To draw a cord through your nose, mouth, or head, so sensible, as it is wonderful to see.
There is another juggling knack which they call the bridle, being made of two elder sticks, through the hollowness thereof is placed a cord, the same being put on the nose like a pair of tongs or pincers, the cord which goeth round about the same being drawn to and fro, the beholders will think the cord goes through your nose, very dangerously; the knots at the end of the cord, which do stay the same from being drawn out of the stick, may not be put at the very top, for that must be stopped up, but half an inch beneath each end, and so, (I say) when it is pulled, it will seem to pass through the nose, and then you may take a knife and seem to cut the cord asunder, and pull the bridle from your nose.
To thrust a bodkin into your forehead without hurt.
Take a bodkin so made as the haft being hollow, the blade thereof may slip thereinto as soon as you hold the point upward, seem to thrust it into your forehead, and so with a little spunge in your hand, you may bring out blood or wine, making the beholders think the blood or wine (whereof you may say you have drunk very much) runneth out of your forehead; then after shewing some countenance of pain and grief, pull away your hand suddenly, holding the point downward, and it will fall so out, as it will seem never to have been thrust into the haft, but immediately thrust that bodkin into your lap or pocket, and pull out another plain bodkin like the same, saying that conceit.
How to thrust a bodkin through your tongue.
Make a bodkin, or a nail, which is all one; the blade thereof being sundered in the middle, so as the one part be not near to the other, by almost three quarters of an inch, each part being kept asunder with one small bout or crooked piece of iron, of the fashion described before, then thrust your tongue betwixt the aforesaid space, to wit, into the bout left in the bodkin blade, thrusting the said bout behind your teeth, and biting the same, it shall seem to stick so fast in, and through your tongue, that one can hardly pull it out. Also you must have another bodkin or nail, just like unto the false one, to serve to shew to the company.