[HOW MAGIC IS MADE.]
BY HENRY HATTON.
V.
About the year 1864 Carl Herrmann introduced at the old Academy of Music, New York, a trick never seen here before, which he called "The Miser." It has since become common, and, under the more prosaic title of "Catching Money in the Air," is exhibited more or less skilfully by many of the present-day conjurers. None, however, has presented it so artistically as the originator, for in his hands it was a very clever bit of melodramatic acting.
Borrowing a hat from the audience, he crept about the dimly lighted stage to the accompaniment of weird music, and with eager eyes and avaricious clutch seemingly plucked from the air half-dollars innumerable, which he deposited in the hat, until he had accumulated twenty-five or thirty.
FIG. 1.
More modern conjurers have tried to improve on Herrmann's method by using apparatus of one kind or another in the trick, but he relied exclusively on his ability to palm a coin.
As it will be necessary for my readers first to master this important element of conjuring, I shall try to teach it before explaining the other details of the trick. To palm a coin, hold it lightly between the tips of the second and third fingers and the thumb of either hand, as shown in Fig. 1. Balancing it on the finger-tips, let the thumb resume its normal position, and at the same moment let the two fingers press the coin into the hollow of the palm. See Fig. 2. Now contract the thumb so that the coin will be held by the ball on one side, and on the other by the opposite fleshy part of the hand, as in Fig. 3. Though at first it may be difficult to press the coin into the exact position, practice will soon make it easy.
