TWENTY YEARS OF SPOOF & BLUFF

CARLTON—OFF

TWENTY YEARS
OF
SPOOF AND BLUFF

BY
“CARLTON”
ILLUSTRATED

HERBERT JENKINS LIMITED
YORK STREET, ST. JAMES’S
LONDON, S.W. 1 MCMXX

WILLIAM BRENDON AND SON, LTD., PRINTERS, PLYMOUTH, ENGLAND

PREFACE

It has been said that any man of mature agecould write at least one interesting book,if he confined himself to relating his ownexperiences.

Well, that is what I have done. This isprimarily the story of my life, interspersed withvarious anecdotes, “wheezes,” and “gags,” pertainingto a profession concerning the real insideof which the public is mostly ignorant.

Like Topsy, the book “growed.” An incidentrecalled here, a story remembered there, has beenjotted down at haphazard as the mood seized me.

I may add that the incidents recorded inChapters XIV. and XV., as also the human telescopestory in Chapter XIII., first saw the lightin the Strand Magazine, to the Editor of whichperiodical I am indebted for permission to reproducethem here.

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CHAPTER I
EARLY EXPERIENCES
	PAGE
Work as a telegraph messenger boy—First attempts at “public” entertainment—Small but appreciative audiences—I introduce the cycle to the post office—Christmas-boxing on my own—I am rewarded with the “Order of the Sack”—Hard times—A home-made conjuring outfit—On tramp to Southend—Busking on the sands—Wrathful “niggers”—“Stage” fright—“Best clear, kid”—I clear—On the road back to London—Hunger and thirst—Four shows for fourpence—A “welcome” home—No food in the house and the brokers in—“Covering the spot”—Jimmy Jennings—I win watches—Beat a game and gain a friend—“A quick way of making money”—Learning to be a street patterer—Tricks of the showman’s trade—Nearly a riot—Jimmy grows anxious—Good-bye to London once more—A new pitch—And the beginning of a new life	3
CHAPTER II
I POSE AS A SHOWMAN
Practising conjuring—Why I rarely play cards—The great Maskelyne and Cooke box trick—I make a trick box of my own—The “Flying Lady” who flew—away—In partnership with Gypsy Brown—My life with the show folk—I begin to make money—The kings of the fair grounds—Caravan life and cookery—The Romany people and their ways—Gypsy Brown cheats me—How the “bluers” work—Fights in the Fair Ground—The etiquette of the showmen—In a boxing booth— ... BU KİTABI OKUMAK İÇİN ÜYE OLUN VEYA GİRİŞ YAPIN! Sitemize Üyelik ÜCRETSİZDİR!

TWENTY YEARS OF SPOOF & BLUFF

PREFACE

CONTENTS

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