-villages -
that I must next particularize an incident.
    The scene was one of those Lyceum-halls, of which almost every village has
now its own, dedicated to that sober and pallid, or, rather, drab-colored, mode
of winter-evening entertainment, the Lecture. Of late years, this has come
strangely into vogue, when the natural tendency of things would seem to be, to
substitute lettered for oral methods of addressing the public. But, in halls
like this, besides the winter course of lectures, there is a rich and varied
series of other exhibitions. Hither comes the ventriloquist, with all his
mysterious tongues; the thaumaturgist, too, with his miraculous transformations
of plates, doves, and rings, his pancakes smoking in your hat, and his cellar of
choice liquors, represented in one small bottle. Here, also, the itinerant
professor instructs separate classes of ladies and gentlemen in physiology, and
demonstrates his lessons by the aid of real skeletons, and mannikins in wax,
from Paris. Here is to be heard the choir of Ethiopian melodists, and to be
seen, the diorama of Moscow or Bunker Hill, or the moving panorama of the
Chinese wall. Here is displayed the museum of wax figures, illustrating the wide
catholicism of earthly renown by mixing up heroes and statesmen, the Pope and
the Mormon Prophet, kings, queens, murderers, and beautiful ladies; every sort
of person, in short, except authors, of whom I never beheld even the most
famous, done in wax. And here, in this many-purposed hall, (unless the selectmen
of the village chance to have more than their share of the puritanism, which,
however diversified with later patchwork, still gives its prevailing tint to New
England character,) here the company of strolling players sets up its little
stage, and claims patronage for the legitimate drama.
    But, on the autumnal evening which I speak of, a number of printed handbills
- stuck up in the bar-room and on the sign-post of the hotel, and on the
meeting-house porch, and distributed largely through the village - had promised
the inhabitants an interview with that celebrated and hitherto inexplicable
phenomenon, the Veiled Lady!
    The hall was fitted up with an amphitheatrical descent of seats towards a
platform, on which stood a desk, two lights, a stool, and a capacious, antique
chair. The audience was of a generally decent and respectable character; old
farmers, in their Sunday black coats, with shrewd, hard, sun-dried faces, and a
cynical humor, oftener