continued in answer to a question from the Stranger. "Snakes are more
particular feeders than any other animals, and they will not touch
anything which is not alive when it is brought to them. This is the
night for feeding them, and if you care to remain until the crowd has
gone you can see how it is done. Long as I have been in the business, I
learn something new every day, and I never saw a cobra fed artificially
until last week, when Brandu, my Hindoo snake charmer, received one
direct from India. It seems that they are cannibal snakes and live upon
their own kind in India, but that would be too expensive a diet here,
and he forces feed down its throat."
The thousands of incandescent lights on the Dreamland tower went
out--the signal that the barkers might cease from barking and the
spielers spiel no more--until the morrow brought its fresh crowd of
amusement seekers, and the Proprietor led the way into the Arena. Brandu
and his two native assistants were carrying the boxes which contained
the snakes into the big exhibition cage, and, when the three men
joined them, the weirdness of the surroundings made a profound
impression upon the Stranger. All of the lights in the Arena were
extinguished, with the exception of the small cluster directly over
their heads, and pairs of luminous spots from the great semicircle of
cages at the outer edge of the building reminded him that the human
beings in the cage were not the only interested spectators of the
proceedings.
[Illustration: _"A procession of sandwich men."_]
The assistants carefully removed the great boas and pythons from the
boxes, laying them on the floor, where they crawled lazily about, their
delicate forked tongues vibrating like streaks of red flame, while
Brandu removed a slat from a crate of rabbits and put a half-dozen of
them on the floor. The little animals had no instinctive fear of the
serpents, for they hopped about among them and over their wriggling
bodies unconcernedly, but the snakes were hungry after a fast of two
weeks and they wasted no time in getting to the business before them.
The proceeding was the same in each case. A serpent would crawl up to
the rabbit and place its nose, at which the little furry beast would
sniff curiously, close to that of its prospective supper. The red forked
tongue would pass rapidly over its face and the rabbit made no attempt
to move. Whether it was the effect of some anaesthetic quality in the
breath of the snake or the traditional charm of the serpent, it was hard
to say, but the rabbit made no move to escape. Slowly but surely it
yielded to the fascination of the snake, the large transparent ears
dropped to the side of the head and the body muscles relaxed until the
tickling of the serpent's tongue caused no reflex movement of the paws.
The snake then carefully withdrew its head until the slim neck was in
the form of a letter S, and when it again straightened out it was with
the force of a released steel spring and the aim of the flat head was
unerring. The stroke was so rapid that it was difficult for the eye to
follow and the rabbit never knew what happened, for its body made a
quick circle in the air and in less than a second all that was to be
seen was one small paw protruding from the coiled body which had brought
it a quick and merciful death. The jaws of the serpent have seized it by
the snout and thrown it back into its coils and the first pressure kills
it, although the ever tightening embrace continues until the bones are
crushed within the unbroken skin, so that it can be easily swallowed.
It is not swallowing in the ordinary sense of the word, for the snakes
pull themselves over the rabbits as a glove is pulled over the finger,
and the progress to the stomach can be watched through the length of the
snake's neck. The snakes which were too small to manage a rabbit were
fed on white rats and mice, but the process was the same in each case,
except that the Hindoos held the rodents by their tails until the snakes
had hypnotized them.
"I suppose that this seems cruel to people because the rabbits are such
harmless little beasts," said the Proprietor as the last bit of fur
disappeared. "To my mind it is not half so cruel as hunting hares with
guns and dogs, for death from the snake's blow is as quick and
painless as that from a bullet, and there are no maimed and wounded
animals to drag themselves away to lingering deaths in hiding. But now I
will show you something which has never been known in this country."
[Illustration: _"Brought the head of the cobra close to his face."_]
One of the natives brought out a curiously woven circular basket which
he handled with great care, and setting it in the middle of the cage
retired to a respectful distance. Brandu crouched on the floor beside
it, and, although the performance was not accompanied by the weird
Oriental music which signaled the public appearances of the snake
charmer, the tense expression of his face and the uncanniness of the
surroundings made it sufficiently impressive, for he was about to handle
the cobra de capello, the most venomous snake in all the great
collection. He wasted no time in the pantomime and incantation of the
ring performance, but quickly threw off the cover, and when the hooded
head arose swaying above the edge of the basket, he started a low
whistling and passed his slim brown hands with lightning rapidity above
it. He was absolutely fearless, but the task before him demanded the
concentration of all his thoughts and he seemed unconscious of the
startling interruption of a fight between two of the lions, and the
shouts and pistol-shots of the keepers who separated them.
He never removed his gaze from the head of the serpent and his hands
moved so rapidly that they were almost invisible until, quicker than a
snake could strike, one of them darted down and caught the slim neck
behind the distended hood. He gave a sharp exclamation of triumph and
sprang to his feet, the cobra coiling its body about his bare brown arm
and giving every indication of rage.
"I am always glad when that part of the performance is over," said the
Proprietor with a sigh of relief. "Of course, it is all in the day's
work with Brandu and he has done it thousands of times, but some day he
will be a fraction of a second too slow and then--well, I shall have to
get another snake charmer. Watch him now and you will see something
which only the men of his caste can do."
Brandu's white teeth glistened as he smiled at the Proprietor and
pointed first to his own eyes and then to those of the serpent. He
brought the head of the cobra close to his face, his expression became
fixed and stern and the pupils of his widely opened eyes, which had been
dilated until the iris was but a narrow rim, contracted to the size of
pin heads. The cobra gazed at him fixedly and the tense body slowly
uncoiled from his arm and hung limp and motionless, and Brandu laid it
on the floor as lifeless and inert as a piece of rope. One of his
assistants handed him a glass containing a couple of raw eggs and,
handling it as carelessly as if it were a harmless garter snake, he
picked up the cobra and forced a tube of polished bamboo between its
jaws. When he had poured the eggs through the tube he withdrew it and
carefully replaced the snake in the basket, still apparently lifeless;
but bending over he blew sharply into its face and the cobra was
instantly reanimated into five feet of viciousness. Its head reared up
above the edge, the spectacled hood distended in anger, but Brandu
quickly clapped on the cover and the snake feeding was finished for two
weeks.
[Illustration: _"You're a blame fine figure of a fat man."_]
"That is a great performance of Brandu's," said the Press Agent, "but it
profits us nothing because the best part of it cannot be shown to the
public. I never see a snake fed without thinking of something which
happened when I was running a side show with the Greatest Show on Earth.
"You know that the dime museum business was run to death while the craze
lasted in this country, and freaks got so common that you couldn't throw
a stone in the streets of any large city without hitting one of 'em.
When the fickle public tired of giving up its dimes to see 'em, a guy
named Merritt and myself had a choice collection on hand, and we went on
the road with the big show for the summer, thinking perhaps our business
would pick up in the fall. Our two great attractions were the biggest
boa-constrictor in captivity, which we called 'Jointless Jake,' and the
heaviest fat man in the world. That snake was about two hundred feet
long, and while the fat man wasn't much on length, he held the record
for belt measurement. Nine hundred and twenty-seven pounds he weighed,
as we demonstrated on our own scales at every performance. Their feed
bill was quite an item, as the snake took a half-dozen sheep every two
weeks and the fat man, who was billed as 'Signor Adipose
Avoirdupois'--Merritt invented that--needed about a side of beef every
day.
"Freaks are a jealous lot and as hard to manage as rival prima donnas,
and these two monstrosities came to hate each other like poison. They
were in different lines, but you may have noticed that the side show
'professor' uses up most of the superlatives in the English language
when he gives his lecture, and each of 'em seemed afraid that the other
would get some of his share of the dictionary. Adipose used to look at
Jake's coiled body as if he would like to sit on it and flatten it out,
and the snake would return the glance with a naughty little twinkle in
its eye, as if he was estimating how much it would have to stretch its
skin to accommodate A. A. in its interior, until it made Merritt anxious
about 'em.
"'That blame fat fool will waste away and spoil his shape, if he don't
stop worrying,' he says, and he cuts a lot of his talk out of the
description of the snake and uses the words on Adipose. Maybe you think
snakes are stupid, but they aren't, and the boa got the hump and refused
to uncoil himself to show his length unless he got his full share of the
spiel. It cheered Avoirdupois up, though, and when we moved to the next
town he stood around to gloat over Jake when he was being moved from the
traveling box to the exhibition cage. The snake hadn't been fed for ten
days and he was good and lively as well as being out of temper, so when
he caught sight of the Signor he scattered the boys with one flip of his
tail and went for him.
"I've heard of bear hugs, but I never saw such a squeezing as that boa
gave poor Adipose. It was a long way around him, but the snake made
about a dozen wraps and all we could see of the fat man was a pair of
feet sticking out at one end of the coil and his face, which looked like
a purple harvest moon, projecting from the other. Jake reaches out and
gets hold of a tent peg with his tail, which gives him a purchase, and
then he tightens up for fair and Adipose lets out a holler you could
hear a mile.
"Of course, we got busy with crowbars and jackscrews and tried to pry
Jake off, but there was nothing doing and the harder we pried the closer
he cinched up on Adipose. Merritt usually had a suggestion to make, so I
looked at him and he was lost in thought, but in a minute he brightens
up and calls for a rope.
"'We can't pry the blame snake away from the man,' says he, as he tied
the rope around the Signor's feet, 'so we'll try to pull the man away
from the snake.' All hands fell to and pulled to beat four of a kind,
but Jake just tightened up a bit and grinned and Adipose let out
another holler.
"'You need a traction engine on that rope,' says I when they gave it up
as a bad job, and Merritt, who was looking a little discouraged, gave a
whoop.
"'Bring an elephant,' he yelled, and when one of the boys started off on
a run for the menagerie, he called after him to 'make that order two
elephants.' The Hathis came lumbering over, and Merritt tied the rope
around the shoulders of one and put another rope around Jake's neck and
the shoulders of the other elephant.
"'Now pull, blame you!' says he, heading 'em in different directions and
giving one of 'em a kick, and they put their shoulders against the
ropes. It was a mighty interesting performance to every one but Adipose,
who didn't seem to enjoy it at all, judging from the yells he let out.
Jake was having the time of his life, and the harder the elephants
pulled the tighter he squeezed the Signor, and when he felt that they
were getting the better of him he made a supreme effort which kinked up
every muscle in his body. But there was no holding on against those
brutes, and pretty soon the fat man commenced to slip out from the
coils, feet first. It was a queer thing to watch and his legs stretched
so that I thought his knees would never come into sight. His legs had
been about the size of barrels when the snake grabbed him, but between
the stretching and the squeezing they were now three times as long and
about as large as broomsticks. He weighed as much as ever when the
elephants finally got him out, but the flesh was distributed differently
and instead of being six feet tall and twelve feet around, he was twelve
feet long and built in proportion. The snake was up against it, too, for
he had cramped himself so with that last squeeze that he couldn't
straighten out the kinks, and he kept in the same shape as when he was
wrapped around the Signor. We tried to straighten him out, but it was no
use; he just stayed coiled up like a spring and the boys rolled him
around as if he were a barrel.
"Merritt had kept cheerful as long as there was anything to be done, but
tears came to his eyes when he looked at Adipose. The Signor was
standing up, gazing at his feet, which he hadn't seen before in twenty
years, and Merritt looked up at him and freed his mind.
"'You're a blame fine figure of a fat man, aren't you, now?' says he.
'Just on account of your confounded professional jealousy we lose our
two star attractions, for that blamed snake is so kinked up that he
isn't good for anything except to cut up into barrel hoops.'
"The Signor was ashamed of himself and hadn't a word to say, so he just
kept quiet and tried to get used to his new shape and taking a
bird's-eye view of things. Merritt and I were feeling pretty blue when
along comes Tody Hamilton, the circus press agent, and as soon as he saw
what had happened he made a run for a trolley car.
"'Don't let 'em get away!' he yelled back over his shoulder. 'This is
the biggest scoop on record and I'm off for the printing-office.'
[Illustration: _"Jake was having the time of his life, and the harder
the elephants pulled the tighter he squeezed the Signor."_]
"'It'll make a good newspaper story, all right; but where do we come in
on it?' says Merritt, looking mournfully at Adipose.
"Well, a couple of hours later I had to go into the city to order some
new togs for the Signor, who looked as if he were dressed in a
particularly baggy bathing suit since he had been stretched out, and the
first thing I saw was a procession of sandwich men marching down the
street. The ink wasn't dry on the posters, but Tody had been busy, and
there in flaming red letters was the announcement--
JUST ARRIVED AT THE
BIG SHOW!
DON'T MISS SEEING THEM!!!
LENGTHY LOUIS, THE TALLEST
MAN IN THE UNIVERSE!!!
CIRCULAR SAM, THE MOST GIGANTIC
HOOP SNAKE EVER CAPTURED!!!
THE LIONESS SKIRT DANCE AND THE INCONSIDERATE PYTHON
THE LIONESS SKIRT DANCE AND THE INCONSIDERATE PYTHON
The conventional skirt dance has long ceased to be a novelty on the
vaudeville stage, but as it is performed by "La Belle Selica" in the
Arena at Dreamland it holds the interest of that most exacting
audience--a crowd of Coney Island pleasure seekers. It is not because
Selica is pre-eminent among dancers, but on account of the unusual and
dangerous stage setting; for she performs in the large exhibition cage,
surrounded by a half dozen lionesses, each animal seated on a separate
pedestal. Any one of the huge beasts could crush the dancer with a
single blow of a massive paw, and the great jaws which snap viciously at
her tiny feet as she kicks them before their faces are sufficiently
powerful to crush the shin-bone of an ox.
She is apparently without fear of them, for she dances gracefully from
one to the other, flicking them across their faces with the light switch
which she carries for her only protection, and kicking over their heads
and into their very mouths, always missing the answering snap of the
jaws by the fraction of an inch, and acknowledging it with a smile as
she whirls away to repeat the performance before another pedestal. The
lionesses see the performance many times in the course of a season, but
they never lose interest in it and they do not remove their eyes from
Selica from the time she enters the cage until she drives them out
before her. So long as she is on her feet and agile enough to escape the
swift stroke of a paw or the snapping jaws, she is safe; for a lioness
would not jump at her from a pedestal; but there is always the chance of
a slip or a false step and then----!!!
It happened once, and caused a suspension of Selica's performance for
two months during the Pan-American Exposition at Buffalo, for Grace, the
largest lioness, was on her before she could recover herself; and it
required the efforts of Bostock and all of his trainers to beat back the
beasts who were maddened by the sight and smell of blood and to rescue
the unconscious woman from the cage. They have never forgotten that
moment of rebellion which was so nearly successful, and they are ever
watchful for another opportunity to avenge the many cuts of the
training whip which they received in the course of their schooling. But
Selica is also watchful, and although Grace had latterly done nothing
particularly out of the way, the wonderful sixth sense which experienced
trainers always acquire warned her that the animal should be regarded
with suspicion. The beast had become nervous; a little more sullen than
usual when ordered to leave her den for the exhibition cage, and a
trifle slow and rebellious when told to jump up on her allotted
pedestal.
[Illustration: _"Now, if you'll kindly give me your attention."_]
Constant association with the wild animals begets carelessness but
Selica, with the scars of Grace's sharp claws still visible on her back
and shoulders, was quick to notice the change and especially careful,
before opening the door from the den to the runway, to look through the
observation hole and make sure that the lioness was not crouched for a
spring. Grace had been particularly sullen in the afternoon and she was
growling ominously when Selica went to get her for the evening
performance, but when the woman saw the three little furry balls which
were huddled in a corner of the den she understood and forgave all. The
cubs were no larger than St. Bernard puppies, but Grace apparently
considered them worth fighting for; and Selica's dance was given that
night with only five lionesses in the cage, and the Proprietor told the
Stranger the reason for the empty pedestal.
"Wait until after the performance and I will take them out of the cage
and show them to you," he said; and the Stranger, remembering a
tradition to the effect that robbing a lioness of her cubs is a
dangerous feat, looked forward with a great deal of interest to the
after-piece.
"We can't trust the rearing of the cubs to Grace," said the Proprietor,
as he stood in front of her cage after the audience had been dismissed.
"The close proximity of the other animals in the Arena and the curiosity
of the thousands of people who come here every day would make her so
crazy that she would destroy them, so I must get them a foster mother. I
have sent to New York for a bitch with pups, and in a couple of days I
will show you a happy family." The cubs were in the center of the cage
and Grace stood over them, snarling and looking with blazing eyes at the
group in front of it; but Selica's voice from the runway and a rattling
of the door at the back distracted her attention, and as she sprang at
the door the Proprietor darted a hand between the bars and seized one of
the cubs, drawing it safely out a half second before the enraged mother
landed against the bars with a force which made them rattle.
The poor beast was almost frantic, but the same maneuver was twice
repeated, and in spite of her fierce attacks on doors and bars the
Proprietor, who had acquired through his lifetime association with the
great cats as much of their quickness of movement as it is given to mere
man to learn, removed the three cubs without receiving a scratch.
Poor helpless little creatures they were, and it was difficult to
realize that they would soon grow into beasts as powerful as the
ferocious Baltimore, the terror of trainers, who was answering Grace's
lamentations with roars which fairly shook the building, from his cage
on the other side of the Arena.
[Illustration: _"Looked like the pennant of a man-o'-war."_]
"That animal was bred in captivity, born and raised in our menagerie in
England," said the Proprietor after he had placed the cubs in charge of
one of the keepers. "I suppose that's what makes him such a bad beggar
to handle. Give me the jungle-bred lion to train, every time, for after
the manhandling and discomfort of his capture and transportation to the
coast by the natives, he appreciates the care and humanity of a
civilized trainer. These cubs which are raised in captivity are always
played with and teased by the employees and visitors, and their first
knowledge of their strength comes to them accidentally when they hurt a
man without meaning to do it; but they soon learn to connect cause and
effect, and then it is time to watch out for 'em. A jungle-bred lion is
pretty much cock o' the walk until he is snared or trapped, and in his
first experience with men he is vanquished and realizes how useless is
his great strength against the nets and ropes which entangle him. The
cub born in captivity is familiar with men from the first, and plays
with them like a kitten until one day he is out of sorts or is
accidentally hurt in a frolic and the swift cut of his razor-like claws
makes his playmate or tormentor drop him and leave him in peace. That
makes it hard for the trainer when he takes him in hand, for although
the cub may be subdued, he remembers that he was once victorious and
watches his chance. Jack Bonavita, the greatest trainer who ever went
into a lion's cage, would have two good arms to-day if Baltimore had
been born in the Nubian desert instead of in Manchester."
They stood in front of Baltimore's cage for a moment, admiring the
swelling muscles of the great beast as he sprang from side to side,
shaking his shaggy mane and roaring defiance at the world, and then
turned to go to the white-topped table in front of the Arena. In the
doorway they met the Press Agent, looking anything but cheerful and
muttering maledictions on the heads of all city editors. The Proprietor
told him of the new arrivals in the Arena, and suggested sending the
announcement of the birth to the papers.
"A fat chance I'd stand of having it printed," he grumbled. "Here I've
worked half the season and never given 'em a story that wasn't pretty
nearly true, and to-day when I take them that account of Morelli and the
jaguar they turn me down and holler 'fake.' Let me take one of those
cubs and stripe it over with a little black paint, and to-morrow morning
every newspaper in New York will have a photographer down here to take
pictures of 'the only hybrid lion-tiger cub ever born,' and all of the
space jerkers will be buttonholing me for a three column, front page
story."
The arrival of the waiter with soothing beverages soon brought back the
customary smile to his genial face and the Proprietor's suggestion that
perhaps he had embroidered some of the stories just a trifle, aroused
only a good-natured protest.
"The worst thing about the press agent's profession is that he has to
risk his eternal salvation by making up plausible lies to satisfy the
newspapers when he could give 'em better stories which are actually true
if they would take 'em on his say so," he said, as he wiped the froth
from his mustache. "I remember once when a guy named Merritt and
myself were running a snake show in New York that we couldn't pay the
rent because the papers wouldn't give us any publicity, although we had
the finest collection of wrigglers that was ever gotten together. We
were running it on the dead level, nary a fake about it, and Merritt's
lecture was highly instructive and interesting and more than half true;
but we saw that we couldn't win out at the game unless we crooked it. We
were running so far behind that the only thing which saved us from a
dispossess was the fact that they couldn't get a constable who would
carry the snakes out to the sidewalk; but Merritt was a resourceful cuss
and I felt confident that he would figure out some scheme to win out.
[Illustration: _"Kicking over their heads and into their very mouths."_]