This collection of games, tricks, and pastimes is the result of many years' effort to find the most clever and practical diversions and entertainments suitable for the home. Each trick has been tested by the editor, and each sport introduced has received most careful consideration in regard to ease of production, as well as the enjoyment to be gained from it.
As no refined person of any age can find amusement in coarseness, great care has been exercised in presenting only such diversions as are to be welcomed in a refined home circle. The necessity for elaborate apparatus has also been avoided, so that with dullness, difficulty, expense, and ill-taste eliminated, it is felt that this collection will supply a lack which has always existed, as the many who have sought in vain for a bright, safe, and up-to-date book of really feasible entertainments will appreciate.
While this book contains much that is original, especially in descriptive matter and ways of presentation, it has of course been necessary to draw freely from the accumulated mass of tricks and "sells" that have in some form or other come down from unknown times, and are recognized as being the common property of any who take pains to learn them. As a matter of courtesy, due acknowledgement is hereby made to all who have preceded me in this line of work.
A word of general advice to the amateur entertainer may be in order. Never tell the company what you are about to do, unless the very nature of a trick demands that its outcome be stated in advance. In this case, do it as guardedly as possible. If you state that you are to perform a certain trick, you thereby greatly increase the chance of detection, as the spectators will know what to look for, and in that way will more readily arrive at the true method of bringing about the results. Do not allow yourself to be persuaded into performing a trick twice in an evening. With the element of surprise gone, the best performance loses much of its effect.