Chapter 3

Fig. 21.

The second of Vaucanson’s automata was his celebrated model of a duck, which he himself described in a letter to the Abbé de la Fontaine in 1738. This extraordinary automaton (according to the inventor’s own account of it), exhibited a considerable amount of physiological and anatomical knowledge and the most profound mechanical skill, for in it the operation of eating, drinking, and digestion, were very closely imitated. The duck stretched out its neck to take corn from the hand, it swallowed it and discharged it in a digested condition, the digestion being effected not by trituration, but by dissolution, and (to quote the quaint expressions of the inventor), “The matter digested in the stomach is conducted by pipes (as in an animal by the guts), quite to the anus, where there is a sphincter that lets it out. I don’t pretend,” he says, “to give this as a perfectdigestion, capable of producing blood and nutritive particles for the support of the animal. I hope nobody will be so unkind as to upbraid me with pretending to any such thing. I only pretend to imitate the mechanism of their actionin these things,i.e., first, to swallow the corn; secondly, macerate or dissolve it; thirdly, to make it come out sensibly changed from what it was.” But (on the same authority), besides being furnished with a digestive system, the wings were anatomical imitations of nature; not only was every bone imitated, but all the processes and eminences of each bone, and the joints were articulated as in a real animal.

After having been wound up, the duck ate and drank, played in the water with his bill, making what is described as a “gugling” sound, rose up on its legs and sat down, flapped its wings, dressed its feathers with its bill, and performed all these different operations without requiring to be touched again.

It is important, however, to point out that this digestion story can only be “digested”cum grano salis, and this is supplied in the sequel which furnishes the explanation. In the year 1840 the automaton was found hidden away in a garret in Berlin; it was very much out oforder, and a mechanician of the name of Georges Tiets undertook to repair it. It was taken to Paris, and in the year 1844 was exhibited in the Place du Palais Royal. In the course of this exhibition one of the wings became deranged, and it was put into the hands of Robert-Houdin for repairs. Robert-Houdin took advantage of this opportunity for examining the so-called digestive system of the automaton, and he thus describes its action:

“On présentait à l’animal un vase dans lequel était de la graine baignant dans l’eau. Le mouvement que faisait le bec en barbotant divisait la nourriture et en facilitait l’introduction dans un tuyau placé sous le bec inférieur du canard; l’eau et la graine, ainsi aspirés tombaient dans une boîte placée sous le ventre del’automate, laquelle se vidait toutes les trois ou quatre séances. L’évacuation était chose préparée à l’avance; une espèce de boullie, composée de mie de pain colorée de vert, était poussée par un coup de pompe etsoigneusement reçue, sur un plateau en argent, comme produit d’une digestion artificielle,” so that, after all, this wonderful digestion of Vaucanson’s duck was nothing more than a clever trick.

The third automaton of Vaucanson was a figure that played on a shepherd’s pipe with one hand while it beat a drum with the other. The instrument played upon was a little pipe with only three holes, and the different notes were produced by a greater or less pressure of air and a more or less closing of the holes, and every note, no matter how rapid was the succession, had to be modified by the tongue. In this machine there were provided as many different pressures of air as there were notes to be sounded, and the mechanism by which these operations and the fingering of the keys were effected reflects the greatest credit on the memory of this remarkable man.[9]

The Automaton duck of Vaucanson was, to a certain extent, anticipated by the Comte de Gennes, Governor of the Island of Saint Christopher, who, we are told by Père Labat, constructed a peacock which could walk about and pick up grains of corn, which it swallowed and digested. I have no means of determining whether or not Vaucanson took the idea of his duck from this automaton, but that Vaucanson had imitators there is abundant evidence to prove. In the year 1752, Du Moulin, a silversmith, travelled all over Europe with automata similar to those of Vaucanson, and they were afterwards purchased in Nuremberg, by Bereis, a counsellor of Helmstadt, at whose place they were seen by Beckmann in 1754.

In the year 1760, there was a writing automaton exhibited in Vienna, which was constructed by Friedrich von Knaus, and about the same time anumber of very curious automata were made by Le Droz, of Chaux de Fonds, in Neufchatel. One of these was a clock, presented to the King of Spain, which had, in addition to several moving figures, a sheep that bleated in a very natural way, and a dog mounting guard over a basket of fruit; if anyone attempted to touch the basket the dog barked and growled, and if any of the fruit were taken away the barking continued until it was restored.

The son of this man (who lived at Geneva), was no less skilful a mechanician, for he made a gold snuffbox about 4½ inches long by 3 inches broad, in which when a spring was touched a little door flew open and a beautifully modelled bird of green enamelled gold rose up, fluttered its wings and tail, and commenced a trilling song of great beauty and power, its beak keeping time with the notes. Such a snuffbox was exhibited in the Great Exhibition of 1851, proving as great a popular attraction as the Koh-i-nur diamond, and (owing to the kindnessof my friend Mr. Tripplin the well-known horologist) I am now able to show you one of these very beautiful triumphs of mechanical skill.

Another of the younger Le Droz’s inventions was his celebrated drawing automaton, which was a life-size figure of a man sitting behind a table and holding a style in his hand. A sheet of vellum was placed on the table, and the figure began to draw portraits of well-known persons with extraordinary correctness. This automaton was shown in London, and attracted considerable attention at the time.

Fig. 22.

I must now re-introduce to you another old friend, first shown here by Brother Manning. Here he is! a little acrobat that turns somersaults backwards down stairs. This is not, as many have thought, an invention of that great mechanical genius, Robert-Houdin, for it is figured and described in Musschenbroeck’s “Introductio ad philosophiam naturalem,” which was published in Leyden in 1762 (a year after the author’sdeath), and half a century before Robert-Houdin was born, and on the screen you have a facsimile (Fig. 22) of Musschenbroeck’s illustration of this mechanical toy, which he refers to as “an old invention of the Chinese.” It is also described by Ozanam in his “Recréations Mathématiques et Physiques,” the first edition of which was published in 1694. The figure I now throw on the screen (Fig. 23), is taken from the second edition of this work which was edited by Montucla in 1790. The principle is exceedingly simple; the whole thing depends upon thecentre of gravity being suddenly changed by a shifting weight. Within a tube contained within the body, is a small quantity of mercury, and the moment that this tube is inclined to the horizon the mercury flows to the lower end tilting one figure over the other, and with such forcethat it is carried over by its inertia far enough to tilt the tubes, and cause the mercury to flow to the opposite end, and the process is repeated as long as there are stairs to descend; by a very simple arrangement of strings passing over pulleys, the legs and arms are always brought into suitable positions to support the figure in every position of its descent.

Fig. 23.

I now come to the automaton which for some years was the wonder of every country in Europe, the automaton chess-player of the Baron Wolfgang von Kempelen, constructed in 1776. This automaton was a life-size sitting figure dressed as a Turk, and having before it a large rectangular chest or cabinet, 3 feet 6 inches long, 2 feet deep, and 2 feet 6 inches high, on the top of which was a chessboard and aset of men. The seat on which the figure sat, was attached to the cabinet and the whole was on castors, so that it could be wheeled about the floor. When the automaton was exhibited, the exhibitor began operations by opening the doors of the cabinet so as to show its contents, and here I will throw on the screen a copy (Fig. 24) of one of the plates in a curious pamphlet,[10]printed anonymously in 1821, but probably by Professor Willis. It must, however, be recollected that these doors were opened in succession, and never all at the same time, but whichever door was opened, nothing could be seen but wheels, levers, connecting rods, strings and cylinders. After this the doors were closed and locked, the machinery was wound up, and the figure was ready to play a game of chess with anyone who would challenge him. On commencing the game the figure moved its head, and seemed to look at every part of the board. When it checked the king, it nodded its head three times, and when it threatened the queen, it nodded twice. It also shook its head when its adversary made a false move, and replaced the offending piece. It nearly always won the game, but occasionally lost.

When it was completed, it was exhibited in Riga, Moscow, St. Petersburg, Berlin, Presburg and Vienna, coming to London in 1783, and having been seen by many thousands during those years with out its secret being discovered, but in the year 1789, a book was published by Mr. Freyherre of Dresden, in which he showed that “a well taught boy very thin and tall of his age, (sufficiently so that he could be concealed in a drawer below the chessboard,) agitated the whole.” In the plate before you, you will see that the author has shown in dotted lines, the position a boy might take when the left hand door was opened.

Fig. 24.

The real story of this most ingenious and successful scientific fraud is so interesting that I must tell it here, although it puts for ever Baron von Kempelen’s chess-player outside the circle of true automata. In the year 1776, a regiment, half Russian and half Polish, mutinied at Riga. The mutineers were defeated, and their chief officer, Worouski, fell, having had both his thighs fractured by a cannon ball. He hid himself in a ditch until after dark, when he dragged himself to the neighbouring house of a doctor named Osloff, a man of great benevolence, who took him in and concealed him, but he had to amputate both his legs. During the time of Worouski’s illness, Osloff was visited by his intimate friend the Baron von Kempelen, and after many consultations and much thought, Kempelen hit upon the idea of conveying him out of the country by devising this automaton (as Worouski was a great chess-player), and in three months the figure was finished.

In order to avoid suspicion he gave performancesen routeto the frontier. The first performance was given at Toula, on the 6th of November, 1777 (that is to say exactly 114 years ago to-day). The machine and Worouski were packed in a case and started for Prussia, but when they reached Riga, orders came from the Empress Katherine II., for Baron von Kempelen to go to St. Petersburg with his automaton. The Empress played several games with him, but was always beaten, and then she wanted to buy the figure. This was an awkward situation for Kempelen, and he was at his wits’ end to know how to wriggle out of it. He declared that his own presence was absolutely necessary for the working of the machine, and that it was quite impossible for him to sell it, and, after some further discussion, he was allowed to proceed on his journey.

This chess-player was, in the same year, purchased by Mons. Anthon, who took it all over Europe. At his death it came into the hands of JohannMaelzel, the inventor of the Metronome, who sent it to the United States. It was afterwards sent back to Europe, and in the year 1844 was in the possession of a mechanician of Belleville, named Croizier.

Maelzel himself was a mechanician of very considerable skill, and he constructed an automaton trumpeter, which was exhibited at Vienna about the year 1804, which played the Austrian and French cavalry marches, and marches and allegros by Weigl, Dussek, and Pleyel. Maelzel was, after that, appointed mechanician to the Austrian Court, and constructed an automatic orchestra, in which trumpets, flutes, clarionets, violins, violoncellos, drums, cymbals, and a triangle, were introduced, and this attracted very great interest in the Austrian capital at the time.

In the year 1772 there was in Spring Gardens, near Charing Cross, a most remarkable collection of automata exhibited in a place of entertainment known as Cox’s Museum, and here I have an original copyof the “Descriptive catalogue, of the several superb and magnificent pieces of mechanism and jewellery exhibited in Mr. Cox’s Museum, at Spring Gardens, Charing Cross.” To which this footnote is added, “Hours of Admission, 11, 2, and 7, every day (Sundays excepted), tickets Half a Guinea each, admitting one person, to be had at Mr. Cox’s, No. 103, Shoe Lane.” This was a very extraordinary exhibition, and contained upwards of twenty large and elaborate automata, several of them being adorned with gold and precious stones. Some were complicated clocks, some were large groups of animals, and figures with fountains and cascades around them. None of these objects was less than nine feet high, and some were as high as sixteen feet. I can find nothing important enough from a Mechanick’s point of view, to describe in detail, but it was the precursor in the same place of the exhibition of Monsieur Maillardet, which was one of the London attractions at the beginning of the present century.

M. Maillardet exhibited a bird automaton (similar to that already referred to which was made by Le Droz), and whose performance lasted four minutes with one winding up. He constructed also a spider, entirely of steel, which imitated all the actions of the real animal, it ran round and round the table in a spiral line, tending towards the centre. Maillardet made automata representing a caterpillar, a mouse, a lizard, and a serpent; the last crawled about all over the table, darted its tongue in and out, and produced a hissing sound.

Maillardet’s most important automata were, however, his drawing and writing figure, and his pianoforte player. The former was a kneeling boy, who wrote in ink with an ordinary pen, sentences in English and in French, and drew landscapes. The pianist was a figure of a lady, who performed eighteen pieces of music. She began by bowing to the audience, her bosom heaved, and her eyes first looked at the music, andthen followed the motion of her fingers, and the music was produced by the keys being played on by the fingers; but the most remarkable of M. Maillardet’s machines, was a magician, or fortune-teller, which gave answers to some twenty given questions, which were inscribed on as many counters or medallions. One of these medallions having been put into a drawer, the figure arose from his seat, bowed to the audience, and described mystic circles in the air with his wand; after appearing to consult his book of mysteries, he struck a little door behind him, which flew open, and exhibited an appropriate answer to the question on the medallion.

The general principle upon which this automaton’s power of selection was founded lay in the fact that in the edge of each medallion there was a small hole drilled, but no two holes were drilled to the same depth, and, by an exceedingly delicate mechanism, the varying depth to which a pin could be thrust into the edge of a disc, was caused to control the mechanism by which the various answers were selected, and which were exhibited when the little door flew open.

The next great master of automaton design and construction, was that wonderful genius Robert-Houdin (about whom our worthy Secretary and Seer discoursed to us so pleasantly and so instructively nearly a year ago). Brother Manning’s paper was so complete in itself, and that part of it which dealt with automata was so ably illustrated, that it will be quite unnecessary for me to add to the length of this communication, by going over that ground again, so I will merely enumerate the automata of that interesting man and pass on to still more recent times.

The first of the automata of Robert-Houdin was a confectioner’s shop, in which a pastry-cook came out of the door when requested and offered to the spectators patisserie, bonbons, and refreshments of every description, and within the shop might be seen the assistants making pastry, rolling out the dough, and putting it into the oven. Then hemade two clowns, known as Auriol and Débureau. The first of these performed a number of acrobatic feats upon a chair which was held at arm’s length by the other. After this, the figure of Auriol smoked a pipe, and accompanied on the flageolet an air played by the orchestra.

Another was an acrobat which performed tricks on the trapèze, and the last to which I shall refer, was his celebrated writing figure, which is illustrated in Brother Manning’s “Opusculum,” No. XXIV., to which I must refer you for a great deal of interesting information respecting that remarkable man.

A contemporary of Robert-Houdin was Mons. Mareppe, who constructed a very wonderful automaton violin player, and which was exhibited at the Conservatoire at Paris, in the year 1838, and which performed on the violin by bowing and fingering the strings, and in an account of the performance which was published at the time in “Galignani’s Messenger,” it is stated that the musical execution was so perfect as to bring tears into the eyes of the audience.

Coming to our own period, from the time of Robert-Houdin, there have been no great automata which will live in the history of the subject, until the year 1875, when Mr. J. N. Maskelyne (who, I am happy to tell you, is honouring us with his presence to-night) exhibited at the Egyptian Hall his marvellous “Psycho.” This was a seated figure, supported by a cylindrical pedestal of glass which stood upon a little platform, and, being on castors, could be wheeled about the floor. This automaton can actually play a game of whist, selecting the cards from a rack in front of it, and playing a most skilful game. The machine works apparently without any mechanical connection with anything outside, and the delicacy and precision of its actions, display the most consummate skill in design, and give to its inventor a high position for mechanical science. This automaton also works out arithmeticalcalculations, with numbers from one to a hundred millions, showing the result behind a door which opens in front of its box.

Another of Mr. Maskelyne’s automata, is the celebrated “Zoe” of 1877, a sitting figure supported like the last on a glass pedestal so as to exclude the possibility of an electrical system of communication. A sheet of paper is fastened on to the table in front, and the figure traces out very fair portraits of public characters chosen by the audience out of a list of some two hundred names.

In respect to these most beautiful machines I must refrain from revealing to you the secrets of their working, and that for two reasons, first, because I do not know them myself; and second, because Mr. Maskelyne is here and is doubtless only impatient to jump up when I sit down and tell us all about them.

I do not intend to say anything about speaking machines or to do more than make a passing reference to the very interesting work andresearches of Kircher in 1650, Van Helmont, 1667, Kratzenstein, in 1780, L’Abbé Mical, in 1783, Von Kempelen in 1791, Willis in 1829, Wheatstone in 1837, or of Faber in 1862. All these mechanicians and physicists studied the philosophy of speech and produced machines or parts of machines, which could utter vowels, words or even sentences, but these machines were operated by keys and stops and were, in no sense of the term, automata.

I must, however, refer to one of the greatest marvels of modern science, the phonograph which Mr. Edison has applied in the construction of his talking dolls. Edison’s talking doll is a figure, within which a little phonograph, driven by a little winch, is concealed, and which repeats in a clear voice any sentence or rhyme which may have been spoken against its recording cylinder or disc. I am deeply disappointed to be unable to show you one of these most interesting automata to-night, for one is on its way to me across the Atlantic. Colonel Gourand very kindly sent for one that I might show itto you this evening, and I deeply regret that it has not arrived in time, for the Odd Volumes would, otherwise, have been the first to hear its voice in Europe.[11]

In the phonograph, that splendid triumph of acoustical and mechanical science, we have literally fulfilled, the prediction made by Sir David Brewster in 1883, when he wrote “I have no doubt that before another century is completed, a talking and a singing Machine will be numbered among the conquests of Science.”

No one who is familiar with any of the great European capitals can have failed to notice in the windows of the higher class of toy-shops, clock-work automata of various kinds. We have jugglers and rope dancers, conjurers, pianists, violinists, harpists and trumpeters, dancing niggers, figures fighting, knitting, sewing, writing, andengaged in almost every occupation performed by human beings, but none that I have seen are fit for comparison with the wonderful mechanical works of Vaucanson, Robert-Houdin or Maskelyne; mechanically they are nearly identical with one another, and differ only in the external application of the internal machinery. At International Exhibitions one sees one or two of superior merit, but I have not recently seen any of sufficient importance to bring before you this evening. The pianists and other musicians merely move their hands on their instruments, but the music (save the mark) whether it be a violin or a trumpet, comes from a musical snuffbox inside which is generally wound up by a different key. These figures are usually very costly, and I am always puzzled to know who are the people who purchase them. The best are generally those mechanical toys which represent the movements of animals, and here I have a mechanical bear which is rather amusing, and it is ingenious because by a very simple combination of clock work withcranks and strings a number of different motions is obtained; we have the mouth opening and shutting, the head going from side to side, the lips moving and the whole animal bowing to the spectators.

Within the last few years a most extraordinary amount of mechanical ingenuity has been brought to bear upon the construction of small automatic toys, which are sold in the streets for a few pence, and I think, even more than the extraordinarily simple and ingenious contrivances by which the various effects are produced, the great inventive merit consists in a design and method of manufacture by which they can be turned out, with a profit, at so insignificant a cost. I have brought together a few examples, a very minute fraction of the hundreds of forms that exist, but selected merely to illustrate the different types of principle of action.

A very favourite motive power is a wound up spring, consisting of strands of vulcanized india-rubber, and here I have one of the well-known butterflies which come out in Paris in 1878, where theyfilled the air of the Avenue de l’Opera, the shops of which were then occupied chiefly by hawkers of toys. The motive power of this toy is nothing more than a light screw propeller or fan rotated by the untwisting of a spring, while on the body of the machine are two fixed wings or fins to prevent the whole machine from rotating. The action is wonderfully like that of an animal, perhaps most like that of a bat. Here again the same principle is applied in a running mouse, and this is especially interesting from the fact that the machine winds itself up the moment the tension of the cord is relaxed, and as the spindle of the wheels is the flexible rubber itself the peculiar scuttling action of a mouse is well imitated.

There is again a large class of mechanical toys in which there is a combination of a rubber spring with a wheel and escapement, the pallets of which by their reciprocating motion producing whatever effect may be desired; the swimming fish is one of them, the wagging of the tail beingproduced in the way I have described. Here is another displaying considerable ingenuity. In this case an escapement wheel works a crutch which by a pair of cranks linked together causes each of two pugilists to turn a little way backwards and forwards on one heel, and the arms being hung loosely to the shoulders by rubber hinges give to the figures the appearance of hitting out vigorously.

I have here a couple of figures which I admit do not contain their motive power within themselves but they require so little aid from outside and do so much for themselves that I have been tempted to bring them in. Here is a monkey climbing a rope, and its progression is insured by the simplest possible device, the string passes over one pin and under another in his posterior hands while the anterior pair of hands grip the rope with a slight degree of friction: if the string be tightened the lower hands act as a lever which pushes the body up, but when it is slack it slips round the pins and does no work, in otherwords the grip of the hands is greater than that of the feet when the cord is slack but less when it is tight.

In this little animated skeleton, we have an immense effect produced by an extraordinarily small external motion. The squeeze that I give to this U shaped spring, by varying the tension of the twisted strings, on which the skeleton is suspended, is almost infinitesimal—but it gives to the skeleton considerably more energy than is usually to be found in skeletons.

Here we have a walking figure whose action depends upon gravity, but his progression is checked by the friction of his feet on the board on which he performs, first one foot catches and then another, and each time his inertia turns him round, which gives him an appearance of having been in the company of teetotallers, or can he have been dining with the Sette of Odd Volumes?

A familiar form of mechanical or automatic toys is in the form of a box or frame having a glass front, behind which figures of acrobats,rope-dancers and moving groups are set into motion by sand falling on a wheel within the case; and it is an ingenious feature of these toys that they are “wound up” by simply rolling the box over on its edge through one revolution, which has the effect of lifting the fallen sand back into the upper reservoir.

The last great class of mechanical figures, to which I shall refer, includes those which depend for their action upon the spinning of a top or fly-wheel, and some of them are particularly pretty and ingenious.

Here, for example, is a couple of figures, which the gentleman who sold it to me told me was “a Narry and a Narriet walking hout on ‘Ampstead ’Eath.” In this case the ruling spirit and go is as usual in thelady, and the man has to follow whither she leads, the legs of the man are connected together at the hips by a pair of cranks so disposed, that if one leg be pushed back, the other is thereby thrown forward. Nowthe heels are so cut that they catch in the ground when in a forward position and can slide forward when behind; in being urged along, the forward leg catching in the ground is relatively pushed back and the other leg comes forward, which in its turn catches, and the effect of walking is produced.

And here we have (Fig. 25) another on precisely the same principle, in which an ostrich appears to draw a cart, which in reality, is pushing him along, but the effect of the ostrich’s strut is delightfully reproduced.

Fig. 25.

Here is another in which several very curious motions are reproduced. This beautiful little mechanical toy (Fig. 26) represents a circus girl riding round the ring, and occasionally leaping over a bar or bowing to the audience, while the prancing action of the horse is ingeniously imitated. The motive power is derived from the spinning of a top or fly-wheel, supported in a frame attached to the bar to which the horseis fixed; and, as the spindle of the top spins on the bevel edge of the circular base, the horse is caused to gallop round in a circle, and, being supported on the table by a roller mounted eccentrically on its axis, it prances up and down as it runs. The equestrienne is attached to a light lever pivotted on the rotating frame and revolving with it. Twice in its revolution this lever is lifted by a cam, forming part of the base; the first lift causes the figure to give a little bow, and the second, which is much greater, makes her leap over the bar under which the horse runs. This little machine is one of the most mechanically ingenious of the modern automaton toys, and it is made at the cost of only a few pence.

Fig. 26.

The last I shall show you is this elephant. In this little machine we have a fly-wheel, which with its vertical shaft looks like an umbrella over the Nabob who sits on the top, the vertical shaft passes into the body of the elephant, and there by a simple frictional gearing, rotatesa couple of cranks to which the legs are connected. The effect of spinning the umbrella is therefore merely to move the legs backwards and forwards; and, if that were all, no progression could be effected; but each foot rests on a little wheel or roller, which can only rotate in one direction so that while it catches the ground in its backward stroke it rolls freely over it while it is moving forward, and thus each leg in its turn contributes to the progressive movement of the toy.

Now I have come to the end, and it only remains to me to thank you all for having supported me by your presence in such numbers to-night, and to say to you in the words of Othello:

“It gives me wonder great as my content,To see you here before me.”

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