Aside from the art interest in the new plates is quite another, that springs from the fact that it is now possible to take pictures of men, animals, and machinery in rapid motion, thus enabling us to view them in a way that would be impossible with the unaided eye. The first experiments in this direction were applied to the movements of a horse moving at full speed. The pictures, taken in series, showed that he performed muscular actions that were not before comprehended or even imagined. These pictures at the time attracted great attention, and instantaneous pictures have been since taken of dancers in a ball-room, of vessels and steam-boats in rapid movement, of all kinds of animals in motion, and of machinery in operation. As the pictures represent the movements at one instant of time, they give, as it were, a fixed view of a motion, precisely as if it were suddenly arrested in full action. In the case of animals, the motions of the nostrils are represented in the most singular manner, and the spokes of a steam-boat’s paddle-wheel are shown apparently perfectly still while the spray and waves appear in active motion, or, rather, as they would look if they could be instantly frozen. It is clear the new process and pictures will open a wide and instructive field in art and in the study of mechanical action. While on the subject of Photography we may mention a very ingenious little apparatus called a SCENOGRAPH, the invention of Dr. Candize. It is really a pocket-camera, and is so easily manipulated that it will be found a most pleasant and useful holiday companion. Any one may obtain good results with it, and friends of ours have had occasion to put it in practice during a series of excursions, when it was found to answer in every instance. The Scenograph is something like a common Stereoscope in outward appearance, and would, perhaps, be at first regarded as a mere toy, did not a more intimate acquaintance prove it a great acquisition, particularly to explorers and tourists. The tripod stand which supports the apparatus is, when not in actual use in that capacity, a very excellent walking-stick, in which the two other “legs” are carried. The instrument, as will be perceived from the illustration (fig. 166), is very handy. It produces pictures about the “cabinet” size, and the whole is so arranged that it can be packed and carried in the pocket with ease. [Illustration: Fig. 166.—The Scenograph.]