Inside The Magic Circle -- Not 200 years ago, we would have been burned at the stake for witchcraft?? murmured a professional magician in the.stalls, whose voice promptly hushed as the curtain rose. On the stage stood a two-horned, gold-painted personage, bathed in red floodlights - "The Devil", - who flung aside his scarlet cloak, poked fun at Britain a fuel shortage (with its unfortunate effect on his own "kingdom"), and bade all magicians present to visit his domains - "where they'll be quite at home!" It was the opening of London's annual Festival of Magic presented by the Magic Circle, loading British association of professional and amateur illusionists, conjurers, escapologists and ventriloquists. April 30, 1947.