Hereward Carrington

“ The trick that is sometimes seen of changing three beans into a scorpion or a snake is simplicity itself—is so simple, in fact, as to be seldom exhibited. It is sometimes seen, however. The juggler has a box, containing two compartments. In the upper one the beans are kept, while the lower one contains the scorpion or the little snake. These compartments are separate, and either can be opened at will. The conjuror puts the three beans into the hand of one of the audience and tells him to hold them. ”

“ When the juggler runs his sword through the basket he takes special pains to run it through this unoccupied space, almost exclusively; and, by the concealed boy wriggling from place to place within the basket, the juggler is enabled to run his sword through almost every portion of it in turn, and so give the appearance of its complete emptiness. ”

“ There is a very simple, and yet a very puzzling, little trick known as the “diving duck.” The juggler places a shallow bowl upon the ground, which he proceeds to fill with water. When this is done the conjuror places a miniature artificial duck in the water, then retires from the bowl about two feet, and begins to play upon his tom-tom, etc. Soon the duck is seen to move, and very soon it dives in a very natural manner. Whenever the hand of one of the onlookers approaches the duck it dives out of sight, reappearing as soon as the hand recedes. ”

“ Presently the conjurors begin to quarrel among themselves, and at the same time others begin to play upon tom-toms, etc., making an awful noise and distracting the attention of the spectators away from the basket containing the boy. Meanwhile the conjuror has procured a large piece of cloth, and has attached one end of this strip to one of the poles—one of those nearest the onlookers. He then proceeds to attach it to each of the other four in turn, thus enclosing the basket in a roofless tent, the front side—the side nearest the audience—being enclosed last. ”

“ The conjuror can easily reach any one of these packets with his tongue, bring it to the front of the mouth, break the skin by pressing it against his teeth, and blow the sand, sugar or chalk out in a perfectly dry condition. This is repeated until all six have been exhausted, when the trick is said to be concluded. If some skeptical investigator wishes to examine the juggler’s mouth, he merely swallows the skins. The sugars or chalks were also swallowed in the first place. Hindu jugglers will frequently swallow far more disagreeable things than skins for the sake of a few rupees. ”

“ In the act of inverting the basket the first time the conjuror introduced the snake or scorpion and removed the stone—very much in the same way as Western conjurors extract and replace the cork balls in the cups-and-balls trick. The little birds are all contained in a black cloth bag; and are introduced into the basket when everyone’s attention is called to the snake or scorpion, left on the ground, after the basket is raised the first time. The conjuror introduces his hands beneath the basket and opens the cloth bag; when the little birds are free to make their escape. ”

“ In the first place, it will be noticed that it is always a mango-tree that is made to grow, and no other shrub. Now, why is this? Surely it is not because the mango is the only tree in India which is ready to the hand of the fakir, for we know that there are numerous others that might be made to grow. ”

“ So, when the conjuror has worked out all the shoot from the seed, he must perforce introduce a fresh shoot of larger proportions; and he does this in 13 the following manner: He passes on word to his assistant, by means of a secret sign, that he has reached the end of his present stock of “occult vitalizing influence”—in other words, the mango shoot—and the assistant, in passing him back the shawl or cloth this time passes him back another cloth, which he has secretly exchanged for the original one—the one the conjuror began operations with. ”

“ In another trick sometimes exhibited the reverse method may be said to be employed—since the egg or small rabbit employed jumps out of the water, at the word of command, and lands on the ground, right outside the pail. No thread or hair is used in this case, however, as might be supposed, and onlookers sometimes come right up to the pail and stand over it while the rabbit makes his marvellous leap. The juggler may be 31 any distance from the pail at the time, and even held by onlookers to prevent any action on his part. ”

“ Hodgson’s paper is his consideration of the alleged feats of levitation and the famous rope-climbing exploit, both of which are probably too well known to my readers to need describing here. The nature of the former of these phenomena is explained by its title; the second is the famous feat in which a rope is thrown into the air by the performer, where it stays—suspended by some unknown power—and gradually stiffens, allowing a small boy, the fakir’s assistant, to climb up it, and finally disappear in the clouds. ”

“ The leaf and twigs of the mango-tree are exceedingly tough and pliable, almost like leather, and can be folded or compressed into a very small space without breaking the stems and the leaves, and, when this pressure is released, the leaves will resume their former expanded condition very rapidly, without showing any traces of the folding process. The leaves can be turned upon themselves and rolled into a tight ball, in which folded condition they occupy very little space, and yet will resume their extended condition when this pressure is released. ”

“ Dr. Hodgson never witnessed the illusion, nor could he find anyone who had a first-hand account to offer him. ‘Even Colonel Olcott,’ says Dr. Hodgson, ‘a faithful servant of Mme. Blavatsky ... told me, after several years’ residence in India, he had never witnessed the rope-climbing performance.’ [6] At the same time Dr. Hodgson was willing to admit that the story might have originated because of some hypnotically induced hallucination, akin to those induced by our Western hypnotists. ”

“ The feats performed by Indian fakirs are numerous, but I shall describe those most commonly witnessed: the mango-tree trick, the basket trick, the bowl of water trick, the dry sands trick, the rope and dismembered body test, levitation, snake charming, burial alive, etc. ”

“ It is now thoroughly cooked over a hot fire until all the lard is burned away—the result being that every little grain of sand is thoroughly covered with a slight coating of grease, which is invisible to the sight and touch, and at the same time this renders the sand impervious to water. ”

“ If flowers can be made to grow under such circumstances, therefore, why not fruit upon mango-trees, grown under similar conditions, and before far less critical audiences, who have already had their critical faculties blunted, moreover, by a succession of unexplained marvels? ”

“ The cloth just employed is exchanged for the original while the eyes of the spectators are fascinated by the huge tree just exhibited to them, and when the trick is concluded this cloth is handed for examination; and, of course, no trickery is discovered in connection with it. The whole performance is a very pretty chapter in the psychology of deception. ”

“ THE ROPE TRICK.
There remains for our consideration only one other well-known feat performed by Hindu fakirs or yogis, and that is the famous “rope exploit,” before referred to. I looked up the evidence for this performance with great care when writing my Physical Phenomena of Spiritualism, contrasting the evidence for hallucination in this and kindred tests with certain of the seances with D. D. Home, to ascertain if there were any similarity between the two. ”

“ It is a well-known fact that snakes and many other animals may be hypnotised and rendered more or less cataleptic by means of passes and various manipulations. Sextus, in his Hypnotism, 40 devotes many pages to this subject. It is probable that, when a snake is stiffened out to its fullest extent, and remains stiff, it cannot be distinguished from a stick at a first casual glance. ”

“ This performance is gone through several times, until the folded mango shoot is all worked out of the seed, the growing tree being covered each time by the shawl. When the shoot is all worked out of the seed, there is a fair-sized shrub standing before you. ”

“ A good somnambule is selected who is in good physical health, and he is prepared by giving him a good dose of castor oil or rhubarb the day before the test. But little must be given the subject to eat or drink for a few hours before he is put to sleep. ”

“ Hindus are exceedingly ingenious in extracting fangs, stings, etc., and I have heard from many independent sources that snakes are never exhibited in public unless their fangs are first extracted. It may interest the reader to learn that my sister, when a little girl, took a great liking to bees, and desired to play with them. ”

“ This fact at once tends to discredit the ordinary tricks 51 exhibited, and strengthens the evidence for the phenomena that so closely resemble the occurrences witnessed in the presence of occidental mediums. It shows us, at all events, that some, and perhaps much, good may come from a close study of these wonder workers ”