MAGIC LANTEKN. 81 



shade when the performance began. In this 

 " darkness visible " the curtain rose and displayed 

 a cave with skeletons and other terrific figures in 

 relief upon its walls. The nickering light was 

 then drawn up beneath its shroud, and the spec- 

 tators in total darkness found themselves in the 

 middle of thunder and lightning. A thin trans- 

 parent screen had, unknown to the spectators, 

 been let down after the disappearance of the 

 light, and upon it the flashes of lightning and 

 all the subsequent appearances were represented. 

 This screen being half-way between the spec- 

 tators and the cave which was first shown, and 

 being itself invisible, prevented the observers 

 from having any idea of the real distance of the 

 figures, and gave them the entire character of 

 aerial pictures. The thunder and lightning were 

 followed by the figures of ghosts, skeletons, and 

 known individuals, whose eyes and mouth were 

 made to move by the shifting of combined sliders. 

 After the first figure had been exhibited for a 

 short time, it began to grow less and less, as if 

 removed to a great distance, and at last vanished 

 in a small cloud of light. Out of this same cloud 

 the germ of another figure began to appear, and 

 gradually grew larger and larger, and approached 

 the spectators, till it attained its perfect develop- 

 ment. In this manner the head of Dr. Franklin 

 was transformed into a skull; figures which re- 

 tired with the freshness of life came back in the 

 form of skeletons, and the retiring skeletons 

 returned in the drapery of flesh and blood. 



The exhibition of these transmutations was fol- 

 lowed by spectres, skeletons, and terrific figures, 

 which, instead of receding and vanishing as 



