- In the days of King Arthur, they lived in Camelot, a source who entertained the Royal Court with miraculous feet South, magic high.

Above the castle walls, the ancient Necro meets with members of the magic round table.

Come with us now to the Secret room of Merlin.

Isha, - Welcome, welcome once more to my secret room.

Nice to see you again.

I'm supposed to do some Oh, yes.

Mike De page left a, a letter here from a young man named Michael Fox.

In the four years we've been meeting in the Secret Room, I've received 12 letters from Michael Fox and he says, dear Merlin, would you do the trick that you did when you were on the Mike Douglas Show with Martha Ray this summer?

I think it's called The Floating Ball when you did it before.

I was upstairs with the flu.

Will you do it again?

Thank you, Mike Fox.

Well, Mike, we'll try to do the trick just as we did when we went back to the 20th century this summer and did it on the Mike Douglas Show.

It's, it's a very old trick, and you're right, it is called a Floating Ball.

And it was invented by a famous magician, perfected by a famous magician named Oto.

And Thurston also did it, the Layton.

Great.

Howard Thurston.

It goes something, something like this.

Well, that was it.

The floating ball did, did you like that?

I hope you did.

It was a, a favorite of the late and great Howard Thurston and OK Oto.

Theodore Bamberg, who's alive today.

The fellow who really deserves the applause though is, is my assistant.

So let's, let's give a little applause right now to my assistant Mike, the page.

Thank you, Mike.

You're welcome.

Thank you very much.

I couldn't, I couldn't do these tricks without Mike the page.

He's a very, very good assistant, as is Patty the pixie, Jack the jester, and Betty the bookworm who lives over in that book.

What's that?

You wanna know if the hoop is solid?

Oh yes.

Very solid hoop.

I'll give you the hoop and you can keep it as a souvenir.

All right, now, oh, you dropped it.

Pick it up.

That's it.

Pick it up.

Fine.

You're not a very good catcher.

You're gonna have to practice that.

Alright, let's make the magic sword rise now, shall we?

You don't remember the magic words?

Will it go like this?

Fiddly die fiddly d magic sword.

Rise for me.

Okay, let's, let's say the magic words together.

Billy Die.

Philly D met Michael.

Now I was just telling how, what a good assistant you are and you interrupted me.

You know, I have to make the sword rise now.

So - Merlin, - What?

- You did that trick so well.

I think you deserve a reward.

- Oh, that's nice.

And you're giving me this rose as a reward.

- Yes.

- It smells so nice.

I love flowers.

Thank you very much, Mike.

I, I didn't get all the flour, did I?

You rascal.

He's always playing tricks on me.

Mike, the page this, I'll keep the stam and I'll, I'll get even with that little rascal later.

Okay, let's make it caliber.

Rise.

You ready?

I'll fix you.

Mike.

Here we go.

Philly, die Philly D magic sword rise for me and the magic word today.

I should say words because there are two of them.

Is animal baggage.

Animal baggage.

Pretty complicated words, aren't they?

You know what baggage is?

Well, I'm gonna draw it on my sketch pad and explain it a little more fully.

But when I talk about baggage, I'm talking about the sort of thing that, well, your mother and dad carry with them suitcases and they carry things around with them in their suitcase.

But animals also carry baggage or luggage around with them.

Can you think of an animal that carries any kind of baggage?

Well, I'm gonna draw a picture and you tell me if you know what this this animal is.

You might know as I draw First we'll start with a head.

Do you have any idea yet?

Well, that doesn't tell you very much, does it?

But if the animal is seven feet tall, I'll tell you that now, I'll draw the rest of this particular animal.

It has a very kind face and small four legs or small, all front legs, not any bigger than that.

And right below the leg is a little head peeking out a little head.

And it has paws here and it's, well, it looks like it's in kind of a kind of a pouch, doesn't it?

Big hind legs and a huge tail that comes out here.

Tail comes way out the back like that.

And this animal is called a, what is it?

Beg your pardon?

Kangaroo.

But how do I spell kangaroo?

K-A-N-G-A-R-O-O.

And a kangaroo carries luggage or its little child, the baby kangaroo around with it in a pouch, an animal that does that is called a marsupial.

M-A-R-S-U-P-I-A-L.

These are big words today, aren't they?

A marsupial refers to any animal that carries her young around with her in a pouch.

Do you know of any other animals that might carry their young with them in a pouch?

Can you think of any?

Well, a cat, some varieties of cats do.

It's hard to believe some wolves do and some koala bears do.

But this is a very strange one.

Now I'm going to, I'm gonna create an animal sound first.

Tell me what the sound is and then tell me which one carries her young or his young.

Because sometimes, sometimes a male animal carries eggs around with him in a pouch.

Listen, what was that?

No, I didn't make that noise.

No, that was Chauncey the clown.

That was, that was a lion.

That's not a marsupial.

Doesn't carry young and a pouch.

Listen to this one.

It's a pig piggy, right?

Does it carry its young and a pouch?

No, I should say not.

One more.

- 2, 2 8.

- What's that?

That was a male bullfrog.

And believe it or not, some male frogs carry their young about with 'em on pouches on their back.

Tiny pouches that carry eggs.

So they're called the marsupial.

Do you know what animal carries?

Do you know what animal carries their young on their back?

Some bears do, right?

Some baboons do and some O possums do.

But what about this one?

What about this animal?

Oh, I don't think you'll ever get this one.

'cause I didn't know this one until Betty.

The bookworm told me I had no idea about, you know what this is?

It's some kind of a bird, isn't it?

It's a swan.

And if you look closely on this swan's back there and sticking out of her feathers, there happens to be two little baby swans.

She swims in the water and they get very tired.

They don't learn to swim right away.

They swim rather quickly, but not right away.

I better put a little feathery tail up here.

Two little baby swans riding on mother's back.

So the animals that carry their young on, on their back include even birds, swans, O possums, bears and some, some baboons.

Can you think of any animal that carries his or her young in their mouth?

How about this one?

I'm going to draw a picture of an English mast if we have one here at the, at the courts, you know, right?

They carry their young about in there, put big flop ears like sir Jock has a dog grabs the little cub or the little puppy, the whole body.

But a bear, a bear carries young in the mouth.

The head of a little baby bear cub goes right in the mouth.

She puts her big jaws around the, the head of the baby and very tenderly carries the cub.

The daddy bear doesn't do that.

He's too rough and too vicious.

And a cat also carries her young with her mouth.

But where the head in her mouth?

No, the whole body, no, right back here by the scruff of the neck.

I think animal baggage is very interesting or animal luggage, the way our very various animal friends carry things.

Something else is, is interesting to me and some of you, because I've received over 350 letters just from Wisconsin alone this week.

And they ask how to become a member of the magic round table and how to get their own magic wand and membership card.

To do that, you must write me your personal letter to Merlin in care of this station and I'll send you your, your membership card and your miniature magic wand.

But you must tell the good deed that you've done.

I'll be looking forward to hearing word from you.

If I have time, I'll read the good deeds, but there's so many we just can't read them all on the air.

You all do belong in the Magic book however.

Bye now.

See you soon.

Goodbye.

Goodbye.

- Merlin was produced in the studios of Ohio University Television, Athens, Ohio.