“Just at present,” remarked the conjurer, “the chest is extremely light; but as it is about to become, at my command, very heavy, I must ask five or six other persons to help this gentleman, for fear the chest should lift him off his feet.” No sooner was this done than the chest came heavily to the ground, dragging along and sometimes lifting off their feet all the spectators who were holding the cord. The explanation is this: On a casual inspection of the pulley and block everything appears to indicate that, as usual in such cases, the cord passes straight over the pulley, in on one side and out on the other; but such is not really the fact, as will be seen upon tracing the course {140} of the dotted lines (Fig. 1), which, passing through the block and through the ceiling, are attached on either side to a double pulley fixed in the room above. To any one who has the most elementary acquaintance with the laws of mechanics, it will be obvious that the strength of the person who holds the handle of the windlass above is multiplied tenfold, and that he can easily overcome even the combined resistance of five or six spectators. [Illustration: Fig. 1.] [Illustration: Fig. 2. THE TALKING BUST.] The “Bust of Socrates” was another favorite experiment with Houdin. In this illusion a living bust with the features of Socrates was suspended in the middle of the stage without visible support. The performer, habited as an Athenian noble, addressed questions to the mutilated philosopher and received replies in stanzas of elegiac verse. The _mise en scène_ is represented in Fig. 2. Houdin explains the illusion as follows: “_A_, _B_, _C_, _D_, (Fig. 3) represent a section of the stage on which the trick is exhibited. A sheet of silvered glass, _G_, _G_, occupying the whole width of the stage, is placed in a diagonal position, extending from the upper part of the stage at the rear, down to the footlights, so as to form an angle of forty-five degrees with the floor. In the center of the glass is an opening through which {141} the actor passes his head and shoulders, as shown in the figure. It should be further mentioned that the ceiling and the two sides of the stage are hung with wall-paper of the same pattern, and are brilliantly illuminated, either by means of footlights at _C_, or by gas-jets placed behind the border _A_. Such being the condition of things, the effect is as follows: The ceiling _A_ is reflected in the mirror, and its reflection appears to the spectators to be the paper of the wall _B_, _D_, which in reality is hidden by the glass. [Illustration: Fig 3. HOW THE TALKING BUST WAS WORKED.] “By means of this reflection, of which he is of course unaware, the spectator is led to believe that he sees three sides of the stage; and there being nothing to suggest to his mind the presence of the glass, he is led to believe that the bust is suspended in mid-air and without any support.”