Letters on Natural Magic; Addressed to Sir Walter Scott, Bart.

by David Brewster

Fig. 67.

Ingenious as all these machines are, they sink into insignificance when compared with the automaton chess-player, which for a long time astonished and delighted the whole of Europe. In the year 1769, M. Kempelen, a gentleman of Presburg in Hungary, constructed an automaton chess-player, the general appearance of which is shown in the annexed figures. The chess-player is a figure as large as life, clothed in a Turkish dress, sitting behind a large square chest or box, three feet and a half long, two feet deep, and two and a half high. The machine runs on castors, and is either seen on the floor when the doors of the apartment are thrown open, or is wheeled into the room previously to the commencement of the exhibition. The Turkish chess-player sits on a chair fixed to the square chest: his right arm rests on the table, and in the left he holds a pipe, which is removed during the game, as it is with this hand that he makes the moves. A chess-board, eighteen inches square, and bearing the usual number of pieces, is placed before the figure. The exhibitor then announces to the spectators his intention of showing them the mechanism of the automaton. For this purpose he unlocks the door A, Fig. 66, and exposes to view a small cupboard lined with black or dark-coloured cloth, and containing cylinders, levers, wheels, pinions, and different pieces of machinery, which have the appearance of occupying the whole space. He next opens the door B, Fig. 67, at the back of the same cupboard, and holding a lighted candle at the opening, he still further displays the inclosed machinery to the spectators, placed in front of A, Fig. 66. When the candle is withdrawn, the door B is then locked; and the exhibitor proceeds to open the drawer G G, Fig. 66, in front of the chest. Out of this drawer he takes a small box of counters, a set of chess-men, and a cushion for the support of the automaton’s arm, as if this was the sole object of the drawer. The two front doors C C, of the large cupboard, Fig. 66, are then opened, and at the back-door D of the same cupboard, Fig. 67, the exhibitor applies a lighted candle, as before, for the purpose of showing its interior, which is lined with dark cloth like the other, and contains only a few pieces of machinery. The chest is now wheeled round, as in Fig. 67: the garments of the figure are lifted up, and the door E in the trunk, and another door F in the thigh, are opened, the doors B and D having been previously closed. When this exhibition of the interior of the machine is over, the chest is wheeled back into its original position on the floor. The doors A, C, C, in front, and the drawer G, G, are closed and locked, and the exhibitor, after occupying himself for some time at the back of the chest, as if he were adjusting the mechanism, removes the pipe from the hand of the figure, and winds up the machinery.

The automaton is now ready to play, and when an opponent has been found among the company, the figure takes the first move. At every move made by the automaton, the wheels of the machine are heard in action; the figure moves its head, and seems to look over every part of the chess-board. When it gives check to its opponent, it shakes its head thrice, and only twice when it checks the queen. It likewise shakes its head when a false move is made, replaces the adversary’s piece on the square from which it was taken, and takes the next move itself. In general, though not always, the automaton wins the game.

During the progress of the game, the exhibitor often stands near the machine, and winds it up like a clock, after it has made ten or twelve moves. At other times he went to a corner of the room, as if it were to consult a small square box, which stood open for this purpose.

The chess-playing machine, as thus described, was exhibited after its completion in Presburg, Vienna, and Paris, to thousands, and in 1783 and 1784 it was exhibited in London and different parts of England, without the secret of its movements having been discovered. Its ingenious inventor, who was a gentleman and a man of education, never pretended that the automaton itself really played the game. On the contrary, he distinctly stated, “that the machine was a bagatelle, which was not without merit in point of mechanism, but that the effects of it appeared so marvellous only from the boldness of the conception, and the fortunate choice of the methods adopted for promoting the illusion.”

Upon considering the operations of this automaton, it must have been obvious that the game of chess was performed either by a person enclosed in the chest, or by the exhibitor himself. The first of these hypotheses was ingeniously excluded by the display of the interior of the machine, for as every part contained more or less machinery, the spectator invariably concluded that the smallest dwarf could not be accommodated within, and this idea was strengthened by the circumstance, that no person of this description could be discovered in the suite of the exhibitor. Hence the conclusion was drawn, that the exhibitor actuated the machine either by mechanical means conveyed through its feet, or by a magnet concealed in the body of the exhibitor. That mechanical communication was not formed between the exhibitor and the figure, was obvious from the fact, that no such communication was visible, and that it was not necessary to place the machine on any particular part of the floor. Hence the opinion became very prevalent that the agent was a magnet; but even this supposition was excluded, for the exhibitor allowed a strong and well-armed loadstone to be placed upon the machine during the progress of the game. Had the moving power been a magnet, the whole action of the machine would have been deranged by the approximation of a loadstone concealed in the pockets of any of the spectators.

As Baron Kempelen himself had admitted that there was an illusion connected with the performance of the automaton, various persons resumed the original conjecture, that it was actuated by a person concealed in its interior, who either played the game of chess himself, or performed the moves which the exhibitor indicated by signals. A Mr. J. F. Freyhere, of Dresden, published a book on the subject in 1789, in which he endeavoured to explain, by coloured plates, how the effect was produced; and he concluded, “that a well-taught boy very thin and tall of his age (sufficiently so that he could be concealed in a drawer almost immediately under the chess-board), agitated the whole.”

In another pamphlet, which had been previously published at Paris in 1785, the author not only supposed that the machine was put in motion by a dwarf, a famous chess-player; but he goes so far as to explain the manner in which he could be accommodated within the machine. The invisibility of the dwarf when the doors were opened was explained by his legs and thighs being concealed in two hollow cylinders, while the rest of his body was out of the box, and hid by the petticoats of the automaton. When the doors were shut, the clacks produced by the swivel of a ratchet-wheel permitted the dwarf to change his place, and return to the box unheard; and while the machine is wheeled about the room, the dwarf had an opportunity of shutting the trap through which he passed into the machine. The interior of the figure was next shown, and the spectators were satisfied that the box contained no living agent.

Although these views were very plausible, yet they were never generally adopted; and when the automaton was exhibited in Great Britain in 1819 and 1820, by M. Maelzel, it excited as intense an interest as when it was first produced in Germany. There can be little doubt, however, that the secret has been discovered; and an anonymous writer has shown in a pamphlet, entitled “An attempt to analyse the Automaton Chess-player of M. Kempelen,” that it is capable of accommodating an ordinary sized man; and he has explained in the clearest manner how the inclosed player takes all the different positions, and performs all the motions which are necessary to produce the effects actually observed. The following is the substance of his observations:—The drawer G G when closed does not extend to the back of the chest, but leaves a space O, behind it (see Figs. 74, 75, and 76), fourteen inches broad, eight inches high, and three feet eleven inches long. This space is never exposed to the view of spectators. The small cupboard seen at A is divided into two parts, by a door or screen I, Fig. 73, which is moveable upon a hinge, and is so constructed that it closes at the same instant that B is closed. The whole of the front compartment as far as I is occupied with the machinery H. The other compartment behind I is empty, and communicates with the space O behind the drawer, the floor of this division being removed. The back of the great cupboard C C is double, and the part P Q, to which the quadrants are attached, moves on a joint Q, at the upper part, and forms when raised an opening S, between the two cupboards, by carrying with it part of the partition R, which consists of cloth tightly stretched. The false back is shown closed in Fig. 74, while Fig. 75 shows the same back raised, so as to form the opening S between the chambers.