By THOMAS FROST.

The dense ignorance which prevailed during the seventeenth century on the subject of conjuring, as the word is now understood, would be scarcely credible at the present day, if instances did not even now occur at intervals to show that there are still minds which the light of knowledge has not yet penetrated. Books did not reach the masses in those days, and hence the beginning of the eighteenth century found people as ready to drown a wizard as their ancestors had been.

A book which was published in 1716, by Richard Neve, whose name is the first which we meet with in the conjuring annals of the eighteenth century, bears traces of the lingering fear of diabolical agency which still infected the minds of the people. Having stated, in his preface, that his book contained directions for performing thirty-three legerdemain tricks, besides many arithmetical puzzles and many jests, Neve says: “I dare not say that I have here set down all that are or may be performed by legerdemain, but thou hast here the most material of them; and if thou rightly understandest these, there is not a trick that any juggler in the world can show thee, but thou shalt be able to conceive after what manner it is done, if he do it by sleight of hand, and not by unlawful and detestable means, as too many do at this day.”

The following are a few of the tricks which puzzled the people of those days: The tricks of the fakirs, or religious mendicants of India were remarkable. One of these fellows boasted that he would appear at Amadabant a town about two hundred miles from Surat, within fifteen days after being buried, ten feet deep, at the latter place. The Governor of Surat resolved to test the fellow’s powers, and had a grave dug, in which the fakir placed himself, stipulating that a layer of reeds should be interposed between his body and the superincumbent earth, with a space of two feet between his body and the reeds. This was done, and the grave was then filled up, and a guard was placed at the spot to prevent trickery.

A large tree stood ten or twelve yards from the grave, and beneath its shade several fakirs were grouped around a large earthern jar, which was filled with water. The officer of the guard, suspecting that some trick was to be played, ordered the jar to be moved, and, this being done by the soldiers, after some opposition on the part of the fellows assembled round it, a shaft was discovered, with a subterranean gallery from its bottom to within two feet of the grave. The impostor was thereupon made to ascend, and a riot ensued, in which he and several other persons were slain.

This trick has been repeated several times in India, under different circumstances, one of the most remarkable instances being that related by an engineer officer named Boileau, who was employed about forty years ago in the trigonometrical survey of that country. I shall relate this story in the officer’s own words, premising that he did not witness either the interment or the exhumation of the performer, but was told that they took place in the presence of Esur Lal, one of the ministers of the Muharwul of Jaisulmer.

“The man is said, by long practice, to have acquired the art of holding his breath by shutting the mouth, and stopping the interior opening of the nostrils with his tongue; he also abstains from solid food for some days previous to his interment, so that he may not be inconvenienced by the contents of his stomach, while put up in his narrow grave; and, moreover, he is sewn up in a bag of cloth, and the cell is lined with masonry, and floored with cloth, that the white ants and other insects may not easily be able to molest him. The place in which he was buried at Jaisulmer is a small building about twelve feet by eight, built of stone; and in the floor was a hole, about three feet long, two and a half feet wide, and the same depth, or perhaps a yard deep, in which he was placed in a sitting posture, sewed up in his shroud, with his feet turned inward toward the stomach, and his hands also pointed inward toward the chest. Two heavy slabs of stone, five or six feet long, several inches thick, and broad enough to cover the mouth of the grave, so that he could not escape, were then placed over him, and I believe a little earth was plastered over the whole, so as to make the surface of the grave smooth and compact. The door of the house was also built up, and people placed outside, that no tricks might be played, nor deception practised.

“At the expiration of a full month, the walling of the door was broken, and the buried man dug out of the grave; Trevelyan’s moonshee only running there in time to see the ripping open of the bag in which the man had been inclosed. He was taken out in a perfectly senseless state, his eyes closed, his hands cramped and powerless, his stomach shrunk very much, and his teeth jammed so fast together that they were forced to open his mouth with an iron instrument to pour a little water down his throat. He gradually recovered his senses and the use of his limbs; and when we went to see him he was sitting up, supported by two men, and conversed with us in a low, gentle tone of voice, saying that ‘we might bury him again for a twelvemonth, if we pleased.’”

A conjuror was exhibiting a mimic swan, which floated on real water, and followed his motions, when the bird suddenly became stationary. He approached it more closely, but the swan did not move.

“There is a person in the company,” said he, “who understands the principle upon which this trick is performed, and who is counteracting me. I appeal to the company whether this is fair, and I beg the gentleman will desist.”

The trick was performed by magnetism, and the counteracting agency was a magnet in the pocket of Sir Francis Blake Delaval.

In 1785 the celebrated automatic chess player was first exhibited in London, having previously been shown in various cities of Germany and France. It had been invented about fifteen years before by a Hungarian noble, the Baron von Kempelen, who had until then, however, declined to permit its exhibition in public. Having witnessed some experiments in magnetism by a Frenchman, performed before the Court of Maria Theresa, Kempelen had observed to the empress that he thought himself able to construct a piece of mechanism the operations of which would be far more surprising than the experiments they had witnessed. The curiosity of the empress was excited, and she exacted a promise from Kempelen to make the attempt. The result was the automatic chess-player.

The figure was of the size of life, dressed as a Turk, and seated behind a square piece of cabinet work. It was fixed upon castors, so as to run over the floor, and satisfy beholders that there was no access to it from below. On the top, in the center, was a fixed chess-board, toward which the eyes of the figure were directed. Its right hand and arm were extended toward the board, and its left, somewhat raised, held a pipe.

The spectators, having examined the figure, the exhibitor wound up the machinery, placed the cushion under the arm of the figure, and challenged any gentleman present to play.

The Turk always chose the white men, and made the first move. The fingers opened as the hand was extended toward the board, and the piece was deftly picked up, and removed to the proper square. If a false move was made by its opponent, it tapped on the table impatiently, replaced the piece, and claimed the move for itself. If a human player hesitated long over a move, the Turk tapped sharply on the table.

The mind fails to comprehend any mechanism capable of performing with such accuracy movements which require knowledge and reflection. Beckman says indeed that a boy was concealed in the figure, and prompted by the best chess-player whose services the proprietor could obtain.