In the movie "Kung Fu", the fire cloud evil god played by Liang Xiaolong once said such a sentence: "I can catch bullets!" "No one expected that the famous fire cloud evil god on the rivers and lakes was actually such a mentally ill person wearing a vest and stepping on slippers." What is even more surprising is that it is such an old man who looks ordinary and unremarkable, and dares to perform "picking up bullets with his bare hands" with his wild words. However, the Fire Cloud Evil God caught up, just as the so-called "world martial arts, only fast is not broken", as long as his shot speed is faster than the bullet, he can easily clamp the bullet.
However, the people who can pick up bullets with their bare hands in history are real, although this is just a trick, but they must also be practiced over the years, otherwise, they will encounter the greatest disaster in life like the American "fire cloud evil god". William Robinson, an authentic American, Chinese has always been synonymous with mystery in an era when East and West were not intertwined. Therefore, in order to make money, Robinson packaged himself as a "Chinese" and named him Cheng Liansu.
In fact, the reason why Cheng Liansu chose to take this road was actually inspired by the magician Jin Lingfu. Jin Lingfu is a magician from China, his real name is Zhu Liankui, because he suffers from stuttering problems, so others also call him "Zhu Yao Bar". In the Qing Dynasty, magic tricks have been very prosperous, not only can be produced, the gameplay has become diverse, very popular in the folk. Unfortunately, the trick has always been difficult to achieve elegance, and if it were not for Zhu Liankui's overly prominent craftsmanship, he would not have been absorbed into the court performance team.
However, Zhu Liankui was eventually "officially recognized", and since then, he has had an additional name - a magician dedicated to Empress Dowager Cixi. In this way, Zhu Liankui's performance road became smooth, and his fame grew, until he was sent out to participate in the World Exposition held in Omaha, USA. After several months of consecutive performances, Zhu Liankui attracted the attention of Colonel Hopkins, who was an American juggling show organizer with a certain social status and voice.
Generally speaking, Zhu Liankui and others should return to China immediately after their performances. However, Colonel Hopkins ignored this rule and directly signed a contract with Zhu Liankui for the performance. Later, under the efforts of Hopkins, Zhu Liankui finally stayed in the United States as a performing artist and embarked on the official performance stage. Unsurprisingly, Zhu Liankui's trick was unheard of by the Americans, and they let out a series of exclamations offstage, and they could not observe the flaws.
Soon after, Zhu Liankui, who was very popular in the United States, made a lot of money, and there was an invisibly line between Chinese and magic, that is, as long as someone used these two keywords as a gimmick, someone would flock to it. Therefore, Cheng Liansu is the person who discovered the mystery, although he is an American, he has found a huge market contained in magic performances, anyway, there are not many Westerners who have seen Chinese, as long as he puts some effort into the dress, and then find a "translator" to accompany him, it is not difficult to achieve the purpose of fish eyes and beads.
Of course, even if Cheng Liansu can pass the dress in disguise, he must have the skill of magic performance. Coincidentally, he is really a magic lover, And Zhu Liankui's tricks he will have several, even if the two have slight differences in appearance and perception, but in general, they are the same. However, in order to prevent the encounter, Cheng Liansu did not plan to perform in the United States. In 1890, he crossed the ocean to Europe, and his first stop was in London, England.
In fact, the reason why Cheng Liansu came to Europe to develop was actually a vendetta with Zhu Liankui. At that time, Zhu Liankui issued a public statement in the New York Times, saying that as long as someone could conjure up a bowl of water out of thin air like him, he would pay a reward of $1,000. In this way, the magic enthusiast Cheng Liansu rushed over overnight, but he was rejected by Zhu Liankui. Therefore, Cheng Liansu came to England in a huff, and he wanted to open up a magic market in Europe that belonged only to him.
However, Zhu Liankui's rejection of Cheng Liansu was for a reason, before that, he had already heard of Cheng Liansu's various imitations, and he did not want to deal with such people. Zhu Liankui believed that if he wanted to do magic, he could only rely on diligent study and invention day and night, while Cheng Liansu, as an American, desperately dressed himself up as a Qing Dynasty man, and he not only shaved a bald head, but even took a fake braid, which made him very unhappy in his heart. Because of this, Zhu Liankui would refuse Cheng Liansu's performance, and he did not want to have any contact with people who deceived the world and stole his name.
Not surprisingly, after arriving in Britain, Cheng Liansu put up a sign of "Chinese", on the stage, he never spoke, any instructions were completed through the assistant standing on the side, even if there was a reporter interview, he only smiled the whole time, and signaled that he could not understand. However, Cheng Liansu's magic techniques are still good, his skills and proficiency are not inferior to Zhu Liankui, except for some small details that are not in place, it will not arouse any suspicion.
In 1905, Zhu Liankui was invited to London to perform, and coincidentally, Cheng Liansu was also performing at the Racecourse Theatre in London at that time, and the performance location between the two was only a few hundred meters. So the British quickly became interested, and they wanted to see a contest between two top magicians. Unfortunately, the competition ended in a ridiculous scolding battle, Cheng Liansu said that Zhu Liankui was a "liar" and an "imposter", while Zhu Liankui said that Cheng Liansu was not even Chinese and was not qualified to compete on the same stage with him... In this way, the much-anticipated competition on the same stage ended without a problem, and Cheng Liansu's career was not much affected.
According to records, Cheng Liansu's best trick is to pick up bullets with his bare hands (death curse), and every time before the performance starts, he will arrange assistants to act as "trusts" in the audience, and then take two specially modified guns to perform. After that, Cheng Liansu will take advantage of the kung fu of checking the gun to hold the bullet in his hand, and the gunpowder in the gun will also be detonated by the space under the chamber, although it looks like a bullet is fired, but in fact, the bullet is still in the gun.
However, on March 23, 1918, Cheng Liansu accidentally lost his hand, due to the wear and tear of the prop gun, resulting in a slight residue of gunpowder in the chamber, so he was wounded by bullets on the spot, and the next day he died due to ineffective rescue. Therefore, it is better not to easily imitate "picking up bullets with bare hands", because if you are not careful, you will lose your life.