THIS was one of the best features of the program given by Guibal when he played at the Eden Musée many years ago. It was not new even at that time; in fact, I had made it a part of my own show in my amateur days; but it is extremely effective if properly handled, and it has always been a surprise to me that it has not
come into more general use.

Guibal probably learned the trick from Verbeck, for whom he acted as interpreter during the tour of the latter in England. His clever patter is said to have greatly benefited the Verbeck performance, but later there was a disagreement, and Guibal started for himself, giving practically the same program.

The effect of the trick in question is as follows: A wedding ring is borrowed from a lady in the audience, and a program from another. A volunteer assistant is invited upon the stage, asked to watch every move and see that no deception is practised. The performer then brings a small hammer from his table and asks the volunteer to hammer the ring flat, but stops him in order first to get the consent of the lady. Her answer being "yes," he then says, "Then, madam, the 'yes' that you have just spoken is as irrevocable as your 'yes' when you received the ring." The volunteer now hammers the ring perfectly flat. Meanwhile the performer has torn a leaf from the program and holds it spread on his open right palm, with his thumb on top. The assistant
places the ring on the paper, sliding it under the thumb of the performer, who immediately crushes it up into a rough package and passes it with the same hand to the gentleman, the left hand never having approached the right, and asks him to hold it a moment. Turning to his table, be picks up a stick of sealing-wax
and with it makes three quick motions toward the crushed program and then asks him to open it. On doing so, the assistant finds that the program has changed to an envelope, sealed with
sealing wax. Opening this he finds another smaller one, and inside this still another, which contains the ring restored to its original shape.

After the young man acknowledges that he does not see how it has been done, the performer does it all over again. This time the last envelope is opened by the owner of the ring, who finds it
fully restored.

Explanation.--The borrowed ring is on the end of the performer's wand, a dummy ring being held on the opposite end covered by the hand. By changing the wand from hand to hand the rings are
"switched" and the dummy is given to the volunteer to hold.

When going to the table for the hammer, the borrowed ring is left there, and while the dummy is being flattened, the stage assistant carries off the original while taking away some other apparatus. The assistant places this ring inside a set of three envelopes made from a program exactly like the borrowed one,
and a little later it is brought on and left behind some object on the table.

During this time the volunteer has flattened the ring and the performer has spread the leaf of the program on his palm, as above, but at the same time he has taken a duplicate set of envelopes with a duplicate dummy ring in the inner one from beneath his vest and holds it underneath the leaf. This is easily done, as the package is small and is held in place by the thumb. When the leaf is crushed up, the two packages look like one, and when they have been crushed quite small, the envelopes are brought to the top and passed to the volunteer, the other package being retained in the hand. This sounds rather difficult, but a little practice will make the move absolutely invisible.

The performer now turns to his table to get the sealing-wax and gets rid of the palmed package, and the trick proceeds as described above.

For the repetition, while the volunteer is flattening the ring, the performer goes to the table and gets another leaf of the program, and at the same time gets possession of the other set of envelopes, which contains the borrowed ring, and the trick is finished as given above.

Guibal used to finish by gathering up the torn envelopes after the lady had opened the last one and found her ring, and rolling them into a ball, passing them to the lady who had loaned him the program. Upon opening them she found her original program none the worse except for a few wrinkles. This substitution was
by the same method used earlier in the trick.

Coffee to Coins - Street Magic Trick

Setup:
Get one of those coffee machine dispensed cups that have the "personal solitaire" graphics on the side. Remove the bottom of the cup with an X-acto knife and place it back, stack the cup three quarters full with odd coins

Pack the coins in and make it tight, and then pour in a little coffee. Enough of cover the coins completely. Coffee words best because it's so dark.

Performance:
Comment on how the cards on the side of the cup(graphics) are magic. Grip the cup from the bottom and push up on the bottom, and shake the cup.
 As the coins "unsettle" the coffee will spill between the cracks and the coins appear.

The Spirit Communication

A QUESTION is written by one of the audience, placed in the smallest of a nest of four folded papers and given to the writer to hold. When the papers are unfolded, the slip bearing the question
will have vanished, being replaced by a duplicate slip on which an answer is written.

For this, take two sheets of stiff paper of exactly the same size, say nine inches square, and fold them separately in three-inch folds each way, which will give you two packages three inches
square and, if the folds have been carefully made, exactly alike. Then paste the backs of the middle portions of these together, making sure that the edges register exactly. Let them dry under a heavy weight, and you will then have a double package that looks like a single fold, either side of which can be opened. Inside
each of these place a smaller fold and inside these still a smaller fold.

Enclose the whole in a ten-inch sheet folded in the same way.

On a sheet torn from a scratch pad write the following: "Looking at your question in one way the answer would unquestionably be 'Yes,' but from another point: of view it is equally sure to be 'No.' This leaves your spirit control in a quandary, so she has taken your leaflet along to submit it to a higher authority, hoping to have the true answer at the next sitting." Fold this, place it in one of the smallest folds and make up the nest with the answer in the bottom part of the fake fold. You are now ready for the
performance.

Begin by passing the scratch pad from which the answer has been torn to one of the company and ask that a question, the answer to which must be yes or no, be written upon it, the sheet torn off and so folded that it cannot be read.

Now open the nest on your table, leaving the sheets one on another in their proper order, and ask the writer to place the folded question in the smallest one. Then fold this as follows:

First the right hand side, then the left, then the fold nearest to you and, finally, the farthest. The next larger sheet is now folded in the, same way, but the next is the fake and must be handled differently. In this case you fold the right, left, and nearest folds as before, but instead of finishing by folding the farthest toward you, you make the last fold from you, which turns the fake over and brings the answer uppermost.
The last sheet is folded fairly, like the unprepared ones, and the package passed to the writer to hold while the "spirit influence" is Brought to you by LearnMagicTricks.org invoked. Finally, the package is placed on the table and all the folds are opened fairly and rapidly one upon the other. Then the answer, which will apply to any yes or no question, will be discovered.

Cup Through Table

Effect: A cup or glass vanishes when wrapped in a sheet of paper.

Secret: A piece of paper wrapped around the cup or glass will retain the shape of the cup – even after the
magician has secretly dropped the cup into his lap.

Props: A cup or glass, any small object and a sheet of newspaper or tissue paper.

Preparation: Select a piece of newspaper slightly larger than the cup so that it will cover it completely with
some overlap.

Presentation: Place the cup over any small object and wrap the paper around it. Ask the audience what is
under the cup. Everyone will, of course, suspect that you are about to vanish the object. Lift the paper and
cup to reassure everyone that the object is still on the table. Moving the wrapped cup slightly towards you,
just clear of the table relax your hold so that the cup is allowed to quietly drop into your lap, out of sight of
the audience, of course, whose attention is still focused on the object.The paper will retain the shape of the
cup. When you again place the paper over the object, you must maintain the illusion that you are replacing
both paper and cup. Wave your hand mysteriously over the "cup" and claim that you will make the object
vanish. When you lift the "cup" the object is still there. Remove the object but replace the "cup". Tell the
audience that something must have gone wrong and you are unable to vanish the object, so you have decided
to vanish the cup instead! At that moment dramatically smash your hand down onto the paper which will
flatten, giving the appearance that the "cup" has penetrated the table. Bring the cup from under the table
(removing it from your lap, in one smooth movement) and replace it on the table.

Mystic Ash

The magician shows you a pack of cards and places it under a large handkerchief. With the cards now covered he asks you to make a cut in the deck. You keep hold of the cut through the handkerchief and the remaining cards are brought back out. You are then shown the top card which you cut to. The deck is put back together and you are handed a small piece of paper and a pen. You are asked to draw a picture of your card on the paper and fold it up as small as you can. This is then held over an empty ash tray and set on fire! The magician sprinkles the ashes on to his forearm and rubs them in with his hand. The card you selected is revealed in ash on the magicians arm! David Blaine has a variation of this trick, I have to say it’s been around a lot longer than he has but nether the less is a great trick!

The deck turned
around under the
handkerchief,
showing the bottom
card and the ash
on the arm at the
end of the trick.

The two secrets to this trick are as follows. The trick is known as a force, the volunteer is forced to select a card even though they think they have a choice. When the deck is put under the handkerchief turn the deck upside down, then after the cut turn it back again so the volunteer is forced to take the original top card. The forced card is drawn on your arm with wet soap prior to doing the trick. When the ash is rubbed into your arm it will stick on the soap even when it’s dry.