St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1888-01-22
TRICKS AND CATCHES.
Easy and Simple to DO, They Ar,
Sure to Meet With Favor, n

Easy and Simple to DO, They re
Sure to Meet With Favor. h.
A good catch is good thing, notwlt
standing the restrictions Of the good
old divine to whom was prOpOunded the
question:
''If a Scuttle, a pair of tOngS aud
poker cost S377.43, what will ton of coal
come to-"
1t is said that the old gentleman puz-
Zled himself for three-quarters of an
hour over this question, and when at
last told it would come to ashes, was
quite shocked and panied, saying he
failed to see the joke. A good catch is
to ask some of the company if they
have seen the latest patent pencils,
like. If they say mo- produce pencil
and paper and request some one to
choose color. Then make pretense
of screwing the top of the pencil around,
in order to obtain the desired color, and
write on the paper the words ''in any
| color you like
Then say to the person who chose the
| color: you chose red. You remem-
Der what told you-that
this pencil will write in any
color you like You see Showing
| it.'' The catch may be made more eff
| fective if it is not ''let OUT generally at
the first test. Let the first person be
shown the writing aside. When you say
to him: you see that the pencil has
written it," he will laugh and probably
say: Eyes. that is So" This will excite
the curiosity of the remaining members
of the company, who may each, in their
turn. ''be taken in.''
A TRICK WITH CARDS.
| Take pack of cards with the corners
| n,,f off oil
/ ask person to draw card. When he
has done so, while he is looking at it,
| reverse the pack. so that when he re-
turns the card to the pack the corner
| of it will project from the rest. Let
him shuttle them. He will never OBJ
serve the projecting card. Then hold
them behind your back. You can feel
the projecting card. Draw it out and
show it. Simple as this trick is. it will
excite great establishment.
ANOTHER CLEVER CARD TRICK.
tsi Suppose you have Just finished play
ing game of authors. or some
other game with cards having
numbers printed Oh them. You
areall closely seated about the table,
7 and friend sitting opposite to you
says: 81 will select any card from this
bpack, and will wager that calling you
by name) can tell me what it is" You
put tOn surprised look, as though you
didn't know yourself how the thing is
to be done, while your confederate COM
Emences. He selects card, shows
hit 95tO all but you, places it
b back in the pack again, shuffles
the pack, and by that time you are
liable to tell the card. The manner of
doing this is very simple. 1t is by tele-
garphic communication underneath the
table. Say the number OF the card Sc
lected is SO. Your confederate presses
his foot against yours three times, then
pauseS and then presses twice. People
are the longest while. sometimes, in
finding out how this trick is done, and
while the deception lasts it is very
effective.
PLAYING DOMINOES FACE DOWN.
4 An excellent variation of the above is
playing dOminOes face down. Each
player selects the usual number OF
pieces and the game is commenced, the
dominoes being PLAYED face down.
The opponents dc not see each others
pieces, yet they play on, draw from
the pool and finish the game.
When the pieces are turned face up they
are all found to match. This is also
done by means of the telegraphic com
municatiOn of the foot, each one teIc-
graphing to the other the number OF
spots on each piece as it is played. This
calls for little test of the memory. TIC
the looker-On the final result is astonish-
| ing