"As I didn't know what I meant by it I couldn't answer, so I picked up my cigar and went home. Once there I tried the experiment again, and in doing so I found that not only my mouth, but my hands and face, indeed, all of my body, was proof against fire. I called on a physician, and he examined me, and reported nothing wrong with my flesh, which appeared to be in normal condition. I said nothing about it publicly, but the fact greatly surprised me, and I have invited you here to-night to witness a few experiments."
Saying this, Mr. Sothern, who had lit a cigar while pausing in his speech, turned the fire end into his mouth and sat down, smoking unconcernedly.
"I suppose you wish to give us the fire-test," remarked one of the company.
Mr. Sothern nodded.
There was probably never a gathering more dumbfounded than that present in the room. A few questions were asked, and then five gentlemen were appointed to examine Mr. Sothern's hands, etc., before he began his experiments. Having thoroughly washed the parts that he proposed to subject to the flames, Mr. Sothern began by burning his arm, and passing it through the gas-jet very slowly, twice stopping the motion and holding it still in the flames. He then picked up a poker with a sort of hook on the end, and proceeded to fish a small coil of wire from the grate. The wire came out fairly white with the heat. Mr. Sothern took the coil in his hands and cooly proceeded to wrap it round his left leg to the knee. Having done so, he stood on the table in the center of the circle and requested the committee to examine the wrappings and the leg and report if both were there. The committee did so and reported in the affirmative.
While this was going on, there was a smile, almost seraphic in its beauty, on Mr. Sothern's face.
After this an enormous hot iron, in the shape of a horseshoe, was placed on Mr. Sothern's body, where it cooled, without leaving a sign of a burn.
As a final test, a tailor's goose was put on the coals, and, after being thoroughly heated, was placed on Mr. Sothern's chair. The latter lighted a fresh cigar, and then coolly took a seat on the goose without the least seeming inconvenience. During the last experiment Mr. Sothern sang in an excellent tone and voice, "I'm Sitting on the Stile, Mary."
The question now is, were the fifteen auditors of Mr. Sothern fooled and deceived, or was this a genuine manifestation of extraordinary power? Sothern is such an inveterate joker that he may have put the thing upon the boys for his own amusement; but if so, it was one of the nicest tricks ever witnessed by yours truly,
ONE OF THE COMMITTEE.
P. S.—What is equally marvellous to me is that the fire didn't burn his clothes where it touched them, any more than his flesh. P. C.