We, Robots

by Simon Ings

  Well, I drew Budlong’s attention to the last cutting, and began to read it to him.

  It was a Washington despatch of the day before, with “display head,” somewhat thus:—

  “TALKING MACHINE!

  THE GREAT PROFESSOR HANSERL FABER!!

  All Washington Crowds To See It!

  GRANT SAYS HE DON’T WANT IT!

  ————

  “The inventor has closely copied the form and action of the different organs producing the human voice, and operated them in the same manner; levers and springs taking the place of muscles and nerves. The machine has a bellows for lungs, a windpipe for the conduction of air, an India-rubber larynx, with vocal cords modelled after those of man, and opening and closing in the same manner. It has a fixed upper jaw of wood, with a

  LIP OF LEATHER.

  “The lower jaw is made of India-rubber; and the mouth has a hard palate of hard rubber, and a movable tongue of flexible rubber.”

  And so on. “There, Budlong,” I said; “what do you think of that?”

  “I don’t think,” said Budlong; “I know. See here!” And with a wise kind of grin, he fumbled in his breast-pocket, and drew forth a document, which I read:—

  “Received [&c.] of P. Budlong, in full for advertisement and notices of Budlong and Fabers machines, fifty dollars. Jenks, Adv. Clk.”

  It was from the office of the very same newspaper. I stared at Budlong, as amazed as Balboa,

  “Silent, upon a peak in Darien,”

  when he first espied the boundless Pacific.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “Why, it’s a costly business to get the right kind of notices in the papers.”

  “But do you know Faber? Were you ever at Vienna?”

  “Hanserl is Viennese for Johnny,” answered he. “I know that; and Faber is Latin for Smith; and professor is American for anybody. Don’t you remember old Johnny Smith?”

  In short, this Dutchman is not a German Dutchman, but a Yankee one; neither more nor less than a self-taught mechanician from the native town of both Budlong and myself. I knew the man had been deluded at one time by the same “perpetual motion” goblin that has fooled so many halftaught or ill-balanced minds; but I had lost sight of him for years. He had, as my friend now informed me, applied to him for assistance in his semi-lunatic labors. Budlong, who, though extremely queer, is not without some good points, had set to work to help the poor fellow out of his delusion.

  “I very soon found,” said Budlong, “that, if I attacked him directly, I should only confirm his notions. I had had some ideas of my own about this talking-machine, for a good while; and so I set Smith at work on that, and managed to give him some correct views on the first principles of mechanics, on pretence of investigations at odd times for improving his own invention. He has really a very fair faculty for mechanics, with some help in the reasoning part; and, after a while, he found himself convinced, without knowing how. I guess he’s the only case on record of a radical cure.”

  “That is a process worth considering for other delusions,” I observed; “it is the great tactical rule of flanking the enemy. But it is you, then, who is really running the talking-machine and Prof Faber of Vienna?”

  “Yes; Vienna’s a good place for the invention to come from, since Von Kempelen’s chess-player. There’s a very neat sum of money in my invention, I reckon, and we’ve marketed enough of them to prove it too. I’ll tell you what—I’ll show you over the factory, and let you make an article on the subject for one of the magazines, if you want to.”

  “I guess,” said I, “that I can get it printed, if you will advertise a little with them.’

  “I never bribe,” said Budlong, virtuously.

  “I know that,” said I. “We abhor it equally: still I think it would look more like business. The advertisement would draw people’s attention to the article; and reading the article would have a tendency to increase the circulation of the magazine.”

  “Oh!” said Budlong: “I hadn’t seen it in that light. I don’t know but you are correct. Well, say one page of advertisement each time the article is printed?”

  This it was agreed I might offer.

  “Now come along, “said my friend. “I’ve got to go right up town this moment; and I’ll show you through the whole concern.”

  So we took a University-place car—Barclay Street, corner of Broadway—which, with only one transfer, left us within two or three blocks of our destination.

  On the way up, Budlong gave me one piece of information which greatly helped me to understand his invention, and which will, I believe, make it very clearly intelligible to most people who know what a mitrejoint or a king-post or a truss-bridge is; and, I hope, to those who do not. I had remarked to him that I believed I understood the vocalizing part of his machine—which was, I presumed, a development of the mechanism used in Vaucanson’s fluteplayer, Maelzel’s trumpeter, and the various speaking automata—but that I was thoroughly puzzled to see how he could deliver through the machine, a long, connected discourse. I could not suppose, I added, that he was going to hide a human being in each figure, as Von Kempelen did in his chess-player—a device quite too thin (to use a slang phrase of to-day, that may be classic to-morrow) for the present state of intelligence.

  “Not at all,” my friend observed. “All my work is genuine mechanism. The device for accomplishing what you refer to is, however, my own special invention, and is precisely what makes a commercial article out of the mere toy of those European fellows. I have simply adapted one of the parts of Alden’s type-setting machine to my use. Do you know that machine?”

  As I did not, Mr. Budlong went on, with a kind of set though fluent clearness, which kept reminding me of the specifications in a patent. I dare say they were from precisely that source, at least in part.

  “Take twenty-six type, one for each English letter; lay them down on their edges close together, with the faces all one way, like a long row of people in bed lying ‘spoon-fashion.’ Then let a different nick or notch, or set of nicks or notches, belong to the upper edge of each of the twenty-six. Suppose a thing like a comb, its back as long as one type, with as many teeth as there can be nicks on a type, and these teeth not tight in the back, but jointed to it. Now, if this comb be drawn along the backs of this row of twenty-six type, (across each individual type, of course) the teeth that fit the nicks of a, for instance, or of t, will fall into those nicks when they reach that letter.

  “Now add the necessary mechanism for lifting out each letter when reached, and carrying it where it is wanted, and you have the principal element of the type-setting machine.

  “Lastly, let the supposed comb be fixed, instead of moving; and instead of type—here is the precise contrivance of Budlong and Faber—instead of type to be carried under the jointed teeth, or fingers, and to let these fall into the proper nicks, let the teeth, or fingers, be lifted by marks in paper or other fabric, raised or embossed, as in printing for the blind; and, as the projections answering to each sound lift the teeth, let these teeth, continued by means equivalent to the leaders from the keys in a piano or organ, open the pipes, reeds, or valves which emit that sound.

  “There! that is the heart of my mystery. I am not in the least afraid of telling it; for I have a monopoly of this application of Alden’s device; and this, you see, enabled me to dodge all the infringers. I should have had the Old Gentleman’s own time, if I had recorded an application for a patent. As it is, I have worked the whole thing out to perfection at my leisure, and without one particle of annoyance or interference.”

  I could not help admiring the truly American combination of mechanical and political genius thus described: and, if my praise did not satisfy Budlong, he must needs have been horribly vain; for I gave him a most hearty portion of it. Indeed, I challenge the intelligent reader (I scorn to address any other) to refuse me his meed of admiration for this most remarkable instance of ingenuity in mechanics, and masterly shrewdness in mana
gement. Would that all great inventors could have done the like! We should not have on our records such miserable stories as that of the thievish persecutions that swindled Whitney, nor the other similar cases.

  The factory of Messrs. Budlong and Faber is on Twelfth Avenue, close to the North River, and between the water and Riverside Park. I well remember being struck, as we entered its precincts, by the dreariness of the premises, and the contrast between their sordid common-place and the brilliant conceptions that were being shaped into actual existence inside. There was a plain brick building of respectable size; the usual tall chimney and squatty engine-house flat at its foot, as if worshipping it; the staring windows, their dingy glass uncovered from the hot sunlight, like eyes left lidless by some torturing tyrant; a cloud of black smoke; the chatter of a small high-pressure engine, and the corresponding spitting discharge of steam from an escape-pipe; a narrow lawn of black dust and scoriae between the sidewalk and the door; two or three broken cog-wheels, shafts, and other portions of invalid machinery, leaning against the outside of the building, like old soldiers, sunning themselves in front of a hospital.

  We entered the office, where Budlong left me for a few minutes to attend to some business or other. In his absence, I betook myself to inspecting divers articles, which adorned the walls of the little room. There were a few portraits of eminent public speakers, both lay and clerical; various drawings of machinery; and one rusty old print, executed in a coarse enough style, but with considerable spirit.

  The imprint stated that it was a view of the newly invented “Kaihuper Seminarium:’’ date, 1807. This partly Greek and partly Latin appellation was somewhat difficult to interpret, but might perhaps be taken to imply that the “Seminarium” was kai huper—even ahead of—any thing theretofore invented in that line. The picture represented a curious machine, or mill, worked by a large crank, at which were laboring several stately personages in academic or clerical costume. Into a species of hopper, at one end, other gentlemen, of like demeanor and costume, were gravely casting huge pumpkins, squashes, cabbages, turnips, and other matters known in Yankee realms by the collective title of “green sarse.” From the discharging-trough at the opposite extremity, hopped and tumbled a number of little lively black creatures, which I took at first to be frogs or diminutive apes, but which, upon closer inspection, were seen to be small clergymen of prim countenance, and jaunty and priggish bearing, accurately arrayed in well-fitting black garments. At their first exit from the machine, they were represented as falling upon the earth in a helpless, sprawly state, on their stomachs, or on all-fours. But they quickly hopped up, and were seen marching off to parts unknown, with a trig strut, and an air of satisfaction and delight, curiously suggestive of those young birds who run about, as naturalists tell us, with the egg-shell still on their heads.

  I was still studying upon this ancient caricature—of which, indeed, I had heard, and which I had sought after in vain—when my friend came to show me through the factory. “We are filling an order for assorted ministers, this week,” said he, “and, except a few specimens in the show-room, you can see hardly anything else to-day. But the difference is entirely in externals.”

  We entered first one or two workshops, of no very particular kind, with lines of shafting overhead, lathes and drills whizzing below, the belts sliding and slapping, and busy workmen operating upon combinations of wood, metal, hard and soft rubber, and gutta-percha, which might, perhaps, be generally described as seeming to be the progeny of the marriage of a mouth organ with a wooden clock.

  “There,” observed Budlong, as he paused before a concatenation of delicate springs, wheels, pipes, and valves, “this is the principal portion—what we call the main action—of the works of a patent minister. This is the vocalizing part, and must go into all of them, of course. There is also always the bellows, the transfer-press (which I described to you) for carrying the prepared printed matter, and the power, or mainspring, which runs the whole. The rest of the works are detached actions for several purposes, all driven by the same power, but which need not be put into the machine unless required, and which can be thrown in or out of gear as desired. There are the gesture movement, which operates the arms and hands, legs, neck, and spine; the expression movement which runs the face; and the stops. About these stops I will show you when we come to a machine set up.”

  It is not needful for me to detail the arrangement of the workshops, nor the numerous neat devices, and the general compact arrangement of the machinery. The junior partner, indeed, who would have been the best man to do this, was, as I have shown, absent in Washington on a business-trip. Suffice it to say, that the factory includes the following departments:—

  1. The machine-shop, where the “actions” are prepared for connection with the remainder of the figure.

  2. The body-shop, where the gutta-percha faces and hands, and the remaining corporeal structures, are made, and the whole creature set up, so far as its working-parts are concerned. This might poetically be figured as a paradise, or garden of Eden, from which these Adams were to be turned out naked.

  3. The tailor’s shop, where the garments are made and put on.

  4. The proving-room. The tests here made are extremely thorough; for it will readily be imagined that any defect in the machinery or its working might cause most ludicrous and mortifying scenes. The explosion or collapse of a patent minister in the middle of his sermon, for instance, though not so terrible as the sudden deaths which have sometimes so happened, would be only less undesirable and lamentable than such an interruption.

  The machine-shop, as already described, was much like any other machine-shop. In the second, or body-shop, there was, however, more that was peculiar and amusing. I inspected with great interest a long row of gutta-percha heads on shelves—some bald; some adorned with elegant heads of hair in various states of curl; some old, and some young; some with beard and mustache, others shaved clean. A messenger came just as we were looking at these, to call Budlong to the office to deal with some important customer. I went on inspecting the rows of heads, until I had examined them all; and then, looking aimlessly about, as one does who is at a loss for occupation, I saw a door having the mysterious legend, “Positively No Admission for any Purpose Whatever.” Now, I need not explain to the Yankee mind, that this legend always signifies, “Here is just the most interesting thing of all!” I tried the door at once. Why should I not? for Budlong had said I was to see every part of the factory. Still it is possible—observe, I say possible—that, if my mind had in the least misgiven me, I should not have opened the door. And, moreover, what business had they to leave it unlocked if it was so very sacred and secret? And how do I know now, but that the inscription had been put there by previous occupants? Nor, lastly, am I at all certain that it was not my duty to go in, as it certainly is my duty to inform the public of what I discovered in consequence. Right or wrong, however—and I had infinitely more justification for entering than had the wife of the late Mr. Bluebeard into the historic closet—right or wrong, in I went; and I was, I fancy, quite as much astounded by what I saw as was that amiable young woman. The first thought that flashed across my mind, as I glanced upon this additional row of heads, was indeed horrid: “Have murderers enticed all the great public speakers of the day into this bloody den, and decapitated them?—the Rev. Dr.—, the Rev. Mr.—, the Hon. Mr.—?” Face after face, as familiar as those of the first Napoleon or Gen. Washington, I saw silent and moveless upon the shelves. A painful spasm of indistinct but intense apprehension for a moment made my very heart stand still. So powerful was the impression, moreover, that I could not escape entirely from it; and, after hastily verifying my observations, I gladly retreated out of the uncanny place, and, shutting the door, returned to the contemplation of the insignificant, generalized types of humanity outside; though I could not help pondering upon what might be the possible significance of that executioner’s museum so choicely hidden away there. However, my guide very soon came back;
and, as I turned round, upon his opening the door, I thought he glanced with an uneasy air towards the closet of horrors; and I therefore gave up, by one of those intuitive apprehensions of the disagreeable, which sometimes flash across us, my previous purpose of asking what it meant. A vulgar person, now, would have been only the more resolute to inquire. What a fine thing it is to be polite!

  Mr. Budlong began at once—I fancied with something of forced volubility and interest, as of one who would fain direct wholly the course of talk—to discuss the heads before us. He took down one of them, and holding it in both hands, with the face towards me, caused the dead visage to writhe and gibber in so fearful a manner, that I started as if a corpse were grinning and winking at me. “You see,” said he, “that we are enabled to furnish a large range of expressions.” And he squeezed the face again, and produced half a dozen exceedingly nauseous simpers and smiles. Then he laid the thing on the table, and inflicted a ferocious blow upon its nose; insomuch that his hand drove in the face completely. “But,” I remonstrated, “aside from the danger of injuring the article, is there no risk of injuring the moral sense of your operatives by allowing them to witness such treatment of a clergyman?”

  “Oh, no!” replied he. “The material will take no injury, even from much severer blows than that; and people that make wooden images are not, in this country, likely to have much respect for them, at any rate. Our workmen are well used to their trade: they think neither the better nor the worse of a minister because they have played football with his head, and manufactured his bowels and his brains for him. It’s all a matter of business with them.”

  A naked minister, near several others, stood ready for transfer to the tailor’s shop. The head and hands were finished and colored skilfully, like nature, and suggested the ghastly idea that they had been cut off from a live man, or a dead one, and stuck up there for models. The rest of the creature was a mass of machinery, bearing enough resemblance to the human figure to admit of being draped into a sufficient resemblance to it.