The Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56, No. 2, January 12, 1884: A Weekly Journal for the Farm, Orchard and FiresideVarious
Science
The Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56, No. 2, January 12, 1884: A Weekly Journal for the Farm, Orchard and Fireside
Various
Agriculture -- United States -- Periodicals; Farm life -- Periodicals; United States -- Rural conditions -- Periodicals
Procure a good, large apple or turnip, and cut from it a piece of the
shape to resemble the butt-end of a tallow candle; then from a nut of
some kind--an almond is the best--whittle out a small peg of about the
size and shape of a wick end. Stick the peg in the apple and you have a
very fair representation of a candle. The wick you can light, and it
will burn for at least a minute. In performing you should have your
candle in a clean candlestick, show it plainly to the audience, and then
put it into your mouth, taking care to blow it out, and munch it up. If
you think best, you can blow the candle out and allow the wick to cool,
and it will look, with its burned wick, so natural that even the
sharpest eyes can not distinguish it from the genuine article.
Once, at a summer resort in Massachusetts, I made use of this candle
with considerable effect. While performing a few parlor tricks to amuse
some friends, I pretended to need a light. A confederate left the room,
and soon returned with a lantern containing one of these apple
counterfeits.
"Do you call that a candle?" I said.
"Certainly," he replied.
"Why, there is scarcely a mouthful."
"A mouthful? Rather a disagreeable mouthful, I guess."
"You have never been in Russia, I presume."
"Never."
"Then you don't know what is good."
"Good?"
"Yes, good. Why, candle ends, with the wick a little burned to give them
a flavor, are delicious. They always serve them up before dinner in
Russia as a kind of relish. It is considered bad taste in good society
there to ask a friend to sit down to dinner without offering him this
appetizer."
"The bad taste would be in the relish, I think."
"Not at all. Try a bit."
I took the candle out of the lantern, and extended it toward my
confederate, who shrank back with disgust.
"Well," I said, "if you won't have it, I'll eat it myself." And so
saying, I put it into my mouth and munched it up, amid the cries of
surprise and horror of the assembled party. Two old maids insisted on
looking into my mouth to see whether it was not concealed there.
Having soaked a piece of thread in common salt water, tie it to a small
finger-ring. When you apply the flame of a candle to the thread it will
burn to ashes and yet sustain the ring.
A DIFFICULT CIRCLE TO JUMP FROM.
Take a piece of chalk, and ask, if you make a circle, whether any boy
standing in it thinks he can jump out of it. As soon as one proposes to
do so, bring him into the center of the room, draw a circle with the
chalk around his jacket, and say, "Now jump out of it!"
AN IMPOSSIBLE WALK.
Ask one young lady in the company whether she thinks, if she clasped her
hands, she could walk out of the room. On her saying she could, request
her to pass her arm round the leg of the table or piano, join her hands,
and walk away.
THE HAT TRICK.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account