Gleanings from the Harvest-Fields of Literature: A Melange of Excerpta
General
Gleanings from the Harvest-Fields of Literature: A Melange of Excerpta
Literary curiosa; Literature -- Dictionaries
This trick, however curious it may seem, is managed easily enough. I
shall describe it. As soon as I was alone in my chamber, I took out of
my pistol-case (which I carry with me wherever I go) a ball-mould. I
took a card, turned up its corners and made a sort of recipient of it,
in which I placed a lump of stearine, taken from one of the candles in
the room. As soon as the stearine was melted, I mixed a little
lamp-black with it—which I obtained by holding a knife over a lighted
candle—and then I poured this composition into my ball-mould. If I had
allowed the liquid stearine to become entirely cold, the ball would have
been solid; but after ten or twelve seconds I reversed the mould, and
the portion of the stearine which was not yet solid flowed out and left
a hollow ball in the mould. This, by the way, is the mode in which the
hollow candles used in the churches are made; the thickness of the sides
depends on the time the melted stearine or wax is left in the mould. I
wanted a second ball. I made it a little thicker than the first. I
filled it with blood, and I closed the aperture with a drop of stearine.
An Irishman had showed me years before, how to extract blood from the
thumb without pain: I adopted his trick to fill my ball with blood. It
is hard to believe how nearly these projectiles of stearine, colored
with lamp-black, look like lead: they will deceive anybody, even when
examined quite closely. The reader now clearly sees through the trick.
While exhibiting the lead bullet to the spectators, I changed it for my
hollow ball, and this last I ostensibly placed in the pistol. I rammed
it down, to break the stearine into small pieces, which could not reach
me at fifteen paces. As soon as the pistol was discharged, I opened my
mouth and exhibited the lead ball between my teeth. The second pistol
contained the ball filled with blood, which was broken to pieces on the
wall, where it left the spot of blood, while the pieces of stearine
could no where be found.
This is the whole mystery.
Weather-Wisdom.
SHERIDAN’S RHYMING CALENDAR.
January snowy,
February flowy,
March blowy,
April showery,
May flowery,
June bowery,
July moppy,
August croppy,
September poppy,
October breezy,
November wheezy,
December freezy.
SIR HUMPHRY DAVY ON WEATHER-OMENS.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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