The art in this arrangement is to have two actors sufficiently alike in person, similarly dressed, and placed so that the phantom figure sits so exactly like the living figure as to match into it. It consists in having two actors, two chairs, and two tables exactly matching each other. On the acting stage, the actor, table, and chair have each their duplicate; so that, if they were pulled a little to one side, the audience would see two actors, two tables, and two chairs. But such an exhibition would be a defect, as the table and chair are mere guides for the spectre actor: if there were no chair he could not sit, and if no table he could not appear as leaning upon one, or seem to do so.
In this and other pieces of a like nature, it is presumed that the parts are not performed in dumb show, but that an able speaker either explains and gives the dialogue, or that concealed actors address the audience, timing their speech to the action before them.
2.—The Returned Mariner.
A naval officer or other seafaring character, belonging to some particular vessel reported to have been wrecked, is seen in a chamber, into which his wife or sister, &c., on entering rushes forward to embrace him, but, clasping nothing, immediately falls down in a swoon.
3.—The Californian Gamblers, or Robbers.
Two men, dressed almost like brigands, engage to play some game with cards or dice. They sit one on each side of a table, on which they place their revolvers. After a short play they dispute and wrangle, during which, one seizing his pistol discharges it at the other. He is horror-stricken by the bullet being returned to him, and his playmate passing away by neither window nor door.
4.—The Miser and Money-lender.
He is an aged man, counting his money, and writing up his unjust gains. His room is furnished with bookshelves and cabinets. With a small taper before him, he is absorbed in monetary calculations. Presently a careworn female enters. He shudders—with cold. She opens a cabinet, takes out a long roll of parchment, replaces it, and closes the door again—not quietly, but with a clap like thunder. The miser is colder than ever—shivers more and more, and rises to look into his cabinet, from which he apparently takes the same roll, replaces it, and returns to his seat, followed by the reappearing phantom, which again rapidly disappears.
This requires a duplicate cabinet, parchment, &c.