Another performance which excited a large amount of public attention, partly through the mystery in which the _modus operandi_ was enveloped, and partly by reason of the excitement previously produced by the Brothers Davenport’s exhibition of alleged spirit-manifestations, was the ‘rope-trick,’ shown first by an expert performer named Redmond at Astley’s, and afterwards at most of the music-halls. The performer was enclosed in a cabinet about three feet square, and five or six feet high, with a door facing the spectators, and provided with a small aperture near the top. In a few minutes an attendant opened the door, when Redmond was seen within, securely bound in a chair. The spectators were allowed to satisfy themselves that he was bound as securely as if a second person had bound him, and then the door was closed. In a few moments he rang a bell, then he showed one hand at the aperture; in a few seconds more he began to beat a tambourine, and in a minute and a half from the time he was shut in the door was opened again, and he walked out, with the rope in his hands. This performance proved so attractive that it soon had many imitators, but none of them did it in so genuine and puzzling a manner, or displayed equal dexterity in its exhibition. The trick was not original, but it was new to the public, or at least to the present generation. I have heard it called both the American rope-trick and the Indian rope-trick, but the former name may have been derived from the similar performance of the Brothers Davenport, who pretended to be passive agents in the business, and to be tied and untied by spirits. Long before the pretended spiritual phenomena were ever heard of, the rope-trick was in the _repertoire_ of the famous Hindoo juggler, Ramo Samee, who performed at the Adelphi and the Victoria some forty years ago. The manner of its performance is said to have been communicated by him to one of the Brothers Nemo, who thought so little of it that he never exhibited it until the public mind had become excited by the tricks of the Davenports and the antagonistic performance of Redmond. Next to the latter, Nemo was the best exhibitor of the trick that I ever saw; but that is not saying much, for most of them were so incompetent to perform it that the effect produced by its exhibition by them was simply ludicrous. I remember one of them—I will not mention his name—complaining when he found that he could not release himself, that he had not been treated as a gentleman by the person—one of the spectators—by whom he had been bound; and another, that he had been tied so tightly that the rope hurt his wrists, and stipulating, on another occasion, that he should not be tied tight!