"He is a mighty listener after prodigies: and never hears of a whale or a comet, but he apprehends some sudden revolution in the state, and looks upon a groaning-board, or a speaking-head, as forerunners of the day of judgment."
Swift, in his Tale of a Tub, written in the following year (1697), says of Jack:
"He wore a large plaister of artificiall causticks on his stomach, with the fervor of which he would set himself a groaning like the famous board upon application of a red-hot iron."
Steele, in the 44th number of the Tatler, speaking of Powell, the "puppet showman," says:
"He has not brains enough to make even wood speak as it ought to do: and I, that have heard the groaning-board, can despise all that his puppets shall be able to speak as long as they live."
So much for the "story" of the groaning-board. As to "how it was done," we leave the matter open to the reader's sagacity.
Edward F. Rimbault.
Footnote 1:[(return)]
This was Stephen College, a joiner by trade, but a man of an active and violent spirit, who, making himself conspicuous by his opposition to the Court, obtained the name of the Protestant joiner. His fate is well known.
Footnote 2:[(return)]