The herald., 1897-03-21
Produces a Bicycle From
Beneath His Cloak
ALL PARIS IS AMAZED
The Work of a Genius-Clever Conceal.
ment and Dextrous Fingers
First You Wonder at the Performance,
Then Your Own Stupidity
Startles You

Special Correspondence to The Herald.
PARIS, March 10.-Arrayed in a gown
of spotIess white, his coal black hair
covered with a snowy turban with many
folds. and Indian juggler, who calls him
self the Nawab of Jellabad. has been
startling the people of Paris nightly with
a marvellous trick and then poking fun
at them with his explanation of how
simple it is to do. Not so simple trick
perhaps to the unskillful. for it Is moth
ing less than the production of bicycle
from beneath that flowing cloak where
the greatest doubters in all the audi
ence would have sworn no bicycle could
have been concealed.
Most marvellous of all the details of
this trick, is the undoubted fact that
what the juggler does he accomplishes
unaided. His assistant or companion,
who he declares is the Rainee of Cham
paran-although the statement is con-
trary to the rite of suttee as practiced
in India. for Rainee is a queen widow
stands in the wings, if it is on a stage,
or at one side when III private house,
merely watching the performance, and
smiling at the wonder of the astonished
auditors.
There is something about this exceed
ingly clever man which makes one re-
spect him instanter Tall, with that
clear olive complexion which is charac-
teristic of the high-cast Indian, he bows
to those before him in a fashion that is
positively princely and makes one Won
der whether he is really what he claims
to be, a nawab. The true Indian nawab
is prince in all that the word i'm
! plies, if he is not in fact more of king.
The chances are, however that our
gentleman of the olive skin is a juggler
of more than usual brain who shrewd-
ly believes that the atmosphere of for
mer royalty will give him the entree
where the plain Indian juggler would
fail of an audience.
After the magnificent bow comes the
wonder. If any ore who reads this has
ever seen an Indian juggler arrayed in
all the glory of his paraphernalia he has
an idea of how preposterous the asser-
tion seems when the necromancer in
very excellent French states to the au-
dience that he proposes to cause to ap-
pear before them by magic a bicycle
complete in every detail. Not only, he
says, will he cause this bicycle to ap-
pear, but will also ride upon it, and thus
demonstrate the fact that it Is no i'm
aglnary or property" machine. 1t shall
be equipped with pneumatic tires. he
declares, in fact, just such a wheel as
the ardent cyclist loves to own.
Inasmuch as it is manifestly impos-
sible to carry a bicycle in ones pocket
or under the arm without being seen,
the onlookers puzzle their brains in
vain to discover how on earth this SEEM
ingly remarkable man is going to carry
out the promise he has made. They are
not long in discovering that he means to
perform exactly what he has promised.
Suddenly there is thrown to him by his
assistant large sheet of ordinary mus
lin folded. He unfolds this sheet In
full view, and then. bowling politely to
those who are watching him, filings it
over himself and disappears beneath the
muslin cloud.
The disappearance is. of course, only
so far as the view of the juggier unob-
secured is concerned. Beneath the mus
lin he remains, but the muslin is in plain
sight of every one and too far from any
thing to permit even the suggestion of
aid from an outside source. The cloth