The instruments behind the doors
Two bound brothers, musical instruments and a cabinet whose interior is hidden from the audience: the Davenport presentation turns these elements into a test. The restraints are meant to prevent the performers from acting. Reported sounds and movements then seem to demand another cause.
Thomas Low Nichols, their biographer and advocate, recounts manifestations occurring while the brothers appeared immobilised. His 1864 book asks readers to take these accounts seriously. For a spectator, however, seeing the restraints before or after an effect is not the same as seeing the hands while it occurs.
Supporters invoke thorough tests. The cabinet contains all this tension in a small space: men visible as they are tied, instruments that can be heard, and an interval during which the interior remains difficult or impossible to observe.
Editorial summary of Thomas Low Nichols, A Biography of the Brothers Davenport (1864), printed pp. 73–74, PDF images 86–87. Nichols is a favorable advocate; this summary does not certify the effects.