Transcriber’s Note
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UNDER THE BIG TOP
By Courtney Ryley Cooper
THE CROSS-CUT
THE WHITE DESERT
UNDER THE BIG TOP
THE LAST FRONTIER
LIONS ’N’ TIGERS ’N’ EVERYTHING
[Illustration: SCOTTY, AND GRIT, THE LION SHE ADOPTED. FRONTISPIECE.
_See Page 144._]
UNDER THE BIG TOP
_By_
COURTNEY RYLEY COOPER
_With Illustrations_
[Illustration]
BOSTON
LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY
1924
_Copyright, 1920, 1921, 1922, 1923_,
BY COURTNEY RYLEY COOPER.
_All rights reserved_
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
TO
HARRY TAMMEN
“With Love and Good Cheer”
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I THE WHY OF THE CIRCUS 1
II “THOSE PRESS AGENTS!” 21
III BUT WE ALL LIKE IT 48
IV ON ENTERING THE MENAGERIE 75
V OUR FRIENDS, THE ELEPHANTS 93
VI WHEN THE ANIMALS ESCAPE 115
VII MOTHERS OF THE MENAGERIE 136
VIII IN THE STEEL ARENA 161
IX “THE CIRCUS MAN’S BEST FRIEND” 180
X THE CHILDREN OF THE BIG TOPS 193
XI “THE SHOW MUST GO ON!” 212
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Scotty, and Grit, the lion she adopted _Frontispiece_
PAGE
The circus unloads in a conspicuous place 10
“Here comes the parade!” 10
“To such Indians as Short Bull, Buffalo Bill was little
less than a god” 46
“And upon this platform—!” a side-show crowd 60
An orang-outang husband and wife 92
Casey, who died of appendicitis 92
Kas and Mo practising their act 102
Moon and Snyder in the performing arena 102
“Cap” Richards, who fights animals for a living 118
One of those placid United States Government Hyneys 118
“I’ve got him eating out of my hand!” 172
The boys are counted upon as a part of the equipment 182
Enough seats must be put into place to accommodate
a whole village 182
Children of the Big Tops. One is the daughter of a
lion trainer, the other the cub of a trained lion 194
The clowns are always ready to amuse a circus baby 198
Stuck! 222
A runaway circus wagon 222
UNDER THE BIG TOP
CHAPTER I
THE WHY OF THE CIRCUS
Snow is flying. It is early March, and cold. Hardly what one would call
“circus” weather, yet there under the train sheds it stands at the end
of a south-bound passenger train, a thing of resplendency, of silver
and gold lettering, of backgrounds in which the main color is a beaming
red, while along the length of it is emblazoned the caption:
“BIGGEST CIRCUS ON EARTH”
“ADVERTISING CAR NO. 1.”
From ahead the “highball signal.” A few quick handshakes, a last
recounting of orders from the general agent who talks to his car
manager until the last possible moment. A rear platform, crowded with
strong-shouldered young men, milling and jostling. A cheer. The train
is moving. Soon only the owner and his general agent remain on the
station platform, watching the red and gold car as it travels far into
the damp, cold haziness of the railroad yards, finally to disappear.
The circus season has begun!
Rather, the first physical demonstration of a beginning has taken
place. In reality, for the show owner, the season begins when the
season ends. Paradoxical? Not a bit. To circus goers the circus season
concludes in the autumn. To circus makers the next season begins at the
same time. A big show doesn’t “just go on the road.” Circuses, to their
makers, are an exact science. When the show comes home in the autumn,
they begin their preparations to send it forth again in the spring.
They know what wagons to repair, what painting is necessary, how many
railroad cars must be discarded and replaced by new ones; whether the
“big top” or main tent will stand another season and where the show is
to travel in the summer days to come. It doesn’t “just happen” that a
circus goes to a certain town. The reason why has been studied out long
in advance, and the show arrives for one of two reasons; either there
is a surety of sufficient money to make a profitable day’s business, or
it is necessary to play the town in order to reach one farther on where
the crowds are sure and the money certain.
Circuses don’t “take all the money out of a town”; neither do they
always play at a certain place “just because it’s a good show town.”
Often it isn’t, and the big organization loses money, leaving more cash
in the village than it took away. But a show train can travel only
about one hundred and fifty miles a day, at the most, and if there
isn’t sure money within three hundred miles, it must take the best it
can get and be satisfied. I have seen “canvas op’rys” exhibit in places
where the traveling population of the show was greater than that of
the village itself! And it is all carefully figured out in advance,
with every possible circumstance taken into consideration; crops, money
conditions, hard or good times, floods, forest fires,—everything which
can affect a pocketbook. If Jonesville and Thomasville lie within
twenty miles of each other, and Jonesville has had a disastrous flood
in its surrounding country while Thomasville has escaped, the circus
is routed to Thomasville. How does the circus know? It must know, for
knowing is part of its life.
There is no other business organization which pays more attention to
the various local conditions of the United States. The informants are
the owners of the billboard privileges in each town along the proposed
route, playing a good business policy by telling the truth about their
community; often a circus general agent has the news of a crop failure
even before the Department of Agriculture! So every town is picked,
every town is known. If a State capital has only a small population,
when does a circus play it? When the legislature is in session and the
town is crowded! Does a circus play a college town in July? Hardly, but
it will be glad to pay a visit in April, May or late September. The
students are there at those times; in July they have gone home. The
circus knows! More, the circus prepares; long before the snows begin
to melt, even the size of the show has been decided upon, according to
the money conditions of the country.
So the departure of the “bill car” or advertising car is a carefully
thought out, preconceived thing. It is to arrive at a certain town in
the far South on a certain day, stay there so many hours and depart
at a certain time. All season it must live up to a schedule,—that of
being three weeks ahead of the show. If it loses a day through storm or
accident, then its men must do double work, a “brigade” of billposters
being dropped at one town to look after the billposting, banner
tacking, country routes and “programming,” while the car, short-handed,
hurries on to the next town and overtakes its schedule, leaving the
“brigade” to catch up as best it can.
For the circus accepts no outside assistance; it depends upon nothing
but itself and its own finely attuned organization. Theatrical
companies leave their billposting to local concerns. It has the time
to do so. A circus must move day by day; consequently it has its own
railroad cars, its own equipment, its own men for everything. The
“bill car” carries its own boiler for making paste; its lockers are
filled with “paper” or billing sufficient to last two months at a time.
Above these are berths where sleep the twenty or twenty-five men who
make up the car, the billposters, “tack spitters” or banner men, the
lithographers, the “squarers” or men who obtain permission for the
posting of paper or the tacking of banners, and the manager. It costs
the world’s biggest show two thousand dollars a day for its “advance”
alone, for the mere publicity and promotion which heralds the coming of
the circus!
More than a hundred men travel ahead of the show, merely to bring it
to a town. There is the general contracting agent, who makes all the
primary arrangements, who arranges contracts for the circus grounds,
for the billboards, for the exhibition and parade licenses, for the
banners which overnight appear on the front of trolley cars, or flutter
from the span wires, for the ten tons of hay, the five tons of straw,
the three hundred bushels of oats, the twelve hundred bushels of bran,
the one hundred and fifty bales of shavings which are used by the show
to sprinkle in entrances and rings and hippodrome track—sawdust, in
spite of tradition, is not used about a circus—for the cord of wood
necessary to keep up steam in the calliope, the ton of coal which will
be consumed in the big traveling ranges upon which is cooked the food
for the thousand or so persons of the show, and the nine hundred loaves
of fresh bread for humans and two hundred loaves of stale for the polar
bears. To say nothing of a broken-down horse or two to be killed for
the lions, tigers and cat animals, and the buying of ton after ton of
beef from the divisional supply houses of the big packing companies for
the human complement of the show.
This completed, the agent hurries on, each day a constant round of
contracts. A single item may bring its difficulties: suppose, in the
year that has passed since his last visit, the usual show grounds has
been cut up into building lots! He must find another, fully five
hundred feet square, fairly level, rentable at a reasonable price, not
too far from the center of town and easily reached by main trunk car
lines. It isn’t easy. But he does it.
Then arrives the “Number 1” car, with its billposters, banner men and
“country routers.” Some of the billboards are contracted for and are
easily covered with the brilliantly lettered advertising posters. In
which, you’ve perhaps noticed, is a predominance of red. The reason is
simply that red is an elemental color. It is the children’s favorite.
The circus appeals to the elemental, to the child in us all. Hence—red!
Each man on the “bill car” has his job. It is the duty of the “banner
squarer” to argue the owner of any building with a blank wall which can
be seen from a downtown street, into allowing that wall to be covered
by cloth announcements proclaiming the coming of the circus—without
payment in actual money. The banner squarer who buys space for anything
except passes to the circus, and general admission passes at that, is
looked down upon by his fellow workers as a coward and disloyal. Isn’t
a circus pass the most valuable thing there is?
Once that permission is gained, the “tack spitters” or banner men
begin their work. No matter how difficult the wall may be, they will
cover it. If it is too high to be reached by ladders, they will swing
a scaffold from the top and there, in hot sun or chilling rain, fill
their mouths with broad-headed tacks and work their magnetized hammers
at a speed of fully forty blows to the minute. And a “tack spitter”
actually spits tacks—or rather, blows them—by rolling them one by one
to his lips with his tongue, flat side toward the waiting hammer, then
propelling them by air pressure to the magnet. An expert can hit the
magnetized end of his hammer at two or three inches; others prefer to
merely force the tack through their lips on the end of their tongue
until it reaches the magnet. Thus, with one hand holding the canvas
in position, the other swinging the hammer, and with nothing to hold
them to their scaffolding save their sense of balance, these men work
sometimes as high as two hundred feet above the ground and brave the
death of broken ropes, a misstep or being literally blown from their
dangerous position,—to advertise a circus they never see!
Remember, the billposter and the banner man must always be from a week
to three weeks ahead of the show, depending upon which of the three
advertising cars he accompanies. The result is that all he actually
knows of his own circus is what he sees in the posters he daily
distributes.
Incidentally a circus isn’t content with merely billing the city in
which it is to show. Its territory of potential patrons extends for
a distance of forty miles on every side of the show place, and these
forty miles must be covered by each bill car in a single day. Hence
men depart by rail, buggy and automobile for the “country routes,” and
if they don’t get back in time,—sorry, but the car must move, and they
catch up as best they can.
There are three such cars with the big shows, one three weeks ahead,
one two weeks and the last one only a week. The job of the last two
named is to do everything that hasn’t been accounted for before, to
renew billing that has been torn by wind or washed by rain,—and to
fight!
For circuses quarrel. It is a battle to a business death once one
circus crosses the trail of another. Every big show carries in advance
what is known as an “opposition brigade” with no other duties save to
fight the like brigades of other shows. As fast as one circus puts up
a piece of billing, the “opposition” attempts to cover it. The result
is flying paste brushes and buckets, faster flying fists, broken noses,
black eyes, police, jail, bail,—and the same thing over again until
one side tires and quits, or circus day arrives to end the war of
the opposition crews. This part of the “advance” knows no schedule,
nothing, in fact, except to fight until a battle is won or lost.
Sometimes a billboard will bear as many as ten or twelve layers of
posters, each alternate layer representing a different show; the last
and winning layer slapped into place a bare twelve hours before the
arrival of the contending circuses!
Then there are the press agents who flit here and there, doubling
on their tracks, dropping in at a newspaper in one town during the
morning, appearing at another newspaper office fifty miles away in
the afternoon, and still a third or perhaps a fourth farther on that
night, according to the flexibility of train schedules. To say nothing
of the “checkers up” who inspect the work of the various cars and the
“opposition brigade” and send each night a report of good or bad work
to the general agent. And after all these are gone—
There comes the twenty-four-hour man.
They originally called him that because he came to town twenty-four
hours before the circus arrived. A better reason might be because he
works nearly twenty-four hours of the day. His is the task of seeing
that every contract is ready to be fulfilled, that the fire department
will have a man stationed at the fire plug nearest the circus lot to
provide water for the sprinkling carts, horses, elephants and lemonade,
that the circus grounds itself is in shape to receive the big show,
any high weeds cut away, holes filled, hummocks leveled off; that the
sidewalk crossings are well provided with boardings to protect them
from the heavy wheels of the circus wagons, all bridges safe on the
parade route, and on that which leads from the unloading point to the
circus lot, the licenses granted, food ready; and after checking up on
some twenty or thirty additional items he can sleep until four o’clock
in the morning, when he must awaken to await the arrival of the show
trains, arouse the various crews, and guide the cook-house wagon with
its chefs, waiters and flunkeys, to the circus lot that preparations
may be begun at once for breakfast. Yet there are those who believe
that a circus “merely comes and goes!”
Did you ever notice for instance that the show trains are always
“spotted” at the same place? Did you ever seek the reason? There is
one—rest assured of that—a circus never does anything without its
consideration of cause and effect!
A big show must record receipts of from $6,000 to $14,000 a day in
order to live, such are a single day’s expenses according to the size.
Often it exhibits in towns which have barely more than twelve thousand
or fifteen thousand population and to gain a livelihood, not a single
opportunity must be missed, not a solitary chance to get one more
person into the big tent passed by. Therefore, from the minute that
circus arrives in town, it must do its utmost to flaunt itself before
every available person and breed the desire to visit the grounds where
roar the lions and the tigers, where the bands play and the bespangled
actors flash about the arena. It has one message and one alone, that of
the instillation of the holiday spirit, the creating of an atmosphere
by which a person says involuntarily and then repeats:
“Circus day—circus day—circus day!”
So it chooses a spot to unload where it can be seen by men going to
work, by the early rising newsboy, and found easily by those hundreds
of enthusiasts who set their alarm clocks for the gray of dawn “to see
the show come in.” It sends its wagons to the circus grounds along
routes selected for the same purpose—a circus wagon never goes up a
side street when it can traverse one where a greater number of persons
can see it. Always must that message be sent broadcast:
“Circus day—circus day!”
And did you ever notice that there is no conveyance which makes
exactly the same sort of noise as a circus wagon? There’s a different
truckling about the wheels, a different, hollower resonance as the axle
flanges touch the steel of the hub rims. It’s meant to be that way;
a circus wagon wouldn’t be such if it were like any other vehicle.
It must shout its announcement from curb to curb, so that even the
preoccupied citizen looks up and says to himself, “Circus day!”
[Illustration: THE CIRCUS UNLOADS IN A CONSPICUOUS PLACE. _Page 10._]
[Illustration: “HERE COMES THE PARADE!” _Page 14._]
And it does seem that there are more and better horses with the
circuses nowadays than there once were, though of course there were
always plenty of them. Is it because the wagons are heavier or—?
Not at all. Simply because horses are going out of fashion; draught
horses are seen rarely on the streets any more. Every one loves the
sight of a pretty horse. A good-looking equine exhibition on the street
to-day is almost as much of a curiosity as an automobile once was. So
the circus has plenty!
Why—every one asks the question—are those little red flags stuck about
a circus ground before ever a tent goes up? Do they mean anything? Or
are they there just so that the drivers will know where to bring their
wagons? Their meaning is simply this,—that without them, there might
not be a circus. Those little red flags, fluttering at the end of thin
iron stakes stuck into the ground, are the map of the big show. They
have been placed there by a hurrying lot superintendent, and to the
workmen, the canvas men, the roughnecks—
Beg pardon? Not “roughnecks” in the general acceptance of the term.
The circus is a land of slang. Its people and workmen and departments
are designated by argot terms which mean a separate division of the
circus. “Roughnecks” are common workmen. Plank men and seat men are
those who erect the seats to accommodate the thousands who gather at
the afternoon and night performances. “Canvas men” load and unload
the tents and aid in their erection. The “big top gang” works nowhere
except on the “big top” or main tent.
“Razorbacks” load and unload the cars. “Kinkers” are performers;
“flunkeys” those who wait upon the people of the circus in the “cook
house” or eating tent. “Punks” indicate a boy, an animal, anything
not yet arrived at the age of maturity. Those who work in the side
show belong to the “kid-show” crew. The entrance, where you give your
ticket to the bawling attendants, is the “marquee.” The attendants of
the menagerie are “animal men.” The lions and tigers and leopards are
“cats.” Anything in the pony, goat, llama or bovine class, which can
be taken to the circus grounds at the end of a rope or halter is “led
stock.” And the elephants are “bulls.” But to return to those little
red flags:
They form a book of information. They tell the drivers, the workmen and
others just where the big top will be, where the connections must be
made to lead to the menagerie at one end and the stables and dressing
tents at the other. They show the position of the “midway” and the side
show,—in fact, every one of the fourteen or so tents which go to make
up the mushroom growth of canvas which constitutes the circus. Once
they make their appearance, the rest is comparatively easy. The long
center poles are placed and raised into position. The canvas travels
upward. The tableau wagons and animal dens are wheeled into line. A
bugle sounds—
“Hold-d-d-d-d yoah ho’sses. The elly—phants are coming-g-g-g-g!”
There are few horses to hold these days as the gleaming, resplendent
parade turns into the main street, with its crowded curbings, its
balloon vendors, its shouting fakirs and excited children. But a circus
lives to a certain degree in the past. That bellowing warning has been
a part of circusdom for years. It is expected, and therefore it is
given. A parade wouldn’t really be a parade without it.
Nor without the balloon vendors. Did you ever stop to consider that
they might be present along the crowded streets to breed atmosphere as
much as anything else? Bright colors—cheery colors. Remarks about the
circus and the fact that this is the glad holiday of them all:
“Buy baby a bal-loon! Buy baby a nice red bal-loon. Baby won’t be happy
when she goes to the circus without a bal-loon. Remember, when baby
goes to the circus—buy baby a bal-loon.”
The old power of suggestion! _When_ baby goes to the circus! Baby may
have been scheduled to return home just as soon as she saw the parade.
But now it’s a different matter. Baby’s never seen a circus; it might
as well be now!
And the parade is passing! Every one in it seems happy. And bright.
And cheerful. And smiling. Seems impossible that some one out of that
long procession should not possess a grouch. But they’re all smiling
because—
It’s part of their work to smile, in parade and performance. Isn’t a
circus the typification of happiness? Isn’t it the bespangled fairyland
which drops out of the night, glories in the sunlight, then fades with
the gathering darkness? Smile—smile—smile! That is the order, and it is
carried out.
Three lions’ cages have passed, with the sideboards down and the pacing
animals displayed. Then a cage which is closed. Certainly if they could
leave three cages open, they could leave a fourth. Wonder what’s in
that cage; it must be valuable, something out of the ordinary or they
would show it.
There you stand and wonder, wonder at a game that is as old as that
of Adam and Eve and the Serpent, old as the world itself,—that of
Curiosity. What’s in that wagon? What’s in that wagon?
Nor do you stop to consider that this may be the purpose of the whole
parade, this play upon curiosity and upon the child-like credulity that
is in all of us. The billboards, with their big, red letters, have
announced a mile-long street parade, which will present a sample of
everything that is in the big, wonderful circus.
One little word has stuck in your mind. A sample! From childhood days
that has meant something very, very small with which you raced to the
store, that you might return with a yard-length match for it. The thing
you got was so much bigger than the sample. If it requires a mile to
display a _sample_ of the circus’s charms, what must the real thing be?
You reason without considering. Then—what were in those closed wagons?
Besides, if the lion trainer can sit in the cage with three lions
during parade, merely as a sample, what must he do in the performance!
Here comes a wagon with ten clowns atop it. The billboards said there
would be fifty clowns—count ’em—fifty, in the performance. That must be
true. There are ten here, just as a sample!
How that one thought sticks! Then the band plays. The horses prance, as
though they were dancing for sheer joy. Of course they aren’t trained
to dance in parade. Why should they be?
Why? Just so that they will achieve the object which that whole parade
pursues, the embodiment of joy, of light-heartedness, the appeal
which touches the hearts of us all when there is even a mention of a
cessation of work and worries, of a real, true holiday. So the horses
dance, and the clowns grimace, and the big-footed policeman in the
tiny police patrol picks up an urchin for a half-block’s ride, and the
calliope player turns to the hundred or so children trotting in his
wake with the question:
“Well, kids, what’ll it be next?”
Oh, there’s joy about a circus parade, joy beyond the gleam of the gold
and silver, the blaring of the bands, the glittering of the spangles
upon the dresses of the equestriennes,—the joy of a thing well done,
of an experiment in psychology worked out to the _nth_ degree. There
goes another closed wagon. Perhaps it’s got the rhinoceros in it!
Or—may be—didn’t some one mention the fact that the circus had a new
sort of animal that no one in town ever had seen before?
Oh, well. Ho hum! Half the day gone. Nobody at the office will be fit
for work, anyway. Guess you’ll go to the circus!
* * * * *
“Now-w-w-w-w, ladies and gentlemen-n-n-n, there are yet fortay-y-y-five
minutes before the big show begins. Fortay-y-y-y-five minutes. A long
time to wait, ladies-s-s-s and gentlemen. So we have arranged for your
benefit a special exhibition in the Grand Annex and Museum of Wonders
to delight the eye, please the brain and sharpen the intellect. If you
will just step a bit closer-r-r-r-r—r!”
“I have brought out before you, ladies-s-s-s and gentlemen, a few of
the strange and curious-s-s-s peo-ple who go to make up this Museum of
Wonders. Starting at the right—”
Why have you stepped closer? You really hadn’t intended to move at all.
But you did, didn’t you? Because some one jostled slightly; wasn’t that
it? The human is an obliging person. Some one jostled and edged closer.
The operation had started with only four or five men, far out there at
the edge of the crowd. Naturally you haven’t seen them,—a hundred other
persons have jostled forward since then. Could they have been men in
the employ of the side show, paid to move forward at the signal, and
by one little movement cause a whole crowd of hundreds and hundreds of
persons to obey that command from the “ballyhoo” man?
Incidentally, he’s talking again, describing all the “strange and
curious-s-s-s peo-ple,” urging that you become better acquainted with
them inside. And repeating:
“Fortay-y-y-y-five minutes to wait. Don’t spend your time on the hot,
dusty, circus lot. Fortay-y-y-y-y-y-five minutes to wait. Plenty of
time before the big show. Fortay-y-y-y-y-y-five minutes.”
So you go in. Humans hate to wait. Circuses learned that almost as soon
as the humans. For aren’t circuses human themselves? After that—
“The B-e-e-g show! This a-way to the b-e-e-g show! Performance starts
in five min-utes! Buy yoah tickets for the be-e-g show!”
It’s crowded about the ticket wagon. Up at the window the ticket seller
is scooping in money with both hands, apparently throwing it on the
floor. You’ve heard that about ticket wagons before,—about how they
throw silver and gold and paper bills indiscriminately about them until
they stand literally knee-deep in money.
But inside the ticket wagon all is orderly. The silver passes into
one drawer just below the marble plate of the ticket window. The gold
goes into another. The currency travels into deep wicker baskets,
one for dollar bills, one for fives, one for tens, and one for any
denominations above that. A circus isn’t so unbusiness-like, after all!
Then you go onward.
Through those gates at last! What a crowd! What a jam; why can’t they
make them bigger?
They could. But then that wouldn’t cause a crowd. A crowd, you know,
means popularity. Like breeds like. There might be fully a hundred
dollars, even more, wandering about out there on the circus grounds
that would be lost if the front gates didn’t indicate a rush on the
part of all humanity to get inside. Strange how they think of those
things!
What was that the ticket taker said to the fat woman who was trying
to smuggle her ten-year-old boy through by carrying him in her arms?
Wasn’t it:
“Hey, Lady! Put down that there young man an’ let him carry you!
Twenty-five cents more for the young man, Lady.”
And what was it the manager had remarked to himself as the protesting
fat woman had paid the extra money:
“Put the most honest woman in the world on a street car or at a circus
gate with a kid, and she’ll lie her head off to get him through for
half-fare!”
The menagerie. You’ve often wondered about menageries, why circuses go
to the expense of carrying them. Yet—
Perhaps you’ve never realized that were it not for the circus
menagerie, a great part of the youthful population of the United States
would be devoid of an education in natural history. That most of the
towns which a circus visits are without a zoo, and that the only chance
which the population has to view jungle or strange beasts is when the
show comes to town?
Also that the circus, utilizing everything, even as a packing house
makes some use of every by-product, keeps its cost of operation down
through that very fact? That there are many municipalities which would
charge exorbitant licenses were it not for the fact that the circus has
certain educational features in its menagerie that are necessary to the
education of its youth?
More, the animal actors of the show are the cheapest actors a circus
can carry. They draw no salaries and require no expensive food, and
they serve a triple purpose: they take part in the parade, they form
the menagerie and they work in the big show—all without salary. And now:
Now-w-w-w-w, the b-e-e-g show!
Just like a great big family, isn’t it, going through its stunts? But
it isn’t.
It’s a community, with community lines, class, divisions and society!
Every grade of performer belongs to a certain Strata. The contortionist
is not on the same plane with the aerialist, nor is the aerialist as
high in social life as the equestrienne. Speaking of equestriennes,
why are they able to stay on those horses so easily? And why are ring
horses invariably white, gray, or dappled?
That’s why: so the equestriennes can stand on their backs! But that’s
no answer. Pardon, but it is. Powdered resin, if you ever have seen it,
is white. Powdered resin prevents one from slipping. But it can’t be
noticed when it is sprinkled on the back of a white or gray horse!
All but over! Into the hippodrome track go the rumbling chariots,
each with its horses four abreast. They’re off! The whites are in the
lead—if they’ll only hold it! But the blacks have gained! They’ve
passed the whites! Now they’re neck and neck again! A cheer! The whites
are ahead again! Neck and neck once more. Now the blacks are in the
lead! Now the whites! And they cross the tape nose and nose!
But it was a good race. If they could only have gone around the track
once more—
They would have finished nose and nose again! For a circus is in the
game of pleasing every one, those who want the blacks to win and those
who favor the whites! So, at every turn, at the end of the track, the
inside chariot veers to the outside rail, while the outside chariot
cuts across to the inside track. The difference in distance brings them
neck and neck,—and so they might race forever!
And that, really, is the secret and the why of the circus; the pleasing
of every one. After all, it’s a simple task, for the circus has learned
one great thing,—that somewhere in our hearts is something that never
grows up, that old though we may be in years, the child lives within
us just the same, and whether we be seven or seventy, that “something”
answers the call of happiness, invariably!