(_Hamilton’s l’Entente Cordiale._)
Provide a skipping-rope, and, having had your wrists firmly bound
together, let the person who thus tied your hands pass one end of the
rope between your arms and join its ends, by which act the cord and your
united arms will form two endless links or rings, to separate which, and
instantaneously, will seem materially impossible.
However, it can be done.
Pull at the cord as if to make sure it is held fast, and, while so
doing, catch between the wrists the part of the rope that happens to be
there, and work the rope up so as to get the looped end through the
handkerchief in your hands. Through this loop pass your left hand. Turn
slightly to the right and jerk the rope a little, when it will fall to
the floor, while your hands remain attached.
In the couple of seconds which this feat requires, move your hands up
and down mysteriously, to baffle the attention of the bystanders on what
you are doing.