Silver swan

Called in at Bowes Museum on our wet journey to Haltwhistle.

The Silver Swan is an automaton dating from the 18th Century and is housed in the Bowes Museum, Barnard Castle.

The swan, which is life size, is a clockwork driven device that includes a music box.
The swan sits in a "stream" that is made of glass rods and is surrounded by silver leaves.
Small silver fish can be seen "swimming" in the stream.
When the clockwork is wound the music box plays and the glass rods rotate giving the illusion of flowing water.
The swan turns its head from side to side and also preens itself.
After a few moments the swan notices the swimming fish and bends down to catch and eat one.
The swan's head then returns to the upright position and the performance, which has lasted about 40 seconds, is over.
To help preserve the mechanism the swan is only operated once each day at 2 pm.
The mechanism was designed by John Joseph Merlin (1735-1803) and the first recorded owner of the swan was James Cox.
The swan was purchased by John Bowes in 1872 for the museum.