Oh my goodness – I think that if I were not made of such stern stuff, I would have fainted clean away at the glorious Steampunk cacophony of mahogany, brass and decorative filigree.  It is a triunial Victorian magic lantern, and forgive me if I preach to the converted but I didn’t know before today what one actually was – a precursor to projectors, they functioned as visual entertainment and eductation devices before things like television and moving pictures.  They used limelight (a wonderfully Victorian means of bright illumination) to project through glass slides, and some had advanced ‘wipe’ capabilities (such as in biunial and triunial lanterns) to give the impression of animation.

There’s a very indepth page all about magic lanterns, the different kinds and examples of the slides here.  I particularly like the tinted photographic slide of an organ grinder, and the real character of a ferryman in this other slide.  Photographs and painted images (as well as combinations of both – photoshop predated) combined for educational, entertainment, and even advertising purposes.  While I didn’t get the link suggestion directly from Mr C.S., it was his link suggestion that took me down this merry road.  Wonderful, beautiful, magic lanterns.