David Brewster
The Invisible Girl (Letter VII)
David Brewster, Letters on Natural Magic, addressed to Sir Walter Scott, Bart., John Murray, London 1834, pp. 161-164.
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In Letter VII, devoted to illusions of hearing, Brewster moves from the speaking heads of the ancients and of modern charlatans to the Invisible Girl, "an exhibition of the very same kind" brought forward in his own day. With three engravings (figs. 37-39) he describes the apparatus built by "M. Charles": four posts joined by rails, wire arches from which a hollow copper ball about a foot across, with four trumpets, hangs by ribbons. The spectator spoke into one trumpet and the answer, faint as if from a tiny person, came from all of them; the "girl" spoke several languages, sang and remarked on those present. The trick: an aperture in the rails opposite the trumpets communicated with a tube running down a post and under the floor to room N, where the woman sat, seeing the room through a small hole in the partition and probably receiving signals from the attendant of the machine. Full transcription and Italian translation.
Language
English
