AT THE FAIR—A PERFORMING DONKEY.
In my time, fairs in England were very common, and they were held in
most of the important country towns twice a year, in the spring and in
the fall.
These fairs were unlike anything that boys and girls of to-day have
seen. They were held in the main street of the town, and the booths, or
stalls, were erected on each side of the street, partly on the sidewalk
and partly on the road, leaving only a very narrow space for people to
walk about, or for horses and carriages to drive.
This would have been inconvenient, as all the people from the country
roundabout flocked into the town at fair time, and it was then more
crowded than ever. But, as every one wanted to linger and loiter and
look at the things displayed for sale in the stalls, and to listen
to the descriptions of the wonders to be seen inside the shows,
menageries, museums, and travelling theatres, this did not matter very
much.
You will hear more about fairs as you read farther on in my story, but
this seems to me to be a good place to tell you something about them as
they were when I was a young and observant donkey.
One of the most curious things about these fairs was that they were
very often “hiring fairs,” that is, men and women used to go and stand
in rows and wait for the squires or the farmers from roundabout to
come and hire them as farm-hands or labourers, or household help or
dairymaids, or what not. There they would be,—the men all in a row in
their smock-frocks, with their whips in their hands, on one side of the
street, and the women, neatly dressed in linsey-woolsey gowns (that was
the name of the stuff) on the other.
I think I can hear them now: “Where did you work last year?” one of
them would bawl out. And the rest would shout all at once:
“Down in Yorkshire,” or Lancashire, or Berkshire, as the case might be.
The first speaker would then say: “How much did you get a year?”
Then all the rest would reply in chorus:
“Five pound, and a new whip,
Fat pork a foot thick,
And a new knife to cut it with.
Work! Work! Work!”
And the things there were to see at these fairs! Everything that any
one could want, from candy for the babies up to coats and boots for
the men, and dresses and gewgaws for the women. Fathers and mothers
came with their children. Young men and women with their sweethearts,
and all bought what were called “fairings” for each other. Everything
bought at the fair was called a “fairing.”
Useful things also were sold,—ploughs and harrows, rakes, spades, and
hoes, horses, wagons and wheelbarrows,—in fact, everything the farmer
and the housekeeper might want.
But the greatest thing of all was “the fun of the fair,”—the shows and
the museums, the freak exhibitions, and such like. There were bearded
ladies, fat women, dwarfs, and giants. Lambs with two heads, and calves
with six legs, and performing animals without number.
And this leads me to a story about a performing donkey, which I heard
from a four-legged friend of mine on one occasion when I was waiting in
the town on a market-day.
My friend’s name was Neddy, the same as my own, and one day he went to
a fair where every one was talking about a wonderful performing donkey
who was exhibiting his tricks in a large tent. “My master,” said he,
“went in the tent, leaving me by the door, so that I could see what was
going on inside. In a few minutes the showman appeared leading in the
donkey that was supposed to be so clever. He was a poor, dismal-looking
creature, who looked as if he wanted a square meal. ‘Ladies and
gentlemen,’ began the showman, ‘I have the honour to introduce to
you Mr. Muffles, the wonderful performing ass. This ass, ladies and
gentlemen, is not such an ass as he looks. He knows a great deal,—a
great deal more than some of you. He is an ass without equal. Come,
Muffles, show the company what you can do. Make your bow, and let these
ladies and gentlemen see that you have learned manners.’ The donkey
went forward two or three steps and bent his head in most melancholy
fashion. I was indignant with the showman. I thought to myself, ‘It’s
quite easy to see that this poor Muffles has been taught his tricks by
means of a rope’s end,’ and I made up my mind to be revenged on that
man before the performance was over.
“‘Now, Muffles, take this nosegay, and give it to the prettiest lady
here.’
“Muffles took the bunch of flowers in his teeth, walked sadly all
around the ring, and at last went and dropped it into the lap of an
ugly, fat woman. She was quite close to me, and I could see that she
had a piece of sugar hidden in her hand. ‘What a fraud,’ I thought.
‘Of course she is the showman’s wife.’ I was so disgusted with what
I thought was the donkey’s bad taste that, before any one could stop
me, I leaped clear into the ring, seized the bouquet in my teeth, and,
trotting around, I at last laid it at the feet of a little girl I knew,
who was really pretty.
“The crowd clapped and cheered, and wondered who I was. ‘_So_
intelligent!’ they said to each other. Muffles’s master, however,
did not seem so pleased. As for Muffles himself, he took no notice
whatever. I began to think he must really be rather a stupid animal,
and that, you know, isn’t common with us donkeys.
“When the audience was quiet again, the showman said:
“‘Now, Muffles, you have shown us the prettiest lady here. Now go and
point out the silliest person present,’ and, so saying, he gave him a
big dunce-cap made of coloured paper and adorned with rosettes.
“Muffles took it in his teeth, and, going straight to a heavy-looking
fat boy, with a face exactly like that of a pig, put it on his head.
The fat boy was so like the fat woman that it was quite easy to see he
must be the showman’s son, and of course in the trick.
“‘Good!’ said I to myself, ‘my time has come.’ Before they could think
of stopping me, I had taken the cap off the boy’s head, and was chasing
the showman himself around and around the ring. The crowd roared with
laughter and clapped and clapped until they were tired. All at once the
showman tripped and went down on one knee. I profited by this to put
the cap firmly on his head, and to ram it down till it fairly covered
his chin.
“The showman shouted, and danced about, trying to tear off the cap,
and I stood on my hind legs and capered about just as he did until the
crowd nearly died from laughing. ‘Well done, donkey! Bravo, donkey!
It’s you that’s the real performing donkey!’ they shouted.
“There was no doing anything after this. Hundreds of people crowded
into the ring, and were so anxious to caress me that I was afraid they
would tear me to pieces. The people from our own village who knew me
were more than proud of me, and before very long all the people in the
place were telling wonderful tales of my intelligence and my adventures.
“They said I had once been at a fire, and worked a fire-engine all
by myself; that I had gone up a ladder to the third floor, opened my
mistress’s door, awakened her, picked her up, and jumped off the roof
with her in safety to the ground. They said that at another time I had,
all alone, slain fifty robbers, strangling them with my teeth when they
were asleep, and that not one had time to awake and alarm the others;
that I had then gone into the caves, where the robbers lived, and had
set free a hundred and fifty prisoners whom the robbers had captured.
At another time they said I had beaten in a race all the swiftest
horses in the country, and had run seventy-five miles in five hours
without stopping!
“The crowd grew thicker and thicker to hear these wonderful tales,
until the crush was so great that some of the people could hardly
breathe, and the police had to come to the rescue. It was with the
greatest difficulty that, even with the help of the policemen, I was
able to get away, and I was obliged to pretend to bite and kick in
order to clear a path; but of course I did not hurt anybody.
“At last I got free from the crowd and into the road.... But after it
all was over, I began to think of the unfortunate showman, and I felt
very, very sorry for the unkind trick I had played him.”[1]
FOOTNOTES:
[1] This story is from a French source. [Ed.