THE AUSTRALIAN BELT

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“Not many people in this country have been fortunate enough to see the old Australian Belt
come-on. It was a closely guarded secret of the old-time Australian swindler and is still
prevalent in the Australian Bush. Very few crooked American gamblers ever learned to do it,
mainly because it is so difficult and requires so many hours of practice.”

The Australian sharper customarily used a four- foot thong of soft leather, tied together into
a circle. You can use a four-foot length of soft string, but you greatly simplify things
for yourself if you get a 48-inch length of ball-chain, tiny brass balls held together in a chain
of the type sometimes found on light fixtures. There is a little clip for such chain. If you put
the two ends of the chain into the two ends of the clip, you will have a circle of chain that is
just the right weight and flexibility to make the trick easy.

“The idea of the Belt Swindle,” you explain as you toss the circle of chain onto the table,
“was that the con-man would lay the belt out in a pattern, usually with a Figure Eight in the
middle. If a victim stuck his finger in either loop, the swindler would bet either that he could
pull the chain free of the finger without dislodging it or that the finger would hold the
chain.”

“Actually,” you explain, “if you put your finger in one loop of the Figure Eight, the chain will
hold. If you put it in the other loop, the chain will come free. The swindler actually was
betting that you couldn’t pick the right loop.” You proceed to demonstrate.

You lay the chain out in a long loop, a couple of inches wide. Your right hand goes out to the
right end of the loop, close to the end but on the far side. Pick up the chain at this point by
putting the fingers beneath it, the thumb on top. You lift the chain a couple of inches, your
fingertips pointing away from you. Now you move the hand to the left and slightly forward
until you reach the left end of the loop. Your hand has turned over slightly in making this
move, and you stop when your fingertips are just inside the left end of the loop. You make
the move in a wide arc, so that an additional loop forms.
Without this extra loop, you wouldn’t be able to form the Figure Eight.

The loop at the right end as you look at it will be much smaller than the one at the left end.
Put the thumb and forefinger of each hand into one of the loops and pull them to equal size.
You’ll have a Figure Eight inside the rectangle. Now, with thumb and forefinger, pinch the
sides of the rectangle together so that you have a double-strand Figure Eight.

If anyone puts a finger in the left loop and you pull one strand of the right hand, the finger
will catch the loop. But if anyone puts a finger in the right-hand loop and you pull one
strand of the left end, the entire loop will come free.

You demonstrate this several times. Now for the monkey business. You form the double
Figure Eight again, apparently the same as before. Only this time, your fingers go under the
right end of the loop on the side closest to you instead of away from you. You make the
Figure Eight just as before and pinch the sides of the rectangle together to make it a double
Figure Eight. Now, whichever loop you put your finger in, if one strand of the opposite end
is pulled, the loop will come free. In other words, the victim can’t win.
 THE AUSTRALIAN BELT
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“I show you that both fingers are caught,” you say. “But I’ll give you a real sporting
proposition. Lift either finger, and I’ll bet you lift the wrong one. In other words, I’ll bet that
the loop will then pull free.”

You have a sure thing. Whichever finger he lifts, the loop pulls free of the other one.

Study the drawings of the way the loop is laid out and the method in which the Figure Eight
is formed. Actually, difficult as the moves are to describe, they’re extremely simple to do.

And this is one of those things like the Impossible Knot where everyone wants to participate.
I’ve seen groups go almost out of their minds trying to figure it out. The “gimmick” laying
out of the Figure Eight is the same as the straight method—except that you grasp the loop on
the side nearest you instead of the far side.

There are many variations to the old Belt Trick, some of them extremely complicated — but
don’t bother with them. The sheer simplicity of the basic routine is what makes it so good.
Making anything more complicated than the simple Figure Eight only makes the trick
confusing.

If you work out a good line of chatter to go with this, you’ll have a “swindle” type trick that
will be absolutely new to most of your viewers and one that will hold their interest. It looks
like a simple puzzle rather than a trick—only it’s a puzzle that nobody can solve.