all regarded.
To make a Sixpence leap out of a Pot or to run along a Table.
A juggler takes a sixpence and throws it into a pot, or lays it on the middle of a table, and, with enchanted words, causes the same to leap out of a pot, or run towards him or from him along the table, which seems miraculous till you know how it is done, which is thus: Take a long black hair of a woman’s head, fasten it to the rim of a sixpence, by means of a little hole driven through the same with a Spanish needle. In like sort you may use a knife or any small thing; but if you would have it go from you, you must have a confederate, by which means all juggling is graced and amended.