On March 23, 1918, William Robinson, an American magician who claimed to be Cheng Liansu of China, was invited by British tycoons to perform the magic trick "grabbing bullets with bare hands" in London's Green Forest Empire. When the gunshots rang out, Cheng Liansu did not show the bullet he was holding, but fell down in response, blood flowing from his chest.
At that time, the audience thought that Cheng Liansu was acting, and it was not until the medical rescue team arrived that they understood that Cheng Liansu was hit by a real bullet. Cheng Liansu, who was sent to the hospital for rescue, died the next day due to serious injuries.
Cheng Liansu is an authentic "fake foreign devil", he was originally an American magician in New York, and he likes to consider himself a "mysterious person". But his performance, although very interesting, was not eye-catching, and few audiences watched.
This Yankee named William Robinson is very "chicken thief", he runs to other "booths" performing magic tricks to observe, looking for the interest of the audience.
After some investigation, William discovered the core of it. The cheering magic performers are gypsies roaming the streets, singing and dancing, and interacting with the audience.
There are also Asian "mages" from China or Japan, especially Chinese, whose "tricks" will always stun the audience. William suddenly realized that he also had to "connect with the world" and add some "international elements".
At that time, there was a Chinese magician named Jin Lingfu who was relatively popular and very popular with those foreigners. William used him as a model, often running to see his performances, pondering his magic principles and stage experience.
Jinlingfu, formerly known as Zhu Liankui, was the first Chinese magician to demonstrate traditional Chinese magic in the Western world. When he performed Chinese folk tricks in the American circus, he alarmed the American magic world and set off a wave of Chinese tricks.
Many foreign magicians followed the Zhu style, dressing in Chinese robes and horse coats, shaving their heads and pigtails to perform magic tricks. But none of them learned the essence of Zhu Liankui's magic.
Among them, he used an empty cloth to conjure a huge bowl that could hold 80 pounds of water in a blink of an eye, and when the water in the bowl spread all the way to the edge of the bowl, Zhu Liankui reached out again and took out a child's show from the water, which made the audience look in the clouds.
For this reason, Zhu Liankui also said in the New York newspaper that if someone can conjure a bowl of water like him, he will reward the other party with $1,000. William, who knew the news, came to apply, but was rejected by Zhu Liankui, so angry that he turned around and went to Europe to perform Chinese-style magic.
In order to set up his own people, William, who was hot, gave himself a name that was very similar to Zhu Liankui's stage name Jin Lingfu in English pronunciation, called Cheng Liansu, claiming to be a 100% authentic Chinese magician.
He took off his suit, changed into the official uniform of China's Qing Dynasty, combed his long braids, and swore that he was a native Chinese. After that, William disappeared, and Cheng Liansu appeared.
In order to convince the audience even more, he pretended not to understand English and symbolically hired a translator to accompany him in the act. Every time it was his turn to speak, he who could not speak Chinese, he carefully spoke into the air in a language that no one could understand, in order to maintain his identity as a Qing Dynasty.
At that time, the British had never seen a few real Chinese, and no one had heard of Chinese, so this Cheng Liansu's divine operation, foreigners were neither suspicious nor fake.
Think of an American with blue eyes and a hooked nose, shoehorned as a Chinese and not speaking, and speaking "Chinese" that is not Chinese, which is extremely absurd, and ask for a psychological shadow.
This copycat version of the scammer, after such packaging, attracted a large number of audiences to watch the performance of "Chinese Cheng Liansu". However, he is not a "dry meal", in addition to performing Chinese magic tricks that "steal from the master", he also has his own unique skills.
The audience will see that several people dressed as "Chinese Boxers" will go on stage and shoot at Cheng Liansu, and after hearing a gunshot, Cheng Liansu grabbed forward pompously, frightening the audience into a burst of exclamation.
As if nothing had happened, Cheng Liansu calmly stretched out his palm and showed everyone the bullet he had caught. The frightened audience felt that this "god man" was not performing magic, but really grabbed the bullet and responded with constant applause.
In fact, Cheng Liansu actually took advantage of the audience to come on stage to test the guns and bullets, and secretly hid the backup bullets in his hands.
And the gun that fired the bullet was specially modified, the gunpowder was detonated in a fake chamber under the real chamber, the real bullet did not leave the gun and shot out, Cheng Liansu showed that he prepared it first.
Cheng Liansu has long been familiar with this skill, so he always seems extremely relaxed on stage, sometimes deliberately pretending to fall to the ground, pretending to be unconscious, and then getting up amid people's screams and spitting out a bullet from his mouth.
The liar Cheng Liansu succeeded, but the real Chinese magician Zhu Liankui was upset. In 1905, Zhu Liankui went to London to perform and discovered this impostor. The theater where the two of them performed was just over 100 meters away.
As a result, the original and pirated copies began to PK, from verbal abuse in the newspaper for personal attacks, to the appointment of time to compete on the same stage. Zhu Liankui said that if Cheng Liansu could perform 10 of his 20 shows, or if he could not play any of Cheng Liansu's shows, he would lose £1,000 to the other party.
Just when people were watching the excitement, Cheng Liansu arrived as scheduled on the day of the game, but Zhu Liankui did not come. British public opinion therefore believed that the winner was Cheng Liansu, and even said that Cheng Liansu had changed Zhu Liankui into nothing.
The gossip of 7788 varied, and the most reliable version was that Zhu Liankui's manager believed that there was no clause proving the Chinese ancestry of both sides in the battle book, so he decided not to let Zhu Liankui play.
In short, Cheng Liansu became famous for a while. But guns always have moments when they go off. That day, Cheng Liansu suddenly suffered an accident, because the wear and tear of the prop gun caused the gunpowder to detonate in the real chamber, and the bullet inside was quickly fired out and hit Cheng Liansu in the chest.
It seems that the charlatans who will "play tricks" and "play terriers" will also have times when they are careless, and they will die because of this. The stage of life for this American, dressed as a Chinese, came to an end at the age of 57.
