These performers actually swallowed the water, stones, pebbles, etc., and retched them up again so cleverly and at such carefully selected instants that the audience did not know that the disgorging had been accomplished. Swallowing glass was a different matter, and the modern human ostriches have all wound up at city hospitals where surgeons have removed broken glass, knife blades, and other foreign matter by means of an operation. I quote the above instances simply to prove that the stones were actually swallowed and then disgorged, and not hidden, as Robert-Houdin claims, in the folds of the Mokadem's burnous. In this one chapter alone Robert-Houdin quotes six authorities in explaining the tricks he witnessed, which fact only strengthens my belief that he borrowed his tricks, as well as his explanations, from able and graphic writers on the art of magic. The next work descriptive of the conjurer's art offered by Robert-Houdin was "Les Secrets de la Prestidigitation et de la Magie." Under the title of "The Secrets of Conjuring and Magic; or, How to Become a Wizard," it was translated and edited by Professor Hoffmann and published in 1878 by George Routledge & Co., London and New York. Absolutely no originality is displayed in this book, and the majority of the tricks explained can be found in French books of a similar character which appeared before Robert-Houdin turned author. The proof of this statement can be found by reading any of the following works upon which Robert-Houdin patently drew for his material: "Nouvelle Magie Blanche Dévoilée et Cours Complet de Prestidigitation," in two volumes, by J. N. Ponsin, published in Paris in 1853; "Grande Initiation au vraie Pratique des Célèbres Physiciens-Prestidigitateurs," Paris, 1855; "Nouveau Manuel Complet Sorciers, les scènes de Ventriloquie exécutées et communiquées par M. Conte, Physicien du Roi," Paris, 1837; "Anciens et Nouvaux Tours d'Escamotage," of which there are innumerable editions; "Le Manuel des Sorciers. Recréations Physiques, Mathématiques, Tours de Cartes et de Gibecière; suivre, des Jeux de Société," Paris, 1802. [Illustration: Position of the "vanished" Hindoo while concealed in the basket. From the Harry Houdini Collection.] His third work, "Magie et Physique Amusante," translated by Professor Hoffmann under the title of "The Secrets of Stage Conjuring," and published in English in 1881, is marred by an almost continuous strain of mis-statements, incorrect explanations, and downright falsification.