Levni shows this evening’s fireworks displays, which are described in elaborate detail by Vehbi, as taking place beneath a starry sky and a crescent moon. In (100b) Ahmed III is seated in his pavilion with İbrahim Pasha outside in their customary positions. In the foreground, pyrotechnists scurry about as they tend the fireworks: a cypress tree, a fountain, a tent, four ewers, and a Solomon’s seal all spouting brilliant cascades of golden fire. In (101a), another tent-firework is ablaze in the upper right as skyrockets hurtle upwards and left and right. Just right of center is another figure garbed in fireworks. According to Vehbi, this performance was staged by members of the Engineers corps. He was dressed in a "cloak" fashioned from fireworks. (The rectangular frame around his neck on which more fireworks are set may be a safety device. Also compare the "executed" bread-seller in (73a) and the simit-seller in the upper right quarter of (76a).) As he passed before the sultan, the hem of his robe was ignited and he suddenly burst into flame and began running this way and that. The mechanical elephant in the foreground is another work by the Arsenal corps. It is being operated by three corpsmen seated in a howdah on the beast’s back. As this contraption marched around the field it continuously spouted fireworks from its trunk. Behind the elephant is a fireworks display fashioned like a water-wheel from whose buckets pour sparks instead of water.

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