"In my opinion," the Frenchman said with some irritation, "all
  this business with bottles, all this deliberate choice of a
  seemingly impossible position while juggling, was nothing but an
  excuse. It was intended as a smoke screen to hide the fact that
  Santini had never been able to juggle with More than nine balls. He
  was clever enough to know his limitations and so he worked out a
  routine to distract the attention of the audience from it, by
  standing in what appeared to the public as a most precariously
  balanced position. I don't want to criticize a distinguished artist
  and a colleague who is no longer with us, but in my opinion Santini
  was merely cheating. It is true that I myself perform standing with
  both my feet on the ground, but then I juggle with twelve balls. Who
  else can do it? It is a classic act accomplished in the purest style,
  without any cheap tricks to lure the public's eye away from real
  difficulty. I am a classicist. I am true to the great French classic
  tradition of the eighteenth century. Purity of style, that is what
  matters. It is just that I wish that I could catch that last ball."
        -- Romain Gary, The talent scout