Author Unknown: The Boy's Own Conjuring Book
©1860 Dick & Fitzgerald
Hardcover, 384 pages

Book Description: 17 Cm. 384 pages. Frontis illustration. blue/green cloth. Gilt title on spine, Bruce Book Warehouse Melbourne blind stamp, on endpaper, previous owners name and inscription dated 1865 on the endpaper. All contents pages are tight in the block, no foxing, this little book is really in top condition.

Comments: "Being a complete hand-book of parlour magic and containing over one thousand optical, chemical, mechanical, magnetical, and magical experiments, amusing transmutations, astonishing sleights and subtleties, celebrated card deceptions, ingenious tricks with numbers, curious and entertaining puzzles, charades, enigmas, rebuses, etc., etc., etc."

Contents (from book):

v Preface

15 Sleight Of Hand Tricks
15 The Flying Sixpence
16 Another Method
17 The Beads And Strings
17 To Get A Ring Out Of A Handkerchief
18 To Tie A Knot In A Handkerchief Which Cannot Be Drawn Tight
19 The Three Cups
20 To Tie A Handkerchief Round Your Leg, And Get It Off Without Untying The Knot
20 The Magic Bond
21 The Old Man And His Chair
22 To Tie A Knot On The Left Wrist, Without Letting The Right Hand Approach It
28 The Magic Handcuffs
28 To Pull A String Through A Button-Hole
24 The Cut String Restored
24 The Knot Loosened
25 To Put Knuts In Your Ear
25 To Crack Walnuts In Your Elbow
25 To Take Feathers Out Of An Empty Handkerchief
26 The Knotted Handkerchief
28 Houdin's Nut Trick
29 Conjuring A Ring
30 The Erratic Egg
30 The Obedient Sixpence
31 The Prisoner Released
31 Advantageous Wager
31 The Double Meaning
31 The Three Spoons
31 The Juggler's Joke
31 To Cause Wine And Water To Change Places
33 Is It Possible?
33 The Toper's Stratagem
33 The Impossible Omelet
33 New Perpetual Rotary Motion
34 The Miraculous Apple
34 An Omelet Cooked In A Hat Over The Flame Of A Candle
35 The Infallible Prophet
36 Philosophy Cheated
37 The Disappearing Sixpence
38 The Penetrative Halfpennies
40 The Die Trick
40 The Doll Trick
41 The Vanished Threepenny-Piece
42 The Restored Document
42 The Magic Rings
43 The Fish And Ink Trick
44 The Cannon Balls
44 The Sixpence In The Ball Of Cotton
45 The Egg And Bag Trick
45 The Dancing Egg
46 The Burned Handkerchief Restored
46 The Fire Eater
47 The Egg Box
47 The Globe Box
48 The Magic Funnel
49 The Magic Bottle
50 The Bottle Trick
51 The Magic Shilling
52 To Change A Sixpence To A Shilling
53 Description Of The Magician's Table
53 Wyman's Gun Trick
54 The Hatched Bird
54 The Apple And Orange Trick
56 Enchanted Coin, As Performed By Professor Wyman
56 Mysterious, Coin, Or How To Make Crown Pieces Pass Through A Wine Glass, A China Plate, A Table, And Fall Into The Hand
57 Professor Wyman's Great Trick Of The Egyptian Fluids, Or Impossibilities Accomplished
58 The Magician's Snow-Ball One Of The Faker Of Ava's Feats
59 The Magnetized Cane
59 Professor Wyman's Mode Of Performing The Egg Bag Trick

62 Tricks With Cards
62 To Make The Pass
62 To Tell A Card By Its Back
63 The Card Named Without Being Seen
63 The Card Told By The Opera Glass
65 The Four Kings
65 The Four Accomplices
66 To Tell The Card Thought Of In A Circle Of Ten
67 To Guess The Card Thought Of
68 To Tell The Number Of Cards By The Weight
68 The Card Found At The Second Guess
69 The Card Found Under The Hat
69 To Call Cards Out Of The Pack
70 Heads And Tails
70 The Surprise
70 The Revolution
70 The Slipped Card
71 The Nailed Card
71 To Ascertain The Number Of Points Of Three Unseen Cards
72 To Tell The Numbers On Two Unseen Cards
72 The Knaves And The Constable
73 The Pairs Re-Paired
74 The Queens Digging For Diamonds
74 The Triple Deal
75 The Quadruple Deal
75 The Card Discovered By The Touch Or Smell
75 The Ingenious Confederacy
76 Hold It Fast
77 The Charmed Twelve
78 The Trick Of Thirty-One
79 To Tell The Names Of The Card By The Weight
81 The Card & The Vase
82 The Metamorphosis
83 To Hold Four Kings Or Four Knaves In Your Hand, And To Change Them Suddenly Into Blank Cards, And Then To Four Aces
84 To Change A Card In A Person's Hand
84 The Card In The Egg
86 The Fifteen Thousand Livres
87 Hints To Amateurs
88 Cure For Troublesome Spectators
89 The Secret Of Ventriloquism

91 The Magic Of Chemistry
91 Sympathetic Inks
93 The Silver Tree
94 Experiments In Combustion
97 Potassium
100 Crystallization Of Metals
101 Beauties Of Crystallization
101 To Crystallize Camphor
102 Crystalized Tin
102 Crystals In Hard Water
102 Varieties Of Crystals
103 A Liquid Changed To A Solid, And Heat From Crystallization
103 Another Experiment
103 A Solid Changed To A Liquid, And Intense Cold From The Liquefaction
104 Magic Of Heat
104 Sublimation By Heat
105 Heat Passing Through Glass
105 Metals Unequally Influenced By Heat
106 Spontaneous Combustion
106 Inequality Of Heat In Fire-Irons
106 Expansion Of Metal By Heat
106 Evaporation Of A Metal
107 A Floating Metal On Fire
107 Ice Melted By Air
107 Splendid Sublimation
107 Magic Inks
108 Chameleon Liquids
108 The Magic Doves
109 Wine Changed Into Water
109 Two Colourless Transparent Liquids Become Black And Opaque
109 Two Colourless Fluids Make A Coloured One
110 Change Of Colour By Colourless Fluids
110 To Change A Blue Liquid To White
110 Veritable Black Tea
110 Restoration Of Colour By Water
111 Two Liquids Make A Solid Ill
111 Two Solids Make A Liquor
111 Two Cold Liquids Make A Hot One
112 A Solid Opaque Mass Make A Transparent One
112 Quintuple Transmutation
112 The Same Agent May Produce And Destroy Colour
113 Union Of Two Metals Without Heat
113 Magic Breath
113 Two Bitters Make A Sweet
113 Visible And Invisible
114 To Form A Liquid From Two Solids
115 The Spectral Lamp
115 Curious Change Of Colours
116 The Protean Light
116 The Chameleon Flowers
116 To Change The Colours Of Flowers
117 Changes Of The Poppy
117 To Change The Colour Of A Rose
117 Light Changing White Into Black
117 Coloured Flames
118 The Visibly Growing Acorn
119 Orange Coloured Flame
119 Emerald Green Flame
119 Instantaneous Flame
119 Proof That Flame Is Hollow
119 To Hold A Hot Tea Kettle On The Hand
120 Incombustible Linen
120 The Burning Circle
120 Water Of Different Temperatures In The Same Vessel
120 Warmth Of Different Colours
121 Substitute For Fire
121 Laughing Gas
122 Flame From Cold Metals
122 Phosphorus In Chlorine
123 Magic Vapour
123 Gas From The Union Of Metal
123 Camphor Sublimed By Flame
123 Green Flame
124 Brilliant Red Fire
124 Purple Fire
124 Silver Fine
125 The Fiery Fountain
125 Combustion Without Flame
125 Combustion Of Three Metals
125 To Make Paper Apparently Incombustible!
126 Heat Not To Be Estimated By Touch
126 Flame Upon Water
126 Rose-Coloured Flame Upon Water
127 To Set A Mixture On Fire With Water
127 Waves Of Fire On Water
127 Water From The Flame Of A Candle
127 Formation Of Water By Fire
127 Boiling Upon Cold Water
128 Currents Of Boiling Water
128 Hot Water Lighter Than Cold
128 Expansion Of Water By Cold
129 The Cup Of Tantalus
129 The Magic Whirlpool
131 Artificial Fire Balls
131 To Melt Steel As Easily As Lead
131 To Tell A Lady If She Is In Love
132 An Egg Put Into A Phial
132 To Astonish A Large Party
132 Test Papers
133 Infinite Divisibility Of Matter

135 The Magic Of Pneumatics And Aerostatics
135 "Weight Of The Air Proved By A Pair Of Bellows
135 The Pressure Of The Air Shown By A Wine-Glass
136 The Air-Pump
137 Elasticity Of The Air
137 To Prove That Air Has Weight
138 To Prove Air Elastic
138 Air In The Egg
139 The Descending Smoke
139 The Soundless Bell
139 The Floating Fish
140 The Mysterious Circles
141 The Air Balloon
142 How To Make An Air Balloon
143 How To Fill A Balloon
143 How To Make Fire Balloons
144 Parachutes
144 The Mysterious Bottle
144 Caoutcnouo Balloons

145 The Magic Of Optics And Optical Amusements
145 Light As An Effect
145 Refraction
146 The Invisible Coin Made Visible
146 The Multiplying Glass
147 The Prism
147 A Natural Camera Obscura
147 Bullock's Eye Experiment
148 The Camera Obseura
149 The Magic Lantern
149 Painting The Slides
150 To Exhibit The Magic Lantern
150 Effects Of The Magic Lantern
151 The Phantasmagoria
152 Dissolving Views
152 How To Raise A Ghost
153 The Thaumatrope
154 Construction Of The Phantasmascope
155 Curious Optical Illusions

157 Tricks In Mechanics
157 Experiment Of The Law Of Motion
157 Balancing
158 The Prancing Horse
158 To Make A Carriage Run In An Inverted Position Without Falling
159 The Balanced Stick
159 To Make A Shilling Turn On Its Edge On The Point Of A Needle
159 To Construct A Figure, Which, Being Placed Upon A Curved Surface, And Inclined In Any Position, Shall, When Left To Itself, Return To Its Former Position
160 To Cause A Cylinder To Roll By Its Own Weight Up Hill
160 The Self-Balanced Pail
161 To Lift A Bottle With A Straw
161 The Dancing Pea
162 The Toper's Tripod
162 Obliquity Of Motion
163 The Bridge Of Knives
163 Sand In The Hour-Glass
164 Resistance Of Sand

166 Tricks In Hydraulics
166 The Pump
167 The Hydraulic Dancer
167 The Water Snail, Or Archmedian Screw
168 The Syphon
168 The Bottle Ejectment
168 The Magic Of Hydrostatics With The Ancients
169 To Empty A Glass Under Water

170 The Magic Of Numbers
179 Aphorisms Of Numbers
171 Palpable Arithmetic
172 The Arithmetical Boomerang
173 Napier's Rods
174 To Find A Number Thought Of
177 To Discover Two Or More Numbers That A Person Has Thought Of
178 How Many Counters Have I In My Hand?
179 The Mysterious Halvings
182 Who Wears The Ring!
182 Probabilities
184 Variations
185 Combinations And Permutations
186 The Visitors To The Crystal Palace
187 How Many Changes Can Be Riven To Seven Notes Of A Piano
187 The Arithmetical Triangle
188 The Three Graces
190 The Fortunate Ninth
191 The Ten Tens
193 Dividing The Beer
194 The Difficult Case Of Wine
194 Another Decimation Of Fruit
195 The Wine And The Tables
195 The Three Travellers
196 Which Counter Has Been Thought Of Out Of Sixteen
197 Magic Squares
197 Odd Magic Squares
199 The Square Of Gotham
200 The Mathematical Blacksmith
200 The Industrious Frog
201 The Council Of Ten
202 The Two Travellers
203 Arithmetical L’Puzzle
203 The Money Game
204 The Philosopher's Pupils
204 To Discover A Square Number
205 The Sheep-Fold
205 Countrywoman And Eggs
205 How To Rub Twenty Chalks At Five Times Rubbing Out Every Time An Odd Number
206 The Figures Up To 100 Arranged So As To Make 505 In Each Column When Counted In The Columns Perpendicularly And The Same When Counted In Ten Files Horizontally
207 The Impossible Triangle
207 Curious Properties Of Some Figures
211 The Mathematical Fortune Teller
212 The Old Woman And Her Eggs
212 The Dice Guessed Unseen
213 The Sovereign And The Sage
213 The Certain Game
214 The Knowing Shepherd
214 The Astonished Fanner
215 Magical Century
215 The Unlucky Hatter
216 The United Digits
216 December And May
217 Odd Or Even
217 The Basket Of Nuts
218 The Two Drovers
218 The Basket And Stones
218 Subtraction
219 The Expunged Figure
219 The Mysterious Addition
220 To Tell At What Hour A Person Intends To Rise
221 To Find The Difference Between Two Numbers The Greatest Of Which Is Unknown
221 The Remainder
221 A Person Having An Equal Number Of Counters Or Pieces Of Money In Each Hand To Find How Many He Has Altogether
221 The Three Jealous Husbands
223 The False Scales
223 The Apple Woman
224 The Graces And Muses
224 The Jesuitical Teacher
224 Quaint Questions
225 The Fox Goose And Corn
225 The Unfair Division
226 A Popular Fallacy

228 Practical Paradoxes And Puzzles
228 The Chinese Cross
228 The Parallelogram
229 The Divided Garden
229 The Vertical Line Puzzle
229 The Endless String
230 The Three Rabbits
230 The Accommodating Square
230 The Circle Puzzle
230 The Cardboard Puzzle
230 The Button Puzzle
231 The Quarto Puzzle
231 The Puzzle Of Fourteen
231 The Square And Circle Puzzle
232 The Scale And Ring Puzzle
233 The Heart Puzzle
234 The Cross Puzzle
234 The Yankee Puzzle
234 The Card Puzzle
235 Three-Square Puzzle
235 The Cylinder Puzzle
235 Puzzle Of The Four Tenants
235 The Puzzle Wall
236 The Nuns
237 The Horse-Shoe Puzzle
237 The Card Square
237 The Dog Puzzle
237 Puzzle Of The Two Fathers
238 The Triangle Puzzle
238 Cutting Out A Cross
239 Another Cross Puzzle
239 The Fountain Puzzle
239 The Puzzle Of The Stars
240 The Counter Puzzle
240 The Japan Square Puzzle
240 The Cabinet-Maker's Puzzle
240 The String And Balls Puzzle
241 Arithmetical Puzzle
241 The Double-Headed Puzzle
242 Grammatical Puzzle
242 The Tree Puzzle
242 An Epitaph On Elinor Bachelor An Old Pye Woman
243 A Curious Letter
243 A Puzzling Inscription
243 The Puzzling Rings
246 Moving The Knight Over All The Squares Alternately
247 Another Method
250 Another Method
251 The Chinese Puzzle
252 Trouble-Wit

254 Answers To Practical Puzzles

268 Miscellaneous Curious Tricks And Fancies
268 An Artificial Memory
269 The Perspective Mirror
270 Easy And Curious Methods Of Foretelling Rainy Or Fine Weather
271 The Hour Of The Day Or Night Told By A Suspended Shilling
272 The Magician's Mirror
272 The Magical Gyroscope
275 The Artificial Landscape
270 Contrivance For A Watch Lamp Perfectly Safe Which Will Show The Hour Of The Night Without Any Trouble To A Person Lying In Bed
277 To Know Which Of Two Different Waters Is The Lightest Without Any Scales
277 To Know If A Suspicious Piece Of Money Is Good Or Rad
278 Pyramid Of Alum
278 The Dancing Automaton
279 To Melt A Piece Of Money In A Walnut Shell Without Injuring The Shell
279 The Invisible Springs
280 The Flight Of The Ring
281 Musical Figures Resulting From Sound
281 To Make A Card J Ump Out Of The Pack
282 The Tell-Tale Cards
283 The House-Breakers
284 The Magic Book
285 The Tape Trick
285 More Than Full
285 Floating Needles
285 The Knotted Thread
286 The Bacchus Experiment
287 Curious Method Of Measuring The Height Of A Tree
287 The Transposable Pieces
287 The Three Haloes
288 Application Of The Moire Métallique To Tinfoil
289 To Make Crocant Or Ornamental Paste For Covering Preserved Fruits
289 To Make Wax Candles
289 Electric Spark From Brown Paper
291 Sympathetic Ink
291 The Magic Oracle
292 Invisible Ink
292 The Magical Tea-Spoon
292 Eatable Candle Ends
293 The Magic Picture
294 To Split A Piece Of Money Into Two Pairs
294 The Tumbling Egg
294 Money Augmented By An Optical Illusion
294 To Keep A Snow-Ball All Summer In A Perfect State
295 Easy Method Of Purloining With Out Discovery
296 Pleasing Optical Appearance
296 Another Pleasing Optical Appearance
296 The Kaleidoscope
297 Changes Of The Kaleidoscope
297 On The Selection Of Objects For The Kaleidoscope
298 To Cause A Five Pound Note To Be All In A Flame Without Hurting It
298 How To Hear The Beating Of A Watch At 20 Or 30 Yards Distance
298 How To Prepare A Candle That A Strong Wind Will Not Blow Out
298 To Prepare A Hortus Siocus
299 Easy Method Of Gilding Steel
300 Solar Microscope
300 The Portable Diorama
301 Golden Ink
300 To Set Fire To A Combustible Body By Reflection
302 To Cause A Green Lambent Flame To Appear And Disappear At The Mouth Of A Flask
302 Luminous Liquor
302 To Put Ale And Water In A Glass Without Mixing Them
303 To Break An Iron Bar As Big As Your Arm
303 Curious Effects Of Oil Upon Water
304 To Draw Beer From A Knife
304 Method Of Painting On Silk Or Satin
305 To Make Fine Blue Sealing Wax
305 Method Of Teaching Drawing Or Writing To Young Persons
306 How To Make A Drawing Desk
306 Illuminated ""Writing
307 The Chameleon Spirit
307 A Ball Of Ice
307 Beautiful Metallic Crystals
307 Curious Change Of Colour
308 The Distorting Mirror
308 To Convert A Colourless Liquid To Deep Brown
308 To Produce A Deep Blue Colour By Mixing Two Colourless Liquids
309 To Render A Blue-Coloured Liquid Perfectly Colourless
309 Exploding Salt
309 Method Or Taking An Impression Of Butterflies On Paper
309 To Change A Blue Liquid To A Bed
310 To Soften Horn
310 To Make Moulds Of Horn
310 To Change Red Or Blue Liquid To Green
310 To Make The Same Liquid Assume Various Colours
311 To Convert Green-Coloured Liquid To White
311 Alternate Illusion
312 Alarum
312 Two Experiments To Be Made With A Concave Mirror Which May Be Easily Tried
313 Composition Of An Ink Similar To China Ink
313 To Produce A Carmine-Red Flame
314 Artificial Flowers
313 Artificial Fruit With Stems Of The Natural Fruit
315 Galvanic Experiments On The Dead Body Of A Criminal
317 To Cause A Report Like That Of A Gun With A Tobacco Pipe
317 To Break A Stone With A Blow Of The Fist
318 The Magic Spider
318 Extinguisher And Ro-Hluminator
318 The Three Knives
319 Iron Transformed Into Silver
319 The Aeolipiles
320 To Find The Specific Gravity Of Solids
320 How To Moke A Piece Of Metal Or Any Other Heavy Body Swim Upon The Surface Of The Water Like A Cork
321 Patterns For Working Muslin Dresses Multiplied By Stencilling
322 Curious Experiment With A Viper
322 Experiments With Sparrows
323 The Pressure Of Water
323 The Power Of Water
324 Expansive Force Of Freezing Water
324 New Method Of Congealing Water
325 The Talking Busts
325 Sound
326 Table Of Specific Gravities
327 Music Of Light
327 Speaking Automata
327 Ideal Spectrum
328 Botanical Experiment
328 Artificial Mahogany
328 To Make Linen Appear Like Diaper
329 Chimney Ornaments Made Of Variegated Eggs
329 Experiments To Show The Separation Of Bodies By Weight
330 To Make Water Ascend Between Two Pieces Of Glass And Form A Regular Figure
330 How To Raise Water Several Feet Above Its Ordinary Level
330 How To Work A Pump Without Manual Labour
331 On Sounds Exicted in Hydrogen Gas
331 To Prepare Fulminating Silver
332 The Detonating Candle
332 To Make an Artificial Spider, Containing Fulminating Silver
332 Fulminating Bombs
332 How to Write In The Dark
333 To Obtain Exquisite Skeletons of Small Animals
333 Phosphorenscence of Wood
333 How Light Wood May Be Made To Lie At The Bottom Of Water
334 To Imitate The Liminous Appearance Of The Lunard Disc
334 Artificial Rain And Hail
334 To Make A Ring Suspend By A Thread, After The Thread Has Been Burned
335 To Break A Stick, Placed On Two Glasses, Without Breaking The Glasses
335 To Melt Lead In A Piece Of Paper
335 Artificial Illuminations
336 To Set Fire To Spirits Of Wine By The Rays Of The Sun
336 Curious Optical Deception
337 To Exhibit The Combustion Of Iron-Wire In Oxygen Gas
338 Musical Figures Resulting From Sounds
338 Gigantic Meterological Aeolian Harp
339 To Make An Aeolian Harp
339 Beautiful Figures In Sand &C. Produced By Sound
340 Curious Transcolourations
340 The Learned Swan
341 The Mysterious Watch
341 Concealed Money
342 The Puzzling Halfpence
342 To So Fill A Glass With Water That It Cannot Be Removed Without Spilling The Whole
343 Singular Experiment With A Barrel-Organ
343 Interesting Account Of The Echo
344 To Find The Poles Of A Magnet
344 To Lock A Padlock Upon Your Cheek
345 To Show The Effect Of The Magnet Poles On Each Other
345 The Magnetic Wand
346 An Optical Game
346 Pleasing And Singular Experiments With Glass Tubes
347 Charades, Enigmas, Rebuses, &c. &c.
347 Enigma/Riddles: to page 366
366 An Epitath: puzzle
367 Enigma/Riddles: more riddles to page 376
376 Interesting Conversation
378 Enigma/Riddles: more riddles to page 383
383 Misnomers