The Andrew County Republican. [volume] (Savannah, Mo.) 1871-1876, 1876-04-27
Some Curious Illustrations of
the Power OF Ventriloquism.

Perhaps the most familiar of myste-
rious sounds are those produced by the
ventriloquist; familiar, because almost
every country fair is visited by one or
other of these exhibitors; mysterious,
because the real source of sound does
not correspond with the apparent. 1t
lies within the province Of the anato-1
mist or Psychologist to explain how 1t
Is that some men can speak as II from
the stomach instead Of the throat, with
out any perceptible movement of the
lips; but the person who can do this,
the ventriloquist, may make himself a
most ~bewildering deceiver Of those who
listen to him. Our power of determine
ing the exact direction whence q sound
comes is less than we usually imagine.
1t is said that Saville Carey, who could
well initiate the whistling Of the wind,
would sometimes amuse himself BY ex-
ercising this art in a public coffee
house; some of the guests at once rose
to see whether the windows were quite
closed, while others would button up
their coats as If cold. Sir David Brew
stcr notices n ven~triloquist of exception
al skill, NJ. st. Gille, who one day en-
tered a church where some monks were
lamenting the death of a brother. Sud.
denly they heard a voice, as If from
over their their heads, bewailing the
condition Of the departed in purgatory,
and reproducing them for their want of
zeal. Not suspecting the trick, they.
fell on their faces and chanted the Z
~Prcfundis. A committee appointed by
the Academic des Sciences, to report on
the phenomena of ventriloquism, went
with M. st. Gille to the house of a lady,
to whom they announced that they had
come to investigate a case of aerial
"spirits" somewhere In the neighbor-
hood. During the interview she heard
what she termed esprit voices" above
her head, underneath the floor, and in
distant parts of the room, and was with
difficulty convinced that the only spirit
present was the ventriloquistic voice. of
M. st. Gille. Brewster tells of another
master of this art, Louis Brabant, valet
de chambre to Francis I, whose suit was
rejected by the parents of a beautiful
and well lowered girl with whom he
was in love. He called on the mother,
after the death of the father, again to
urge his suit, and while he was present
she heard the voice of her deceased
husband, expressing remorse of having
rejected Louis Brabant, and conjuring
her to give her immediate consent to
the betrothal. Frightened and alam-
ed, she consented. Brabant, deeming
1t desirable to behave literally in the
marriage arrangements, but having not
much cash at command, resolved to Try
whether his ventriloquism would be as
eflicacious with a moncy-lending banker
as it had been with the widow. Calling
on the old usurer at Lyons, he managed
that the conversation should turn p
the subject of demons, spectres, and
purgatory. Suddenly was heard the
voice of the usurer's father, complaining
of the horrible suflerings he was endw-
ing in purgatory, and saying that there
was no way of obtaining alienation ex-
cept by the usurer advancing money to
the visitor for the sake of ransoming
Christians from the hands of the Turks.
The usurer was terrified, but too much
in love with his gold to yield at once.
Brabant went next day and resumed
the conversation, when shortly were
heard the voices of a host of dead rela-
tives, all telling the same terrible story,
and all pointing out the only way of OBJ
tanning relief. The usurer could resist
no longer; he placed 10000 crowns in
the hands of the unsupported ventrilo-
quist, who, of course, forgotto pay it over
for the ansom of Christians, either in
Turkey or anywhere else. When the
usurer learned afterward how he had
been duped he died Of vexation, OF all
producers of so-called mysterious
sounds, DIR. Tyndall's sensitive or vowel
flame is the most curious. Out of a par
ticular kind of gas, with a burner of Pc
culiar construction, the learned Profess
or produces a lighted jet of flame lear
ly two feet in height, extremely narrow,
and so exquisitely sensitive to sounds
that it dances up and down in response
to every thing that is sung or said with
different degrees of sensibility for differ
ent vowel sounds. '"The slightest tap
on a distant anvil reduces its height to
seven inches. When a bunch
of keys is shaken, the flame is
violently agitated and emits a loud
roar. The dropping of a sixpence in
to a hand already containing a coin, at
a distance of twenty yards, knocks the
flame down. 1t is not possible to walk
across the floor without agitating the
flame. The creaking of boots sets it in
violent commotion. The crumpling or
tearing of paper, or the rustic of a silk
dress, does the same. 1t is startled by
the patter of a rain-drop. l hold a
watch neal the flame; nobody hears its
ticks; but you all see their effect upon
the flame; at every tick it falls and
OAR The winding up of the watch
also produces tumult. The twittering
of a distant sparrow shrieks in the
flame; the note of a cricket would do
the same. A chirrup from a distance
of thirty yards causes it to fall and
roar" In reference to the power of the
flame to respond to poetry, the Pro-
fessor says: "The flame selects from
the sounds those to which it can re-
spond; it notices some by the slightest
nod, to Others it bows more distinctly,
to some its obeisanee is very profound,
while to many sounds it turns an en-
terely deaf ear"
R7h.OOO for n pioture-