had been spirited into space!
The surprising dexterity of these jugglers is emulated by their descendants, and
many of the Indian conjurors produce illusions scarcely less wonderful than any
we have described.
Take the pretty mango-trick. The juggler who exhibits has no other drapery than
half a yard of cotton, and no other apparatus than a handful of common toys. He
has none of those elaborate mechanical contrivances, on which the European
professors of legerdemain mostly rely for their effects.
He takes a mango-stone, buries it in a little mud, and covers it with a jar.
A few minutes later, the jar is lifted up; and lo, a tender green seed-leaf has
delicately sprouted. Another peep into the magic hotbed, and we see that the tiny
leaf has withered, and that a flourishing young tree has sprung into sudden
existence.
Or we have the egg-trick, which an eye-witness thus describes:—[39]
“One of the party, a very handsome woman, fixed on her head a fillet of strong
texture, to which were fastened, at equal distances, twenty pieces of string of
equal length, with a common noose at the end of each. Under her arm she carried
a basket, in which were carefully deposited twenty eggs. Her basket, the fillet,
and the nooses were carefully examined by us. There was evidently no
deception.
“The woman advanced alone, and stood before us. She then began to move
rapidly round on one spot, whence she never for one instant moved, spinning
round and round like a top.
“When her pace was at its height, she drew down one of the strings, which now
flew horizontally round her head, and, securing an egg in the noose, she jerked it
back to its original position, still twirling round with undiminished velocity, and
repeating the process until she had secured the whole twenty eggs in the nooses
previously prepared for them. She projected them rapidly from her hand the
moment she had secured them, until at length the whole twenty were flying
round her in an unbroken circle. Thus she continued spinning at undiminished
speed for fully five minutes; after which, taking the eggs one by one from their
nooses, she replaced them in her basket; and then in one instant stopped, without
the movement of a limb, or even the vibration of a muscle, as if she had been