"Seeing is believing," is an old saw that depends for its truth very largely upon the individual who sees. We most of us know, however, how fallible is the sense of sight; for it is upon this very fallibility that the sleight-of-hand performer depends for his success. He passes a coin from one hand to the other (or appears to do so), before your very eyes and then, after some diversion or other, in some mysterious manner, again shows the coins in the hand which it never had left. So prone is the eye to deceive itself, that when this simple trick is skillfully done, it will involuntarily follow the palpable itinerary of the coin hat its possessor knows full well it does not make.

Neither is the sense of hearing to be relied upon, else the ventriloquist's occupation, like that of Othello, would be gone. But who that has seen Heller or Hermann at his best, would not willingly see him again, though he knew that their performances were but tricks for the deception of the masses. Doubtless, the magicians of the East were adepts in this art, but their tricks have lost none of their mystery by the tales of travelers who have witnessed them. If it be true, as Barnum said, that the public likes to be humbugged, it is also true that this same public, after having been humbugged, itself delights in assisting other publics in becoming humbugged. It becomes a ready accomplice to the performer whose tricks it has itself witnessed.

The first exponent of this new art, if so it may be called, so far as the writer knows, was Miss Lulu Hearst, of Georgia. Some seven or eight years ago, rumors began to spread of the wonderful feats of strength performed by a slight country girl in that Southern State. She was described as pale and thin, about fourteen years of age, weight about 100 pounds, and of an extremely nervous temperament. Her weight and temperament were always emphasized, the first, doubtless, to show the impossibility of her accomplishing her feats by pure physical force, and the last, as hinting at occult powers which alone seemed adequate to the occasion.

So wonderful were her performances described to be, that people made long pilgrimages to see her and to marvel. Not alone were the uneducated mystified, but even those who pass for people of more than ordinary intelligence came away from her séances convinced with the idea that she was possessed of some inexplicable power, unknown to mortals of ordinary mold. Scientific men, while not sharing this belief in her occult or superhuman powers, were no less mystified. They proposed tests to which neither Miss Hurst nor her manager would consent; so they were left the only argument, that her powers were capable of explanation upon rational principles if it was but permitted them to find out what those principles were.

No less an authority than Professor Simon Newcomb, of the Smithsonian Institution, thought her feats worthy of investigation and he, with other well known scientists, made the pilgrimage to the little Georgia town where this new star was scintillating in all her brilliancy. He found her as described--young, slight and of nervous temperament, and her whole makeup apparently of such a character as to preclude, at first glance, the possibility of her performing her feats by means of her own, unaided, physical strength. He noticed, however, the play of the muscles in her arms and legs during the exhibition of her powers and discovered, as he thought and proclaimed, an abnormal development of the muscles.

His explanation, as widely published at the time, was in accordance with this assumed discovery. The enterprising dime museum manager saw in her a bonanza, and it was not long before she made the tour of the principal cities, and her fame was spread broadcast. Many imitators who had discovered the secret of her art, sprang up, and the Lulu Hurst's of the dime arena became plentiful. Some of these, indeed, far surpassed their prototype in skill and, while some assumed her name, others traveled upon their own reputations, made by performing all the tricks of Miss Hurst, together with others which were equally astonishing and originated with themselves.

It was one of these latter whom the writer first saw in a dime museum in Cincinnati. The performance took place upon a temporary stage, consisting simply of some rough boards loosely laid upon wooden horses at one end of a large hall. The performer was a young girl, pale and slender, and weighing probably not over 100 pounds. She wore short skirts so that the calves of her legs were partially disclosed to view, and her arms were bare. There was certainly nothing abnormal in the muscular development of either her arms or legs; it was, if anything, subnormal, or rather would I say, just such development as would be expected in a girl of her slight build. Her manager, mounting the platform, requested that some heavy-weight man from the audience should step to the platform. One of aldermanic proportions, who gave his weight as 240 pounds, stepped up and took a seat in a chair provided for the purpose. Being told to hold the chair down at all hazards, he planted himself firmly within it, with his hands akimbo upon its arms, his feet set solidly upon the floor and his lips tightly compressed. As he sat there he looked the picture of determined immobility, and it appeared as though it would require the strength of a giant to move him. The slightly-built girl, however, advanced to a position behind the chair, where, stooping so as to place the palms of her hands against the legs of the chair just below the seat, soon had both man and chair dancing a lively duo around the stage.

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