AUTOMATON, 
of the proper levers, to exhibit alt the different motions of 
a flute-player, to the admiration of every one who faw it. 
M. de Kempell, a gentleman of Prefbtirg in Hungary, 
excited by the above performances of M. de Vaucanfon, 
at fird endenvoured to imitate them, and at lad excelled 
them. This gentleman conftru6led an automaton capable 
of playing at chefs ! Every one who is in the leaf! ac¬ 
quainted with this game muff know, that it is fo far from 
being mechanically performed, as to require a greater ex- 
ertionof the judgment and rational faculties than is l'uffi- 
cient to accompli Hi many matters of greater importance. 
An attempt, therefore, to make a wooden chefs-player, 
mud appear as ridiculous as to make a wooden preacher 
or counfellor of date. That this machine te.iily was made, 
however, the public have had ocular demondration. The 
inventor came to England in 2783, where he continued 
above a year with this automaton. It is a figure as large 
as life, in a Turkidi drefs, fitting behind a table, with 
doors of tl'.ree feet and a half in length, two in depth, 
and two and a half in height. The chair in which it fits 
is fixed to the table, which runs on four wheels. The 
automaton leans its right arm on the table, and in its left 
hand holds a pipe : with this hand it plays after the pipe 
is removed. A chefs-board of eighteen inches is fixed 
before it. This table, or rather cupboard, contains 
wheels, levers, cylinders, and other pieces of mechanifm ; 
all which are publicly difplayed. The vedments of the 
automaton are then lifted over its head, and the body-is 
feen full of fimilar wheels and levers. There is a little 
door in its thigh, which is likewife opened ; and with 
this, and the table alfo open, and the automaton unco¬ 
vered, the whole is wheeled about the room. The doors 
are then flmt, and the automaton is ready to play ; and it 
always takes the fird move. At every motion the wheels 
are heard ; the image moves its head, and looks over eve¬ 
ry part of the chefs-board. When it checks the queen, 
it (hakes its head twice, and thrice in giving check to the 
king. It likewife fhakes its head when a falfe move is 
made, replaces the piece, and makes its own move ; by 
which means the adverfary lofes one. M. de Kempell 
remarks as the mod furprifing circumftance attending his 
automaton, that it had been exhibited at Prefburg, Vienna, 
Paris, and London, to thoufands, many of whom were 
mathematicians and chefs-players, and yet the fecret by 
which he governed the motions of its arm was never dif» 
covered. He prided himfelf folely on the condniblion of 
the mechanical powers, by which the arm could perform 
ten or twelve moves. It then required to be wound up 
like a watch, after which it was capable of continuing the 
fame number of motions. The automaton could not play 
nnlefs M. de Kempell or his fubflitute was near it, to di¬ 
rect its moves. A fmall fquare box, during the game, 
was frequently confulted by the exhibiter; and herein 
confided the fecret, which he faid lie could in a moment 
communicate. He who could beat Kempell was, of 
courfe, certain of conquering the automaton. It was 
made in 1769. His own account of it was : “ C’ed une 
bagatelle qui n’ed pas fans merite du cote du meehanifme, 
mais les effets n’en par'oiflent fi merveilleux que par la 
hardiefle de Pidc-e, Sc par l’heureux choix des moyens em¬ 
ployes pour faire illufion.” 
To the no fmall diminution of the merit of this chefs- 
player, however, the following Letter of Thomas Collin- 
fon, Efq. nephew of the late Peter Coliinfon, F. R. S. is 
publifhed in Dr. Hutton’s Mathematical Dictionary, Vol. 
ii. p.730. “ M. de Kempell’s chefs-player would have 
have been the greated mailer-piece in mechanics, had its 
fcientific movements depended merely on mechanifm. Be- 
ing (lightly acquainted with M. de Kempell when he ex¬ 
hibited his chefs-playing figure in London, 1 called on 
him about five years fince at hishoufe in Vienna ; another 
gentleman and myfelt being then on a tour on the conti¬ 
nent. The baron (for I think'he is fuch) (hewed me fome 
working models which he had lately made; among them, 
an improvement on Arkwright’s cotton-mill, and alfo 
3 
one which he thought an improvement on Boulton’s and 
Watts’s lead deam-engine. I afked him after a piece of 
fpeaking mechanifm, which he had dievvn me when in 
London. It fpoke as before, and 1 gave the fame word 
as I gave when I fird faw it, Exploitation, which it dif- 
tinctly pronounced with the French accent. But I par¬ 
ticularly noticed, that not a word palled about the chefs- 
player ; and of courfe 3 did not adc to fee it. In the pro- 
grefs of the tour I came to Drefden, where becoming ac¬ 
quainted with Mr. Eden our envoy there, by means of a 
letter given me by his brother lord Auckland, who was 
ambad'ador when I was at Madrid, he obligingly accom¬ 
panied me in feeing feveral things worthy of attention. 
And he introduced my companion and myfelf to a gentle¬ 
man of rank and talents, named Jofeph Frederick Frey- 
here, who feems completely to have difeovered the vitality 
and foul of the chefs-playing figure. This gentleman 
courteoudy prefented me with the treatife he had pub¬ 
lifhed, dated at Drefden, September 30, 1789, explaining 
its principles, accompanied with curious plates neatly co¬ 
loured. This treatife is in the German language. A 
well-taught boy, very thin and fmall of his age (diffid¬ 
ently fo th.at he could be concealed in a drawer almod im¬ 
mediately under the chefs-board), agitated the whole. 
Even after this abatement of its being dridlly an automa¬ 
ton, much ingenuity, however, remairis to the contriver. 
This difeovery at Drefden accounts for the dlence about 
it at Vienna; fori underdand, by Mr. Eden, that Mr. 
F'reyhere had fent a copy to baron Kempell : though he 
deems unwilling to acknowledge that Mr. F. has com¬ 
pletely analyfed the whole. 
“ I‘know that long and unintereding letters are formi¬ 
dable things to men who know the value of time and 
fcience : but, as this happens to be upon the fubjed, for¬ 
give me for adding one very admirable piece of mecha¬ 
nifm. When at Geneva I called upon Droz, fon of the 
original Droz of la Chaux de Fonds. He dievved me an 
ova! gold fnuff-box, about four inches and a half long, 
by three inches broad, and about a inch and a half thick. 
It was double, having an horizontal partition ; fo that it 
may be confidered as one box placed on another, with a 
lid of courfe to each box. One contained fnuff, and in 
the other, as foon as the lid was opened, there rof'e up a 
very fmall bird, of green enamelled gold, fitting on a gold 
ftand. Immediately this minute curiofity wagged its tail, 
fhook its wings, opened its bill of white enamelled gold, 
and poured forth, minute as it was (being only three 
quarters of an inch from the beak to the extremity of the 
tail), fuch a clear melodious fong, as would have filled a 
room of twenty or thirty feet fquare with its harmony. Droz 
agreed to meet me at Florence; and we vifited the abbe 
Fontana together. He afterwards joined me at Rome, 
and exhibited his bird to the pope and the cardinals in the 
Vatican palace, to the admiration, I may fay to the ado- 
nifhmcnt, of all who faw and heard it.” 
Another extrail from a fecond letter upon the fame fub- 
ject, by Mr. Coliinfon, is as follows: “Permit me to 
fpeak of another automaton of Droz’s, which feveral 
years fince he exhibited in England ; and which, from 
my perfonal acquaintance, 1 had a commodious opportu¬ 
nity of particularly examining. It was a figure of a man, 
a drawing-mafter, the fize of life. It held in its hand a 
metal ftyle ; a card of Dutch vellum being laid under it. 
A fpring was touched, which releafed the internal clock¬ 
work from its flop, when the figure immediately began 
to draw. Mr. Droz, happening once to be fent for in a 
great hurry to wait upon fome confiderable perfonage at 
the wed end of the town, left me in poffieffion of the keys 
which opened the recedes of all his machinery. He open¬ 
ed the drawing-mader himfelf; wound it up ; explained 
its leading parrs • and taught me how to make it obey my 
requirings, as it had obeyed his own. Mr. Droz then 
went away. After the drd card was finifhed, the figure 
reded. I put a fecond ; and fo on, to five feparate cards, 
all different fubjeiffs: but five or fix was the extent of its 
delineating 
