| Citation |
VGR(DN.780.026
9 Dec 1780:21, 22 (92)
Extract of a letter from a gentleman at Tillicheery in the
East Indies.
. . . [description of life in the country of the Malabar,
with civil unrest.]
Never would they suffer the day to peep, before our sleep
was interrupted with the thundering of cannon and musketry,
the rattling of drums, the shrill squeaking of fifes, the
clattering of tom-toms, whose bass is a large deep sonorous
kettle covered over with a skin, and the bellowing of large
brazen trumpets; and all this, within thirty yards of the
drum of our ears.
. . . [2 1/2 paragraphs, impresses the natives with
electrical experiments and mechanics:]
The solar microscope astonishes them, and they shudder with
fear when they see the snakes of vinegar writhing about upon
the white wall, but they are ready to think me in a league
with Old Nick himself, when I introduce the devil, punch,
and all the grotesque figures that accompany the magic
lanthorn, dancing about upon the wall just as I please; but
none have immortalized my name so much as that extraordinary
faculty I have of drawing forth fire from a tube of brass,
making bells ring that never are touched, and causing little
paper men and women to get up and dance a cotillon. . .
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