pages: latestmagicbeing00hoff.pdf, 205
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latestmagicbeing00hoff.pdf | 205 | THE WIZARD'S POCKETBOOK 189 ing on the same page, their appearing under these conditions making no difference to the calculation. I am indebted to an ingenious amateur, Mr. Victor Farrelly, for the idea of a novel method of using the pocket-book. Mr. Farrelly does not offer of his own accord to show what can be done with it, but keeps it in reserve, for use in a special emergency. Every conjurer meets now and then with the pig-headed person who absolutely declines to have a given card forced upon him, and persists in endeavouring to extract one from some other part of the pack. Armed with the pocket-book, the performer can set such a person at defiance, and indeed get additional kudos from his objectionable behaviour. He cheerfully gives up the struggle, saying"You seem to think, sir, that I wish to influence your choice in some way. To prove the contrary, I give the pack into your own hands. Shuffle it well. Thank you. Now take from it any card you please. Look at it, and put it in your pocket. You are satisfied, I presume, that I do not know that card? You are quite right. I have not the smallest idea of it, but I shall discover it without the smallest difficulty by a process of mathematical magic. I have here" (producing pocket-book) "a little book of six pages, on each of which thirty-six cards are illustrated. Will you kindly see whether the card you chose is represented among those on the first page? Meanwhile I will divide the pack, which |