If children were present, they would follow Mr. Threader about, and, whenever he stopped moving, form up around him and look expectant. He would pretend not to notice them at first. Then, suddenly, he would reach out and snatch a penny out of some child’s ear. "Were you looking for this? Do take it—it is yours!" he’d say, holding it out, but before the little hand could grasp it, the penny would vanish as mysteriously as it had appeared, and be discovered a moment later in a dog’s mouth or under a stone, only to disappear again, &c., &c. He would drive the little ones into a frenzy of delight before finally bestowing a silver penny on each of them. Daniel hated himself for being so fascinated by what he knew to be the cheap jugglery of a carnival mountebank, but he could not help watching. How, he wondered, could the wealthy parents of these children entrust money—as they apparently did—to a prestidigitator ?