clean bright articles, ending up occasionally, as I have seen, with the production of twelve large Chinese lanterns all lit!

The Chinaman is the inventor of many of the most beautiful illusions that are performed. One of the prettiest tricks imaginable is that of the production of bowls of gold fish in real water, one of Chinese origin. He has improved from ancient times as an up-to-date showman, and is a wonderful illusionist. To show what can be done in the voluminous garments of a Chinaman, on one occasion, I, in his national costume, produced a large bowl of water which took two men to carry away, then a little boy aged ten, and his younger brother aged five, ostensibly from a shawl without moving from the centre of a stage devoid of trap doors, or any furniture. It was more a feat of strength than skill at conjuring, though, as one may readily imagine, extremely effective.

The Chinaman is also a clever productionist and excels in producing flowers, lanterns and similar articles. His dexterity or sleight-of-hand is good but inferior to that of the European. He has and uses well, many extremely ingenious devices, or "fakes." One in particular has always appealed to me and is worth describing. He takes a piece of tissue paper which he either chews, or moistens somehow and rolls it into a small ball like pulp. This he places on his fan and tosses up into the air several times while it gradually assumes the shape of an egg. After some few seconds it has become a large duck's egg which he places in an egg cup on the table in full view of the audience. This little trick is very effective, easy to do, and can be purchased for half-a-crown at any magical depot in London.

I hope that I have gained my point in showing that the Chinaman is an ingenious and a neat performer. There are many other amazing tricks which were originated in China and the far East, (as the Japanese are as good, if not better than the Chinese) but this egg trick is to my mind the most symbolical of Chinese magic.

The Indian juggler or Jadoo-wallah arrives with a basket large enough to contain a man, as we will see later, a huge dilapidated bag, a voluminous dhotie or loin cloth, and possibly a snake basket or two. He is a poor man or "gareeb admi" and looks it. He starts a whine in the hope of getting an audience through sympathy. If he does not whine he assumes an air of superiority that is somewhat exasperating. At sleight-of-hand he is far below the level of the average European performer. He spoils his art by the continual diving into his bag ostentatiously to dig out the bone of a cow or an antiquated "dolly," of the rag doll type. If only he would do his little tricks away from his impedimenta in clean clothes he would add 50% to the merit of his performance though it would probably be not so entertaining to those newly arrived in India.

I have very little praise to give to the Indian conjuror as an artist, either in sleight-of-hand, in juggling, or as an illusionist. His tricks are as "old as my unpaid bills" and from time immemorial have been performed with the same monotonous patter and the irritating drone of the "bean" or so called musical instrument. I may here say that this musical torture is used to disguise movements of the showman's hand in the same way as the European uses his magic wand, an instrument that does not appeal to me at all, though at times very useful.

The articles used by the Indian conjuror are very very primitive and of indifferent manufacture. The Jadoo-wallah has remained as he was 50, 60, or 100 years ago. The old gentleman whose portrait forms the first illustration of this book told me that the tricks he does were learnt by his great grandfather from a friend in Lahore. This takes us back some 150 years. The tricks have remained the same as when taught at Lahore though my old friend has brought them up-to-date by singing "Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay" between each experiment!

The Indian conjuror has never indulged in pure sleight-of-hand to any extent, and has never improved upon any of his illusions.

He seldom has any patter worth listening to and that which he uses consists usually of "Beggie, beggie, aow" or "Beggie beggie jaow." "Bun, two, three, four, five, white, bite, fight, kite." Amusing to a casual observer but hopeless from an artists point of view.

Latterly some Indian conjurors have attempted to give in India performances on European lines. They have purchased the necessary paraphernalia from London and have as much idea of using it to its best advantage as a crocodile has of arranging the flowers on a dinner table. Our Indian Jadoo-wallah usually gets himself into a very tight fitting third or fourth hand evening dress on these occasions, to show, I presume, how European he is. The audience is more concerned with the possibility of its bursting and their having to leave the theatre for decency's sake than they are of the feats he is attempting to imitate.

His patter is excruciating and, to hide his want of skill in sleight-of-hand, he moves his hands and arms in grotesque curves, with his body so bent that it is almost impossible to see what he is trying to do. I have never yet seen any Indian give an English performance that would be tolerated on the sands at Slushton-on-Sea the seat of my ancestral home. While writing the above I have in mind one of these Indians, an impossible person, who, as Court performer to several of the Ruling Indian Princes, makes the astonishing total of Rs. 1200 or £80 a month.

The only native conjurors that I have seen who are consistently good at sleight-of-hand, (and they are Arabs or Egyptians) are the invaders of the ships at Port Said, and their one and only good point, magically, is their manipulation of those unfortunate chickens. Their "Gillie, gillie, Mrs. Langtry" is more up-to-date and an improvement upon the "Beggie, beggie, aow" of India.

It has always been a marvel to me how the Indian conjuror has gained his spurious reputation. I can only ascribe the fact to the idea that the audience start with the impression, sub-conscious though it may be—of Mahatmaism, Jadoo, or any other synonym by which Oriental Magic is designated. This allows them to watch with amazement tricks that are so simple that no English conjuror would dare to show them to his youngest child.

Without partiality I can safely assert that of the three types under discussion, the European, the Chinaman, and the Indian, the average European conjuror is the most skilled particularly at sleight-of-hand. He certainly excels in card manipulation which is seldom touched by the Oriental magician. In illusions he is beyond comparison, as many of our readers may certify who have seen the wonderful productions by Messrs. Maskelyn and Cooke, Devant, and their many followers. The gradual disappearance of a lady in evening dress, visibly, and in mid stage growing smaller and smaller until she is small enough to be put into a paper bag, which is rolled into a ball and thrown away, is an illusion that no Oriental will ever attempt to compete with. Such illusions can be seen at any time of the year at the Palace Theatre and other halls in London, in Paris and even Bombay.

There may be many who will readily disagree with my disparagement of the Indian Jadoo-wallah. I admit that Magic may have come originally from the East. The Egyptians for instance, had wonderful illusions that were freely used