61. The Self-propelled Ball.

Effect: A ball rolls across the table until you tell it to stop.

Secret: Under the table cloth is a small ring attached to a length of strong thread. The thread runs across the table to where your secret assistant is sitting. A small ball is placed on the table. It must go into the concealed ring. On your word of command your assistant pulls on the thread and the ball moves. You then pick up the ball and hand it to a spectator. As you are doing this, your assistant pulls the ring from beneath the cloth and hides it.

62. Disappearing Coin

Effect: A coin disappears from your hand in spite of the fact that several people check it is there.

Secret: Show the coin on the palm of your hand and cover it with a handkerchief. Go to several people and ask them to feel the coin under the handkerchief. The last person you approach is (unbeknown to the rest of the audience) your secret assistant. He pretends to feel the coin but actually takes it off your palm. You can now pull the handkerchief away with a flourish and your hands are shown completely empty. The coin has disappeared.

63. Fruit Transformation

Effect: An orange transforms itself into an apple.

Secret: Carefully cut the peel from an orange, as shown in the illustration and scoop out all the fruit. When the peel has dried put an apple inside it. Hold the peel closed and it appears you are holding an ordinary orange. Cover the orange with an handkerchief. When you remove the handkerchief, take the orange peel off the apple but keep it hidden within the material. Casually drop the handkerchief (with the orange peel still hidden) behind something on your table or put it in your pocket, as you display the apple.

64. In The Red

Effect: You instantly identify a selected card.

Secret: Place all the black cards on top of the red cards and you are ready. Spread the cards face down and ask someone to take any card. Make sure he takes one from the top (black) half of the pack. He then replaces it anywhere in the pack but you make sure he replaces it somewhere in the bottom (red) half of the pack.

Look through the cards and somewhere in the red cards will be one black card. That is the chosen card. Remove it and show it to everyone.

65. Going Up!

Effect: Two tumblers are suspended from a newspaper balanced on a magic wand.

Secret: Bend a paper clip around your magic wand to form a U shape. Tape the wire to a newspaper. The newspaper is shown and then folded into a long flat tube. The secret wire should be on the side of the newspaper nearest to you. Place the newspaper across two tumblers, making sure that each prong of the wire goes into the tumblers. Place your wand between the tumblers and lift it towards the newspapers. The newspaper will be lifted – but so will the tumblers.

66. Name That Name

Effect: You reveal a thought-of name.

Secret: Cut a slot in the top of a box with a removable lid and tape a small box on the inside. Write the same name on 10 slips of paper. Put them in the box and replace the lid. Hand out 10 blank slips and ask spectators to write a name on their slip. The slips are put in the box through the slit. They actually go into the hidden box. Remove the lid for just one slip to be chosen. As all the slips are the same it is easy to reveal the name chosen.

67. The Ninth Card

Effect: You divine the identity of a selected card.

Secret: This is how to make someone take the card you want. Secretly place the card you decide to use ninth from the top of the pack. Ask someone to call a number between 10 and 20. Count that number of cards, one at a time, from the pack. Add the digits of the chosen number. Deal that number of cards off the cards just dealt. Ask someone to look at the next card. It will be the card you placed at ninth position. You can reveal it in any way you wish.

68. Indestructible String

Effect: A string is threaded through a drinking straw. The straw is cut in two but the string remains unharmed. Secret: Secretly cut a short slit in the straw. Thread the string through the straw. Bend the straw in half and pull both ends of the string. This forces the string through the slit in the straw. Your hand hides this from the audience. Cut through the straw, as shown by the dotted line in the drawing. Now pull the string from your hand. The straw is in two pieces but the string is still whole.

69. Multiplying Money

Effect: Three coins increase to six in your hand.

Secret: Show three coins and count them out on to a magazine. Unbeknown to your audience there are three more coins hidden inside the magazine cover. Fold the magazine slightly and tip the three visible coins into your hand. At the same time the three hidden coins will slip from the magazine into your hand too but the audience do not know about this.Wave your other hand over the one holding the coins. Slowly open your hand to show that the coins have mysteriously multiplied.

70. Money Telepathy

Effect: While you are out of the room, a coin is hidden under a cup. When you return, you announce the value of the hidden coin.

Secret: A secret accomplice is used. It is your accomplice who actually places the cup over the coin. He places the cup down in such a way that the position of the handle tells you the value of the hidden coin as shown in the illustration. Before doing this trick, you must agree with your accomplice which handle position will be at the 12 o'clock position or you may read the signal upside down and that could prove disastrous! This trick can of course be performed using any currency.

71. Card Code

Effect: You identify a chosen card.

Secret: Place nine cards on the table. The suits do not matter but the values must be the Ace to the Nine. While you are out of the room, someone chooses any one of the nine cards. When you return, you know immediately which card has been chosen because you have a secret assistant who holds a pack with a Nine showing. They secretly indicate the value of the chosen card to you by the position of their thumb over one of the nine pips.

72. Match Rise

Effect: A match rises from a matchbox.

Secret: Make a small hole in the top of a matchbox. Push a match into the hole as shown in the illustration. When you push the drawer, the match will be forced out through the hole. If you tilt the matchbox slightly with the end of the drawer facing the audience, it will give the impression that the match rises from the drawer as it is opened.

73. The Ghostly Card

Effect: A playing card vanishes when placed in a glass tumbler.

Secret: You need a piece of clear plastic the same shape and size as a playing card. Place this on top of a pack of cards. Cover the cards with a handkerchief and apparently remove the top card in the handkerchief. You actually take the sheet of plastic. Show a glass tumbler and ask a spectator to push the card, still covered by the handkerchief, into it. Whisk the handkerchief away and the card has vanished. Being transparent, the plastic cannot be seen from even a short distance away.

74. Watch Wizardry

Effect: You use a watch to divine a thought-of-number.

Secret: Show a watch and ask someone to think of any number from 1 to 12. Tap a pencil against numbers on the dial. As you do this, the spectator mentally counts to 20, one for each tap, beginning with one above the number he is thinking of. You make the first seven taps anywhere on the watch face. On the eighth, tap your pencil on 12. Continue tapping the numbers anti-clockwise around the dial. When the spectator reaches 20, your pencil will be pointing to the number he is thinking of.

75. Floating Ball

Effect: A small ball defies gravity and floats in space

Secret: The secret is a long loop of dark thread which is on your table with a ping-pong ball resting on it. Put your thumbs through each end of the loop. Lift your hands with the thread stretched between them and the ball appears to be floating in the air. With practice you can make the ball float from hand to hand (it is really just rolling along the thread). You must wear dark clothing for this trick and be a little distance from your audience so the thread cannot be seen.

76. Changing Card

Effect: A playing card changes value magically.

Secret: You need an Ace of Clubs, a Queen of Hearts and one other card.

Score across the centre of the Ace and the Queen and glue them together for half their length. Use the third to form a back to the special card. Hold the card in your left hand with the flap pointing upwards. Pass your right hand over the card and, as you do so, push the flap down to its lower position – and the card changes.

77. Chain Reaction

Effect: Paper clips form themselves into a chain.

Secret: Link 10 paper clips and put them in one corner of an envelope. Put a strip of glue on the inside of the envelope, just above the chain. Put 10 loose paper clips into the envelope and you are ready to show the trick. Tip out the loose clips then drop them, one at a time, back into the envelope and seal it down. Tear off the corner of the envelope. The chain will drop out. Casually put the envelope in your pocket and display the chain of clips.

78. Your Card Is ...

Effect: You tell a spectator the name of a card he chose.

Secret: Spread a shuffled pack face up to show they are well mixed. Remember the bottom card. Turn the cards over and ask a spectator to take one. Ask him to remember the card and then place it face down on top of the pack. Cut the cards a few times. Spread the cards before you. The selected card is the next card to the right of the one you remembered earlier. Pretend to read the spectator's mind and reveal the card selected.

79. Salt Cellar Suspension

Effect: A salt cellar is suspended from your fingertip.

Secret: All you need, apart from the salt cellar, is a toothpick. Keep the toothpick hidden behind your forefinger as you touch the salt cellar. Secretly push the toothpick into the top of the salt cellar. Hold the hidden toothpick between your thumb and forefinger and you can lift the cellar. It appears that the cellar is sticking to your finger. Take the cellar in your left hand and pull it away from the toothpick. As you hand the cellar to someone for examination, secretly drop the toothpick on your lap.

80. Crafty Catch

Effect: Two pre-determined cards are caught in mid-air.

Secret: Secretly place the Seven of Clubs on the bottom of the pack and the Nine of Spades on the top. When you do the trick, remove the Seven of Spades and the Nine of Clubs from the pack. Show them briefly and push them into the pack. Throw the pack in the air but keep tight hold of the top and bottom cards. Pretend you have caught the two you now hold. Show them triumphantly and everyone will believe they are the two cards you placed in the centre of the pack earlier.