Genre:

Illustration, Drollery

Relevant illustrations:

wdct.

Illustrators:

C H B *

Subjects:

Invention, Technology, Magnetism, Machinery

    This illustration of Captain Larboard's attempt to 'protract his inventive and useless existence into the twentieth century' shows an old man (Larboard) in a bed, which is being oriented by means of cables stretching between the bottom of the bed and a windlass operated by another man. The caption explains that the magnet above Larboard's head increases his 'vital energy while the windlass regulates the bed by the points of the compass', which stands behind the other man. The caption concludes with Larboard's order to his assistant to orientate the bed so that it does not generate too strong a dose of magnetism.