Principles and
Deceptions
Photo by J. McDermott
ARTHUR H. BUCKLEY Past President of The Society of American Magicians, Assembly No. 3, Chicago, Illinois. Past President of The International Brotherhood of Magicians, Ring 43, Chicago, Illinois. Also life member of The Society of Indian Magicians, Bombay, India.
Ill
•r ^jCK- \e
Principles and
Deceptions By
ARTHUR
Vrinted by
BUCKLEY
T H E WILLIAMSON PRESS, INC., SPRINGFIELD,
III.
PRINCIPLES and DECEPTIONS
CONTENTS CHAPTER ONE
Page
Photograph of the Author
iii
Dedication
ix
Introduction by Theo Bamberg (Okito)
xix
Foreword by the Author
xx
The Principles of Magic
22
Manipulation
25
Substitution Duplication
"
Camouflage
26
Imitation
"
False Partition Concealed Mechanism Falsification Arrangement
27
Preparation Misdirection Concealment
28
XI
PRINCIPLES and DECEPTIONS
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE (Continued)
Page
The Entertainment Value
30
Showmanship
33
Sleight of Hand
"
Something New
34
Invention
35
Talking Acts Versus Silent Acts, and Pantomine
37
The Practice of Leaving the Stage Unattended
"
Assistants from the Audience
38
Fakes and Accessories
"
Gimacs
39
The Plot
40
Timing, Rhythm and Pace
40
Footwork
42
Presenting the Act in Public
43
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PRINCIPLES and DECEPTIONS
CONTENTS
Magic With Coins CHAPTER TWO
Page
Sleeving
47
The Muscle Pass with One Silver Dollar
48
Chinese Coin Mystery
49
A Coin, A Ring and a Handkerchief
51
The Bounce Vanish
52
The Rear of the Thumb Palm
53
The Pencil and the Silver Dollar
54
The Turnover Pass With One Coin
55
The Pinch Pass With a Single Coin
56
A Very Pretty Disappearance
"
Allan Shaw's Vanish of a Coin
57
Front and Back of Hand Transfer of a Coin
58
Three Methods of Producing a Coin
59
Downs' Palm (first method)
61
"
(second method)
62
The Vanish of a Coin From the Fold of the Pants Leg
63
Second Method . .
64
Third Method
64
xiii
PRINCIPLES and DECEPTIONS
CONTENTS Magic With Coins CHAPTER TWO (Continued)
Page
To Pass Four Coins From Hand to Hand, Through Your Head One At a Time
65
The French Drop and the Eye-glass
65
The "Roll Down" Production for Four Coins (Buckley Method) The Downs "Click Pass" Viewed from a New Angle
66
(improved)
68
An Illusive Pass (original)
69
The Click Pass and the Table
69
The Spread Vanish (Allen Shaw)
70
The Color Changing Discs (original)
70
A Fine Coin Transfer Pass (by Downs)
72
The Throw Away Vanish of Five Coins (original)
73
The Appearance of Five Coins One After Another At the Finger Tips (Allan Shaw) The Surprise Appearance of a Coin (by Ron Leonard) The Magnetic Pass With One Or Several Coins
xiv
74 76
PRINCIPLES and DECEPTIONS
CONTENTS Magic With Coins CHAPTER TWO (Continued)
Page
Silken Silver (by Frank Cruse)
77
Borrowed Money
78
John Mulholland's Slide Pass With a Single Coin
81
Another Very Effective Production of Five Coins in the Left Hand (original)
82
The Lynn Pennies (by Terry Lynn)
83
The Steal (my method)
84
Passing Several Coins Through the Table At Which You Are Seated
85
The French Drop (improved)
86
Another Original Five Coin Pass
"
The "Miser's Dream"
87
Finale To "The Miser's Dream" (by W. J. Alkinson)
89
Coin Through Handkerchief (original)
90
A Coin Vanish and Reappearance By That Clever Artiste (Carlyle)
91
The Steal (by Cardini)
92
Twenty-one Cents (by Ross Bertram)
94
Coins Pass One By One From the Left Hand to the Right Hand 96 xv
PRINCIPLES and DECEPTIONS
CONTENTS Magic With Coins CHAPTER TWO (Continued)
Page
The Transfer of a Silver Dollar From One Hand to the Other
99
John Platt's Chinese Coin on Pencil Illusion (with permission) 100 Five Silver Dollars and a Handkerchief Routine
102
An Invisible Journey (improved)
106
The Eureka Vanish (by T. Nelson Downs)
107
Production of Five Coins One By One At Fingertips and An Original Change Over
108
The Thumb Pass With a Silver Dollar
109
Split Fans and Coin Production (original)
110
A Production of Twenty-four Coins in a Series of Fans, An Original Routine (by John Brown Cook) "The Multiple Roll Out" (by John Brown Cook)
112 114
A Phantasy in Silver—A Complete Act with Coins, Fully and Carefully Explained and Illustrated 115 A Phantasy in Silver—A Complete Act as it was presented by the Author at the I.B.M. Show, Chicago, on Jan. 17, 1948. 116
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PRINCIPLES and DECEPTIONS
CONTENTS
Magic With Cards CHAPTER THREE
Page
Magic W i t h Cards
137
Foreword to Chapter Three
139
Opening F o r a Card A c t
143
A Finish for a Card A c t
145
T h e Buckley False Shuffle
146
Cards to Pocket, W i t h T e n Cards (with improvements)
148
T h e Count (original)
151
T h e False Count for More
152
My Card in Cigarette Illusion (with improvements)
153
T h e T h i r t y Cards and T w o Assistants (with improvements). . . 155 Ten and T e n
157
T h e Vanish of t h e Last T w o Cards in Presenting t h e T e n Cards to Pocket
159
Method of Double Cutting Cards
160
T h e Triple Climax (original)
161
An Amazing Card Illusion, J u s t T h i n k of a Card
164
T h e Crimp (one hand) Exchanging a Card in Passing
167 168
The Peek Location
169
The Hofzinser Force
"
The Slap Shift
170
Sighting While Fanning the Cards
171
xvii
PRINCIPLES and DECEPTIONS
CONTENTS Magic With Billiard Balls CHAPTER FOUR
Page
My Original Billiard Ball and Card Harness
174
Pointers
175
The Production of a Ball From Behind the Left Hand followed by the Take Away Vanish 176 A Ball Held in the Finger Palm Position by the Left Hand is Secretly Removed by the Right Hand in Passing
177
The Wrist Roll
178
The Production of a Ball on the Fist
179
Moving the Ball Down from the Fist Position to the First and Second Fingers The Production of a Ball Between the Middle Fingers from
180
the Palm Without Aid from the Thumb
182
The "De'Biere" Production of a Ball
184
The Ball Roll from Finger to Finger
186
The Ball Roll with Another Ball Concealed in Your Palm
188
The Knee Roll Vanish
190
The Strike Vanish
192
The Wrist Roll and Palm Off Vanish
193
Concealing a Ball Behind the Hand While Both Palms Are Shown Color Changes (first method) (second method) (third method) (fourth method) The Ball and the Handkerchief
194 196 198 200 202 204
Production of Eight Solid Balls at the Finger Tips Without a Shell
206
Concluding Remarks
218
xvni
INTRODUCTION
While cards have always been assigned first place in manipulative magic, coins and billiard balls are equally welcome for the high entertainment value of the seeming miracles they may be adapted to create. I have been privileged to study the contents of this book, and I am both pleased and astonished by the remarkable knowledge the author has displayed on the handling of his subject, which has come to pass from his forty years' professional experience in its many branches. It is with great admiration for his ability in the dual capacity of the artist and teacher that I attach my signature to these introductory remarks to herald this advancement of the art of manipulative magic. This is truly a great book on practical manipulative magic, taught in a manner that will inject new life into magic and perpetuate many masterpieces of great skill. The author has given credit to others and to the great masters, Downs and Shaw. These men were great artists in their day, and no doubt they would rank highly in the practice of their art today, but I am confident their knowledge and combined skill could not exceed the modern methods taught in these pages. I wish to compliment the author, Arthur Buckley, and recommend to you this great book. T H E O . BAMBERG (Okito)
xix
FOREWORD The practices as set forth herein and the theories of my contemporaries will often be found at variance, and sometimes in direct conflict. It is self evident that theories which are antithetical cannot both be true. Because of this, I have carefully analyzed such statements as fully and clearly as I am capable of doing before printing the things I judge to be correct. I find it to be impossible for a mind informed on the principles of magic and the inner workings of illusion to receive impressions similar to one not so informed. The reason for this is the informed person is necessarily conscious of the reality of the happening. Such a person sees these things differently than an uninformed person. The latter is often merged in the tangled bewilderment of his own imagination and the pseudo evidence offered him by the magician. When the evidence of which a spectator is conscious is subjected to the process of analytical reason, the spectator is often left more bewildered than before. This, I believe, is why some children more correctly define the workings of many illusions better than one capable of reasoning analytically. Perhaps my lasting impressions of Allan Shaw are founded on my complete ignorance of the ways and wiles of magicians. I was privileged to see this master before I was enlightened by such understanding, and to this day I still retain those first impressions—the shock of seeing the hand of Allan Shaw, with the grace and artistry of a Paderewski, pluck from the air a coin! It was amazing! How could anyone formulate, let alone believe, in such a theory that the coin was concealed within the open hand when the fingers were moved with such apparent freedom as evidence of the contrary! Shaw's quiet, easy manner was in itself a highly potent factor in disbursing the evidence that may eventually have given support to such beliefs. Those around me as I watched Shaw's performance with my intense and always growing interest were no wiser in their deductions, so I became an admiring, baffled spectator until one day I made inquiries at a large book store (Dymocks) about a treatise on the subject of coin magic, and to my pleasure and amazement I was directed to a shelf containing "Magic Stage Illusions and Scientific Diversions" by H. T. Hopkins, Sachs' "Sleight of Hand," "New Era Card Tricks," "Conjuring for Amateurs" by Ellis Stanyon, xx
"Magic by Professor Hoffman," Howard Thurston's "Card Tricks," and "Expert at the Card Table" by Erdnase, and my eyes popped at the sight of the little treasure of my dreams, "Modern Coin Manipulation" by T. Nelson Downs. If I had discovered a gold mine, which in fact I had, it could not have given me either the surprise or the happiness the purchase of this little book brought to me. It was later my constant and treasured companion in the years to follow. Within the hour I was thus initiated into the secret working of this lovable, wonderful art. I could now become a magician, or perhaps a man like Allan Shaw! A master! How many years would it take? What did it matter? Time was only relative. I would study, learn and practice. Closeted for hours alone in my room, I would practice every moment when I had the time available to do so. I recall one morning my mother, in those days an early riser, came downstairs one morning to find me practicing in front of the sideboard mirror, and exclaimed, "You are up early this morning, son." I replied, "I haven't been to bed yet, mother." I was not conscious of the passing time, so intent was I on learning to become a magician. In a commendable, though naturally an amateurish way, I copied ray idol, Allan Shaw, and dreamed of that other man in the book, T. Nelson Downs, in the far-off land of America. Only six months passed when my chance suddenly came. I was launched on a professional career as young Dante, "King of Koins." Such was my egotism and superb lack of modesty that I proclaimed myself the King, but in my heart I can now truthfully say I never felt that I was any more than a poor and inferior imitation of Shaw. Later I had the opportunity and pleasure of seeing Owen Clark present the Maskelyn and Devant show in Sydney, Australia, and when fairly dexterous (for my years and the time spent) in card manipulating, gleaned mostly from the books of Thurston and Erdnase, I became the self-crowned King, not alone of coins, but also "King of Kards." I have before me as I write the evidence of this naive guilt, a newspaper clipping relating to these early performances. Fortunately, as my knowledge of cards and dexterity grew, my self-bestowed titles were allowed to diminish to more sensible proportions. The Author.
xxi
THE PRINCIPLES OF MAGIC The principles of magic are very definite things indeed, and each and every one has a very essential application, as I shall attempt to show. Magicians, those who practice the art of magic, often do so without being aware that magic has a set of principles on which the art they practice is founded. This is undoubtedly because magic may be and is often acquired, practiced and taught without knowledge of or reference to its principles; nevertheless, the principles are present even though some may not be fully aware of them. I believe a comprehensive understanding is equipment that will not fail to recompense anyone for the study. Perhaps you may have a right to question ray authority for stating that this or that is a principle of magic, and because I am concerned with what you think, I shall try to prove ray point on a basis of logic. Music, as we are better aware, has recognized principles on which that art is founded, but it is also practiced by many without any training or knowledge of these things; that is, they cannot read music. That, to some extent, is not unlike the magician who may build an illusion and present it, often very commendably, without knowledge of the principles embraced. To ascertain each and every principle that magic is comprised of will require much care and research. I trust you will find the list I give complete. My method is to carefully search the different types of magical effects, define and enumerate the principles upon which each is founded, and by that means I hope to embrace them all. For example, I shall take a few effects that embrace principles that differ from each other. The first example: If you see a magician tie a knot in a handkerchief and later the knot disappears, what would you say was the principle embraced in this procedure? Disappearance? No, because disappearance is not a principle, but an effect. Or to put it more clearly, the principles of magic which permitted the illusion of disappearance of the knot to be effected were in fact two, falsification and manipulation, for, you know, the knot was never tied. For our second example, a lady enters a box, the box is locked, a moment later the lady makes her appearance elsewhere and the box is shown to be empty. Again the effect is disappearance and reappearance, but the principles that permitted these effects to be brought about in a magical manner were false partition and concealed mechanism, for the box in this example had an extra concealed bottom to which was attached the back, and the mechanism permitted the bottom to take the place of the back when the box was closed, and thus permitted the girl to hide behind the newly formed back, lying on the part that formed the back before the girl entered the box. Another principle besides false partition and concealed mechanism was involved because the girl, in reality hidden behind the false partition of the box, apparently walked on the stage from the wing and before the box had left our sight. This principle 22
is duplication. The girl who walked on stage sufficiently resembled the girl who disappeared to be mistakenly identified as the same one that vanished. A handkerchief disappears from a water bottle or decanter at the command "Go!", and instantly reappears in another glass-stoppered bottle held by an assistant. The principles underlying this effect are again concealed mechanism, and also manipulation, for the performer manipulated the "sleeve pull" to cause the first handkerchief to leave the first decanter by way of its neck and pass quickly up his sleeve, and the assistant released the spring pull that rapidly caused the duplicate handkerchief to be drawn through an opening in the rear side of the stoppered bottle into its interior, by the thread passed through a tiny hole in the bottom of the bottle, so in addition to the principles of concealed mechanism and manipulation, the principle of duplication is also employed. I believe we can also safely add the principle of falsification, for the bottle, held by the assistant, was falsified by having a hole cut in its side and a hole drilled in its bottom for the thread to pass through. The performer places a girl on a table, and after covering her with a sheet causes her to rise into the air off the table. The table is pushed aside, a hoop passed over the girl, and lo! at a command the girl vanishes. The sheet, under which her form could be plainly discerned, flutters empty in the air. The audience looks at the table to see if she could have been exchanged for something more easily disposed of than flesh and blood, but no, the table is far too thin and innocent for this contingency. The principles that permit this illusion to be sustained are substitution, concealed mechanism, manipulation and camouflage. Substitution of a wire form for the girl during the interval that the girl was hidden from view by the manipulation of the sheet; the secret mechanism employed to permit the form to be substituted for the girl on the table as the girl passed through the elastic trap in the table top into the table; the camouflage principle that makes a thing look thinner than it is by constructing bevels that taper to the sides from the center, decorating and making the table appear much thinner than it really is; the secret arrangement of the threads that permitted a solid hoop to be passed unmistakably and completely over the suspended form. A glass jug is seen to be full of milk. A large portion of the milk is poured into a cone made from a sheet of paper. The jug is seen three parts empty after the act of pouring is discontinued. The paper is unrolled and tossed away. It is empty; the milk seemed to vanish. The principles that permitted this to be accomplished were false partition and manipulation. The jug has a transparent celluloid partition which is cemented inside the jug to within a space of a quarter of an inch of its sides, and secured firmly to the bottom by cement. When the jug is tilted to imitate the act of pouring the milk into the paper cone, the milk runs into the celluloid container from between the space outside the container on the inside of the jug, satisfying the appearance of the milk being poured. The principles embraced by this effect are therefore imitation, false partition and manipulation. 23
A glass jug full of water, together with several empty glasses, stands on a tray. From the jug the magician pours the water, but as it reaches the glass it changes to a different colored liquid which the magician designates as wine. The principle is manipulation if the magician manipulated the chemicals in pellet form into the glasses, or preparation if he prepared the glasses with the chemicals beforehand. In presenting the chemical change as an illusion of turning water to wine, he would be depending on them being uninformed on the subject of chemical reactions. If they were so enlightened they could not concede anything unusual. There would be no phenomenon. The principles of chemistry, like those of mechanics, optics, electronics, acoustics or other sciences, are often used in magic to advantage. They cannot, however, be considered principles of magic any more than a pot of paint used to camouflage some piece of apparatus, for in such an instance the paint plays a parallel role. The principles of magic, as I will show, are: (1) Manipulation, (2) Substitution, (3) Duplication, (4) Camouflage, (5) Imitation, (6) Partition, (7) Concealed mechanism, (8) Arrangement, (9) Preparation and (10) Falsification. With these ten formidable devices I believe that all magic is accomplished. The magic itself, the illusion, is: (1) Transference, (2) Transposition, (3) Disappearance, (4) Appearance, (5) Penetration, (6) Restoration, (7) Change, (8) Levitation, (9) Suspension, (10) Elongation, Contraction, or Distortion. They are the psychological effects the magician aims to create in the minds of his audience, and should not be confused with the aforesaid principles, which are the fundamentals, the tools as it were, to create the illusion of the latter. A knowledge of the laws of Magnetism, Electricity, Electronics, Optics, Hydrostatics, Pneumatics, Hydraulics, Chemistry, Mathematics, Mechanics and Accoustics serves the magician in bringing about a state of illusion. (1) Misdirection, (2) Sustained Attention, (3) Diverted Attention, (4) Restriction, (5) Repetition, (6) Conclusion, (7) Climax, (8) Anti-Climax, (9) Mannerism, (10) Surprise, (11) Expectancy, (12) Memory, (13) Mnemonics, (14) Reconstructive Imagination, (15) Dramatics and (16) Humor are the abstract or psychological factors that aid in its accomplishment. All our senses are subject to illusion—Seeing, Hearing, Touching, Tasting and Smelling. Every mental concept is formed from the sensations received through these organs, and it is not given either to reason or innate understanding that sensations are received by other means, or that concepts can be formulated otherwise. Whenever phenomena seem apparent, it is well to reason that all things are explainable by natural laws, though the explanation may not always be within the limited comprehension or immediate understanding. 24
For example, let us suppose that ten magicians, thoroughly proficient in their art, were to witness the performance of a mentalist (as we regard this term), after being thoroughly searched and locked in a room with the magicians, read a page from any book previously selected by the said magicians and handed to his sponsor, stationed in another room apart from the mentalist. If the mentalist read or wrote down the words from the page of the book selected and also described all things accurately shown to the sponsor, would that be Telepathy, thought projection, or just a good illusion? When something is performed that cannot be immediately explained, it is no criterion for supposing it to be contrary to natural law. This illusion could be performed by the sponsor being in cahoots, and an expert telegraphist, using apparatus for sending out a wave of high amplitude of a frequency above the hearing ability of the average person, or more specifically, the said magicians. The only ability the pseudo mentalist would require is a knowledge of the Morse code and a hearing of unusual pitch, enabling him to hear about eighteen thousand cycles per second. I have met such men, but not among magicians. The pitch or frequency audible to normal hearing cuts off sharply at about eight thousand cycles per second, so another baffling phenomenon is explained by the principles of concealed mechanism. MANIPULATION Manipulation is the manner in which an object is handled to create an illusion in the mind of a spectator, or aid in its creation; i. e., to cause belief that something really occurred that did not, due in the main to the manner in which the object was handled or manipulated. There are many examples that may be cited: (1) unsuspectedly loading a glass from a secret well in the table into a hat as the hat is taken from the table; (2) cutting and restoring a turban; and of course the multitude of card, coin, ball, thimble, handkerchief, watches and cigarette routines, etc., etc. SUBSTITUTION Substitution, the second principle of magic, is sometimes dependent to an extent on manipulation, such as when connected with small objects as in the card and cigarette illusion when the prepared cigarette is secretly exchanged or substituted for the borrowed cigarette. But substitution also applies to substituting one assistant for another, exemplified by an assistant garbed in suitable costume as the performer, and under the pretense of removing a screen, or substituting a wire frame for a female assistant stretched out on the table as in "Asra," or making the top change with cards, etc. DUPLICATION Duplication, the third principle of magic, is exemplified in all illusions in which doubles are essential to the effect, and likewise in the smaller illusions such as the quarter stack or passing 25
a fan of cards through the knees where a fan of cards is really in each hand. There is an almost endless stream of examples that may be related here. CAMOUFLAGE
Camouflage, the fourth principle of magic, is the art of disguise, of making something appear different from what it really is—a table that is six inches deep to appear to have a depth of perhaps only three inches, or a box to be empty when it has a flap, or a shelf usually at an angle, with a gold or silver bar to conceal its edge, or a cabinet with a mirror which makes you believe you see the whole inside when in fact you see only half and again the same half reflected, or a sheet of glass at an angle and the lights arranged to let you see through it one moment and to see reflected light the next. Optics play an important part in camouflaging. Lot's wife, the pillar of salt, is an example. Or a half shell to represent a billiard ball. Or black art. IMITATION Imitation, the fifth principle of magic, may be exemplified by the imitation of sounds created by another source than that from which they appear to emanate, as in the bell under the glass illusion, an imitation hand that holds the blind or curtain while the real hand rings the tambourine behind it, etc., etc. FALSE PARTITION
False partition is the sixth principle of magic. All cabinets, boxes, platforms, cages, glasses and other things that have a partition secretly arranged to conceal for the purpose of effecting an exchange appearance or disappearance or transformation, or perhaps to hide some secret mechanism or contrivance that plays a useful part in an illusion. False partition and camouflage often go together, but not necessarily. CONCEALED MECHANISM
Concealed mechanism, the seventh principle, is exemplified by the clockwork pack in the rising cards, or the thread which likewise causes the spectator's cards' timely appearance, or the mechanism that causes the lady to float through space, or that which permits the coin to appear at the end of your wand, or the cigarette to appear in your cigarette holder, etc. FALSIFICATION
Falsification, the eighth principle of magic, is exemplified by things that are something else quite different from the things they appear to be, such as a bowl of goldfish with black silk around the bowl placed inside of another bowl with a hollow stem so that it looks like a bowl of ink, but appears as what it really is when the silk is suddenly pulled down the table leg. Or the pigeons 26
caught in the air, really being only feathers on springs pushed out and pulled back into the rod supporting the net as a pigeon is released to synchronize with the disappearance of the feathers. ARRANGEMENT Arrangement is the ninth principle of magic, and is exemplified in Paul Curry's card illusion, "Out of This World," wherein the red and black cards are separated from each other, or the "Cards from Four Pockets," or the Howard Thurston arrangement so often credited to Si Stebbins. Other illusions besides those with cards depend on the principle of arrangement. Arrangement must not be conflicted with preparation, for we may prepare a single thing, but to arrange there must be more than one, and it must be arranged with relation to others. Therefore, I have concluded that the tenth principle of magic is preparation. PREPARATION Preparation is exemplified in the "Card Found in the Cigarette," "Long and Short Cards," "Dollar Bill and Lemon," "Rabbit from a Hat," or a thousand and one such items. Without these fundamental principles, the pillars of illusion, there would be no magic. This may be perhaps less obvious to some magicians than others. Many may prefer to enumerate other things and consider them principles. Others may ask, "What about mental magic, mindreaders, etc." To this the answer is—all mental magic is dependent on those things that I have already defined as principles, or that is my contention and experience. You must really think, and think very deeply, to get a clear and proper understanding of these concepts, and not confuse them with the things of lesser import. For example, misdirection or concealment is a consequence, perhaps of certain types of manipulation such as palming, or it may be dependent on the principle of camouflage or the principle of false partition. It is a desirable result, a consequence of a principle, but not in itself a principle.
MISDIRECTION In "The Secrets of Conjuring" Robert Houdin tells about misdirection, and most authors who have written about magic since Houdin's day have more or less been content to pass on his teachings on this subject. In the hope of clarifying the existing confusion on this important subject, I have searched the magic literature and dictionaries without avail or agreement with those matters taught as misdirection. It does seem, to my way of thinking, to have been disturbingly misapplied to magic. Mis—meaning as a prefix, wrong. Therefore, misdirection—meaning wrongly directed. If you agree on this definition, then let us further consider in magic terminology directed attention and misdirected attention. Whether it be one person's thoughts or many is of no consequence for the moment. 27
If a performer by some means has directed the thoughts of his audience to the conclusion that he has done something which he has not done, he has wrongly directed them into this belief, hence, misdirection. It may be construed that all magic is misdirection; however, I disagree with this contention. We are not at this moment concerned with the technique or methods employed in misdirection, for they may be many and varied to suit the occasion, but I do propose to show that the term misdirection is wrongly applied when it embraces what is definable as diverted attention. For example, a disturbance of some kind takes place on one side of the stage so that the audience will not be cognizant of the fact that the performer left the stage for a moment. That, to my mind, is stretching misdirection beyond its normal dictionary confines without occasion or gain, for this is an example of diverting attention. Diverting attention is sufficiently important in itself not to be embraced by the term misdirection. Pickpockets and their confederates often start a fight so that they divert attention from the act of picking the pockets of the spectators, which is then more apt to succeed. Magicians have many subtle means at their command for diverting attention at a crucial moment from the procedure under observation. Surprise is one method that is sure to succeed in diverting attention, whether it be occasioned by the sudden appearance of a ball, card, thimble or rabbit. This newly found interest on the part of his audience provides the performer with the needed second or two of diverted attention while he secures the next load. Woe betide the performer who attempts to secure the required load without having first diverted attention from the place of procurement. The only person that will be fooled is in all probability the performer if he should attempt it, unless, of course, there is some other suitable means of coverage provided. There is one other word that is equal in importance to misdirection and diverted attention. That is sustained attention. It is useful when you have something in one hand which the audience believes is in the other, and by some simple act you are thus enabled to dispose of it under cover of picking up an object from the table, or taking something to be used from your pocket. You center the attention of your audience on your closed empty hand while you casually dispose of the object in the other. This is really sustained attention, and has nothing in common with misdirection or diverted attention, except that they are all important abstract things in the magician's art. Some writers of magic literature consider misdirection as a fundamental principle of the magician's art; with this I do not agree. Important as misdirection is, I can only consider it as a consequence, a necessary result.
CONCEALMENT By this I mean to hold in your hand an object in such a manner that its presence passes unsuspected. There are two ways in 28