Illusions depending on the ear--Practised by the ancients--Speaking
and singing heads of the ancients--Exhibition of the Invisible Girl
described and explained--Illusions arising from the difficulty
of determining the direction of sounds--Singular example of this
illusion--Nature of ventriloquism--Exhibitions of some of the
most celebrated ventriloquists--M. St. Gille--Louis Brabant--M.
Alexandre--Capt. Lyon’s account of Esquimaux ventriloquists.
Next to the eye, the ear is the most fertile source of our illusions,
and the ancient magicians seem to have been very successful in turning
to their purposes the doctrines of sound. In the Labyrinth of Egypt,
which contained twelve palaces and 1500 subterraneous apartments, the
gods were made to speak in a voice of thunder; and Pliny, in whose
time this singular structure existed, informs us, that some of the
palaces were so constructed that their doors could not be opened
without permitting the peals of thunder to be heard in the interior.
When Darius Hystaspes ascended the throne, and allowed his subjects to
prostrate themselves before him as a god, the divinity of his character
was impressed upon his worshippers by the bursts of thunder and flashes
of lightning which accompanied their devotion. History has of course
not informed us how these effects were produced; but it is probable
that, in the subterraneous and vaulted apartments of the Egyptian
labyrinth, the reverberated sounds arising from the mere opening and
shutting of the doors themselves afforded a sufficient imitation of
ordinary thunder. In the palace of the Persian king, however, a more
artificial imitation is likely to have been employed, and it is not
improbable that the method used in our modern theatres was known to
the ancients. A thin sheet of iron, three or four feet long, such as
that used for German stoves, is held by one corner between the finger
and the thumb, and allowed to hang freely by its own weight. The hand
is then moved or shaken horizontally, so as to agitate the corner in a
direction at right angles to the surface of the sheet. By this simple
process a great variety of sounds may be produced, varying from the
deep growl of distant thunder to those loud and explosive bursts which
rattle in quick succession from clouds immediately over our heads.
The operator soon acquires great power over this instrument, so as
to be able to produce from it any intensity and character of sound
that may be required. The same effect may be produced by sheets of
tin-plate, and by thin plates of mica; but, on account of their small
size, the sound is shorter and more acute. In modern exhibitions an
admirable imitation of lightning is produced by throwing the powder of
rosin, or the dust of lycopodium, through a flame; and the rattling
showers of rain which accompany these meteors are well imitated by a
well-regulated shower of peas.
The principal pieces of acoustic mechanism used by the ancients were
_speaking_ or _singing heads_, which were constructed for the purpose
of representing the gods, or of uttering oracular responses. Among
these, the speaking head of Orpheus, which uttered its responses
at Lesbos, is one of the most famous. It was celebrated not only
throughout Greece, but even in Persia; and it had the credit of
predicting, in the equivocal language of the heathen oracles, the
bloody death which terminated the expedition of Cyrus the Great into
Scythia. Odin, the mighty magician of the North, who imported into
Scandinavia the magical arts of the East, possessed a speaking head,
said to be that of the sage Minos, which he had enchased in gold,
and which uttered responses that had all the authority of a divine
revelation. The celebrated mechanic Gerbert, who filled the papal chair
A.D. 1000, under the name of Sylvester II., constructed a speaking
head of brass. Albertus Magnus is said to have executed a head in
the thirteenth century, which not only moved but spoke. It was made
of earthenware, and Thomas Aquinas is said to have been so terrified
when he saw it, that he broke it in pieces; upon which the mechanist
exclaimed, “There goes the labour of thirty years!”
It has been supposed by some authors, that in the ancient
speaking-machines the deception is effected by means of ventriloquism,
the voice issuing from the juggler himself; but it is more probable
that the sound was conveyed by pipes from a person in another apartment
to the mouth of the figure. Lucian, indeed, expressly informs us,
that the impostor Alexander made his figure of Æsculapius speak, by
transmitting his voice through the gullet of a crane to the mouth of
the statue; and that this method was general appears from a passage in
Theodoretus, who assures us, that in the fourth century, when Bishop
Theophilus broke to pieces the statues at Alexandria, he found some
which were hollow, and which were so placed against a wall, that the
priest could conceal himself behind them; and address the ignorant
spectators through their mouths.
Even in modern times, speaking-machines have been constructed on this
principle. The figure is frequently a mere head placed upon a hollow
pedestal, which, in order to promote the deception, contains a pair of
bellows, a sounding-board, a cylinder and pipes supposed to represent
the organs of speech. In other cases these are dispensed with, and a
simple wooden head utters its sounds through a speaking trumpet. At the
court of Charles II., this deception was exhibited with great effect by
one Thomas Irson, an Englishman; and when the astonishment had become
very general, a popish priest was discovered by one of the pages in
an adjoining apartment. The questions had been proposed to the wooden
figure by whispering into its ear, and this learned personage had
answered them all with great ability, by speaking through a pipe in the
same language in which the questions were proposed. Professor Beckmann
informs us that children and women were generally concealed either in
the juggler’s box or in the adjacent apartment, and that the juggler
gave them every assistance by means of signs previously agreed upon.
When one of these exhibitions was shown at Göttingen, the Professor
was allowed, on the promise of secrecy, to witness the process of
deception. He saw the assistant in another room, standing before the
pipe with a card in his hand, upon which the signs agreed upon had
been marked, and he had been introduced so privately into the house
that even the landlady was ignorant of his being there.
An exhibition of the very same kind has been brought forward in our
own day, under the name of the _Invisible Girl_; and as the mechanism
employed was extremely ingenious, and is well fitted to convey an idea
of this class of deceptions, we shall give a detailed description of it.
[Illustration: _Fig. 37._]
The machinery, as constructed by M. Charles, is shown in fig. 37 in
perspective, and a plan of it in Fig. 38. The four upright posts A, A,
A, A, are united at top by a cross rail B, B, and by two similar rails
at bottom. Four bent wires a, _a_, _a_, _a_, proceeded from the top
of these posts, and terminated at _c_. A hollow copper ball M, about
a foot in diameter, was suspended from these wires by four slender
ribands _b_, _b_, _b_, _b_, and into the copper ball were fixed the
extremities of four trumpets T, T, T, T, with their mouths outwards.
[Illustration: _Fig. 38._]
The apparatus now described was all that was visible to the spectator;
and though fixed in one spot, yet it had the appearance of a piece of
separate machinery, which might have occupied any other part of the
room. When one of the spectators was requested by the exhibitor to
propose some question, he did it by speaking into one of the trumpets
at T. An appropriate answer was then returned from all the trumpets,
and the sound issued with sufficient intensity to be heard by an ear
applied to any of them, and yet it was so weak that it appeared to come
from a person of very diminutive size. Hence the sound was supposed to
come from an invisible girl, though the real speaker was a full-grown
woman. The invisible lady conversed in different languages, sang
beautifully, and made the most lively and appropriate remarks on the
persons in the room.
This exhibition was obviously far more wonderful than the speaking
heads which we have described, as the latter invariably communicated
with a wall, or with a pedestal through which pipes could be carried
into the next apartment. But the ball M and its trumpets communicated
with nothing through which sound could be conveyed. The spectator
satisfied himself by examination that the ribands _b_, _b_, were real
ribands, which concealed nothing, and which could convey no sound; and
as he never conceived that the ordinary piece of frame-work AB could
be of any other use than its apparent one of supporting the sphere M,
and defending it from the spectators, he was left in utter amazement
respecting the origin of the sound, and his surprise was increased
by the difference between the sounds which were uttered and those of
ordinary speech.
Though the spectators were thus deceived by their own reasoning,
yet the process of deception was a very simple one. In two of the
horizontal railings A, A, Fig. 38, opposite the trumpet mouths T,
there was an aperture communicating with a pipe or tube which went
to the vertical post B, and descending it, as shown at TAA, Fig. 39,
went beneath the floor _f f_, in the direction _p p_, and entered the
apartment N, where the invisible lady sat. On the side of the partition
about _h_, there was a small hole through which the lady saw what was
going on in the exhibition-room, and communications were no doubt made
to her by signals from the person who attended the machine. When one of
the spectators asked a question by speaking into one of the trumpets
T, the sound was reflected from the mouth of the trumpet back to the
aperture at A, in the horizontal rail, Fig. 38, and was distinctly
conveyed along the closed tube into the apartment N. In like manner the
answer issued from the aperture A, and being reflected back to the ear
of the spectator by the trumpet, he heard the sounds with that change
of character which they receive when transmitted through a tube and
then reflected to the ear.
[Illustration: _Fig. 39._]
The surprise of the auditors was greatly increased by the circumstance,
that an answer was returned to questions put in a whisper, and also
by the conviction that nobody but a person in the middle of the
audience could observe the circumstances to which the invisible figure
frequently adverted.
Although the performances of speaking heads were generally effected
by the methods now described, yet there is reason to think that the
ventriloquist sometimes presided at the exhibition, and deceived the
audience by his extraordinary powers of illusion. There is no species
of deception more irresistible in its effects than that which arises
from the uncertainty with which we judge of the direction and distance
of sounds. Every person must have noticed how a sound in their own ears
is often mistaken for some loud noise moderated by the distance from
which it is supposed to come; and the sportsman must have frequently
been surprised at the existence of musical sounds humming remotely in
the extended heath, when it was only the wind sounding in the barrel
of his gun. The great proportion of apparitions that haunt old castles
and apartments associated with death, exist only in the sounds which
accompany them. The imagination even of the boldest inmate of a place
hallowed by superstition, will transfer some trifling sound near his
own person to a direction and to a distance very different from the
truth, and the sound which otherwise might have no peculiar complexion
will derive another character from its new locality. Spurning the idea
of a supernatural origin, he determines to unmask the spectre, and
grapple with it in its den. All the inmates of the house are found
to be asleep--even the quadrupeds are in their lair--there is not a
breath of wind to ruffle the lake that reflects through the casement
the reclining crescent of the night; and the massive walls in which he
is enclosed forbid the idea that he has been disturbed by the warping
of panelling or the bending of partitions. His search is vain; and
he remains master of his own secret, till he has another opportunity
of investigation. The same sound again disturbs him, and, modified
probably by his own position at the time, it may perhaps appear to
come in a direction slightly different from the last. His searches are
resumed, and he is again disappointed. If this incident should recur
night after night with the same result--if the sound should appear to
depend upon his own motions, or be any how associated with himself,
with his present feelings, or with his past history, his personal
courage will give way; a superstitious dread, at which he himself
perhaps laughs, will seize his mind; and he will rather believe that
the sounds have a supernatural origin, than that they could continue to
issue from a spot where he knows there is no natural cause for their
production.
I have had occasion to have personal knowledge of a case much
stronger than that which has now been put. A gentleman, devoid of all
superstitious feelings, and living in a house free from any gloomy
associations, heard night after night in his bed-room a singular noise,
unlike any ordinary sound to which he was accustomed. He had slept in
the same room for years without hearing it, and he attributed it at
first to some change of circumstances in the roof or in the walls of
the room, but after the strictest examination no cause could be found
for it. It occurred only once in the night; it was heard almost every
night, with few interruptions. It was over in an instant, and it never
took place till after the gentleman had gone to bed. It was always
distinctly heard by his companion, to whose time of going to bed it had
no relation. It depended on the gentleman alone, and it followed him
into another apartment with another bed, on the opposite side of the
house. Accustomed to such investigations, he made the most diligent
but fruitless search into its cause. The consideration that the sound
had a special reference to him alone, operated upon his imagination,
and he did not scruple to acknowledge that the recurrence of the
mysterious sound produced a superstitious feeling at the moment. Many
months afterwards it was found that the sound arose from the partial
opening of the door of a wardrobe which was within a few feet of the
gentleman’s head, and which had been taken into the other apartment.
This wardrobe was almost always opened before he retired to bed, and
the door being a little too tight, it gradually forced itself open
with a sort of dull sound, resembling the note of a drum. As the door
had only started half an inch out of its place, its change of position
never attracted attention. The sound, indeed, seemed to come in a
different direction, and from a greater distance.
When sounds so mysterious in their origin are heard by persons
predisposed to a belief in the marvellous, their influence over the
mind must be very powerful. An inquiry into their origin, if it is made
at all, will be made more in the hope of confirming than of removing
the original impression, and the unfortunate victim of his own fears
will also be the willing dupe of his own judgment.
This uncertainty with respect to the direction of sound is the
foundation of the art of ventriloquism. If we place ten men in a row
at such a distance from us that they are included in the angle within
which we cannot judge of the direction of sound, and if in a calm day
each of them speaks in succession, we shall not be able with closed
eyes to determine from which of the ten men any of the sounds proceed,
and we shall be incapable of perceiving that there is any difference
in the direction of the sounds emitted by the two outermost. If a man
and a child are placed within the same angle, and if the man speaks
with the accent of a child without any corresponding motion in his
mouth or face, we shall necessarily believe that the voice comes from
the child; nay, if the child is so distant from the man that the voice
actually appears to us to come from the man, we shall still continue
in the belief that the child is the speaker; and this conviction would
acquire additional strength if the child favoured the deception, by
accommodating its features and gestures to the words spoken by the
man. So powerful, indeed, is the influence of this deception, that if
a jack-ass, placed near the man, were to open its mouth, and shake
its head responsive to the words uttered by his neighbour, we should
rather believe that the ass spoke than that the sounds proceeded from
a person whose mouth was shut, and the muscles of whose face were in
perfect repose. If our imagination were even directed to a marble
statue or a lump of inanimate matter, as the source from which we were
to expect the sounds to issue, we would still be deceived, and would
refer the sounds even to these lifeless objects. The illusion would be
greatly promoted, if the voice were totally different in its tone and
character from that of the man from whom it really comes; and if he
occasionally speaks in his own full and measured voice, the belief will
be irresistible that the assumed voice proceeds from the quadruped or
from the inanimate object.
When the sounds which are required to proceed from any given object
are such as they are actually calculated to yield, the process of
deception is extremely easy; and it may be successfully executed, even
if the angle between the real and the supposed direction of the sound
is much greater than the angle of uncertainty. Mr. Dugald Stewart
has stated some cases in which deceptions of this kind were very
perfect. He mentions his having seen a person who, by counterfeiting
the gesticulations of a performer on the violin, while he imitated the
music by his voice, riveted the eyes of his audience on the instrument,
though every sound they heard proceeded from his own mouth. The late
Savile Carey, who imitated the whistling of the wind through a narrow
chink, told Mr. Stewart that he had frequently practised this deception
in the corner of a coffee-house, and that he seldom failed to see some
of the company rise to examine the tightness of the windows, while
others, more intent on their newspapers, contented themselves with
putting on their hats and buttoning their coats. Mr. Stewart likewise
mentions an exhibition formerly common in some of the continental
theatres, where a performer on the stage displayed the dumb-show of
singing with his lips and eyes and gestures, while another person
unseen supplied the music with his voice. The deception in this case
he found to be at first so complete as to impose upon the nicest ear
and the quickest eye; but in the progress of the entertainment, he
became distinctly sensible of the imposition, and sometimes wondered
that it should have misled him for a moment. In this case there
can be no doubt that the deception was at first the work of the
imagination, and was not sustained by the acoustic principle. The real
and the mock singer were too distant, and when the influence of the
imagination subsided, the true direction of the sound was discovered.
This detection of the imposture, however, may have arisen from another
cause. If the mock singer happened to change the position of his head,
while the real singer made no corresponding change in his voice, the
attentive spectator would at once notice this incongruity, and discover
the imposition.
In many of the feats of ventriloquism the performer contrives, under
some pretence or other, to conceal his face, but ventriloquists of
great distinction, such as M. Alexandre, practise their art without any
such concealment.
Ventriloquism loses its distinctive character if its imitations are
not performed by a voice from the belly. The voice, indeed, does not
actually come from that region; but when the ventriloquist utters
sounds from the larynx without moving the muscles of his face, he
gives them strength by a powerful action of the abdominal muscles.
Hence he speaks by means of his belly, although the throat is the real
source from whence the sounds proceed. Mr. Dugald Stewart has doubted
the fact, that ventriloquists possess the power of fetching a voice
from within: he cannot conceive what aid could be derived from such
an extraordinary power; and he considers that the imagination, when
seconded by such powers of imitation as some mimics possess, is quite
sufficient to account for all the phenomena of ventriloquism which he
has heard. This opinion, however, is strongly opposed by the remark
made to Mr. Stewart himself by a ventriloquist, “that his art would
be perfect, if it were possible only to speak distinctly without any
movement of the lips at all.” But, independent of this admission, it is
a matter of absolute certainty, that this internal power is exercised
by the true ventriloquist. In the account which the Abbé Chapelle
has given of the performances of M. St. Gille and Louis Brabant, he
distinctly states that M. St. Gille appeared to be absolutely mute
while he was exercising his art, and that no change in his countenance
could be discovered.[16] He affirms, also, that the countenance of
Louis Brabant exhibited no change, and that his lips were close and
inactive. M. Richerand, who attentively watched the performances
of M. Fitz-James, assures us that during his exhibition there was
a distention in the epigastric region, and that he could not long
continue the exertion without fatigue.
[16] Edinburgh Journal of Science, No. xviii., p. 254.
The influence over the human mind which the ventriloquist derives from
the skilful practice of his art is greater than that which is exercised
by any other species of conjuror. The ordinary magician requires his
theatre, his accomplices, and the instruments of his art, and he enjoys
but a local sovereignty within the precincts of his own magic circle.
The ventriloquist, on the contrary, has the supernatural always at
his command. In the open fields as well as in the crowded city, in
the private apartment as well as in the public hall, he can summon up
innumerable spirits; and though the persons of his fictitious dialogue
are not visible to the eye, yet they are unequivocally present to the
imagination of his auditors, as if they had been shadowed forth in
the silence of a spectral form. In order to convey some idea of the
influence of this illusion, I shall mention a few well-authenticated
cases of successful ventriloquism.
M. St. Gille, a grocer of St. Germain-en-Laye, whose performances have
been recorded by the Abbé de la Chapelle, had occasion to shelter
himself from a storm in a neighbouring convent, where the monks were
in deep mourning for a much-esteemed member of their community who had
been recently buried. While lamenting over the tomb of their deceased
brother the slight honours which had been paid to his memory, a voice
was suddenly heard to issue from the roof of the choir bewailing the
condition of the deceased in purgatory, and reproving the brotherhood
for their want of zeal. The tidings of this supernatural event brought
the whole brotherhood to the church. The voice from above repeated its
lamentations and reproaches, and the whole convent fell upon their
faces, and vowed to make a reparation of their error. They accordingly
chanted in full choir a _De Profundis_, during the intervals of
which the spirit of the departed monk expressed his satisfaction at
their pious exercises. The prior afterwards inveighed against modern
scepticism on the subject of apparitions, and M. St. Gille had great
difficulty in convincing the fraternity that the whole was a deception.
On another occasion, a commission of the Royal Academy of Sciences
at Paris, attended by several persons of the highest rank, met at St.
Germain-en-Laye to witness the performances of M. St. Gille. The real
object of their meeting was purposely withheld from a lady of the
party, who was informed that an aërial spirit had lately established
itself in the neighbourhood, and that the object of the assembly was
to investigate the matter. When the party had sat down to dinner in
the open air, the spirit addressed the lady in a voice which seemed to
come from above their heads, from the surface of the ground at a great
distance, or from a considerable depth under her feet. Having been thus
addressed at intervals during two hours, the lady was firmly convinced
of the existence of the spirit, and could with difficulty be undeceived.
Another ventriloquist, Louis Brabant, who had been valet-de-chambre
to Francis I., turned his powers to a more profitable account. Having
fallen in love with a rich and beautiful heiress, he was rejected by
her parents as an unsuitable match for their daughter. On the death
of her father, Louis paid a visit to the widow, and he had no sooner
entered the house than she heard the voice of her deceased husband
addressing her from above, “Give my daughter in marriage to Louis
Brabant, who is a man of large fortune and excellent character. I
endure the inexpressible torments of purgatory for having refused her
to him. Obey this admonition, and give everlasting repose to the soul
of your poor husband.” This awful command could not be resisted, and
the widow announced her compliance with it.
As our conjuror, however, required money for the completion of his
marriage, he resolved to work upon the fears of one Cornu, an old
banker at Lyons, who had amassed immense wealth by usury and extortion.
Having obtained an interview with the miser, he introduced the subjects
of demons and spectres, and the torments of purgatory; and, during an
interval of silence, the voice of the miser’s deceased father was heard
complaining of his dreadful situation in purgatory, and calling upon
his son to rescue him from his sufferings by enabling Louis Brabant to
redeem the Christians that were enslaved by the Turks. The awe-struck
miser was also threatened with eternal damnation if he did not thus
expiate his own sins; but such was the grasp that the banker took of
his gold, that the ventriloquist was obliged to pay him another visit.
On this occasion, not only his father but all his deceased relatives
appealed to him in behalf of his own soul and theirs; and such was
the loudness of their complaints, that the spirit of the banker was
subdued, and he gave the ventriloquist ten thousand crowns to liberate
the Christian captives. When the miser was afterwards undeceived, he is
said to have been so mortified that he died of vexation.
The ventriloquists of the nineteenth century made great additions to
their art, and the performances of M. Fitz-James and M. Alexandre,
which must have been seen by many of our countrymen, were far superior
to those of their predecessors. Besides the art of speaking by the
muscles of the throat and the abdomen, without moving those of the
face, these artists had not only studied with great diligence and
success the modifications which sounds of all kinds undergo from
distance, obstructions, and other causes, but had acquired the art
of imitating them in the highest perfection. The ventriloquist was
therefore able to carry on a dialogue in which the _dramatis voces_,
as they may be called, were numerous; and when on the outside of an
apartment, he could personate a mob with its infinite variety of
noise and vociferation. Their influence over an audience was still
further extended by a singular power over the muscles of the body. M.
Fitz-James actually succeeded in making the opposite or corresponding
muscles act differently from each other; and while one side of his face
was merry and laughing, the other was full of sorrow and in tears.
At one moment he was tall, thin, and melancholic, and after pausing
behind a screen, he came out “bloated with obesity and staggering with
fulness.” M. Alexandre possessed the same power over his face and
figure; and so striking was the contrast of two of these forms, that an
excellent sculptor, Mr. Joseph, has perpetuated them in marble.
This new acquirement of the ventriloquist enabled him, in his own
single person and with his own single voice, to represent upon the
stage a dramatic composition which would have required the assistance
of several actors. Although only one character in the piece could be
seen at the same time, yet they all appeared during its performance,
and the change of face and figure on the part of the ventriloquist was
so perfect, that his personal identity could not be recognized in the
_dramatis personæ_. This deception was rendered still more complete by
a particular construction of the dresses, which enabled the performer
to reappear in a new character after an interval so short that the
audience necessarily believed that it was another person.
It is a curious circumstance that Captain Lyon found among the
Esquimaux of Igloolik ventriloquists of no mean skill. There is much
rivalry among the professors of the art, who do not expose each
other’s secrets, and their exhibitions derive great importance from
the rarity of their occurrence. The following account of one of them
is so interesting that we shall give the whole of it in Captain Lyon’s
words:--
“Amongst our Igloolik acquaintances were two females and a few male
wizards, of whom the principal was Toolemak. This personage was cunning
and intelligent; and, whether professionally, or from his skill in
the chase, but perhaps from both reasons, was considered by all the
tribe as a man of importance. As I invariably paid great deference
to his opinion on all subjects connected with his calling, he freely
communicated to me his superior knowledge, and did not scruple to
allow of my being present at his interviews with Tornga, or his
patron spirit. In consequence of this, I took an early opportunity
of requesting my friend to exhibit his skill in my cabin. His old
wife was with him, and by much flattery and an accidental display
of a glittering knife and some beads, she assisted me in obtaining
my request. All light excluded, our sorcerer began chanting to his
wife with great vehemence, and she in return answered by singing
the Amna-aya, which was not discontinued during the whole ceremony.
As far as I could hear, he afterwards began turning himself rapidly
round, and in a loud, powerful voice vociferated for Tornga with great
impatience, at the same time blowing and snorting like a walrus. His
noise, impatience, and agitation increased every moment, and he at
length seated himself on the deck, varying his tones, and making a
rustling with his clothes. Suddenly the voice seemed smothered, and was
so managed as to sound as if retreating beneath the deck, each moment
becoming more distant, and ultimately giving the idea of being many
feet below the cabin, when it ceased entirely. His wife now, in answer
to my queries, informed me very seriously, that he had dived, and that
he would send up Tornga. Accordingly, in about half a minute, a distant
blowing was heard very slowly approaching, and a voice, which differed
from that at first heard, was at times mingled with the blowing, until
at length both sounds became distinct, and the old woman informed
me that Tornga was come to answer my questions. I accordingly asked
several questions of the sagacious spirit, to each of which inquiries I
received an answer by two loud claps on the deck, which I was given to
understand were favourable.
“A very hollow, yet powerful voice, certainly much different from the
tones of Toolemak, now chanted for some time, and a strange jumble of
hisses, groans, shouts, and gabblings like a turkey, succeeded in rapid
order. The old woman sang with increased energy; and as I took it for
granted that this was all intended to astonish the Kabloona, I cried
repeatedly that I was very much afraid. This, as I expected, added fuel
to the fire, until the poor immortal, exhausted by its own might, asked
leave to retire.
“The voice gradually sank from our hearing as at first, and a very
indistinct hissing succeeded; in its advance it sounded like the tone
produced by the wind on the brass chord of an Æolian harp. This was
soon changed to a rapid hiss like that of a rocket, and Toolemak with
a yell announced his return. I had held my breath at the first distant
hissing, and twice exhausted myself, yet our conjuror did not once
respire, and even his returning and powerful yell was uttered without a
previous stop or inspiration of air.
“Light being admitted, our wizard, as might be expected, was in a
profuse perspiration, and certainly much exhausted by his exertions,
which had continued for at least half an hour. We now observed a couple
of bunches, each consisting of two stripes of white deer-skin, and a
long piece of sinew, attached to the back of his coat. These we had not
seen before, and were informed that they had been sewn on by Tornga
while he was below.”[17]
[17] _Private Journal of_ Captain G. F. Lyon. London, 1824, pp. 358,
361.
Captain Lyon had the good fortune to witness another of Toolemak’s
exhibitions, and he was much struck with the wonderful steadiness of
the wizard throughout the whole performance, which lasted an hour and
a half. He did not once appear to move, for he was so close to the
skin behind which Captain Lyon sat, that if he had done so he must
have perceived it. Captain Lyon did not hear the least rustling of his
clothes, or even distinguish his breathing, although his outcries were
made with great exertion.[18]
[18] Id. p. 366.