“Don’t mind it, pray!” said Castelli. “I am very fond of hot dishes, so allow me to pepper and salt you in my usual fashion.”
And he began covering the unhappy man with a white powder, which, adhering to his hair, face, and clothes, soon gave him an extraordinary appearance. The stout youth, who at the beginning had tried to rival the conjurer’s gaiety, did not laugh now, and seemed earnestly to desire the end of the jest.
“Now, then!” Castelli added, rolling his eyes about ferociously, “kneel down, and hold your hands over your head. Very good, my friend: it really looks as if you had never followed any other trade than being eaten alive. Now, then, say your prayers, and I will begin. Are you ready?”
“Yes, sir,” the stout lad muttered, turning quite yellow with emotion, “I am ready.”
Castelli then took the end of the patient’s thumb in his mouth, and bit it so hard that the latter, as if working by a spring, jumped up, shouting energetically,
“Confound it, sir, take care; you hurt me!”
“What! I hurt you?” Castelli said, with perfect calmness. “What will you say, then, when I reach your head? It was really absurd of you to cry out like a baby at the first mouthful. Come, be reasonable: let me go on. I am frightfully hungry, and long for my supper.”
And Castelli, thrusting him by the shoulders, tried to make him take his first position. But the young man resisted with all his strength, as he cried, in a voice palsied with fear, “I won’t have it: I tell you I won’t have it. You hurt me too much!” At length, by a supreme effort, he escaped from his tormentor’s hands. During this time the audience, foreseeing the result of this amusing scene, had been shouting with laughter, and Castelli found some difficulty in gaining a hearing.
“Gentlemen!” he said, assuming a tone of the deepest disappointment, “you see me both surprised and vexed at the flight of that gentleman, who had not the courage to allow himself to be eaten. Now, I expect some one to take his place; for, far from shunning the performance of my promise, I feel so comfortable, that I pledge myself, after eating the first spectator who offers, to eat the second, and so on. Indeed, to prove myself worthy your applause, I promise to eat the whole roomful.”
This jest was greeted by another hearty laugh, but the farce was played out. No one came forward to be eaten, and the crowd went home to digest the trick played on them all.