When the equestrian robbers appeared one by one galloping across the distant mountains, and Mrs. Jones had carefully counted them all to ascertain that there was the full complement of exactly forty, Miss Flimbrey laughed, and assured her that in reality there were only three, one mounted on a black, one on a bay, and one on a white horse, but they passed round and appeared again, till the precise number was accomplished. "And the same thing," said she, "is always done when an army marches across the stage, so that a few soldiers are made to seem like a great many." "You perceive, Mrs. Jones," said Mr. Dodcomb, "these robbers that ride over the distant mountains are not the real men; but both man and horse is nothing more than a flat thin piece of wood painted and cut out." On Peter remarking that there was certainly a look of life or reality in the near leg of each rider as it was thrown over the saddle, Mr. Dodcomb explained that each of these equestrian figures was carried by a man concealed behind, and that one arm of the man was thrust through an aperture at the top of the painted saddle; the arm that hung over so as to personate a leg, being dressed in a Turkish trowser, with a boot drawn on the hand. "Do you mean," said Peter, "that these men run along the ridge, each carrying a horse under his arm?" "Exactly so," replied Dodcomb, "the horse and rider of painted board being so arranged as to hide the carrier." "Well--I never did hear anything so queer," said Mrs. Jones, "I wonder how they can keep their countenances. But, there are so many queer things about play-acting. Dear me! what a pug-nose that cobbler has! Let me look at the bill and see who he is--why I saw the same man in the play, and his nose was long and straight." "Oh! when he wants a snub nose," replied Miss Flimbrey, "he ties up the end with a single horse-hair fastened round his forehead, and the horse hair is too fine to be seen by the audience." During the scene in which Morgiana destroys the thieves, one at a time, by pouring a few drops of the magic liquid into the jars in which they are hidden, Mrs. Jones found out of her own accord that the jars were only flat pieces of painted board; but Mrs. Dodcomb made her observe that as each of the dying bandits uttered distinctly his own separate groan, the sound was in reality produced from the orchestra, by he of the bass viol giving his bow a hard scrub across the instrument. "Well," said Mrs. Jones on her way home, "now that my eyes are opened, I must say there is a great deal of deception in plays."