At the sign of the Coach and Horses, against the State House, in Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, every evening, at seven a clock precisely, will be acted, in several scenes, viz. An agreeable comedy or tragedy, by changeable figures of a sight of the sea and ships.

A merry dialogue between Punch and Joan his wife. With several other pleasing entertainments.

The prices, two shillings, eighteen pence, and sixpence.

The name of the proprietor, the titles of the repertory of plays, and other details are not given. The figures two feet tall were probably string-puppets; "changeable" was another way of saying moveable. The "sight of the sea and the ships" was a diorama like Holt's optick. It would have been as simple as the rocking ships on the face of a grandfather's clock, but if the showman were worth his hire, it had moving ground strips scalloped into white-capped waves, ships that sailed in cardboard splendor from one side to the other, and a lantern that was darkened, to the whistling of a wind machine and the rain pelt of peas in a box, to give the effect of a storm. Since Punch and his wife did not head the bill, they seem to have been reserved for an afterpiece, along with the "other pleasing entertainments," perhaps trick and variety numbers. No diary or letter has came to light to indicate what some Philadelphian may have thought of this show. The Coach and Horses Inn was an inn that survived into the nineteenth century. In it the Declaration of Independence, crossing the road from the State House, refreshed themselves.

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