“There are very few conjurers out busking now. I don’t know above four; one of ’em has had the best chances in the world of getting on; but he’s a very uneducated man, and that has stood in his way, though he’s very clever, and pr’aps the best hand at the cups and balls of any man in England. For instance, once he was at a nobleman’s party, giving his entertainment, and he says such a thing as this:—‘You see, my lords and ladies, I have a tatur in this hand, and a tatur in that; now I shall pass ’em into this handkercher.’ Of course the nobleman said to himself, ‘Tatur! handkercher! why, who’s this feller?’ You may depend upon it he was never asked there any more; for every thing in a wizard’s business depends upon graceful action, and his style of delivery, so that he may make himself agreeable to the company.
“When a conjurer’s out busking, he may reckon upon making his 20s. a-week, taking the year round; pr’aps, some weeks, he won’t take more than 12s. or 15s.; but then, at other times, he may get 6s. or 8s. in one parlour alone, and I have taken as much as 1l. by teaching gentlemen how to do the tricks I had been performing. I have sometimes walked my twenty miles a-day, and busked at every parlour I came to, (for I never enter tap-rooms,) and come home with only 1s. 6d. in my pocket. I have been to Edmonton and back and only earned 1s., and then, pr’aps, at eleven the same night, when I was nearly done up, and quite dispirited with my luck, I’ve turned into one of the parlours in town and earned my 6s. in less than an hour, where I’d been twelve only earning one.”
STREET CONJURER PERFORMING.
The Street Fire-King, or Salamander.
This person came to me recommended by one of my street acquaintances as the “pluckiest fire-eater going,” and that as he was a little “down at heel,” he should be happy for a consideration to give me any information I might require in the “Salamander line.”
He was a tall, gaunt man, with an absent-looking face, and so pale that his dark eyes looked positively wild.
I could not help thinking, as I looked at his bony form, that fire was not the most nutritious food in the world, until the poor fellow explained to me that he had not broken his fast for two days.
He gave the following account of himself:—