The best of the wax-work exhibitions was Ewing’s, which was well arranged in ten caravans. The others were Ferguson’s, with the additional attraction of “the beautiful albiness,” a really beautiful woman, named Shaw, who was then in her twenty-second year; Hoyo’s; and a small and poor collection at a house in Giltspur Street, where the wax figures were supplemented by the exhibition of twin infants united at the breast, “extremely well preserved.”
Phantasmagorial exhibitions were at this time a novelty to the masses. The best of those shown this year in Smithfield was the Optikali Illusio of a Frenchman, named De Berar, who startled the spectators with the appearance of a human skeleton, the vision of Death on a pale horse, etc. There was another in Long Lane; and a third at a house in Giltspur Street, where the public were invited to witness “the raising of the devil!” A fire-eater named Haines stood at the door of the last show, emitting a shower of sparks from a lump of burning tow in his mouth. Sir David Brewster, who witnessed a phantasmagorial exhibition at Edinburgh, describes it as follows:—
“The small theatre of exhibition was lighted only by one hanging lamp, the flame of which was drawn up into an opaque chimney or 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 flickering light was then drawn up beneath its shroud, and the spectators, in total darkness, found themselves in the midst of thunder and lightning. A thin transparent 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 halfway between the spectators 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 mouths were made to move by the action 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 development. In this manner the head of Dr. Franklin was transformed into a skull; figures which retired 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 followed by spectres, skeletons, and terrific figures, which, instead of receding and vanishing as before, suddenly advanced upon the spectators, becoming larger as they approached them, and finally vanished by appearing to sink into the ground. The effect of this part of the exhibition was naturally the most impressive. The spectators were not only surprised, but agitated, and many of them were of opinion that they could have touched the figures.”
Dupain’s French theatre combined the exhibition of a dwarf, Jonathan Dawson, three feet high, and fifty years of age, with posturing by a performer named Finch, and two mechanical views, one representing Algiers, with the sea in motion, and vessels entering and leaving the harbour; the other a storm at sea, with a vessel in distress, burning blue lights, firing guns, and finally becoming a wreck.
Broomsgrove’s show, which made its first appearance, contained three human curiosities, namely, Clancy, an Irishman, whose height was seven feet two inches; Farnham, who was only three feet two inches in height, but so strong that he carried two big men on his shoulders with ease; and Thomas Pierce, “the gigantic Shropshire youth,” aged seventeen years, five feet ten inches in height, and thirty-five stones in weight.
Simmett’s show contained four “living wonders” of this kind, namely, Priscilla and Amelia Weston, twin Canadian giantesses, twenty years of age; Lydia Walpole, the dwarf exhibited in Maughan’s show in 1825; and an albino woman, aged nineteen. Harris added to a peep-show a twelve years old dwarf, named Eliza Webber; a sheep with singularly formed hind hoofs; and a very fine boa constrictor. Another show combined the performances of a monkey, which, in the garb of an old woman, smoked a pipe, wheeled a barrow, etc., with the exhibition of several mechanical figures, representing artisans working at their various trades, and a juvenile albino, named Mary Anne Chapman. Another exhibited, as an “extraordinary hermit,” a man named Daniel Mackenzie, whose only distinction rested upon his statement that he had voluntarily secluded himself from the world for five years, which he had passed in a coal-mine near Dalkeith.
Toby, the learned pig, if he was the original porcine wonder of that name, must have been, at least, seventeen years of age, but showed no symptoms of declining vigour or diminished intelligence. He was now exhibited by James Burchall, in conjunction with the proprietor’s monstrously fat child, and was announced as,—
“The Unrivalled Chinese Swinish Philosopher, Toby the Real Learned Pig. He will spell, read, and cast accounts, tell the points of the sun’s rising and setting, discover the four grand divisions of the Earth, kneel at command, perform blindfold with 20 handkerchiefs over his eyes, tell the hour to a minute by the watch, tell a card, and the age of any party. He is in colour the most beautiful of his race, in symmetry the most perfect, in temper the most docile. And when asked a question, he will give an Immediate Answer.”
Toby had a rival this year in the “amazing pig of knowledge,” exhibited by James Fawkes, at the George Inn. This pig could tell the number of pence in a shilling, and of shillings in a pound, count the spectators, tell their thoughts (so at least it was pretended), distinguish colours, and do many other wonderful things. The following doggrel verses, extracted from Fawkes’s bill, are offered as a curiosity; they seem apropos of nothing, and show that the exhibitor was ignorant or oblivious of the fact that George IV. had been dead three years:—