The Miracle Mongers and their Methods | Page 4

Rel
Maeub, 1876. Rivelli (died 1900)
IV.--The Master--Chabert, 1792-1859
V. Fire-eating magicians. Ching Ling Foo and Chung Ling
Soo.--Fire-eaters employed by magicians: The Man-Salamander,

1816.-Mr. Carlton, Professor of Chemistry, 1818.--Miss Cassillis, aged
nine, 1820. The African Wonder, 1843.--Ling Look and Yamadeva die
in China during Kellar's world tour, 1877.--Ling Look's double, 1879.--
Electrical effects, The Salambos.--Bueno Core.--Del
Kano.--Barnello.--Edwin Forrest as a heat-resister --The Elder Sothern
as a fire-eater.--The Twilight of the Art
VI. The Arcana of the fire-eaters: The formula of Albertus
Magnus.--Of Hocus Pocus.--Richardson's method.--Philopyraphagus
Ashburniensis.--To breathe forth sparks, smoke and flames.--To spout
natural gas.--Professor Sementini's discoveries.-- To bite off red-hot
iron.--To cook in a burning cage. --Chabert's oven.--To eat coals of
fire.--To drink burning oil.--To chew molten lead.--To chew burning
brimstone.--To wreathe the face in flames. --To ignite paper with the
breath.--To drink boiling liquor and eat flaming wax
VII. The spheroidal condition of liquids.--Why the hand may be dipped
in molten metals.--Principles of heat resistance put to practical uses:
Aldini, 1829.--In early fire-fighting.--Temperatures the body can
endure
VIII. Sword-swallowers: Cliquot, Delno Fritz, Deodota, a
razor-swallower, an umbrella-swallower, William Dempster, John
Cumming, Edith Clifford, Victorina
IX. Stone-eaters: A Silesian in Prague, 1006; Francois Battalia, ca.
1641; Platerus' beggar boy; Father Paulian's lithophagus of Avignon,
1760; ``The Only One in the World,'' London, 1788; Spaniards in
London, 1790; a secret for two and six; Japanese
training.--Frog-swallowers: Norton; English Jack; Bosco; the
snake-eater; Billington's prescription for hangmen; Captain
Veitro.--Water spouters; Blaise Manfrede, ca. 1650; Floram Marchand,
1650
X. Defiers of poisonous reptiles: Thardo; Mrs. Learn, dealer in
rattle-snakes.--Sir Arthur Thurlow Cunynghame on antidotes for
snake-bite.--Jack the Viper.--William Oliver, 1735.--The advice of
Cornelius Heinrich Agrippa, (1480-1535).--An Australian snake

story.--Antidotes for various poisons
XI. Strongmen of the eighteenth century: Thomas Topham (died, 1749);
Joyce, 1703; Van Eskeberg, 1718; Barsabas and his sister; The Italian
Female Sampson, 1724; The ``little woman from Geneva,'' 1751;
Belzoni, 1778-1823
XII. Contemporary strong people: Charles Jefferson; Louis Cyr; John
Grun Marx; William Le Roy.-- The Nail King, The Human
Claw-hammer; Alexander Weyer; Mexican Billy Wells; A foolhardy
Italian; Wilson; Herman; Sampson; Sandow; Yucca; La Blanche; Lulu
Hurst.--The Georgia Magnet, The Electric Girl, etc.; Annie Abbott;
Mattie Lee Price.--The Twilight of the Freaks.-- The dime museums
CHAPTER ONE
FIRE WORSHIP.--FIRE EATING AND HEAT RESISTANCE.--IN
THE MIDDLE AGES. --AMONG THE NAVAJO INDIANS.--
FIRE-WALKERS OF JAPAN.--THE FIERY ORDEAL OF FIJI.
Fire has always been and, seemingly, will always remain, the most
terrible of the elements. To the early tribes it must also have been the
most mysterious; for, while earth and air and water were always in
evidence, fire came and went in a manner which must have been quite
unaccountable to them. Thus it naturally followed that the custom of
deifying all things which the primitive mind was unable to grasp, led in
direct line to the fire- worship of later days.
That fire could be produced through friction finally came into the
knowledge of man, but the early methods entailed much labor.
Consequently our ease-loving forebears cast about for a method to
``keep the home fires burning'' and hit upon the plan of appointing a
person in each community who should at all times carry a burning
brand. This arrangement had many faults, however, and after a while it
was superseded by the expedient of a fire kept continually burning in a
building erected for the purpose.
The Greeks worshiped at an altar of this kind which they called the

Altar of Hestia and which the Romans called the Altar of Vesta. The
sacred fire itself was known as Vesta, and its burning was considered a
proof of the presence of the goddess. The Persians had such a building
in each town and village; and the Egyptians, such a fire in every temple;
while the Mexicans, Natches, Peruvians and Mayas kept their ``national
fires'' burning upon great pyramids. Eventually the keeping of such
fires became a sacred rite, and the ``Eternal Lamps'' kept burning in
synagogues and in Byzantine and Catholic churches may be a survival
of these customs.
There is a theory that all architecture, public and private, sacred and
profane, began with the erection of sheds to protect the sacred fire. This
naturally led men to build for their own protection as well, and thus the
family hearth had its genesis.
Another theory holds that the keepers of the sacred fires were the first
public servants, and that from this small beginning sprang the intricate
public service of the present.
The worship of the fire itself had been a legacy from the earliest tribes;
but it remained for the Rosicrucians and the fire philosophers of the
Sixteenth Century under the lead of Paracelsus to establish a concrete
religious belief on that basis, finding in the Scriptures what seemed to
them ample proof that fire was the symbol of the