AUTOMATON is • derived from two Greek words signifying self-movement., and is usually implied to machinery constructed to represent human or animal actions. The construction of automata has occupied the attention of mankind from very early ages. Archytas of Tarentum is reported, so long ago as 400 B.C.. to have made a pigeon that could fly. Albertus Magnus and Roger Bacon, in the 13th c., are said—butt there is some dubiety-about the matter—to have -made respectively a porter to open the door. and a speaking head. In France, riu-tbe,beginning of the 18th c., many persons busied themselves in the construction of automata; and among other things, a pantomime, in five acts, was represented by actors moved by machinery. The most perfect A,. about which there is absolute certainty, was one constructed by M. Vaucanson, and exhibited in Paris in 1738. It represented a flute-player, which placed its lips against the instru, ment, and produced the notes with its fingers in precisely the same manner as a human being does. In 1741, M. Vaucauson made a flageolet-player, which with one hand beat a tambourine; and in the same year he produced a duck. This was a most ingenious contrivance, the mechanical thick being made to conduct itself in every respect like its animated pattern. It swain, dived, ate, drank, dressed its wings. etc., as naturally as its live companions: and. most wonderful of all, by means of a solution in the stomach, it was actually made to digest its food ! An A., produced by M. Droz, drew likenesses of public characters; and, some years ago, Mr. Faber contrived it figure, exhibited in vari
ous places, Edinburgh among others, which, by means of certain keys, was made to articulate simple words and sentences very intelligibly, but the effect was not pleasant. The chess-player of Kempelen was long regarded as the most wonderful of automata. It represented a Turk of the natural size, (tressed in the national costume, and seated behind a box resembling a chest of drawers in shape. Before the game commenced, the artist opened several doors iu the chest, which revealed a large number of pulleys, wheels, cylinders, springs, etc. The chessmen were produced from a long drawer, as was also a cushion for the figure to rest its arm upon. The A. not being able to speak, signified when the queen of his antagonist was in danger by two nods, and when the king was in check by three. The A. succeeded in beating most of the players with whom it engaged; but it turned out afterwards that a crippled Russian otticer—a very celebrated chess-player—was concealed in time interior of the figure. The figure is said to have been constructed for the purpose of effecting the officer's escape. out of Russia, where his life was forfeited. So far as the mental process was concerned, the chess player was not, therefore, an A.; but great ingenuity was evinced in its movement of the pieces. M. Houdin. the celebrated conjurer, was the inventor of some striking Hutton's Mathematieat Recreations; Memoirs of Robert Houdin. Loud. 18.59. Chapman & Hall.