Every year a few of the blest among the boys of Still Harbor were taken
to New Haven or New London to see the Greatest Show on Earth, while the
unlucky remainder were obliged to content themselves with what
imagination could do for them. But one memorable year Mr. P. T. Barnum
landed and magnified himself on our own fences. His magnanimity ran over
and flamed into Still Harbor, bringing all his miracles and monsters to
our very doors, as it were, and we had no more miserable boys. But we
had plenty of boys who aspired to be miracles and monsters, or boys who
essayed the trapeze, the tight rope, the flying leap and all sorts of
possible and impossible acrobatic contortions and distortions.
Eminent among these was Benny Briggs, for if you looked high enough, you
could see him any day with a balancing pole in his hand, walking on the
ridge-poles and fences, or making of himself all sorts of peduncles and
pendulums; bringing about in his own individual person the most
astonishing inversions, subversions and retroversions, and the most
remarkable twists and lurches and topsey-turveys and topplings-over.
But there was one opportunity that Benny's soaring ambition had not
embraced. His active mind had never yet discovered the possibility of a
real tight rope. For a real tight rope he languished, on a tight rope he
yearned to walk. The clothes line was a little too slender; his sister
Fanny's skipping rope was not only too slender, but too short; and these
were the only ropes of his acquaintance. The ridge-poles and fences only
mocked at his ideal. He wanted something that hung unsupported;
something airy; something worthy of the acrobatic art, upon which he
could walk with credit and grace, and, reaching the end, bow and kiss
his hand to the spectators, before returning. For this he searched by
day, and of this he dreamed by night. And one day he found it.
"Benny," said his mother on the morning of that day, "your grandmother
Potter has sent for you to come over. She's going to have uncle John's
and uncle Calvin's boys there. You'll like that, won't you?"
"Hi!" shouted Benny, throwing up his new straw hat, the sign and seal of
pleasant summer weather, "I'd like to see the fellow that wouldn't!"
At nine o'clock that morning--at exactly nine o'clock--Benny started.
His mother remembered it well, for she looked up at the clock and said:
"Now, don't hurry, Benny; go along easily and you'll get there before
ten," for grandmother Potter's was scarcely two miles back in the
country, and Benny thought nothing of stepping over there, especially
when inducements were offered.
He called his dog Sandy, and marched off with a light step and a light
heart; but his hands remained at home, that is to say, his hands were
nowhere so much at home as in his trousers pockets, and there they
reposed, while Benny paced along, whistling "Not for Joseph, not if I
knows it," and Sandy nosing it all the way. His mother watched him with
pride as usual; the neighbors saw him go by and said, "There goes Benny
Briggs; he hain't broken his neck yet, but I presume to say that'll be
the next thing he does."
Uncle John's and uncle Calvin's boys from New Haven, arrived early at
grandmother Potter's, a place which seemed to them to contain all the
pleasures of all the spheres, for grandmother's weakness was for boys,
and nothing suited her better than getting all her grandsons together
and giving them "full swing," as Abijah called it, and Abijah was made
by nature to help grandmother out in her benevolent plans. He instituted
jolly measures, and contrived possibilities of riot and revel that no
mortal ever thought of before. As circuses were the fashion in urchin
society, on that particular day, Abijah, like a wizard, had called up
out of the farm resources, and out of certain mysterious resources of
his own, that were so plainly of unearthly origin that it was of no use
in the world to try to look into or understand them, such a circus as
would have made not only P. T. Barnum, but the ancient Romans themselves
perfectly miserable with envy. There was the trapeze, the tight rope,
the--well, alas, I don't know the names of them all, having had a
limited education in such matters, but there they all were, whatever
they are called--those things that make a perfect, finished,
spal-_en_-did, be-_yeu_-ti-ful circus. There were hoops with tissue
paper pasted over them, to be jumped through by the most wonderful
bareback riders on earth, and old Tom, grandmother's own horse, was
perfectly safe as a trained Arabian steed, when 'Bijah was there to see
how the thing was managed. Everything was safe and sure and delightful
when 'Bijah had charge of it. Nothing ever went wrong, or upset, or came
to a sorry end with him or his plans. He knew what he was about, and
ends with him were even more brilliant and satisfactory than beginnings
and means. I shouldn't dare to fully tell you what good times the boys
had at grandmother Potter's, especially on Fourth of Julys,
Thanksgivings, Christmases and birthdays, for fear of making all the
boys who couldn't go there, discontented and low spirited for the rest
of their lives. I'm sorry for those boys, but at the same time I may as
well go on and tell them about Benny Briggs. _He_ was preparing to be
very discontented and low spirited just at the moment when Joe and Will
and Harry and Rob and Charlie and Morris and Cad were shouting their
exultation at the only wonderful circus on earth. They all decided that
the performances were not to begin, however, until Benny Briggs arrived.
There could be no circus without Ben. No, indeed! There were stars of
the arena among them, of various magnitudes, but Benny was the comet
that outshone and outstripped them all.
"Why don't he come along?" said Charlie, dancing a double-shuffle on the
barn floor to let off his impatience.
"Let's go and look for him," said Joe, and they all shuffled off down to
the gate, thinking to see Benny with his nose pointed straight for that
gate, or as straight as could be expected, considering its faithfulness
in another direction. But no Benny was to be seen.
"He can't be far off," said Joe, seizing an opportunity to look at his
new silver watch, "for it's half-past ten now, and Ben is always here
before ten--always _was_, I mean."
"Let's go up to the top of the hill and meet him," proposed Will; "we
can see him from there anyhow."
So Charlie and Joe and Morris and Will and Cad started for the top of
the hill, while Harry and Rob, who were a good deal inclined to wait for
things to come to them, remained to swing on the gate.
The five spies soon returned and reported that Benny was nowhere to be
seen. Impatience now seized them all, and they flocked into the house to
put it to grandma whether it wasn't mighty queer that Ben Briggs hadn't
come.
"He _hasn't come_?" exclaimed grandma, looking up over her glasses at
the clock. "Why, what can be the matter? It's almost eleven o'clock!"
"It's one minute and a quarter past," said Joe, appealing to his watch.
"Your clock's 'leven minutes slow."
"O, get out!" said Charlie, with a contemptuous sniff. "All the clocks
are either fast or slow, according to that turnip."
Here would have ensued a good deal of pro and con about watches, but
grandma held them to the subject of Benny Briggs. She drew from them
that they had been to the very top of the hill and couldn't see him
coming.
Grandma was surprised and disappointed. "It's incomprehensible," said
she.
"O, I say, grandma," groaned Charlie, flopping into a chair and fanning
himself, with his hat, "_what_ a big word! In-com-pre-hen-si-ble! And
the other day you said Prist-by-te-ri-an-ism! O my!"
"P-p-p-p-pooh!" stuttered Morris, who was always a little ahead of
everybody, except in conversation; "I know a l-l-l-l-longer word."
"Let's hear you say it, then," shouted the rest of the boys.
"Takes you to make long words," said Charlie.
"I-i-i-i-i-i-i"--began Morris, embarrassed by the evident want of
confidence in his ability.
"Go it!" said Charlie.
"Fire away!" said Joe.
"In-co-co-co-co-co" proceeded Morris.
"Spell it!" suggested Harry.
"I-n, in, c-o-m-e, come," spelled Morris with great fluency, and then
stopped short.
"_Income!_" exclaimed two or three voices disdainfully. "Call _that_ a
long word? Ho-ho!"
"N-n-no; wa-wa-wa-wait a minute," implored Morris, tugging at a button
on his jacket, and fixing a studious, inquiring gaze on the kitchen
floor.
"Write it," said Will.
"I c-c-c-c-can't," said poor Morris gloomily.
"Give it up, then," recommended Joe.
"No _sir_," said Charlie, putting his feet up in a second chair and
making himself comfortable, "I don't give it up, sir; I'm going to know
what this bumper of a word is."
"Well, how are we ever going to know if Morris can't say it nor spell it
nor write it?" demanded Joe.
"Mebby he can thing it," said little Cad.
"Good for you, Caddy!" said Charlie. "You've hit it; Morris can sing
fast enough. Now, Morris, we'll sing, 'I love to go to Sunday-school,'
and you sing your word instead of those. Begin, boys! Sing loud,
Morris."