Now we WERE astonished. How he did his tricks I could not imagine;
no, not even when Miss Pole pulled out her pieces of paper and
began reading aloud--or at least in a very audible whisper--the
separate "receipts" for the most common of his tricks. If ever I
saw a man frown and look enraged, I saw the Grand Turk frown at
Miss Pole; but, as she said, what could be expected but unchristian
looks from a Mussulman? If Miss Pole were sceptical, and more
engrossed with her receipts and diagrams than with his tricks, Miss
Matty and Mrs Forrester were mystified and perplexed to the highest
degree. Mrs Jamieson kept taking her spectacles off and wiping
them, as if she thought it was something defective in them which
made the legerdemain; and Lady Glenmire, who had seen many curious
sights in Edinburgh, was very much struck with the tricks, and
would not at all agree with Miss Pole, who declared that anybody
could do them with a little practice, and that she would, herself,
undertake to do all he did, with two hours given to study the
Encyclopaedia and make her third finger flexible.
At last Miss Matty and Mrs Forrester became perfectly awestricken.
They whispered together. I sat just behind them, so I could not
help hearing what they were saying. Miss Matty asked Mrs Forrester
"if she thought it was quite right to have come to see such things?
She could not help fearing they were lending encouragement to
something that was not quite"-- A little shake of the head filled
up the blank.
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