Sketches of imposture, deception, and credulityDavenport, R. A. (Richard Alfred)
History
Sketches of imposture, deception, and credulity
Davenport, R. A. (Richard Alfred)
Common fallacies; Impostors and imposture
“At the new theatre in the Haymarket, on Monday next, the 16th instant,
is to be seen a person who performs the several most surprising things
following: viz. first, he takes a common walking-cane from any of the
spectators, and thereon plays the music of every instrument now in use,
and likewise sings to surprising perfection. Secondly, he presents you
with a common wine-bottle, which any one present may first examine;
this bottle is placed on a table, in the middle of the stage, and
he (without any equivocation) goes into it, in the sight of all the
spectators, and sings in it; during his stay in the bottle, any person
may handle it, and see plainly that it does not exceed a common tavern
bottle. Those on the stage or in the boxes may come in masked habits
(if agreeable to them), and the performer (if desired) will inform them
who they are.” The display of these wonders was to occupy two hours and
a half. The advertisement also promised that the conjuror, after the
performance, would show to any gentlemen or ladies, for, as Trapbois
phrases it, a proper “con-si-de-ra-tion,” the likeness of any deceased
friend or relative, with which they might also converse; would tell
their most secret thoughts; and would give them a full view of persons,
whether dead or alive, who had injured them.
At the same time with the above advertisement, there came forth
another, which may have either been intended to put the public on
their guard by its out-heroding Herod, or to make their credulity, if
possible, still more glaring, in case they should accept the invitation
of the Bottle Conjuror. It purported to be issued by Signor Capitello
Jumpedo, lately arrived from Italy, “a surprising dwarf, no taller
than a tobacco-pipe,” who could perform many wonderful equilibres on
the tight and slack rope, transform his body into above ten thousand
different shapes and postures, and who, after having diverted the
spectators two hours and a half, would “open his mouth wide, and jump
down his own throat.” This most “wonderfullest wonder of all wonders
as ever the world wondered at,” expressed his willingness to join in
performance with the Bottle Conjuror Musician.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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