Go ogle

This is a digital copy of a book that was preserved for generations on Hbrary shelves before it was carefully scanned by Google as part of a project
to make the world's books discoverable online.

It has survived long enough for the copyright to expire and the book to enter the public domain. A public domain book is one that was never subject
to copyright or whose legal copyright term has expired. Whether a book is in the public domain may vary country to country. Public domain books
are our gateways to the past, representing a wealth of history, culture and knowledge that's often difficult to discover.

Marks, notations and other marginalia present in the original volume will appear in this file - a reminder of this book's long journey from the
publisher to a library and finally to you.

Usage guidelines

Google is proud to partner with libraries to digitize public domain materials and make them widely accessible. Public domain books belong to the
public and we are merely their custodians. Nevertheless, this work is expensive, so in order to keep providing this resource, we have taken steps to
prevent abuse by commercial parties, including placing technical restrictions on automated querying.

We also ask that you:

+ Make non- commercial use of the files We designed Google Book Search for use by individuals, and we request that you use these files for
personal, non-commercial purposes.

+ Refrain from automated querying Do not send automated queries of any sort to Google's system: If you are conducting research on machine
translation, optical character recognition or other areas where access to a large amount of text is helpful, please contact us. We encourage the
use of public domain materials for these purposes and may be able to help.

+ Maintain attribution The Google "watermark" you see on each file is essential for informing people about this project and helping them find
additional materials through Google Book Search. Please do not remove it.

+ Keep it legal Whatever your use, remember that you are responsible for ensuring that what you are doing is legal. Do not assume that just
because we believe a book is in the public domain for users in the United States, that the work is also in the public domain for users in other
countries. Whether a book is still in copyright varies from country to country, and we can't offer guidance on whether any specific use of
any specific book is allowed. Please do not assume that a book's appearance in Google Book Search means it can be used in any manner
anywhere in the world. Copyright infringement liability can be quite severe.

About Google Book Search

Google's mission is to organize the world's information and to make it universally accessible and useful. Google Book Search helps readers
discover the world's books while helping authors and publishers reach new audiences. You can search through the full text of this book on the web

at http : / /books . google . com/

The ways of
the circus

George Conklin

/

CORBIT LIBRARY

OF

ODESSA, DELAWARE
School Districts Nos. 6i and 6t^

A.

Class ■\ \ Book

Accession.

1111.

Cli9lC

Digitized by

Google

Digitized by Google

Digitized by

Google

Digitized by

Google

TBE WAYS OF THE CIECUS

Digitized by

Google

Digitized by

Google

GEORGE CONKLIN AND HIS BABY ELEPHANT
Coming down the lUin of St. Vincent*! HoepiUl, March 18. 1908

Digitized by

Google

The

WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

Being" the Memories
and Adventures of
GEORGE CONKLIN

Tamer of Lions

Set down by
HARVEY W. BOOT

With a faretoord by
DONC.SEITZ

Illustrated

HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS
NEW YORK AND LONDON

Digitized by

TVE Wats or m Cncus

Copyright, X93X, by Harper & Brotben
Priotcd in the United Sutet of America

M-U

Digitized by

Tmsd and tawdry! Say not so
Of these^ the trappings of the show!
Splendors* instead, of Eastern kings
Glitter around the triple rings;
Jewels and silks from TCf^nAg^h^r
To deck the queens on their gilded car.
Who ride as proudly as of old
Bode she of Sheba 'mid her gold;
Whose knights attend in shining mafl
As bold as they who sought the Grail.
Hephants swaying side to side
Bear on the Mogul and his bride,
To whom the tawny tigers fawn
While lordly lions stretch and yawn.
*Tis Poms marching o'er the plain
To meet Iskander once again!

D. C. S.

V

Digitized by

Google

CONTENTS

FoBEwoBD. Don C. Setk xi

I. Breaking Into the Game 1

n. I Become a Lion Trajneb SS

in. In Winter Quabtebs 57

IV. Wandebinob bt Riveb, Land, and Sea 75

V. The Elephant People 112

VI. FOLLOWEBS, FbEAKS, AND FaKEBS 146

Vn. Escapes, Recaptubes, and Monkey Tbicks .... 179

VnL Some Incidents bt the Wat 212

IX. "Btar! Rube!" and the Clown 233

X. Gbeat Bbitain and the Continent 251

XI. Babnum— Bailbt— <k>LB 290

XII. L'Envoib 308

Digitized by

ILLUSTRATIONS

GeOROB CoNKIilN AND HiB BaBT ElEPHANT . . . ' FrcntUpUce
POQET O'BRnar Facing p. ^

Gboup of Fbeaks. Moss-haired Girl in thb^

Center . " 164

Old-Tdub Circus Train 218

Some of the Led-Stock 218

Digitized by

I

I
r

Digitized by

FOREWORD

/^NE moist May afternoon in Albany, New York,
long ago, while viewing the Greatest Show on
Earth as it sweltered and suflFered under superheated,
dripping canvas, the ground mired with trampling feet
and General Discomfort in charge, I was cheered by
the remark of a genial stake driver made to the surly
l^eeper of the elephants:

"I tell you what it is, life with a circus is an un-
in-ter-rup-ted round of pleasure/*

So it would appear to be to the onlooker who sees
it for only a passing hour, but, large or small, it rep-
resents excellent organization, skill in touching the
popular fancy, and executive ability of no mean order.
All this is beside the talent employed, the wild and
rare beasts gathered together, and the choice of
clowns and special performers.

My ancient friend, the late Francis H. Whitman,
of Harrison, Maine, used to say that there never was
but one circus — the first one. That is in a measure
true. I know it was so with me, but the circus is
perennial and there is every year a new generation
to be first with the emotion of joy in beholding the
splendor and wonders of the show.

I was a very small boy, in the very small village of
Attica, Ohio, when my first show came along. It
was It very small show — like that which the Yfde

Digitized by

FOREWORD

student dubbed ^^monohippic" for the unlearned
proprietor who had seven towns billed before he found
out that the ma^^nificient, mouth-filling word meant
"one horse."

This was truly a **one-horse" show. The animal
was old, white, and extremely docile. The tent seated
a bare twentyscore and the performers did not exceed
a dozen. I was not among the twentyscore at the
afternoon performance under the snowy canvas
pitched in the field almost in front of the minister's
house, for I, alas, was the minister's son and not
allowed, alone of all the boys in the village, to go!
This was not due to paternal prejudice, but to the
fact that quarter dollars were very scarce in our house-
hold and the financial stringency was the cause of my
deprivation. I do not think I ever felt so forlorn
before or since, and I hung around, solitary, before
the crisscross of canvas cloth at the entrance which
barred all vision of what was going on inside, but
through which applause and laughter came in a steady
stream. For more than an hour I lingered. Then
a big, hearty man, wearing a chin whisker and broad
sombrero, came out and, noting my lonely presence,
said:

**Bub, why don't you go inside?'*
Haven't any quarter," I replied.
**0h, run along in," he ordered.
**But," I said, full of misgiving, "won*t they put
me out?"

"No," he said, with a more than genial smile.
"It's my show. Go on in."
I went. It was all over but the last act — ^a bit of

FOREWORD

foolery in low comedy between the clown, the Col-
umbine, who earlier had ridden the amiable white
charger around the tiny ring, and a black-face co-
median. Never was anything so funny before or since.
I screamed until I was sore in the ribs. By evening
the family had found a quarter which I begrudged
using, and to this day feel that it meant a privation,
and forced me to take in the whole show. It was
fine, but the edge had been worn off by the after-
noon's agony and adventure.

The after effects of this visitation were long visible
in the village. All the boys practiced stunts and
tried to organize a show. I nearly killed myself
when flung from the naU keg on which I was trying
to emulate the athlete who rolled himself up a plank
balanced on a sawhorse, and safely over the peak to
the ground on a blue ball spangled with silver stars.
Other boys damaged themselves in trying somersaults
and bareback tricks, while the girls spoiled their locks
aiming to imitate the hair of the Circassian lady who
constituted the side show and was very disdainful
when asked where she got her splendiferous foliage.

A dozen years later, in a barber shop down in Nor-
way, Maine, when I was quite grown, I picked up an
illustrated newspaper given to news of sports, crime,
and shows. There before me on its pink page was
the picture of a handsome man with chin whiskers.
It was William H. Stowe, my friend of the circus^
who not long before had lost his life in a burning
river steamer near Cairo, trying to save his wife. I
am frank to confess that ""all my mother came into
mine eyes and gave me up to tears.''

xiii

FOREWORD

The genesis of the spirited narrative that follows is
briefly this: Mr. Harvey W. Root, a traveling mem-
ber of the New York WorUTs staff in Connecticut,
discovered one whom he reported to be an "old, re-
tired showman" living in Bridgeport, whose gossip
of other days he found "mighty interesting." I
suggested that he write out some of the material.
He did not name his friend, and it was not until I
read the first chapters that I guessed it was Greorge
Conklin, "tamer of lions," whom I had so often seen
and admired in action. Truly, if there ever was a
master of wild animals it was he. Indeed, Mr.
Conklin was more. He was a circus man through
and through, accomplished, not only in his own par-
ticular line, but able to turn a facile hand to any part
of the game.

His story is the Epic of the Circus; its ways and
wanderings, its great leaders, its freaks, followers, and
fakers. I believe it to be the only history of the kind
ever written — certainly no other ever told so much
or so well.

Like a good ringmaster, I here crack the whip in
signal. The canvas in the dressing-room wall lifts
aside. The band strikes up thunderously.

Ladies and Gentlemen! I now introduce you to
the narrative!

Don C. Seitz.

Thb ••Wobld," New York, September 2^, im.

THE WAYS OF THE CIECUS

Digitized by

Google

Digitized by

Google

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

I

BREAKING INTO THE GAMS

ON a spring forenoon in 1866 a young fellow
mounted on a pacer hurried along a highway
which followed the northern bank of the Ohio River.
Slung across his horse behind him were a pair of
bulky saddlebags. As was the custom in that r^on
at the time, he wore a slouch hat and a pair of heavy
cowhide boots into which the ends of his trousers
were tucked. Hanging from his side, from a cord
which passed over his shoulder and noosed to its
tongue, was a large hand bell.

After a few miles the road led down to the river.
A ferryboat with the name Tobacco Plant painted in
great letters on its side carried the horse and its rider
across to the Kentucky shore, where they made their
way into the town of Maysville. Here, sitting on
his horse in front of the courthouse, the young fellow
rang his bell vigorously. As soon as something of a
crowd had collected he straightened up in his stirrups
and made the following announcement:

Ladibb and Gents, — am here to tell you that the great Haight
ft Chambers Steamboat Show will be in Ripley day after to-mor-

I

THE WAYS OF THE CmCUS

row. Everybody tliat wants to go will be carried free both ways
by the show's boat. You can't mistake the boat, for it has a
steam organ on board and you will know when it is coming, for
you will hear the organ playing away down the river.

I was that young fellow. That announcement
was the first work I ever did for a show and marked
the b^inning of forty years* experience with circuses.

Ripley, nine miles down the river on the Ohio side
was my home at the time. Frederick H. Bailey,
an advance agent of the Haight & Chambers show,
had come to town the day before to arrange for the
show's appearance, and, knowing that he was ac-
quainted with my two brothers, who were on the road
with John O'Brien, I had gone to him and iatroduced
myself. As a result he had offered me a position as
advance courier of his outfit, an offer which I eagerly
accepted.

The Haight & Chambers show traveled only on
the river. It usually exhibited in one of the larger
towns and ran a free excursion by boat from a couple
of smaller near-by communities. The "nms" were
laid out in such a way that the show stopped, coming
down the river, at the towns which it skipped on its
way up. It was a good-sized circus for those days.
Besides eighteen or twenty performers it carried
thirty-five or forty men and seven or eight cages of
animals and played to audiences of from twenty-five
himdred to three thousand people.

My work as advance cornier consisted in billing
the towns and announcing its coming before such
places as blacksmith shops, marketplaces, and court-
houses, after c^ing a crowd together with my bdit

BREAKING INTO THE GAME

Billing a town was not the undertaking in those days
that it has since become. A bill for each livery
stable was all that was needed, for those were the
only places that we could put them where the boys
would not tear them down. The bills were about the
size of a modem three-sheet, perhaps a yard square,
and carried a few rough woodcuts besides the printed
matter. They were not pasted up as now, but fastened
tq the stable wall with tacks driven through small
round pieces of leather.

I traveled altogether on horseback, keeping about
three days ahead of the show and reporting to it every
third or foiurth day for orders and supplies. I hired
horses from the livery stables in the different towns
as I needed them, and could have my choice of gaits
and the best horse in the stable for a dollar a day. I
stayed with the show until the end of the season,
going up the river as far as Pittsbiwgh and back down
to Cincinnati, where it broke up for the winter and
I went home to Ripley.

Although my two older brothers and I were con-
nected with circuses the greater part of our lives, I
do not know that there was ever a member of our
family on either side before us that had anything to
do with shows of any kind. My mother, Catherine
Schupp, was French, bom in a little town in Alsace,
the daughter of John Schupp, a dockmaker. He
was an expert, and people brought clocks long dis-
tances for him to repair. He helped to put the great
Strassburg dock running again alter it had stopped
for fifty years. Eachg year, as long as she lived, my
mother received a small pension from the French

3

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

government. The story which she told in connec-
tion with it was that when Napoleon's son was bom
the Emperor granted a pension to every French child
bom on the same day and hour, and that she was one
of those children.

My father was by trade a tailor. He was bom in
Germany, left an orphan in his teens, and lived for
a while with his married sister. Their father's estate,
though small, could not be divided until my father
came of age. Life in the sister's home was far from
pleasant, for he was not welcome, but he endured
it until one night, as he lay in bed, he heard the
brother-in-law advise his sister to put him out of the
way so they could have all the property. This con-
vinced him that it was time for him to be getting out,
and so a few days later he ran away and apprenticed
himself to a tailor. He was of a restless, roving dis-
position, and after his apprentice days were past he
wandered from place to place, working awhile in
each and then going on. In this way he traveled
over a large part of Russia, went down into Turkey,
and from there through France to New York.

In New York he met and married my mother, and
the three older children were bom there. From
New York he moved to Cincinnati, Ohio, settling in
what was known as the "over the Rhine" section of
the city. There it was that I was bom on Decem-
ber 7, 1845, and christened in St. John's Catholic
Chiurch on Green Street. Some years afterward,
when the family had moved away from Cincinnati,
a dispute arose over my age, mother claiming I was
bom in '45 and father insisting it was in '47. It

4

BREAKING INTO THE GAME

was not settled until I was a man in middle life,
showing in Cincinnati, when I went over to the
church and had the records looked up and found that
mother was right.

The first school to which I went was Catholic and*
the teachers were monks, dressed in long robes, with
great hoods hanging down their backs and large
white cords aroimd their waists, from the ends of
which hung big crosses. Their discipline was severe,
and as I did not care much for school I was flogged
frequently and severely. As a result I played truant
habitually, another boy and I hiding our books be-
hind a stone in the graveyard. Of course my parents
found out from time to time that I was not in school.
Then I would have a lively session both with them
and with the monks, and for a while I would be
watched so closely that it was impossible for me not
to stay in school. Sooner or later, however, the
watchfulness would be relaxed and I would run loose
again. This went on until my father had a differ-
ence with the monks, accused them of cheating him,
and then took me away and put me in a parochial
school connected with St. John's Church. Here I
enjoyed it much better, and, though I ran away
altogether too much, I managed to be passed along
and confirmed. After that the rest of my schooling
was obtained in the public schools.

I was often at my wits' end to invent stories and
explanations to account for my lack of knowledge
when questioned about school matters by my father,
but, as he was of a rather credulous make-up, I was
much more successful than was to be expected. I

5

THE WAYS OP THE CmCUS

remember once, though, when he completely got the
best of me. There was a sensational case being tried
in the town, and instead of going to school I had
wedged myself into the very front row of the crowd
at the courthouse. Unknown to me, father had
passed that way during the afternoon and, seeing
the crowd, had gone in. At night he asked me a
number of things about the day in school, all of which
I answered in some sort of fashion. Finally he wanted
to know what I was doing when he saw me in the
courthouse. This was a poser for me and I had to
admit that I had been lying. There was more to it
then and for a short time I was less interested in the
law.

In trying to make me see the need of going to school
father used to say, frequently: **You think you are
working for me when you are going to school, but
some day you will find out that you were working
for yoiu-self and wish you had done more." I have
lived to find out that he was right.

In Ripley we lived on Front Street, which ran
along the top of the levee. Ordinarily the level of
the river was Vay below us, but in flood it used to
drive us out, sometimes coming up as high as the
second floor of the house. At such times its surface
was littered with all sorts of things — ^houses, chicken
coops, pigpens, flatboats, barges, trees, and what-
ever the current could tear loose.

Father was one of those men who would never get
out until the very last minute, no matter what might
happen, and so, while we had to move a good many
different times, we were usually caught in the water

BREAKING INTO THE GAME

wlule doing it. When the river b^an to rise he
would drive pegs equal distances apart in a row down
to the river in order to estimate the speed with which
it was rising. The thing which upset his calcula-
tions oftenest was the fact that the river was apt to
rise much faster after it got almost to the house. I
remember how he once tried to use his great tailor's
table for a skiff, loading it with a quantity of things
and floating it out of the door, and how disrespect-
fully and unfeelingly I laughed when it met with
shipwreck as soon as it struck the current outside.

Living on the levee as I did, it was not strange that
I felt the attraction of the river and spent most of
my time on or around it. Besides fishing with
^^trot-lines'' I caught and hauled ashore so much
wood and all sorts of things which I found floating
that I was known around the town as "the wrecker."
I was also more or less around the wharf boat, and
for giving "Noy'* Hutson, who had charge of it, a
hand now and then I was allowed the use of a large
closet under the stairs. In this I locked up baggage
for passengers who for any reason wanted to leave
it in safe-keeping for a few hours or a day. There
was seldom a time when the wharf boat did not have
a number of barrels of whisky on it. As I owned a
gimlet and straws were plenty, I almost always had
a couple of bottles full out of which I could furnish
a man a good-sized drink in exchange for a quarter.
I also carried baggage up into the town for passen-
gers. In such varied ways I managed to pick up
quite a good income.

Two companion boats belonging to the same line,

7

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

the Magnolia and the Boslonian^ had their runs so
arranged that the boat going up the river usually
met the one coming down not far from Ripley, As
both had to stop there, it frequently happened that
while one was still at the wharf boat the other would
come in alongside and tie to her, the passengers cross-
ing over the first one and going ashore. She would
then have to wait until the first one had pulled out
before she could get next the wharf boat and dis-
charge her freight.

One day while the Magnolia^ on its way up the river
from Cincinnati, lay at the wharf boat, discharging
freight, the Bostonian came down, swung round, and,
with her nose upstream, slipped in next the Magnolia.
I was watching her from the deck of the Magnolia^
eager to rush on board and solicit business* As she
drew near I climbed outside the Magnolia^ s rail and,
just before the boats touched, jumped across the
few feet between them and caught the rail of the
Bostonian. As I did so a big fender swung back,
caught my right leg between it and one of the Bos-
Ionian's stanchions, and knocked me into the river.
I managed to swim around the Magnolia^ crawl
across the mud to the wharf boat, and hobble along
its platform, not realizing that my leg was broken,
although it was strangely numb and useless. Once
inside the .boat I collapsed, and a couple of men car-
ried me home.

The first doctor who was called found the leg
broken in three places just above the ankle, and
promptly decided that it must be amputated at once.
A second doctor said the same thing. Father, not

3

BREAKING INTO THE GAME

being convinced, called in an old doctor by the name
of Wiley, who said he could save the leg, and the
case was turned over to him.

The first thing he did was to make a box a little
larger than my 1^, with the board on one side enough
longer than the box to reach from my hip to my
armpit. Putting my leg in the box, he boimd its
long side so tightly to my body that the box could
not move. Then, with a couple of men holding my
shoulders and two more pulling on my toot, he put
the broken pieces of bone together and boi^d the
1^ in splints, after which he filled the box with bran,
packing it so carefully under and around my leg that
no part of my leg or foot touched the box.

There I lay with my leg in that box for two months.
At first I suffered a great deal of pain, especially in
the heel, but after a while that went away and my
greatest discomfort was from being obliged to lie in
one position all the time. It was no uncommon
thing to w:ake up in the night and find the mice
nibbling the bran. The two months seemed like
two years, but at last the day came when the old
doctor dug out the bran and took off the box and
splints. My leg was as stiff as a stick and black as
a coal. It did not seem possible that it could ever
be of any use again. But in a few days the doctor
came, bringing in some pieces of board which he
called "playthings." He showed me how to lift my
1^ and support it by placing one of the boards under
my knee, and to rub the knee joint with oil which
he gave me. After a few days the weight of the foor
would bend the knee slightly, and then he would have

0

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

me take the board from mider my knee, place my
heel on a greased board, and let the weight of the
gradually straighten it again. By such methods I
gradually regained the use of my leg, and after I was
up, around, helping father run the sewing machine
in his shop gave me back the use of the ankle.

When I first got about I was very much disturbed
to find that my 1^ was an inch too short, and I
wanted to have that much thickness added to the
bottom of my boot, but the old doctor would not let
me. He said that I was so young my hip would
settle down on that side and I would never know the
difference. He was right, and all my life I have not
had so much as a hitch in my walk.

With the dose of the Civil War, shows, which for a
time had been closed down, started out on the road
again. The John O'Brien Circus, in which my two
brothers were employed, made its headquarters in
Philadelphia, where its owner lived. My brothers
were anxious to have father and mother make it
their home also, and bought a house for them. So
in the fall of '66 we moved from Ripley to Philadel-
phia, into a house near the winter quarters of the
show.

As soon as we got settled in Philadelphia the
question 6f what I was to do came up. I had no
leaning toward any particular occupation. In fact,
like many boys, I was not especially concerned if I
was not employed. The dty was new to me and
there was much to see and go to. My father did not
want me to learn a trade, because he considered the
work was hard, and many of them, espedally that

10

BREAKmG INTO THE GAME

of bmldingy dangerous. It had been his ambition
that I should be a musician and have a place on the
circus band, where my brothers could look out for
me, but it did not take long to convince him that
there was no music in me and the plan had to be given
up. Things drifted until one day in the winter my
brother John took me over to the circus winter
quarters with him and hunted up Charles Forepaugh,
who was superintendent of the menagerie.

'Xharlie, I want you to give this young brother
of mine a job. Will you?'*

"Yes,** Forepaugh answered, "when we start out
in the spring. I can't use him now, but just as soon
as we get ready to go out on the road 1*11 put him on."

It was in the spring of 1867, not long after Charlie
Forepaugh made his promise to my brother, that I
became a part of the 0*Brien show. We were on
the way to our first stand at Manayimk and I was
finding out for myself what circus life on the road
was like. I soon concluded it was no sort of work
for a weakling. My first duties were to clean out
cages, help prepare and give the animals their food,
make myself generally useful, and at night drive one
of the wagons.

At that time shows started out on the road much
earlier in the season than they do now, often as early
as the 1st of April. It was no uncommon thing if
the weather tinned cold, to have a snowstorm, and
then we had to build bonfires in the tent to melt the
snow on top and prevent its being crushed in. The
performers shivered around little charcoal stoves in
their dressing-rooms» unsuccessfxilly trying to ke^

U

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

comfortable. The animals curled up in the corners
of their cages. The drivers heated stones and put
them in blankets to keep their feet warm, and every-
body cussed the weather and wished for sunshine.

That sleep was of secondary consideration aroimd
a show and was dealt out in emergency rations was
another discovery I was not long in making. While
there were many connected with the show who could
snatch an hour or two of sleep between times, it was
exceedingly diflScult for any of us around the menag-
erie to do this, for it was open to the public nearly
all day, and as long as there were visitors we had to
watch to see that none of them poked the animals
with an umbrella, gave them things to eat, or tried
to pat the lion just to see if he was really ugly, and
at night in addition to everything else we had the
lights to see to.

Lighting a show in those days was not the simple
matter of connecting up a few wires that it is to-day.
We did not even have kerosene, but had to depend
on candles. In the menagerie we used to put one
on the top of each wagon wheel, fastening it there
by tipping it up so some of the grease dripped on the
tire, and then setting the bottom of the candle into
it. In a few moments the grease hardened and held
the candle firmly until it had burned down. Then
we made what we called "'chandeliers" and hung
one on each center pole. These "chandeliers,"
built of boards, were eight or ten feet square at the
base, and all four sides came together in a common
point at the top by a series of steps. On these steps
we fastened the candles as thick as they could stand.

BREAKING INTO THE GAME

probably noteless than three hundred on a "chande-
lier/* As there were five center poles, it meant that
between fifteen hundred and two thousand candles
had to be provided for and attended to. At best
the light was dim, flickering, and uncertain, but it
was seldom that it was at its best, for often there
were draughts sucking and drawing through the tent,
making the candles flare up and smoke, or perhaps
blowing out all on one side of the chandelier,''
while they were smoking on the other. To furnish
light by which to take down the tents and pack up
we burned pitch pine in iron baskets and made torches
by winding the end of a stick with cotton candle
wicking and soaking it with tmpentine. Many is
the chain and rope which I have found with the
help of such a tordi.

We usually started in about nine at night to tear
down the menagerie and pack it up ready for the
road. As soon as this was done we hustled for bed.
Sometimes there was no bed, for we had to depend
on local accommodations, and few hotels could care
for so many people. Many hotel keepers found
places in private homes for those they could not
take care of. Others put straw in piles on the floor
of an attic or a hallway, and over them stretched
sheets fastened to the floor with tacks, and we slept
on these. If there was no hotel the whole show had
to put up at private houses. But whether a bed or
a floor, in private house or hotel, it was always wel-
come and had to be left long before we felt like it.

How long we slept depended on the distance we
had to travel to the next day's "stand." When it

18

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

was time to get up we were roused by a watchman.
If it was a long *'run" it would be as early as eleven
o'clock. If a short one, perhaps an hour later, but
whenever it was he was not welcome. He never
called us but once. If we did not wake up and dress
promptly he came around a second time and banged
us across the bottom of our feet with a club he car-
ried. Once up, however, there was always a smoking-
hot meal ready for us, which we went at as only hearty
hard-working men can. As soon as this midnight
breakfast was over we climbed on our wagons and
were oflf.

The show was divided into two "trains" — ^the
"baggage train" and the "cage train." The "bag-
gage train" consisted of the wagons which carried
the tents and equipment and started off as soon as it
could be loaded up after the show was over. It hur-
ried through as quickly as possible, averaging about
eight miles an hour, and usually had the tents all up
when the rest of the show pulled in. The "cage
train" was made up of the menagerie, the band, and
the performers. TTiis did not travel so fast nor start
out so soon, making only about four miles an hour
and leaving so as to reach the next "stand" just in
time to "make parade." Sometimes all or a part
of the performers had teams of their own, and there-
fore could go when they saw fit, so long as they were
in time for the parade. In this way they could
sleep longer, and then make up for it by traveling
faster than the show and overtaking it. Of course,
if the show furnished them transportation they had
to "go with the trick." The performers and mem-

BREAKING INTO THE GAME

bers of the band were made to get out and walk up
all the steep hills. There was always plenty of
swearing and grumbling when they were waked up
in the middle of the night to trudge uphill a mile or
more in the dark. Each train was led by its ^'boss
hostler/' riding either on horseback or in a sulky.
He set the pace and foimd the way. As a usual
thing the leader of the first train was furnished by
the agent who routed the show and was known as a
"layer out," with brief written directions for keeping
the road. They read something like this: "Go till
you come to the blacksmith shop, then turn to the
right and go till you come to the red house on the
hill, where you turn to the left,** etc. The first train
would leave a rail from a fence or a bush across the
road at forks and turns, so those following would
know which way to go. Sometimes it was not pos-
sible to find a rail, or bush either, and then a piece
of paper weighted with a stone took its place. If a
stone could not be found large enough a little pile of
sand was made on the paper instead, to hold it down.
It was not an unknown thing for both sand and j^aper
to be blown away or for some one to come along and
throw the rail from the road, thinking a careless or
vicious person had left it there, and then we had to
find the road as best we could.

The whole train moved in dose order, each driver
keeping his horses just behind the wagon in front of
him. If anything happened that one of the teams
had to stop, its driver called out "Whoaup!** to the
driver behind him, and he in turn to the next» and so
on the length of the line. Sometimes a wagon tipped

2 15

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

over, due to a drowsy or careless driver or a bit of
bad road impossible to see in the dark. When this
happened the whole train stopped and helped to
right the wagon.

The nightly journey could not wait upon the
weather* No matter how much or how hard it
rained, we had to go just the same, and the worse
the roads the earlier we must start in order to insure
our being in time for parade next morning. Neither
did we have rubber coats to keep us dry, as now, and
often have I, like the rest of the drivers, before start-
ing out on a rainy night, put my shirt away in a box
on the under side of the wagon, so that it would be
dry the next morning to put on after wringing the
water out of the rest of my clothes. Unless we hap-
pened to be traveling among the hills, rain meant
mud and mud meant trouble. The wagons were
heavy, and, there being many of them, the road was
sure to be cut to pieces in the soft places before all
had pajssed, and almost always some of them got in
so deep that the rest of the train had to stop and pull
thenl out. I have seen mud so deep and soft that
wagons would slide through it as they would through
snoWy and I have seen it take a couple of dozen extra
horses and the elephants pushing behind to lift one
out. Ji there were no extra horses handy when a
wagon got stuck, there was always a shout for the
"hook rope." This was a long strong rope with a
stout iron hook on the end, which was caught aroimd
the axle of the wagon, and every available man took
hold of the rope and pulled his best to help the horses
start the wagon.

16

BBEAKmG INTO THE GAME

Foi^ the &st few weeks I was on the road it Was
next to impossible for me to keep awake. ^ No sooner
did we get started than I would go fast asleep, to be
wakened by a jolt or lurch of the wagon or a shout
of, "Whoaup!" I found that it bothered even the
oldtimers to stay awake, although most of them did
until light in the morning, but there was a saying
among the show people that ''nobody can keep awake
after the old haymaker comes up." Except on
stormy nights when everyone was too miserable,
everything seemed to conspire together to make the
desire to sleep irresistible; the previous lack of it,
the time, the quiet and darkness of night, the soimds
of the train itself — ^jangling of harnesses and chains,
chuckle and rumble of wheels, and rhythmic tread
of horses* feet and the gentle touch of the night wind
on the face made a combination which was too much
for a novice. I simply could not keep awake. I
tried all sorts of devices. I would rouse myself and
pick out some object which I could just see in the
distance — a tree, a house, a bend in the road — ^and
attempt to keep alert until I reached it. I even tried
rubbing tobacco juice into my eyes, but it was no
use. Hardly would the determination be made
before I was again asleep. As a result my tip-overs
were frequent and my driving came in for a good
deal of profane comment. Finally one night when
I tipped over, and the boss in his buggy at the head
of the line was told of it, he said: ''Oh, that fellow
CoHklin again, is it? To hell with him! I won't
go back for him; he tips over too much. Let him
get up the best way he can."

17

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

Sometimes a man was hurt by being jomiced off
his wagon while asleep. Once, in the hilly region
of Pennsylvania, a man was nearly killed in this way
while on the wagon with me. We were not supposed
to take anyone on the wagon with us, but I had been
allowing a fellow by the name of Barney, who be-
longed in Albany, to ride with me occasionally. He
was what we called a "candy butcher** — ^that is, he
traveled with the show and sold candy to the crowds.
Each took a turn driving while the other curled up
on top of the cage and slept. There were a good
many water-breaks on the hills and I was worried
for fear Barney would be jounced off by one and killed
some night. Finally, after much persuasion, I got
him to fasten himself on by his suspenders. The
very first night he did so a water-break threw him
dear off his seat and only the suspenders saved his

On the outskirts of each town in which we were
to show, the cage train stopped beside some con-
venient stream or pond and washed away the dust
and mud of the night*s travel, so that the cages and
wagons would be fresh and shining for their entry
into the town. Just before ten the wardrobe wagon
was opened and each one was given a long coat.
These coats, like charity, covered a multitude of sins,
for they were put on over old clothes, overalls, or
whatever combination of dress one happened to have
on, and, being long enough to reach to the ankles,
hid all from sight. Blacking was passed out to polish
the boots, and a high hat with a cockade on one side.
As soon as all was ready the band wagon led off and

life.

18

BREAKING INTO THE GAME

the rest of the cages and wagons fell into line behind
it and paraded through the principal streets of the
town and then on out to the show grounds. Here
we gave our finery back to the wardrobe keeper, the
cages were backed into their places in the menagerie
tent, the horses imhamessed, and then we got our
second meal for the day. The third one we had
after the afternoon performance.

On Sundays the show rested, the horses got a
chance to freshen up, the animals were given their
weekly fast, and the keepers gave the cages an extra-
careful washing. The canvas men took the oppor-
tunity to make any repairs needed on the tents, and
if out in the coimtry many of the performers went
fishing and hunting. Everybody else slept.

By the third season I was with the show it had
acquired an elephant named Queen Anne and I was
given charge of her. I trained her, performed her
in the ring, and drove her from town to town nights.
This brought me the responsibility of finding the
road and marking it for the rest of the show, for
Queen Anne was started out on the road ahead of
anything else, to insure her being on hand for parade
the next morning without being hurried. She u^ed
to make about four miles an hour. I rode by her
side on a horse. Although by this time fully accus-
tomed to night travel, I was from time to time plagued
by being desperately sleepy. Several times when
a few mfles out on the "run" I have gone to sleep on
my horse. Feeling the difference in my riding, he
would stop and stand still, and Queen Anne wandered
away. When I waked up there was no elephant to

19

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

be seen and I had a lively hunt for her. Each time
I found she had gone back to the grounds we had just
left. In some sections of the pountry it was next to
impossible to miss the road and in others equally
difficult to keep it. I have often taken the wrong
turn and not discovered it until I had gone five or
six miles. Such a mistake was always annoying, but
it became decidedly impleasant if before I got back
on the right road I met the baggage train and it all
had to be turned around in the dark, perhaps on' a
narrow, imeven road. At such times there was
always plenty of opportunity to learn the various
drivers' opinion of the elephant, its keeper, the roads,
the " layer-out,'* the country, and the circus business
in general. I shall never forget one wrong turn I
made. It was about daylight in the morning that I
discovered that the road ended in a lake. The whole
show was just behind me and it was eight miles back
to the right road. In finding my way or making
sure I was on the right road I frequently waked the
people in some house I was passing, to make inquiry,
and I soon learned that few cared to be routed out
in the middle of the night to give directions even to
a man with an elephant. I also found that such
people's estimates of distances were very inacciu*ate,
and that often the nearer I actually was to a town
the farther away I would be told it was.

But in spite of all these things, traveling with Queen
Anne had many advantages and was much pleasanter
than driving in the cage train. If I reached the edge
of the town before the rest of the animals I could
fasten Queen Anne and my horse to a tree and lie

BREAKING INTO THE GAME

down and sleep beside them until the cage train
came up. If I got a late start or the run was extra
long, the last part of it would be by daylight and the
farmers and their families all came out to see the
elephant, sometimes following us for quite a distance,
and it was easy to get plenty of milk and ^gs and a
fine breakfast by just showing Queen Anne off a bit.
I also used to have fun upsetting wagons along the
way. I always made it a practice to call out to the
driver of any team I saw coming to watch out for his
horses, as they might be frightened at the elephant.
Most of them appreciated the warning and profited
by it, but frequently some smart Alec or a stubborn
hick would call back, "You look out fer yoiu* elephant
and I'll look out fer my hoss." At such times I used to
give Queen Anne a certain little dig under the ear and
she would start up quickly, at the same time letting
out a loud squeal that woidd make any horse on earth
that Was not used to it bolt, leaving tiie road covered
with apples or milk bottles or anything else that was
in the wagon and loose enough to be jerked out.
Many is the good meal of apples I have got in this
way.

The cage wagons with the O'Brien show all had a
uniform width of four feet. In one of them we had
a glass front and exhibited an assortment of stuffed
fish which we advertised as an aquarium. These
fish were arranged on a board partition just back of
the glass. This left an unoccupied space of some
three feet behind the partition, which we made use
of in various ways. After I was made superintendent
of the menagerie and cage train I rode at the head of

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

it in a buggy with the boss hostler, and one season
we made up a bed nights in the fish cage and each of
us drove and slept half the night.

Another season a few of us had a mess of our own
and kept our cooking utensils and provisions in the
back of the fish cage. The rest of the show called it
the "robbers' roost," One of the members of the
mess was Jack Shoemaker, the driver of the wagon.
Jack was the best driver and the worst liar I ever
knew. He could drive one or a dozen horses with
equal skill and ease. He had a whip whose lash was
eight feet long and the stock four, and he could play
a time with it by snapping it. He could also stand
a man, holding a straw in his fingers, the reach of his
whip away, and flick the straw out of the man's hand
without touching his fingers. I never saw anyone
else who could do it except an Eskimo, and that was
years after I knew Jack. Jack kept our mess well
supplied with chicken. Any plump fowl or broiler
that ventured near Jack's wagon as he drove along,
he reached down with his whip and with amazing
skill caught the end of the lash around its throat and
lifted it up to his seat without attracting attention
or it being possible for the chicken to make a noise.
One day Jack was passing the big mess tent and saw
that Doris, the cook, had just set a great pudding out
one side to cool. Watching his chance when Doris's
back was turned, he lifted the pudding and locked it
up in the fish cage. Doris was in a rage when he
found his pudding gone, and swore he would find and
kill whoever stole it, but we had our fill of pudding
for several days and Doris did not find out until the

BREAKING INTO THE GAME

end of the season what became of it. It was this
same Jack that we missed one rainy Smiday morning
in Arkansas. After a while he showed up with a
whole hive of bees he had stolen somewhere. He
proceeded to kill the bees and get out the honey.
We ate so much of it that it made us all sick,
and we lay the rest of the day on hay under the
wagons in such distress that the sweat stood out
on us. Not one of us has ever wanted a mouthful
of honey since.

John O'Brien was one of those unique and success-
ful characters not unconmion in this country » especially
the newer portions of it, during the first five or six
decades of the nineteenth century. Rough and
illiterate, yet with a large stock of native shrewdness,
he found his way into the show business, became
wealthy, and at one time owned more show property
than any other one man in the United States. It
was only to strangers that he was known as John
O'Brien. To his help and acquaintances he was
simply Pogey. Pogey was an Irishman, but where
he was bom or where he lived as a boy I never
knew. At the time I went to work for him he was
the yoimgest show proprietor of any consequence in
the country, being only about thirty-five.

He was a great sufferer from asthma, and never
after I knew him was he able to go to bed, but always
slept in a chair. Any remedy for it he might hear of,
no matter how absiu*d or how improbable the benefit,
he would try. Under his direction I once killed a red
fox, dried its entrails, and mixed the powder, obtained
by pulverizing them, with pitch-pine sawdust. This

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

mixture Fogey smoked, and daimed that it gave
him a good deal of relief.

He was tall» fat» and good-natured. His asthma
gave him a wheezing voice and a funny little laugh,
and he had a queer way of shaldng his head when he
talked.

According to a story current at the time I went to
work for him and whidb I never knew to be questioned,
Fogey'' began his career as a stage driver. Most
of his evenings were spent in hotel offices where there
was a good deal of card and billiard playing going
on, and, as he never played either, but enjoyed watch-
ing the games, he easily fell into the habit of keeping
the tally for the rest. Because of this service he was
always included when the drinks were set up. Being
a teetotaler, he took cigars when the rest took whisky,
and these cigars he did not smoke, but put away until
he had collected a boxful, and then sold them. This
money he laid away with what he was able to save
from his earnings as a stage driver, and after a little
« he had enough to begin buying horses, and soon had
a stage line of his own. He ran this a few years,
saving money all the time, and then gave up the stage
route because he had contracted to furnish horses
and move Jerry Mabie's circus from stand to stand
for him.

Fogey learned more or less about the show busi-
ness from observation while engaged in carrying out
his contract, and, discovering toward the end of the
season that Mabie was running behind, arranged to
purchase the show. As he did not have money
enough of his own, he proposed to Adam Forepaugh,

POGEY O BRIEN

Digitized by

Google

Digitized by

Google

BREAKING INTO THE GAME

a friend of his, that they go into partnership. With
funds provided by his father, who was a butcher and
cattle dealer, Forepaugh paid for his share of the
Mabie show. Soon after getting possession of it the
two young partners put it into winter quarters in

They started out with the next spring and made
money from the first, but by the end of the second
season they had discovered that it was impossible to
get along together, and so dissolved the partnership^
dividing the show between them. The division was
made by each man alternately selecting an animal
or a wagon or some piece of equipment until every-
thing had been portioned off. After separating, the
two men were bitter rivals. They had winter quarters
on opposite sides of the street in Philadelphia, but
each tried to keep his affairs and plans from the other
as much as possible. Fogey had rather the best
of Forepaugh in this, though, for he was friendly with
"young Ad," his rival's fourteen-year-old boy, who
told him many things that his father never dreamed of.

Fogey could neither read nor write, not even so
much as to sign his name, but the statement of his
men tliat he '^was hell on figures" was substantially
correct. Like most ignorant men suddenly become
wealthy, he was fond af attracting attention by his
dress, and he had all of a showman's fondness for
jewelry. I never knew him to dress any other way
than with a frock coat and pants made of blue broad-
cloth, and a silk-velvet vest. He kept a double-
breasted vest for special occasions which had two
rows of buttons inlaid with diamonds. In the center

Philadelphia.

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

of each button was a diamond which must have
weighed at least two carats, with smaller ones clus-
tered around it. He never failed to put on this vest
when hiring performers. Across the front of it hung
a watch chain with great, flat gold links, and set in
each link was a diamond. The one in the middle
link weighed four carats, and the next a little less,
and so on, the ones in the end links weighing a half
carat apiece. For a charm he had an elephant about
an inch long, made of gold, with rubies for eyes and
a diamond in its trunk, and on one of his fingers he
wore a big seal ring set with a cluster of diamonds.

As Pogey was always with the show and around
among his wagons and men, the blue-broaddoth suit
was frequently mussed and soiled. Once he caught
the seat of the trousers and tore a great hole in them.
He called for a canvasman and had him sew up the
tear with one of the big needles and coarse thread
used to repair the tents. Some of the men called
his attention to the big white stitches, but he insisted
that it was "good 'nuflf*' and that his coat covered
*em up, anyway." Reminded that he went aroimd
a good deal without his coat, he replied, with em*
phasis: •'Never mind! That's good 'nuflP fer them
* gillies* and * rubes.* They don't know the differ*-
ence, anyhow." No one said anything more and the
half circle of white stitches stood out like the Northern
Lights for the rest of the season every time Pogey
took off his coat.

Pogey never drank himself and was terribly
down on a drunk. "Now look there,'* he used to
say, "see that feller? What a fool he is to go and git

BREAKING INTO THE GAME

drunk and spend all his money. 'Twould be better
fer me to keep his money. I don't ought to pay him.
He'll just go an* give it all to the barkeeper." But
in spite of his aversion to drunks Pogey would
never turn a man down that asked to come back to
him, no matter what the fellow had done, provided
he showed any sort of repentance and promised to
do better.

One such case was a driver who was completely
down and out and had been sent away from the
show. After we had got into winter quarters he
showed up one day and asked for a job. Pogey
very bluntly reminded him of his past actions, but
agreed to take him on again in the spring if he would
promise to do better. It then developed that the
man had no place to go and nothing to do until spring,
so Pogey told him:

"Wall, we've got lots of potatoes here and plenty
of 'monkey bread.' You can cook yourself potatoes
and eat what * monkey bread' you want and stay here
as much as you like. Perhaps I may ask you to help
the men get manure out to the farm sometime, or do
a little job for me." So the fellow lived around the
quarters all winter, sleeping on the haymow nights,
and in the spring went on the road again with us.

Another instance was a man by the name of Smith,
who was with us one season, and the next spring came
aroimd and asked for a job.

"Now, Smith," said Pogey, "you know that you
are an awful drinker and that you were drunk most
of the time last season. You know, too, that this
'ere is a nice, moral show and I can't be carrying

THfi WAYS OF THE ClRCtJS

round a lot of drunkards and spoiling the reputation
d the show/'

"Yes, I know," replied Smith, "but, Pogey, you
needn't be afraid to take me. I'll be all right and
won't hurt your show none. You can depend on itt
too, for since last year I've been copper lined."

Pogey gave one of his little wheezy chuckles
that passed for a laugh and Smith got his job.

"Pogey" lived but a little way from the winter
quarters in Philadelphia, and one winter t and two
or three others boarded with him. The first few
times that we were at his house for dinner Pogey
would gulp down a few mouthfuls and then make
some remark about having to get back and hurry out.
We did not feel that We could do any different than
to get up and go along with him. As a result we were
having practically no dinner. We said nothing, but
after a few days Pogey^s wife took me one side
and told me that we should sit still days and finish
our dinner. That her husband came back each time
as soon as we were at work and ate a hearty meal.
We took her advice and Pogey was no longer in a
hurry about his dinner.

He was glad to have the men have things so long
as the price did not come out of his pocket. Nearly
always, after paying a hotel bill, he would say, "Now,
Mr. Hotel Keeper, you know that when a man pays
a bill it's the thing to give him a cigar. Now you
know I've jest paid you a mighty big bill; let's see
you open up yer heart and give these boys some
cigars." And as a usual thing the hotel proprietor
gave us a generous quantity.

BREAKING INTO THE GAME

Pogey had a fast horse; one that could go a mfle
in three minutes, and one day while we were in winter
quarters at Philadelphia he let me take it to give my
girl a sleigh ride. We had a great time and passed
everything on Broad Street, but when I took the
horse back it was dripping wet and looked used up.
Pogey came and looked it over, asked a few ques-
tions, and then he said, 'Xonklin, I guess the next
time you want a horse to go sleigh riding you'd better
go to a livery stable.'*

Whenever possible we used to avoid turnpike roads
with their frequent toll gates, for the tolls were always
heavy and if we had far to go it made a heavy bill.
Sometimes, however, there was no choice and the
boss hostler at the head of the first wagon train would
tell the gatekeeper that the man in the buggy at the
fear of the line would pay the tolls. ^ So the old gate-
keeper, patiently standing by the roadside, slate in
hand, put down a record of the two-horse, four-horse,
eight-horse wagons, the *'led stock," etc., that made
up the show. Finally Pogey, hurrying along be^
behind everything else in his buggy, would draw
up by the gatekeeper and drawl out in his wheezy
voice:

"Wall, how much do I owe yer?'*

The account read off by the gatekeeper was sure
to be challenged by Pogey.

*ain't got no such number of teams."

'^But they all went through this gate and I counted
'em and set 'em down," and the old keeper would
read the list again.

"Wall, they must be some people following the

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

circus that don't belong to it, I ain't going to pay
for them. How many did you say ther was?"

"Now ther must be some mistake about this.
Let's see your slate." And Pogey would reach out
and take it. After pretending to look it over he
would begin again.

"Now this ain't right. I've got so many two-
horse teams, and so many four-horse teams, and so
many eight-horse teams, and — "

"But how do / know?" the gatekeeper would
inquire, in alarm, as he saw Pogey deliberately wet
his fingers and rub out the record on the slate.

"Wall, I'm telling yer, ain't I?" Pogey would
calmly answer, and go on with his enumeration. In
the end the gatekeeper was obliged to settle on the
basis of Pogey's statement, for, with his list gone,
he could hardly do otherwise. In this way^ Pogey
often beat a gatekeeper out of a third of his tolls.

O'Brien used to sneer at a practice, common among
small shows in those days, of hiring the privilege of
using the name of some big show for a season.

"It ain't no use buying a name," he would say,
"Go out in the graveyard an' pick out the worst
name you can find an' it '11 be jest as good as Bar-
num's. That's the way I do."

But the time came when he did just that thing, not
only arranging to use Bammn's name, but taking
some of Bammn's equipment and performers. It
was a poor season and he did not make much money.
Toward the end of the summer he went over into
Canada, and there he not only did not make money.

Again the list would be read off.

80

BREAKING INTO THE GAME

but he lost heavily and quit before the end of the
season and came back to the United States. When
he went over into Canada a lot of his horses were
poor and run down> and while he was there he traded
them in for good ones. When he came back into
the United States the customs officers, not knowing
anything about the change, passed, duty free, as many
horses as he had taken into Canada. When the show
broke up Fogey was owing considerable salary
money to "Doc" Thayer, a clown that Bamum had
furnished for the show. When Doc asked for his
money Pogey refused to pay and told him to "get
it out of Banuun." This angered Doc and he
threatened to tell the customs officials about the
horses unless Pogey paid him what was due. Not
a cent would Pogey pay, but told him, instead,
with a laugh and wheezy drawl: "I don't care. Tell
all yer want ter. I ain't scared.**

The clown was as good as his word and went to the
customs officers with his story. They held that the
duty should have been paid on the horses traded for
in Canada, and the government took steps to collect.
Pogey was foolish enough to take the matter into
court, where it dragged along for two or three years.
In the end, of course, he was beaten, and the duties,
together with the court fees, made a large sum for
him to pay. Meanwhile Jay Cooke had failed, and,
as most of Pogey's capital had been deposited
with him, the two things together practically cleaned
him out. His show had now acquired an unfortunate
notoriety because of the swindlers and crooks that
traveled with it, and his affairs went rapidly downhill.

3 31

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

It was not long until all he had left was a small show
with which he could scarcely more than earn a living.
His misfortimes, changed circ\mistances> together
with family troubles, wore on him. He aged ^ast,
his asthma constantly grew worse, and in a few years
he died.

n

I BEOOBIE A UON TRAINER

^l\mEN I got back to Phaadelphia with the
^ ^ O'Brien show at the end of my first season on
the road I was given a job as night watchman for the
winter. When O'Brien gave me the position he laid
great emphasis on the importance of my keeping
awake and suggested that he thought perhaps he had
better get a watchman's clock.

"Pogey, if you do I'll teach the el^hant to wind
it, I told him."

"Well, I don't know but what you would," he
replied, and, though he was skeptical of my being
able to do it, he never got the clock.

All through the summer I had watched Charlie
Forepaugh as each day he went into the cage with
the Uons and made them do their various tricks. In
helping care for them I had come to know their ways
and they in turn were well acquainted with me. I
had listened day after day to the applause that always
followed Charlie's act, and I knew, too, that his salary
was large enough to make mine look trivial in com-
parison. So as I went about my work nights I got
to thinking the matter over, and it was not long before
I b^an to wonder why I should not be a lion tamer
9s well as anyone else. The more J thought about

Digitized by

THE WAYS OF THE CmCUS

it the more certain I became that I was equal to it.
As a result of my thinking it was not very long before
I decided that I was to be a lion trainer. Then came
the question — ^how? The idea of serving a long
apprenticeship to some regular trainer did not appeal
to me. I was impatient to be at it right away. So
after going over and over the matter from every angle
and weighing the advantages and disadvantages of
various schemes^ I finally decided to stake everything
on one bold stroke.

The animals which Forepaugh exhibited were in
three cages. In one were the stars» three lions —
George, Pomp, Nellie — ^and a leopard. Belle. Divided
between the other two cages were seven or eight more
lions. Though Charlie performed with all of the
animals in these three cages, he never worked but
one cage at a time. The cages were so arranged in
the winter quarters that all three opened into a big
performing cage in the center of the building. Every
forenoon Charlie came to the quarters and, letting
one group at a time into the performing cage, put it
through its act, and then drove it back into its cage.
It had occurred to me while on the road diu*ing the
smnmer that it ought to be possible to let all of the
animals into the big cage at one time, and now as I
considered my training project the idea kept coming
back to me and I pictured in my mind the sensation
it would create to perform so many lions at once in
the same cage, for up to that time no one had done it.

After reaching a decision to put my theories to the
test I did not wait long, nor did I mention my plans
to anyone, for I knew if I did that I would be stopped.

I BECOME A LION TRAINER

From midnight until early in the morning I was
pretty sure not to be distiwbed by anyone, and so I
settled on two o'clock in the morning as being a good
time to make my experiment. Accordingly, a few
nights later, when the hands on the old wooden clock
had crawled past one, I went round and made sure
that everything in the place was all right and that the
doors were all fast, so no one could come in and inter-
rupt me. Then I got Charlie's whip and pistol,
opened the big performing cage, and climbed in.

The animals seemed somewhat surprised at being
disturbed in the middle of the night and b^an to
pace rapidly up and down their cages. I paid no
attention to this, but opened the door of each cage
in succession and drove them out. Then I b^an as
sternly as I could to order them roimd and give them
their cues.

Except, perhaps, for an unusual amount of snarling,
they did as well for me as for Charlie. I put them
through their regular work, which took fifteen or
twenty minutes, drove them back, and fastened them
into their own cages and climbed down on to the floor
from the performing cage, much elated with my suc-
cess. I had proved to myself that I could handle
lions.

The next morning when O'Brien came in I said,
*'Pogey, I worked your lions last night."

"I did! What's more, I worked them all at the
same time."

"I don't believe it."

"Well you come over to the cage and I'll prove it."

No!

35

THE WAYS OP THE CmCUS

So after enough more talk to convince Pogey
that I was m earnest and not trying to play a joke on
him, he went over to the cages with me, and I went in
again and worked them all with as much good luck
as I did the first time. He could not hide his astonish-
ment, and when I came out he said:

"Well, you did do it, didn't you? YouVe done
more 'n Charlie can do, anyhow. You jest work *em
every day/*

Charlie had a year's contract with O'Brien, which
did not run out until spring, so he kept on coming to
the quarters each forenoon and working the lions,
while I began working them each afternoon, I was
very particidar not to let Charlie find out about it,
for he was a big fellow with a quick temper, and I had
a pretty definite idea of the sort of beating up I would
get if he knew what I was doing. When it came
nearly time to go out on the road in the spring and
Charlie's contract expired, O'Brien told him he did
not want him any more and then came to me and
informed me that I was to work the lions on the road .
that season. Of course this pleased me very much,
for it meant that I was noW a lion trainer and per-
former in my own right.

My act with the animals was one of the principal
parts of the show. For a man to appear in a cage
with loose lions was a comparatively new thing in
those days, and the public was a good deal more
interested than it is in any such thing to-day. The
act was made as impressive as possible. When its
turn came the big performing cage with the lions and
myself in it was slowly pushed into the ring by an

36

I BECOME A LION TRAINER

elephant. Whfle this was being done the ringmaster
announced the act, and, in a nice little speech that
was calculated to send the shivers down the spine of
everyone, explained the character of the animals and
the risk I took. I was dressed in elaborate Roman
tights covered with spangles, and across the top of
the cage was painted in great letters, 'Xonklin Is
Our Master."

When all was ready I opened the act by holding
out my leg and having the lions jump over it. Then
the leopard would put her front paws on one of the
bars in the side of the cage. I would pick her up by
the hiad l^s and hold her while the lions jiunped back
and ''forth over her. Next she would lie down with
a lion on either side of her, and I would lie across the
three, with my head on my hand and my elbow resting
on the head of one of the lions. After a moment or
two in this position the animals and myself got up,
and Pomp would rear up on his hind legs and balance
himself against the cage with his forepaws. I woidd
go up to him and, taking him with one hand by the
nose and with the other by the lower jaw, open his
mouth as wide as possible and put my head in it as
far as it would go, which was about halfway. This
never failed to make the crowd hold its breath but
it was not so risky as it seemed, for with my hold
on the lion's nose and jowl I could detect the slightest
movement of his muscles and govern my actions
accordingly. After he got down I woidd dangle a
piece of meat in front of one of the others, which
would do a sort of waltz round the cage after it. Then
I fed them all meat with my naked hands. I always

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

had prepared especially for the act an extra-long,
skinny piece of meat. One end of this Pomp took in
his mouth and I put the other in mine, and before I
let him have it we did a sort of tug-of-war round the
cage. For a grand climax I got them all to snarling
and growling, fired my pistol two or three times, and
dodged out of the cage. The elephant was then
brought in and the cage pushed out of the ring again.

The larger part of this act was the same as when
Charlie Forepaugh worked it, but I had added some
features to it and put all of the lions into the big cage
at once to perform them, so it was really the first
cage of lions I trained. Since then I have probably
trained altogether as many as twenty-five or thirty
cages of lions.

While' I presume I have handled more lions than
anyone else in the United States, only once was I
ever hiui; by one enough to lay me up. As I did my
act with the lions day after day I noticed that one of
them seemed to pay attention to the band and show
a tendency to move round while it was playing. I
encouraged and developed this inclination until it
became a r^ular feature of the act. The rest of the
lions would sit in a row in their places and at the
proper cue the band would strike up a certain waltz.
I would back round the cage, making movements
with my hands, and the lion followed with a sort of
waltzing movement on all-fours.

I never knew for certain just what caused him to do
it — ^whether I backed up too close to him or acci-
dentally stepped on his tail or what — ^but at any rate,
^ I was doing this waltz act one of the lions in bacl^

38

Digitized by

I BECOME A LION TRAINER

of me suddenly reached out and bit me clear through
the thigh. I reached round and struck him over the
head with the butt of my whip as hard as I could.
He let go his hold and sank to the floor. I got out
of the cage as quickly as possible. When I reached
my dressing room I bathed my thigh in arnica and
bandaged it up. At first I did not think it was much
of an injury, but it was enough to keep me laid up
for three weeks.

Of course, while I was laid up there was no one to
take my place and work the lions, so their act had to
be omitted. It made quite a difference with the
show, for the act was billed as one of the principal
attractions and it was hard to satisfy the crowds with
any explanation of my being hurt. They were quite
inclined to think they had been swindled. Finally
my not working made Kelsh, the manager, so im-
patient that he came to me and told me that I would
have to come in and do my act, anyway. I explained
that my 1^ was still stiff and I could not do it. In
a day or two he came to me again and insisted that I
must go to work. We had quite a heated argument
and I told him I would leave before I would try to
work until I was all right. He preferred to have me
leave and paid me off.

The n^ morning Jack Williams came to me and
wanted to borrow my tights and pistol. I asked him
what he wanted with them, and he explained that he
was to do my act with the lions. Jack had always
worked round the elephants, and did not know any-
thing about lions, anyway. My tights were covered
with a thick layer of spangles, had a fine leopard skii^

THE WAYS OF THE CmCUS

round the waist, and had cost me a hundred dollars.
I did not see why I should loan them to a fellow to get
himself killed in trying to take my job from me, so I
advised him to keep away from the lions and if he
wanted tights to go buy himself some.

Jack had talked the manager into the idea of letting
him perform the lions, and neither of them paid
any attention to what I said, but went ahead and got
Jack fixed up to do it and had the elephant push the
cage into place; but when it came to opening the door
and going in with the lions Jack's courage left him
and he backed out, and nothing would induce him to
try it. That ended Jack as a lion tamer.

Meanwhile O'Brien had heard something about
the matter and he came round to me and said : Conk-
lin, what's all this talk about yer leaving the show?
You ain't going to leave the show. Don't you know
Kelsh can't fire you without I let him? Now you
give me back that money an' you stay. Don't you
try to work imtil yer 1^'s all right. It don't make
no difference how long 'tis and yer pay '11 go on just
the same.

I was satisfied to have it that way and I giive
O'Brien the money and stayed with the show.

O'Brien had a coachman that he wanted to do
something for, and he asked me to try and make a
trainer of him; so when we came in off the road I
started in, and during the winter taught him how to
handle a couple of lions and a leopard. He took to
it nicely and by spring he could put them through
quite an act without any trouble. So far as it went
the ^ct was like mine, but it was not so long and did

40

I BECOME A LION TRAINER

not have so many features. In the spring O'Brien
sent the fellow, whose name was Joe Whittle, and
his cage of lions out on the road with a show which
did not use O'Brien's name, though it was managed
and owned by him.

When the show came in oflf the road in the fall
Whittle thought he knew all there was to know about
animals and, much to my siuprise, he back-capped
me to O'Brien sCnd tried to have him get rid of me.
O'Brien did not do this, but sent me down to Colonel
Wood's museum at the comer of Ninth and Arch
Streets in Philadelphia, with my lions. I performed
them twice a day and had charge of some other cages
of animals that O'Brien had furnished the museum
for the winter.

In the spring I asked O'Brien for more money and
he would not give it to me, so I left him. I did not
see how he could get along without me, for he had no
one to perform the lions that I had worked with and
I knew of no one who could do it. Whittle was the
only one who had had any experience of the kind and
he had his own cage to look after. But a few days
after I left he gave my cage to V?hittle to perform.
I think probably Whittle had asked for it, though I
never knew.

Had I known that Whittle was planning to try
working my cage I could have warned him not to do
it, but neither he nor O'Brien said anything to me
about it before he tried it. That part of my act
which was similar to Whittle's he had no trouble
with, and of course the animals would not start in
and do the balance without their cues, but, unfortu-

41

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

nately for poor Whittle, there was one part of my
act which he did not know about and could not be
prepared for, and at the same time could not help
giving the cue.

I had taught George to jump for me as I went out
the door. It had been done by blowing on his nose
and then jumping back, as you would play with a
dog. It always made a great hit with the crowd,
who supposed it had seen a lion try to eat a man and
that I had had a very narrow escape. I worked it
this way: After I had finished the rest of my act I
would get George all stirred up and growling. Then
I would fire my pistol two or three times and jump
out of the cage as quickly as I could. At the same
time George would give a big lunge and come against
the door which I had just shut behind me. George
had learned the trick so well that I frequently had to
turn on him once or twice and work him farther back
from the door before I dared to attempt getting out.

When Whittle went to get out of the cage of coiu'se
George sprang for him, and, without actually meaning
to, he caught him in the 1^. Whittle got out with no
trouble and was not much hurt. An elephant man
by the name of Cooley, who had seen the trouble,
advised Whittle to go back into the cage at once and
conquer the lion. This was bad advice, but Whittle
took it. The second time he attempted to come out
the lion sprang again, and before the attendants
could drive him away he chewed Whittle's leg nearly
ofif. The injured man was rushed to the hospital,
but in spite of all they could do for him he died in a
day or two from blood poisoning.

42

Digitized by

I BECOME A LION TRAINER

It was not long after Whittle's accident that
O'Brien hunted me up and made arrangements for
me to come back to the show. All the men round the
menagerie advised against my going into the cage
with George again, for they believed he would attack
me after his experience with Whittle. I did not think
so. They were a pretty nervous set the first time I
tried it, and stood ready with irons to beat him ofif if
he gave me any trouble. I put him through his
r^ular act, and came out as iisual with no difficulty,
and I never had any trouble in all the time that I
worked with him after that. He was needlessly shot
years afterward in Bridgeport, Connecticut. The
winter quarters of the Bamum & Bailey show caught
fire, when George, getting loose, ran into a dwelling
house and into a room where a woman was workilig.
She did not realize that it was anything but a big dog
and calmly drove him out with a broom handle. He
was foimd in the street by a policeman, who shot him
to death without making any effort to catch him.
If I had been there I could have led him in without
trouble.

At the time I was performing my cage of lions the
modem revolver and cartridges had not been invented.
The pistol which I used was what was known as a
"pepperbox." Its six barrels were combined in one
large one, which revolved so that the barrels could
be fired one at a time. Sometimes all six barrels
would go off at once, and at other times I could not
make any of them fire. Each barrel had to be loaded
separately, the powder and wads being forced down
tight with a little ramrod.

48

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

My old "^pepperbox" came near making a lot of
trouble on one occasion. I had a little trunk in
which, along with some other things, I carried the
pistol and a can of powder. One day I could not
make the pistol fire in the cage, and when I came out
I handed it to the property man, who threw it in the
trunk beside the can of powder. Then he shut the
trunk, put it on his shoulder, and carried it out by the
baggage wagon and. threw it on the ground. When
the trunk struck the ground the pistol went oflf — ^and
so did the can of powder, blowing the trunk all to
piieces.

Like many other popidar beliefs about lions, it is
not true that because one walks rapidly up and down
his cage he is ugly. The contrary is more likely to
be true. A lion that will walk round when you get
in the cage with him is all right, as a general thing,
but look out for the one that goes and lies down in a
comer.

Another widely popular belief is that a lion will not
look a himian being in the face. This, too, has no
basis in fact. It is true, though, that you should
never let one get behind you if you can help it, though
in many of the acts it is not possible to keep all of
them in front of you all the time.

Another thing which never fails to make an impres-
sion on the public out of all proportion to its merits
is for some performer to go into a cage with a large
number of lions at the same time, the general notion
being that the greater the number of animals the
greater the trainer*s skill. As a matter of fact, lion
are like sheep in that they will always follow their

44

I BECOME A LION TRAINER

leader. If you can get one lion to jump over a bar
all the rest in the cage, no matter how many, will
follow him. If you have two or three trained lions
which you can depend on you can take a himdred
into a cage with them and it will not be so dangerous
as to go in with only two or three which are badly
trained or not trained at all. Neither does a lion's
growling mean anything. A lion that growls fright-
fully and acts very ferocious when you are outside
the cage may be one of the easiest to handle and to
get work out of when once you are actually in the
cage; and on the other hand, a lion that is mean and
dangerous to do anything with in the cage may be
exceptionally docile from the outside and allow you
to pet him freely.

One of the most successful parade features used to
be a tableau wagon on the top of which was a group
of smiling girls, and lying in the center of the group
a great shaggy-maned lion. The indifference of the
girls to the big brute never failed to astonish the
crowd, nor the possibility of his leaping down to send
a chill up their spines. The supposed danger did not
exist, however, for hidden under the mane of the Uon
was an iron collar to which was attached a strong
chain running through the roof of the wagon and
roimd a windlass inside. When the lion was placed
on the wagon the chain was woimd up on the
windlass tmtil the lion was drawn down tightly in
place, and then the chain was fastened. It was an
impossibility for the lion to move out of his position,
and his man^ and the girls hid the chain from sight.
Still another popular theory to account for its being

45

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

possible to go into a cage with lions used to be that
we fed them until they couldn't eat another mouthful,
and therefore they had no inclination to taste of us.
Nothing could be farther from the truth. We had
to be most careful what and how much we fed the
lions or they would have sickened and died. Of
coiu-se we gave them nothing but meat, and from
this we cut all fat, for if we had not they would have
had boils. And the only cuts of meat we gave them
were chuck and neck pieces with the bones in. Meat
without the bones they would gulp down without
chewing and this would bring on indigestion. With
the bones in it they had to eat slowly, biting and lick-
ing the meat off.

On Sundays we never fed them at all. The one
fast day each week was necessary to keep them
healthy. If too well fed or overfed they were sluggish
and dumpy, and would do their work in an indifferent
way, so if for any reason I was especially anxious to
give a fine exhibition I always let them go without
anything to eat for a couple of days. Then they
would be quick about their work and do it in fine
shape. I could never see that it made them any
more dangerous to have them hungry.

There is a vast difference between the lion training
of to-day and that of twoscore years ago. Now
practically all the trained lions are bom in captivity.
They are acquainted with humans from their earliest
recollections, and training may commence as soon as
the cub is strong enough. As a result the trained
lion of to-day is more like a big rough dog than a
fierce wild beast. Contrary to the popular supposi-

I BECOME A LION TRAINER

tion, lion cubs are very tender, especially their back^,
and it is not an unusual thing for one to be ruined
by rough handling when small.

In the old days the lions which came to U3 were
caught in the jimgle and brought with them all their
native fear and hatred of man. They were always
several years old at best when the trainer got hold
of them, and to bring them to a point where they
could be depended upon to go through certain acts
at the word of command without hesitancy, and at
the same time make no eflfort to injure the trainer,
was a task which called not only for fearlessness, but
a keen judgment of animal traits, and infinite patience
as well.

Practically every animal but the lion is taught to
do what you want by giving it a reward every time it
does it, or makes an eflfort to, either a Imnp of sugar
or a v^etable, or a bit of fish, or some other thing
of which it is fond, but this is impossible with the
lion, as it eats only meat, and is only allowed a certain
amount at that. This increases the difficulty of the
lion trainer.

I never made any attempt to enter the cage of a

lion or teach him anything until I had an opportunity

to study him and allow him to become accustomed

to me. I would hang round his cage, talk to him,

if possible stroke him a little, and in every way try

and get him to realize that he had nothing to fear

from me. At the same time I was making up my

mind as to his disposition and personal peculiarities.

When the time came to make an attempt to go in the

cage with him I partitioned o3 one end and went
4 47

THE WAYS OP THE CIBCUS

into that, and observed the eflfect on the animal.
Some paid little more attention to it than they did
to my being on the outside of the cage, while others
would throw themselves against the partition with
thdr whole weight and do their best to get at me.

The first time that I ventured into the cage without
the partition I fastened the lion in a comer. This
was not always an easy matter. In order to do it it
was necessary to pull him down with a rope and put
a collar on. It is not only difficult to get a hitch on
the animal, anyway, but unless it is done just right
there is danger of killing a valuable beast. As a
full-grown lion can bite a large rope ia two with one
snap of his jaws, it is necessary to have a few feet of
chain on the end of the rope used in pulling down.
On the end of the chain was a large ring which made
it a simple matter to form a slip noose, which was
dropped over the lion's head with the aid of a two-
pronged meat fork with a handle six or eight feet
long, which was used to feed with.

The noose was allowed to come down on the floor
just in front of the forefeet. As soon as he placed
one foot through the noose it was drawn tight as
quickly as possible. In this way, with the noose
round the neck and one leg, there is no danger that
the animal will either be choked to death or break
its neck in trying to turn over. I have known a lion
to be killed struggling with a noose roimd its neck.

Once securely noosed, it was possible to draw the
lion into the comer of its cage and put a strong collar
round its neck. On the collar was a ring. Into the
ring, I snapped the end of a chain and could then

48

\

I BECOME A LION TRAINER

fasten him to one end of the cage. Wiih the animal
chained to the cage I opened the door and went in.
No matter what he did, he could not get at me. At
first I only stayed in the cage for a few minutes and
made no attempt to get near the animal, but went
in a couple of times each day.

After a time he would pay less and less attention
to me. I would move about the cage more and also
gradually lengthen the hitch on his chain. It would
not be long before it would be lumecessary to rope
him down in order to snap the chain to his collar. He
would allow me to do it without.

When he had become accustomed enough to my
being in the cage I took an ordinary broom and cut
two or three inches off the ends of the straws so it
woidd be good and stiff, gave him an extra length of
chain, and, taking the broom with me, went in as
usual. If he paid no attention, neither did I, but
moved roimd as usual, pretending to sweep the cage
and gradually going nearer him. When the time
came that he attempted to come for me I gave him
a good smart pimch in the tender end of his nose with
the broom. His teeth slipped between the straws.
With nothing to fasten on, baffled and in pain, he
would curl back into his comer. It did not take
many such treatments to convince even the most
stupid animal that I was a good thing to let alone.

The next step in his education was to teach him to
mind his business without being chained while I was
in the cage. As a precaution iJie first few times the
attempt was made I put gloves on him. These were
made of canvas and resembled boxing gloves. One

49

THE WAYS OF THE CmCUS

was drawn on to each front paw while he was pulled
down and securely tied round above the paw. With
the gloves on it was impossible for him to open out
his daws, and, of course, without doing so he could
not catch me and cut me open. At the same time
the gloves were put on a muzzle was slipped over his
nose and fastened to his collar. This muzzle was
made of catgut cords and was similar to an ordinary
dog muzzle. I bought the largest size bass viol
strings to make the muzzle, and when it was in place
the lion could not open his jaws, nor coifld the muzzle
be seen a few feet away. With these two things on
he was let loose in the cage, and I, taking my broom,
went in as usual. At first he would act like a dog
with a muzzle on for the first time — lie down and roll
and try to paw it oflf. Then, as day after day the
same thing was repeated, he paid less and less atten-
tion to the muzzle, the gloves, and to my being with
him, until there came a time when it was possible to
b^in to train him for actual acts.

As with any other animal, in trying to teach an
act, the first and oftentimes the most difficult thing
was to make him understand what was wanted. It
was possible to teach some lions to stand up against
the cage by working them up gently with a little
whip. Others it was necessary to pull up with rope
several times before they grasped what you wanted.
Once they know what you want, it is then simply a
matter of constant and patient repetition, the doing
over and over again day after day of the same thing
in response to the same cue. As time passed one
after another of the aids and precautions was dis-

00

Digitized by

I BECOME A LION TRAINER

carded. It was no longer necessary to pull down the
animal. The chain and snap were dropped. The
gloves, the muzzle, and finally the collar were left off,
and you were dealing with a trained animal. Only
the whip and pistol were needed as a protection.
With experience came the ability to tell by the look
of a lion if he was dangerous and how slow and
cautious one must be in his education.

In all my experience I never came across but one
lion that I could do nothing with. It was a big,
black-maned African, which W. W. Cole bought from
Carl Hagenbeck. Lions of this kind are the most
diflScult to do anything with. He was ten or twelve
years old when he came into my hands. The first
time I went into the cage he Ixmged at the partition
over and over again with all his force, trying to get
me. I tried all sorts of things to tame him, but never
succeeded, even with hot irons. At last I gave up
trying to do anything with him and had a bar with
a ring on it put in the cage along one side. Before
going into the cage I snapped his collar to the ring.
He could go back and forth the length of the cage
with the ring sliding on the bar, but he could not get
his head away far enough to touch me. With him
secured in this way I went in and worked two other
lions that we carried in the cage with him.

Old John Robinson said to me once, ^'Conklin, I
wouldn't go in with that lion the way you do for all
the animals and money Cole*s got.**

In those days a circus crowd expected to see a per-
former go into the lions' cage and put them through
a variety of acts. Most of the old acts were what

61

THE WAYS OF THE CIECUS

would be known to-day as hurrah acts — ^that is, the
lions would be made to jump and run aroimd, hop
over one another, and simulate great excitement.

To-day I do not think there is a single show on the
road which performs lions in the old way. At most
they have a man ride in a cage on parade. I have
broken many a cage for this purpose. All the lions
are taught is to be indifferent to a man sitting in the
cage and to pace up and down while he is there. I
used to get liie lions accustomed to my being in the
cage, and then I would take a man in with me and
get them accustomed to him, after which I could
leave that cage to him.

I think the worst animal to try and do anything
with in a cage is a big bear. He is up on his hind l^s
where he can box with you. He has a most terrible
squeeze, and, of coiu*se, has a tremendous advantage
in weight. Another bad feature is that you cannot
force him at all. A lion you can pimish and force to
a certain extent, but the bear you have to coax all
the time. There is nothing any more treacherous
than a tiger or big Brazilian jaguar. In fact, I would
sooner handle lions than any of the large animals
except elephants.

I was the first man to train hyenas. They were
supposed to be untamable. I found that you could
do very much the same with the spotted ones that
you can with a dog, but the striped ones will only sit
in a comer and make a noise. I was with the O'Brien
show the first time I went into a cage of hyenas. I
made a three-sided shield of boards that came halfway
to my waist to prevent their getting at my feet and

52

r

Digitized by Google

I BECOME A LION TRAINER

l^s. In that way I protected myself from thdp
attacks. I pushed this m ahead of me and took in
my hand a rawhide whip wound with brass. I foimd
them to be not nearly so bad as imagined, and was
able to teach them to jump and run aroimd and make
a noise* Altogether I suppose I have trained as many
as eighteen or twenty hyenas.

The hyena is known around the show as a weather
prophet. About a day before a storm or a cold spell
he will howl for an hour or more, which usually starts
all thc^ animals of the cat tribe howling also. The
hyena will eat anything he can get his mouth on,
dead or alive. I once had a yoimg tiger that lost
part of his tail by allowing it to come within reach
of a hyena, who promptly bit it oflF. We were show-
ing in New York once, when, just before time to open
the doors for the evening performance, I heard a
growling among the hyenas and went to see what was
the matter. I found them quarreling over something
which seemed to be meat. It was not feeding time
and I was puzzled to know where it came from. On
going close up to the cage I saw in the other compart-
ment of it a hyena lying on its back and bleeding
at the mouth. Examination showed it to be minus
its tongue. The only way I could ever accotmt for
it was by supposing that while licking the bars of
the cage one of the hyenas in the other compartment
had seized it by the tongue and in the ensuing struggle
the tongue had been pulled out by the roots. We
could do nothing for the animal and it soon bled to
death.

One has to be constantly on the watch with hyenas

53

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

Or they will eat off their own l^s and tails. K they
feel a spot that itches they will b^in to gnaw, and
keep on. I had one once that in spite of everything
I did ate its tail off clear up to its body. Even sear-
ing the stump with a hot iron made no difference.

We had one bad spotted hyena. We could not let
him loose in his cage. He would bite through ordi-
nary sheet iron and tear it off the rivets. Finally
we had to floor his cage with boiler iron, bolted down,
and chain him so he could not reach the sides of the
cage. In this way he could only walk in a circle, and
at the end of the season that circle was as bright as
a new dollar.

In trainings animals there is nothing so valuable
as patience. Anything which you have to club or
which you cow in breaking is no good. It should
always be the aim of the trainer to win the confidence
of the animal. It is just as important that the animal
should not be afraid of the man as for the man not to
be afraid of the animal. If a man was constantly
being hit in the jaw and expected it he would be look-
ing for opportunities to hit back. The same is true
of an animal. If you are rough with him all the time
he will try and return the same treatment to you. It
is poor policy to punish an animal much if you can
avoid it. If possible, when it needs punishing get
some one else to do it and you do the petting. I did
that way once with a dog which I was trying to teach
to stay in a certain part of the menagerie. He had a
trick of following different ones away all over the
grounds. I arranged with several to coax him away
and then touch his nose with the live end of a cigar.

I BECOME A LION TRAINER

When he came whming bade to me I petted him.
After a few experiences of this kind he stayed where
I wanted him to and never cojmected me with the
pmiishment.

Another important point in animal training is not
to overwork the animal. Short lessons and often
are much better. If you overwork an animal you
break his heart, and then he is no good. An animars
feelings and moods vary from day to day, and perhaps
an extra-fine bit of work one day will be followed by
very stupid work the next. This cannot be helped,
but some trainers are foolish enough to try and force
the animal on the off day, on the ground that, as
they have done the act well once, they can and must
every time after.

It has always been a fad with most American
trainers and performers to use foreign words in so far
as possible in giving directions and cues to animals.
The theory is that it makes a greater impression with
the audience, but I never cared to do it.

Of course a man who trains animals like lions must
not be afraid of them, however much he may realize
his danger. I have been asked thousands of times if
I was not afraid in the cage with the animals. I have
always been able to answer truthfully, "No." Inside
you don't mind it. You are too busy thinking about
your business, but sometimes after you get out your
hair stands on end to think how near you came to
having something happen.

I think that one of the great secrqts of my being so
free from accidents with my animals was the fact
that I was never a boozer. Every man in my busi-

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

ness whom I knew who got hurt was a heavy drinker.
They went into the cages when full of whisky, which
gave them a false courage and upset their ju<|gment.
Nearly all of the old lion tamers whom I knew were
heavy drinkers, most of them being in the habit of
tossing it off by the tumblerful. I remember the
death of one such by the name of Crockett when I
was a boy in Cincinnati. He was a big, strong fellow,
one of the most successful of the early lion tamers in
this country. The circus with which he was con-
nected had come to Cincinnati, and Crockett had
fortified himself for the parade with a copious supply
of whisky. The morning was hot and the combina-
tion of sun and whisky was too much for him. When
the parade got back to the grounds he was carried
from his cage to the dressing room, where he died in
a short time. I was just getting over my broken 1^
and I remember going on my crutches to the dressing
room and seeing him stretched out there.

Digitized by

m

THE WINTER QUARTEEIS

TN the old days of the circus the Atlantic House in
* Philadelphia, which stood in Market Street, be-
tween Eighth and Ninth, was a sort of clearing house
for show matters diuing the wintertime. To it came
showmen from all over the coxmtry, looking for
talent for the next season, and there, also, came most
of the principal performers, looking for new and better
contracts. Philadelphia was the home town of two
circuses, Pogey O'Brien's and Adam Forepaugh's.
For two months during the middle of the winter the
old hotel fairly reeked with a circus atmosphere, and
seldom did it happen that sometime between the
closing of one season and the opening of the next
one failed to meet all of the greater lights of the show
world at the Atlantic House.

Among others that were sure to drift in was " Jim-
mie" Robinson, champion bareback rider of the
world. Jinunie was broken in by "Old John"
Robinson, but I do not think the two men were any
relation. Jimmie, in the days before rum got the
best of him, could do what no other rider, before or
since, has been able to do in this country. That was
to stand on his left foot on a horse, put his right leg
straight in the air by his ear, and ride around the ring.

57

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

While riding with his face toward the front, he
could turn a "twister" somersault and land on his
feet again with his face toward the horse's tail. Then
he would reverse the feat and repeat, so as he went
around the ring he would be alternately facing the
tail and head of the horse. Cooper & Bailey at one
time paid Jimmie five hundred dollars a week.
He went with them to Australia, and when Bailey
was preparing to go to South America he kept saying
things about the country and the trip to Jimmie,
intended to discourage his wanting to go, and hoping
that he would suggest breaking his contract and come
home. This he had no idea of doing. One day when
Bailey had been talking to him he turned and asked:

"I've got a contract with you, haven't I?"

"Yes," Bailey answered.

"It calls for my staying with you so long and getting
so much money, don't it?"

"Wall now, I want that money and I'm going to
have it, and you can go where you danm please — to
hell if you want to — but I'm going to stick to you
just the same."

That was the last said about his quitting the show.
He stuck, and made more money out of the trip than
Bailey did, which was just what Bailey was afraid
would happen.

Rum was Jimmie's undoing. I have seen him
so drunk that he would have to be helped on to his
horse to get into the ring, yet when he got out in front
of the crowd he could do his act. Years later, when
working for W. C. Coup, Jinmiie would pawn

Yes.

58

IN WINTER QUARTERS

himself for drink. His pockets empty, he would
arrange with the bartender to give him drinks on the
strength of his promise that he would stay at the
saloon until some one came for him and paid the bill.
True to his word, he would sit behind the bar until
Coup, knowing his habits, missing him from the
show, and searching through the saloons of the town,
foimd him, paid his bill, and took him back in time
for his act.

Another character whom everyone knew was
"Popcorn George." Hardly a show, large or small,
that sometime or other he had not had the popcorn
concession. He made money at it, and after a time
gave it up and became a dealer in second-hand
animals. His specialty was to buy "bad" elepfaants
cheap and dispose of them to small shows. His real
name was George Hall, but no one knew him as Hall.
One of his first ventures in animal buying was when
a zoological garden in St., Louis sold its animals at
auction. Before the sale b^an Popcorn George
deposited a thousand dollars and told the auctioneer
that if he bought anything to just say it was sold to
Mr. Hall. Then he wandered out among the crowd.
When the sale took place a niunber of the animals
went to him. He made his bids by a nod of the
head or holding up his fingers, and no one paid any
attention, but there was great inquiry to know who
Mr. Hall was. After the sale was over and it was dis-
covered that Mr. Hall and Popcorn George were one
and the same person there was considerable surprise
manifested.

Then there was little Danny Green. Danny was

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

a noted side-show talker and had charge of Cole's
side show at one time. He liked to be considered a
judge of good whisky, and was a great gambler. His
greatest gambling feat occurred in New Orleans. He
went, after the show one night, to a gambling estab-
lishment and sat down at a faro table with two
thousand dollars in his pocket. Luck did not seem
to be with him and he bc^an to go backward. Morn-
ing found him still at the game. He sent out for
something to eat and kept on. After all his money
was gone he began to borrow from his friends, and
when theirs was gone they loaned him their diamonds.
All through the day he sat and played, and night
found him still at it. Sometime d\u*ing the afternoon
or evening his luck tiuned, and when he quit toward
morning of the second night he had won back all his
losses and a thousand dollars besides.

Dan Rice, the famous clown, came in sometimes
from his palatial home in Girard, Pennsylvania.
Dan at that time commanded a greater salary than
the President of the United States. Forepaugh gave
him a thousand dollars a week. Dan had some
unique advertising methods of his own which helped
to make his name valuable. Before starting out on
parade he would load down his pockets with small
coins. While going along in the parade he would
throw handfuls of the coins among the boys, and
while they were scrambling tell them to shout for
Dan Rice. While the show was going on he would
slip outside the tent, gather up a lot of boys, lift the
canvas, shove them imder, tell them where to sit and
direct them also to "holler" for Dan Rice. In spite

IN WINTER QUARTERS

of his great income at one time Dan died in Saratoga
a poor man.

One of the most familiar faces around the hotel was
that of Old Ad Forepaugh. He was not popular with
anyone who had business relations with him. His
help complained much about his red-crossing them.
It was a common question among his men, ^^How
much were you short this week?'*

Many of his old hands had learned his tricks and
would not stand for them, but the old man was
always siu-e to try it on a newcomer. One of Fore-
paugh's ticket sellers, Ben Lusby, known as the
lightning ticket seller and reputed to be the fastest
one in the coimtry, filled the pay envelopes. Old
Ad himself gave them to the men. At first the
envelopes would be short a sum so small that one
woidd pay no attention to it. Then the shortage
would gradually increase from week to week imtil
either something would be said about it or the old
man felt he had reached the limit of what the person
would stand. If anyone took Forepaugh to task for
the shortage he would always say, ^^Lusby must have
forgotten to put that in. I'll make him see to that."

One winter he stayed with his show in Conners-
ville, Indiana. In the spring he had some empty
cages shipped to him and suggested to a number of
men, who were going to Connersville to start out
with the show, that they could save their car fares
by hiding in the cages. So the men took a lot of
food with them, and got out at different stops and
procured fresh water, and reached the show without
paying any fare. In the fall, when the old man

61

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

settled up with them, he jcharged car fare from Phila-
delphia to Connersville.

On one occasion Old Ad threw his father out of the
animal house. Later in life, with a sort of poetic
justice, his only child, Young Ad, did the same thing
to him. Old Ad had five brothers and all of them
worked for him.

Here" came, also, the Sells brothers from Columbus,
Ohio. They had been auctioneers and drifted into
the show business. Later the Sells show made its
headquarters at Peru, Indiana, where one of the
brothers had a fine farm he had bought from a Miami
Indian named Godfry. Godfry's grandmother, a
white girl, had been stolen from Cherry Valley at the
time of the massacre, and, though foimd by her
people, she would never return to them, because of
her kind treatment by the Indians.

Jerry Mabie was another comer we were sure to
meet. He had a show that traveled mostly in the
South. He was a Yankee, I think from Vermont.
The boys said he was so tight that when he went from
his home to the show he would take a whole satchelf ul
of food to save spending any money on the way.

There was Whitby, also, who was ringmaster for
O'Brien at one time, and later had a show of his own,
and was killed at the door while taking tickets, by
some Southern gunman who was trying to get in free.

"Yankee" Robinson was one of the best advertising
agents ever in the coimtry. He finally had a show
of his own and went broke. He used to have his
name and "good for one admission" stamped on a lot
of half dollars and use them for complimentary tickets.

IN WINTEE QUARTERS

Cooper & Hemming, who were at one time part-
ners of Bailey's, came into the show business from
opposite angles. Hemming was a tight-rope per-
former, one of the best in the country, and worked
his way up to being an owner. Cooper was a livery
man and his only connection with the show was
through his capital. When the firm became Cooper
& Bailey, his tendency to be saving offset nicely Mr.
Bailey's inclination to spend freely.

We were always sin-e to see W. C. Coup and Dan
Costello. Dan made a reputation and a lot of money
as a dancing-and-leaping clown. Coup was a clever
agent. He had a most winning way and was the only
agent I ever knew who could get a show through the
coimtry without money if he needed to. They dug
up Bamum in Bridgeport at a time when he was land
poor, and got him to go into partnership with them.
Bamum furnished his name and a lot of money that
he raised on his real estate. Coup and Costello ran
the show. It was the biggest show and had the
biggest tent of any circus that ever went on the road.
It made barrels of money. The special performers
were driven to the ring in a Clarence coach. A groom
in livery opened the door and bowed them out, and
at the end of their act the coach came for them again.

After a few years Coup and Costello left the show.
Both lost their forttmes and went downhill. Costello
worked roimd livery stables, and once in a while
broke a pony if he had a chance, and finally died of
a cancer on the lip.

The last time I saw Coup he was running a little

exhibition in a car which he took from town to town,
5 63

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

and kept standing on a siding as long as people would
pay an admission to go through. At last this failed
and he died poor. Before that he gave New York
its first aquarium, fitting up a building at the comer
of Thirty-fifth Street and Broadway. He had a
white whale in a tank, as Bamum did in his famous
museiun at Broadway and Ann Street. For a time
in the middle 'seventies it was very popular.

Between the time when the big tent comes down
for the last time in the fall and goes up again in the
spring the circus is lost sight of by the public. Many
of the performers and employees leave and go their
various ways, but there is still left a large number of
men with much to do, and the winter quarters of a
big show is always a busy place. Diu*ing the few
months of winter aU the wagons, cars, and equipment
must be gone over, repairs made, and all freshly
painted. If new equipment of any kind is needed,
it is in winter that it is built and tested. It is in
winter, too, that new acts are taught the animals and
new animals are broken in to take their parts with
the veterans.

Except for one incident I enjoyed a winter during
which I had charge of the Cole show, in Utica, New
York, more than any of those spent in various places
with different shows. There were deep snow and good
sleighing for three months, and the weather was clear
and cold. Our quarters were on the show groimds,
about a mile and a half from the town. The wagons
needed to have considerable repair work done on
th^, and I employed a blacksmith in the town to
do it. I sent them down two or three at a time, and

64

m WINTER QUARTERS

as soon as one was finished had it brought back* It
was in connection with this repair work that my one
untoward experience occurred.

One day I sent "Curly** Bush down to bring back
one of the wagons that was finished. Curly got
soused'' and on the way up managed to tip the
wagon over into the snow. I went down to see to
getting it righted up. It was a bitter-cold day and
I did not stop to dress my feet as warmly as I should^
and as a result froze them both. I was confined to
bed with them for several days, and they were so
painful and tender that I could not bear so much as
the weight of the sheet on them. However, I had a
good doctor, and he kept them soaked in witch-hazel,
which brought them out all right and I have never
had any trouble with them since.

We were keeping about a himdred and fifty horses
that winter, and a fellow by the name of Johnny
Lampright was boss hostler. Johnny was very much
impressed with his own importance, and, although I
was in entire charge, resented anything I had to say
about the horses. It was necessary for me to go
down to the town often, sometimes as frequently as
two or three times in a day. It was the best of sleigh-
ing, but I had no sleigh, so I took planks and made a
long sled and put some shafts on it which I took off
from a buggy. When I got my sled done I called on
Lampright for a horse to use with it, but he refused
to let me have one. We had a few words over it and
I finally told him that he might keep his horses and
I would get one of my own. So I went down in the
town and foimd a fellow who would let me have an

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

old canal-boat horse for his keep. I took it back to
the quarters with me and began driving him around,
hitched to my long-runner sled. He was a pretty
good "old skate** and answered my purpose nicely,
but he was most desperately poor and skinny. I
called him Dexter, after a noted trotting horse of the
day. When I went to town I nearly always drove
up in front of the Utica House with a flourish and
called out loudly, "Whoa, Dexter!" It was not long
before my rig was known all over town and furnished
amusement to a lot of others besides myself.

The matter was drifting along this way when
Charlie Sivells, one of Cole's agents, came to Utica
for a few days. One of the first things he asked was
why I was driving such a "bag of bones" as Dexter.
I told him how it happened, and he sat right down
and wrote Cole:

Conklin is all right, but he is driving all over town with an
old horse that is nothing but a bag of bones, which he calls
* Dexter/ and everybody in the place knows and laughs at, just
because Lampright won't let him have a horse. It looks bad
for the show, and I should think with your hundred and fifty
horses Conklin might have the use of one to drive into town with.

By return mail Lampright got a letter from Cole,
saying:

You give Conklin a horse whenever he wants it. When he
asks for horses you make it your business to get them ready for
him, even if he asks for the whole hundred and fifty all at the
same time.

So Dexter had to give way to a younger and
handsomer horse, but I had come to like him and
would have been glad to keep him*

60

Digitized by

IN WINTER QUARTERS

Cole's mother and her brother, Henry Cooke,
traveled most of the time with the show, and they
spent the winter with us in Utica. They came of a
noted family of Scotch show people and had lived all
their lives with shows. Mr. Cooke at the time was
quite a bit along in years and took no very active
part in the show, but looked after many little matters
and was company for his sister and nephew. He
was a cheery, good-natured little man whom every-
one liked to have around, and we all called him
**Uncle Henry."

"Uncle Henry'* liked the people in and aroimd
Utica. He was something of a musician and enjoyed
himself a great deal that winter fiddling for neighbor-
hood dances, frequently not getting home until
almost, or quite, morning.

"Damn me toes!" he would say, "but these are
nice people. They know how to enjoy themselves."

"Uncle Heiuy" was also fond of having some beer
handy all the time, and it was in Utica that he got a
doctor to prescribe it for his sister to drink every day.
"Uncle Henry" was very careful to have her follow
the doctor's orders and he saw to it that she bought
it by the case.

"Now, sister," he would say, "you remember what
the doctor said about the beer."

"Well, you'll have some, too, won't you, Henry?"
she'd answer.

Henry was always willing, so he would bring out
a couple of bottles and open them. He would finish
one and his sister would take a few swallows from the
other and then turn to him and say: /

07

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

"Henry, don't you want to finish nune? I can't
drink any more."

"Well, if you don't want any more, perhaps I will,"
"Uncle Henry" would say. "I don't suppose you
ought to drinik too much, but I think a little is very
good for you."

So "Uncle Henry" got his regular beer ration.

When on the road it was "Uncle Henry's" practice
to take a lantern to the show nights, and he and his
sister used it to pick their way back to the train in the
dark after the show was over. One night while in
Leavenworth, Kansas, "Uncle Heiuy" forgot his
lantern. When he and his sister came out of the
show it was pitch dark, and to make matters worse
some of the streets were torn up to put in sewers.
Mrs. Cole gave "Uncle Henry " a little lecture about
his forgetf ulness and asked what they were going to do.

"Why, damn me toes!" he replied, "we'll walk
V down behind the albino family. They are supposed
to see better in the dark, and if we follow them we'll
be all right."

So off they started after the albino family. Every-
thing seemed to be going all right, when suddenly the
whole albino family tumbled into an open ditch, with
"Uncle Henry" and his sister on top of them.

"Damn me toes!" exclaimed "Uncle Henry,"
**they can't see any better than the rest of us!"

"Uncle Henry" was considerably shaken up by the
fall and the caustic remarks of his sister, whose silk-
velvet dress was all mud and water, and it was some
time before he forgot his lantern again.

Mrs. Cole had a little white poodle dog named

68

IN WINTER QUARTERS

Fiddle-dee-dee. It was her constant companion and
was considered around the show a nuisance, as it was
always nosing and poking into everything and had
to be watched and looked out for. Some of the men
who were not always busy sort of half liked the dog,
for it gave them warning of the approach of Mrs.
Cole, who always wanted to see everyone doing some-
thing. About twice a season Fiddle-dee-dee woiild
be missing. Search the grounds and trains as much
as they might, he could not be found, and the show
would be obliged to move on without him. Next
day the local papers would be offering a reward of
twenty-five dollars and no questions asked for his
return. In about two days he would be brought in.
The real explanation of his absence was that some of
the canvasmen had left him in the care of a saloon-
keeper until they sent for him, which they did as soon
as the expected reward was offered. For a while after
his return he would be watched very closely and not
allowed to roam aroimd much, but after a week or
two he was again as much of a nuisance as ever.

About twenty-five of us boarded that winter with
Mrs, Richards, wife of "Al" Richards, the boss
"candy butcher." One of the munber was Harry
Long, champion leaper. Harry used to leap over
twelve horses standing side by side, and he drew a
big salary for it, but he was an inveterate gambler
and spendthrift, so when the season was over he
found himself without money. Mrs. Richards, know-
ing that he would have plenty as soon as the show
opened in the spring, agreed to let him live with her
through the winter and wait for her pay. Harry was

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

a good-natured, likable sort of chap, and he used to
do a good many things for Mrs. Richards. One day
she gave him five dollars and asked him to go down
into the town and get certain provisions for her.
Harry took the money and started. That was the
last any of us saw of him for more than two months,
until one day, only two or three weeks before it was
time to go on the road again, a grocer's wagon from
the village drove up to Mrs. Richards's door and left
a barrel of flour, a couple of bushels of potatoes, a
quantity of rice, and various other things, probably
altogether twenty-five dollars' worth. About an hour
after the things had been left Harry walked in and
hung up his hat as though he had never been away.
It seemed that when he found himself in Utica with
Mrs. Richards's five dollars, he was imable to resist
the temptation to try his luck and had gone into a
faro place and lost it. He was then ashamed to go
back, so he had jumped a freight train and made his
way to Dayton, Ohio, his home town, and spent the
rest of the winter there. Before coming back he had
managed to get hold of some money, and on his way
stopped in the grocer's at Utica and bought the load
of provisions, waiting until they were delivered before
he showed himself to anyone who knew him.

That was the winter we got Samson, the big ele-
phant. He had been used at Coney Island to carry
people on his back, but his owners had become afraid
of him and sold him to Cole. We had to have a car
built on purpose to carry him in, he was so big. I
had gotten him up to Utica and was trying to teach
a fellow named John Gray to care for him and drive

Digitized by

IN WINTER QUARTEBS

him. I had explained to him repeatedly that a
driver should not go directly up in front of an elephant,
especially if there was any question about his being
good-natured. I had tried to show him that the
proper way was to approach him from the rear, keep-
ing out of reach of his hind feet, or from the side.
Then if he tried to reach for him with his trunk he
would be obliged to turn, and, in turning, give warn-
ing and an opportunity to get out of the way. Gray
soon became convinced that he knew much more
about elephants than I did, and it was not long before
he tried walking directly up in front of Samson, who
unrolled his trunk, hitting Gray a flip with the end
of it that sent him spinning through the air like a ball,
and landing several feet away against a wall, breaking
his leg. It was fortunate for Gray that Samson was
chained, for if he had not been he would probably
have followed him over to the wall and finished him
oflf by stepping on him.

Once I wintered with the Cole show in Memphis,
in some big cotton sheds. During the winter there
was a Mardi Gras carnival in the city and I was asked
for the use of an elephant for the king of the carnival
to ride on. At the time I had none that had been
broken to a saddle, so I took one by the name of
Pete, and started to train him. I got a big dry-
goods box and cut it to fit Pete's back. Into the
box I put a couple of bags of corn for weight, and then
we walked him aroimd in the building. After doing
this for a few days I decided to take him outside and
try it, so the next forenoon I had the packing-box
saddle put on to Pete, but instead of the bags of

71

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

corn I had one of my men that we called "Boiler**
get in the box, and we took Pete outside. Every-
thing went well for a few rods, and then Pete
bolted, running under some trees whose limbs brushed
the box off his back. The box was smashed to pieces
and "Boiler" was considerably bruised. As I met
him limping back I asked, "How do you feel. Boiler?**
and I was not left in any doubt by his answer.

We caught Pete without much trouble. I got
another box, and in a few days he would go anywhere
with it on his back, but I had to have some one else
ride in it, for Boiler declared he had "had enough.**
Pete behaved himself nicely on the day of the
carnival, carrying both the king and queen, and the
people were so pleased that they made me a present
of a pair of handsome brass knobs to put on the ends
of Pete*s tusks.

I remember one winter that I was in New Orleans
at the time of the Mardi Gras carnival. It was ar-
ranged that I was to ride in the parade in my cage of
lions. The parade started early in the forenoon. I
was dressed in my suit of tights and spangles. The
streets were paved with such uneven blocks that the
cage pitched and rolled so much that it was almost
impossible to stand. It got to be noon and still the
driver kept on going. There did not seem to be any
provision for my having any meal. I saw all kinds
of cake and food being eaten and flung aroimd, but
no one dared come near enough the cage to hand any
to ine, and so I was obliged to keep on all through the
afternoon with nothing to drink or eat. My act with
the lions was advertised for that night in Ferante*s

m WINTER QUARTEKS

Iron Building, and I had to go directly from the
street to it. I got thirty-five dollars for my day*s
work, but I would not do it again for a himdred.

I spent aU of one winter at Bridgeport with the
Bamum & Bailey show, breaking six zebras to be
driven like horses. It was the only team of zebras
ever trained to be driven that way in this coimtry.
I used to take them out every day and drive them the
whole afternoon. It was always a diflScult job to
get the harness on them, for they would kick it to
pieces if you were not quick. They especially dis-
liked having anything around their heads, and at first
I did not try putting bridles on them, but snapped
the bits to rings on their halters. At first I used
ponies with them. A pair of ponies for wheelers,
then a pair of zebras, with another pair of ponies in
front of them. As the zebras improved I gradually
did away with the ponies. They were real mountain
zebra, which are much harder to do anything with
than quaggas, which are a cross between zebras and
ponies, but I finally got them so we could drive all
six nicely, and we used them to draw one of the parade
wagons. I never had but one serious accident with
them. This happened one afternoon as we were
coming in from training. They became frightened
at a train, and one of them caught his leg in the goose-
neck on the end of the wagon pole and tore the flesh
to the bone.

Another amusing experience that I recall in con-
nection with being in winter quarters occiured in
Bridgeport and was connected with "Tody" Ham-
ilton, the ubiquitous press agent of the Bamum &

73

/

THE WAYS OF THE CmCUS

Bailey show. Tody was always springing some
kind of a scheme to create notoriety. This time he
came up to Bridgeport with a bimch of reporters from
New York, and a man and his wife who were credited
with being expert hypnotists. His scheme was to
have them hypnotize some of the animals and the
reporters give it a big "write-up.** The couple had
given him some assurances that they coidd do their
part, but in spite of all efforts their many attempts
ended in complete failure. Then they wanted to
hypnotize me, and worked away for a while, with no
better success than they had with the animals. They
said my mind was on something else.

Finally Tody gave up in disgust and took us
all down to Fred Bullen's to have a dinner. While
we were there the hypnotist took me out one side and
told me if I would let him hypnotize me he would give
me twenty-five dollars. I told him I was willing, and
he explained just what he wanted I should do and
how he wanted I should act. A few minutes later he
got Tody out one side and said to him: "Hamilton,
I believe if we could get a couple of drinks into ConkUn
I could hypnotize him."

"All right. Let's do it," he answered.

It was not long before Tody came around and
wanted me to have a drink with him, which I did,
and pretty soon after the hypnotist tried his skill on
me with considerable success, and furnished plenty
of fun for the crowd. He was as good -as his word,
and gave me the twenty-five dollars, but I don't think
Tody or the reporters ever knew that the fellow had
not actually hypnotized me.

74

Digitized by

Google

IV

WANDERINGS BT RIVER, LAND, AND SEA

'l^fHILE still a boy in Cincinnati, I went to a
^ ^ circus on a boat. It was the only one of the
kind there ever was in the country. In those days
there were many shows, especially the small ones,
which traveled on the rivers, but they performed on
the shore under a tent. In the case of this one, the
whole show was given on the boat, which was known
as the Floating Palace and was owned and operated
by Spalding & Rogers. It was the largest and most
elaborate venture ever made in boat shows and only
traveled on the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers. The
craft had no power, but was towed from place to
place and tied up at the docks in the towns where it
gave performances. On the deck, in the center of the
boat, was a fiill-sized regulation ring in which the
show was given, and around the ring was a regular
amphitheater of seats, and over these seats a gallery
with more seats. A portion of the gallery was par-
titioned off for the band, and the whole thing was
inclosed so that it was impossible to see any of the
performance from the outside.

I never traveled much with shows by river and
canal. The Haight & Chambers show, with which I
had niy first job, was a river show, traveling by boat

75

Digitized by

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

on the river, but playing in the towns under a tent.
I went ahead of the show on horseback most of the
time, so it was hardly boat travel so far as I was
concerned.

My first real experience in boat travel came to me
after I had been with Pogey O'Brien several years
and was with a show which billed itself as the "Com-
monwealth Show." It was a stock-company affair,
the principal performers being the owners. My two
brothers were managers and had more of the stock
than any of the rest. The show started out of Phila-
delphia by canal very early in the season. I had had
a little difficulty with Pogey over terms. I was not
working, and he had not started out, so I went along
with my brothers and tended door for them.

They had two boats. On one were the horses,
tents, wagons, etc., and the other had been fitted up
with bimks for the performers and the band. When
it came time to turn in the first night out it was f oimd
that there were not bimks enough by one. A fdlow
by the name of Max Gebbler happened to be the one
that had none, so Max sat up on the deck in no very
good humor while the rest went to bed. All hands
had been abed some time and sound asleep when we
came to the first lock. As soon as the boat was in
the lock and the water b^an to run out. Max went to
the top of the stairs that led down into the boat and
shouted: "The boat is sinking! The boat is sinking!"
The lightest sleepers waked quickly, and, feeling the
boat settling in the lock, stopped for nothing, but
started for the stairs. The rest, hearing their shouts,
jumped out and followed, and there was a wild

76

WANDERINGS BY RIVER, LAND, AND SEA

scramble for the deck. One fellow, a member of the
band, in his hurry to get out of his bunk, struck his
nose and broke it. It pained him so that he did not
care to go back to bed and so Max got his bunk. The
next day another bimk was built in and the boat did
not sinkNigain.

It was necessary to "sugar" each lock tender, for
if we did not he would let the water out and delay
us, or, on pretense of there being something the
matter with the canal, hold us and not let us into the
lock. If they had plenty of tickets to the show there
was never any trouble.

Strange to say, the people voyaging on the per-
formers' boat dreaded a storm almost as much as
they would if they had been at sea. The reason was
that the canal boat, not having much weight oii it)
stood up high out of the water, and whenever there
was a wind it was forced over against the side of the
canal and groimded unless it was held off. So every
time the show had to travel in bad weather the per-
formers had to take ttuns holding the boat away
from the bank with pike poles.

The Commonwealth Show had no menagerie, but
it made a feat\u*e of its band which it billed as "The
Great German Band." The members of the band
were all young fellows, except the bass drununer, and
he was an old, gray-haired man, so the show people
always spoke of the band as "Grossvater's band."
In each town the show stopped my brothers hired
horses from the livery stable for the band to ride on
in parade. The old bass dnunmer was not a very
good rider and they used to buckle him on to his

77

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCCS

horse. Tlie band proved to be a drawing card
wherever they went- The band not only played,
but sang as wdl. One of their most popular hits was
to alternately sing and play the verses of '*The
Cuckco Song.*' Another popular song idiidh they
sang was the ''Little German Band.''

Canal and river shows always hired a lot to show
on, as near the water as they could get. It happened
that my brothers' show and that of Springer, Austin,
& Henderson were biUed for the same day in one of
the towns. The two competing shows were set up
on opposite sides of the canal from each other, and
there was a sharp rivalry to draw the crowd. The
Springer & Henderson show had the advantage of a
menagerie, but the Commonwealth had the better
talent. In the afternoon the opposition show drew so
well that we had a very small house. It looked as
though we might at night, too. The man from whom
we had hired the lot took a sporting interest in seeing
us win and went around urging people to go to our

show. "By ! boys, I won't let them beat you," he

said, and paid for the tickets of all his help and ac-
quaintances. We were on the side of the canal near-
est the town, and the people had to pass our tents to
get to the other show. At night my brother had the
band give a concert in front of the tents, and he went
out by the side of the street and talked to the crowd,
told them to ask the people who were at our show
in the afternoon what kind of a show it was, and set
out our attractions so well that we had a fuU house
and the other show hardly any.

After 1 had been with the Commonwealth Show

78

WANDERINGS BY RIVER, LAND, AND SEA

about three weeks O'Brien sent for me, and I went
back to Philadelphia and started out as usual with
his show. The Commonwealth had a good season
that year, and went clear into Canada, all the way by
water. While in Canada my brother and two or
three of the other performers bought Brussels carpet-
ing enough to carpet their houses in Philadelphia.
A few days before they were ready to come back into
the United States they had the carpeting cut into
strips the length of a room and loosely sewed together.
These carpets were then put down in the ring two or
three times for the men to tumble on. When the
customs officers were examining the belongings of
the show they were told that the carpets were a part
of the r^ular circus paraphernalia carried for the use
of the performers, and they passed them duty free.
As soon as the show was in the United States the
carpets were brushed up and carefully put away until
such time as their owners got ready to have them laid
in Philadelphia.

In the spring of 1875 W. W. Cole bought my cage
of lions from Pogey O'Brien, and I was sold along
with the lions. That is, it was a part of the bargain
that I was to go to Cole when the lions did, perform
them, superintend his menagerie, and train his ele-
phants. Besides the lions, Pogey sold him four
other cages of animals, an elephant, and a miscella-
neous collection of parade wagons and circus equip-
ment. With one man to help me care for the animals
I started for the South.

At New Orleans we were met by Oscar Hyatt, an

agent of Cole's, who told us that Cole and the show
6 79

THE WAYS OF THE CmCUS

were at Galveston and we were to join it there. I
found that Hyatt had engaged transportation for us
on a steamer called the Gussie^ belonging to the
Morgan line. The five cages of animals were lashed
to the upper deck, the wajgons put down in the hold,
while I, with my helper and Queen Anne, the elephant,
were put into the steerage. Among other freight
on board there was a lot of flour in barrels, and the
captain had the deck hands pile a lot of the barrels
up round Queen Anne so that they made a sort of
box stall which separated her from the emigrants.

When the boat was ready to cast off Hyatt handed
me a dollar and a half to pay for meals, explaining
that he could give me no more, as he was broke;
wished me good lock and promptly disappeared. As
it was a three-day trip it did not look as though we
would live very high, but I foimd the captain was
interested in the animals, so each day when I went up
to care for them I gave a little performance for his
benefit, and as a result had a stateroom and all I
wanted to eat.

I was wakened in the middle of the second night by
an uproar in the steerage, and knew by the soimd that
Queen Anne was in some way involved, and I hurried
down to see what was the matter. Much to my
astonishment, the first thing I could distinguish in the
almost total darkness were groups of white figures
huddled in every available comer. Seemingly the
emigrants had suddenly been turned into ghosts.

The explanation of the mystery was soon found.
Queen Anne had broken open some of the barrels and
.tried to eat the flour. The moistiure in her trunk had

80

WANDERINGS BY RIVER, LAND, AND SEA

made a sticky paste of it, which soon became uncom-
fortable, and in her attempt to clear it out she had not
only created a panic among the emigrants, but covered
them with flour as well. Apparently she enjoyed the
commotion, for when I got to her she was still amusing
herself by filling her trunk with flour and blowing it
all over the foreigners, I soon put a stop to her fun,
and after some difficulty got the steerage calmed
down.

We reached Galveston at nine o'clock at night. I
had never been there before, had never seen Cole,
and there was no one to meet me. I went ashore
and learned, on inquiry, that the show was some
distance out of the town, on the beach. I finally
found it, and on asking for Mr. Cole had a tall, sad,
scholarly-looking man pointed out to me. I intro-
duced myself, and after greeting me good-naturedly,
and asking about the things in my care, he turned me
over to Al Richards, another of his agents. Richards
went back to the boat with me and we got the stuff
off and out to the show, and then he took me into the
town and put me up at a hotel. I was dead tired,
but I had scarcely blown out my candle before I felt
something that induced me to strike a light. I saw
quite enough to convince me that I could sleep better
elsewhere. I dressed again as quickly as possible
and made my way back to the show on the beach,
and slept the rest of the night in the band wagon.
The next day I told Cole of my experience. He was
indignant, and gave Richards a stiff laying out for it,
and as a result I was furnished with first-class hotel
accommodations.

THE WAYS OF THE CmCUS

We started out that season from Galveston billed
as W. W. Cole's New York and New Orleans Circus
and Menagerie. Cole was a pioneer in the art of
using great quantities of printer's ink in advertising
a show, and he was also one of the first — ^if not the
first — ^to use lithographed posters, and led all his com-
petitors by putting up 100-sheet bills to advertise
his attractions.

In those days towns were not equipped with perma-
nent billboards, aa now, and the owner of a show not
only had to provide advertising matter, but he must
have built in each town a board to display it. Cole's
billboard announcements never belittled his show or
failed to attract a large amount of attention, which
sometimes reacted unpleasantly. Such was the case
with his much-advertised stuflFed whale, which drew
heavily until the public discovered that it was simply
a clever fake made of papier-mach6. This knowledge
created so much resentment that, in order to show
again another season in the r^on where the whale
had been exhibited. Cole had to change the name and
appearance of the show, and in some towns suppress
certain acts, for if the people had realized that it was
the same show they would have wrecked the whole
outfit.

Before going on the road with Cole I had traveled
only with a wagon show, but when we started out
from Galveston we went by rail. Though it was a
decided improvement over wagon travel, it was far
from being what it is to-day. We had no cars of our
own, no sleepers, no through trains. The roads were
not of uniform gauge and each junction point meant

WANDERmCS BY RIVER, LAND, AND SEA

the changing of all our stuff from one train to another.
Frequently we were routed out twice in one night
to make a shift, but even under such difficulties there
were more opportunities to sleep than with a wagon
show. We carried planks which we laid along on top
of the seat backs, making a platform on which to
spread our beds. •

If there was not room for all on this platform, shorter
planks were laid on the cushions of two seats, bridging
the space between them, and some of the men crawled
into the little bunks thus formed.

At that time Texas still retained many of the rough
characteristics of the frontier. There were many
feuds in the state. Everyone carried firearms.
Shootings were frequent and accepted as a matter of
course. Amusements were few, and the coming of
the circus was an event which brought men and their
families into the towns from miles away. Many of
them came in a day or two before the show and
camped on the outskirts of the town imtil after the
show had left. Some of them pitched tents, while
others lived in the big covered wagons in which they
came. A man with his wife and children had come
into one of the towns not far from Dallas in such a
wagon, and spent the night near the courthouse.
Being a party to a feud, he never went even for a few
steps without a weapon in his hands. As he got out
of his wagon in the morning to go with his family to
see the show imload, he reached for his double-
barreled shotgim, and in some way accidentally fired
both barrels, the two charges taking the top of his
head off. As I went up into the town from the rail-

83

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

road I saw his body lying alongside his wagon» with
his family and a lot of curious people standing aroxmd.
Later in the forenoon it was taken over to the under-
taker's and cared for. In the afternoon the widow
and the children came to the show. She was over-
heard telling some acquaintance:

"I reckon how Henry he's dead an I've had him
fixed up an' I kain't do no more fur him, and the
children an, I cum all the way in f er to see the show
an' I allow we mought jes as well see it."

It was also in a Texas town that I was arrested and
came very near getting a five-year sentence. Coming
one day into the menagerie from the dressing room, I
saw an excited crowd gathered round one of my men.
I walked over and asked him what was the matter.

"A woman dropped a quarter in the sawdust here.
She can't find it and so she says I stole it/' he explained.

"If you haven't touched her money, why don't you
go on about your business," I asked.

"Because," he answered, pointing to a big, husky
fellow standing beside him with a pair of forty-fives
on his belt, "the marshal has arrested me."

"If you found some money and just picked it up,
not knowing who it belonged to, they can't arrest you
for that," I told him.

"Yes, I can; and if you say that again I'll arrest
you, too," the marshal snapped at me.

"Well, I'm an American citizen, and I guess I can
say it if I want to," I replied.

At this he made a grab for me and caught me by
the lapel of the coat. I twitched away from him,
and as I did so a big pin stuck in the under side of the

WANDERINGS BY RIVER, LAND, AND SEA

lapel caught his finger and cut a deep gash the whole
length of it. He promptly put me under arrest, took
me into the town, and locked me up on a charge of
attacking him with a knife.

After he went out I sat down to think things over
and the more I thought the more I realized I was in
a pretty ticklish predicament. If convicted of the
charge I might be sentenced to as much as five years
in state's prison. The local court would never accept
the word of any of the "damned Yankee showmen,"
while, on the other hand, I knew the marshal's
friends woiild, any niunber of them, swear to any sort
of a story that he wanted them to. I did not have
long to think it over, however, before a couple of
men who looked like walking arsenals came in. They
told me I was "too nice'* a fellow to be locked up in
a cell, so they were going to let me out to see the
town, but they would go along to guard me. While
I accepted the invitation with the best grace I could
muster, I woiild have mugh preferred to stay in the
eeU.

I quickly discovered that instead of showing the
town to me that they were going to show me to the
town. Entering the first saloon we came to, they
b^an drinking heavily and wanted I should. I
managed to refuse what they offered me without
giving offense, but of course I could not prevent their
boasting loudly to the crowd, "WeVe got the lion
tamer here," nor their invitation for all hands to
"Come on up and take a look at the lion tamer."
This sort of thing was repeated in every saloon in
the town. As we went from place to place they gave

85

Digitized by

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

me repeated opportunities to slip them and even
suggested my running away, saying:

"You're a nice fellow. You don't ought to be
arrested. Now we won't look and you can jest git
round the comer quickly."

As I felt very certain they were trying to provide
an excuse for filling me full of holes, I stuck as closely
to them as possible. This sort of thing was kept up
all the afternoon, my escorts becoming dnmker and
drunker and my nervousness increasing in proportion.

Meanwhile Cole was doing all he could to get me
discharged, and finally, just at night, he came and
told me he had succeeded in having the case settled
by my being fined fifty dollars, which simi he had
advanced for me. It was a pretty expensive pin
scratch, but nevertheless I considered I was getting
out of a bad mess cheaply.

In those days it was no imcommon thing in Texas
for some fellow to walk up to the entrance to the tent
and, shaking a pair of big pistols in the face of the
door tender, say, "Them's my pass." A ticket col-
lector was never known to question such a pass, nor
was the possessor of it disturbed unless he was foolish
enough to linger aroimd alone after we began to
pack up at night. If he did the chances were that
the next morning found him sorer and with consid-
erable more knowledge of circus ways.

I have reason to remember an experience with
such a chap in a town not far from Dallas. "Uncle
Henry'* was with the show, and on this particular
afternoon he was tending door. The show had com-
menced. I was not busy for the minute, and had

WANDERINGS BY RIVER, LAND, AND SEA

strolled over for a little visit with "Uncle Henry."
I had been there but a few minutes when a great
six-foot Texan in a pair of high-heeled boots came
up and started to go into the show. "Uncle Henry"
stopped him and asked for his ticket, and found that
he had none. He then explained firmly but politely
that in order to go in he must have a ticket or pay
him the money. At this the Texan became very
angry and pulled out a big pistol which he flom*ished
around in front of "Uncle Henry's" face, saying, "I

will go in, you gray-haired Yankee

Just at that point I hit him with all my strength
under the jaw, and he dropped to the ground like a
log and lay without moving. My arm fell to my
side, limp and useless. I thought at first I had
broken it, but found I had not. For three days I
could not use it; then gradually the use came back,
and as it did so a small bunch began to form on the
top of my shoulder joint. It has slowly increased
in size all the years since, until now it is nearly as
large as a man's fist. The doctors tell me that I hit
witii such force that I burst the sac which holds the
synovial fluid and that it has been leaking ever since.
A surgeon in Philadelphia tried to have me let him
operate on it, but, as it gives me no particular trouble,
I did not.

Fortimately some of the Texan's friends carried
him away before he came to. It was a good thing
for me that they did, for if he had not been knocked
out or had come to at once he would probably have
shot me on the spot.

Some fifty miles outside San Antonio, at a small

87

Digitized by

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

town in which we showed, there lived a sheri£F by
the name of Allison, who had a wide reputation as
a gunman. When he was sufficiently dnmk his
favorite amiisement was to find a preacher or lecturer
about the town, draw his pistols, and make him
dance.

"Dance, you — — * — ^, you! Dance,"

he woiild say, at the same time making the bullets
patter aroimd his heels.

He became very much mterested in the show and
followed us to the next town, explaining that he did
not have a "chance to see it right" in his own town
and wanted to see it again and see if there woiildn't
be some excitement.

After the performance had got well started one
of our men discovered some toughs on one of the top
seats, cutting the canvas. He did not dare to speak
to them about it, but found Allison and asked him
if he could stop it.

"Yes, you bet Fll stop 'em for yer," he said, and
walked up to where they were.

When he told them to quit cutting the canvas one
of the toughs started to reach for his gun, but before
he coiild get it out Allison had fired twice and the
fellow slid down between the seats to the ground,
dead. One of the shots had passed on out through
the canvas and hit a fellow in the knee, and he had
to go to the hospital.

The local sheri£F arrested Allison, but at once let
him go again, and I don't believe anything was ever
done about it. The affair happened just when a
horse was going into the ring and the clown was

88

WANDERINGS BY RIVER, LAND, AND SEA

cracking jokes, but there was no excitement and only
those few who saw it knew anything about it until
afterward.

Allison himself later on was shot in a theater in
San Antonio. He and the proprietor of the theater
had at one time been very intimate friends, but some-
thing had happened to make them the bitterest of
enemies. Afterward a supposed reconciUation had
been effected and Allison was invited into San Antonio
to "bury the hatchet.*' He was received and enter-
tained with apparent cordiality. In the evening he
was taken to the theater and given a good seat.
Soon after the play b^an, and while the proprietor
was standing near, two gunmen, who had been put
there for the purpose, opened fire on him. He was
fatally hurt at the first volley, but did not die before
he had been able to draw his own pistol and kill his
one-time friend and one of the gunmen.

At first Texas officials welcomed the traveling show
and charged it a small license fee. But as soon as
the shows became large and gathered in a lot of
money at each stand this policy was changed and the
license fee placed at a thousand dollars per town,
which was an almost prohibitive figiu-e in those days.
Cole tried his best to have the fee reduced, but with
no success. Finally he decided to try and beat it.
No license was required to exhibit a menagerie or
give a show to which the admission was free. So
in the large towns where he did a big business Cole
paid the license, but in the small towns he sold tickets
to the menagerie, and all who cared to were free to
go from the menagerie into the show. This scheme

88

THE WAYS OF THE CmCUS

worked fairly well for a while, and he thought it was
going to be a success imtil he heard in some way that
the state officials were keeping tab on him and plan-
ning to collect every dollar of license money he had
dodged before he left the state, or attach his show.

Instead of promptly paying up or attempting to
get out of the state. Cole, when he heard of it, started
in and billed Denison, a town near the state line,
more extensively than usual, and coolly continued
his itinerary. The state officers made no move, since
they planned to either get his money or hold the show
when he was ready to leave Denison. When the
train carrying the show reached Denison the night
before it was to appear there, it failed to stop, but
kept right on at full speed into Indian Territory.
The next day a big crowd in Denison swore all sorts
of things at Cole and his show. One of his agents
went around early in the morning and paid for the
supplies which had been contracted for, and then
got out of the town as unobtrusively and quickly as
possible. Of course the officers who were so confi-
dent of gathering in the unpaid licenses were terribly
chagrined, but in the end they won, for Cole was
obliged to settle up with them before he could come
into the state again.

Quite a niunber of years later I was with the Bar-
num & Bailey show when it got the best of a Texas
town which attempted to get a big fee out of it. The
city government had placed the license high, and
then asked five himdred dollars more for the privil^e
of parading. When Mr. Bailey found this out he
was so provoked that he hired a spot just outside

90

WANDERINGS BY RIVER, LAND, AND SEA

the borough limits and set the show up there, sending
riders through the town to announce that there
would be no parade in the town, but it would be
given on the show grounds. The crowd came out
to the groxmds and we made parade, and went aroxmd
the grounds for it. The city fathers were so upset
at being beaten that they threatened to arrest any
member of the show who came inside the borough
limits, and everyone connected with the show was
warned by the foremen and superintendents to keep
out of the town. Everyone obeyed except an
Englishman by the name of Marvin, who was head
property man and looked after the ballet girls. He
scoffed at the idea of being arrested if one had not
done anything to warrant it, and went boldly into
the place after the afternoon performance. He was
promptly arrested and locked up on a charge of being
a pickpocket. There was not the slightest ground
for such a charge, and as a matter of fact he was so
big and clumsy that he could not have lifted a
leather" from a table successfully, let alone a pocket,
yet, absurd as the charge was, he had to furnish a
bond for one thousand dollars to appear for trial in
the fall before they would let him go. The fact that
he must go back and stand trial on a false charge in
the fall, and the possibility that he might be con-
victed and given a heavy sentence, so worried him
and preyed on his mind that he began to run djwn,
and before the season was over he died.

My next experience with river travel came after I
had been several years with the Cole show. We had
finished our regular summer season and got back to

91

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

New Orleans when Cole decided to try a winter tour
in the South. He bought a big stem-wheel cotton
and passenger boat and fitted it up for the show people
and the horses, and a barge on which he put the
menagerie, and towed it by the side of the steamer.
The women and the best performers had staterooms,
while the rest of the show slept on cots set up in the
cabins like beds in a ward.

We started out from New Orleans, bound up the
Mississippi River. At a few of the larger towns we
stopped two and three days, but most of tiie stops
were one-day stands. These were more profitable,
for where we stopped for two days the people were
so leisurely in their manner of attending the show
that often we sold no more tickets in the two or three
days than we would in one day where the people
must see the show at one of two performances or not
at all. We also made side trips up some of the bayous
among the great plantations. People would come
in to the towns where we were billed to stop from
many miles away, and live in tents and wagons from
two or three days to a week. It was a r^on where
feuds were common and parties to one usuaUy con-
sidered the coming of the circus a good time to ''look
for their man.'*

The planters were a tough set, especially if they
had been drinking. I used to be bothered a lot by
their going in back of the cages to drink and treat
one another. Almost without exception they carried
a big bottle of whisky "on their hip," and each one
thought his particular brand was the best.

"Mine's best^ You try mine and I'll try yoiuti,"

WANDERINGS BY RIVER, LAND, AND SEA

I used to hear them say, and when the fires of friend-
ship b^an to glow:

"Bill ril stick teryer! FU stick teryer! No matter
whether yer right or wrong, I'll stidc ter yer," and
similar vows of alliance both offensive and defensive.
It was not imusual to clean up two or three bushels
of whisky bottles behind the cages after a show.

It was not possible for Cole to run his boat as far
up the bayous as he wanted to, so he hired flatboats
and transferred the show to them, and was towed
up, changing to the steamer again on his way back.
In one of the stops away up on Bayou Teche we tried
to get some tea or coffee to drink, but we could not
find any.

"We *ain't got no tea nor coffee. All we got is
^orange-blossom tea,'" they told us.

We tried the "orange-blossom" tea, but found it
bitter as gall. The people were no pleasanter than
the tea, for in the evening they sat in the show and
shot the lights out, explaining that they wanted to let

the "Yankee " know they were "after

them," which might have been good fun enough for
them, but was mighty uncomfortable for us. It was
on the same bayou that we were shot up again one
night. We had got everything on board and were
just b^inning to move out. "Pop" Fitch sat imder
a light, counting up his receipts, when all of a sudden
the light was shot out over his head. We all ducked
on to the deck, and it was lucky we did, for another
lot of bullets came singing across the boat, and there
was more or less shooting at us imtil we were out of
range.

98

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

At that time pedestrianism was a great fad in the
United States, and all kinds of walking stunts were
very popular. Every show had some kind of a walk-
ing act. We had for an expert walker an Irishman
by the name of Pat O'Hara. He was a big, lanky
fellow over six feet tall, and he certainly could walk.
His act was divided into two parts — a race against
a horse and a race against an elephant. He would
walk half the way aroimd the hippodrome track while
a horse trotted the whole distance. Then I woidd
appear mounted on a mustang, driving an elephant. .
By the time we were halfway round the track he
was in the lead, and then he would tiun and walk
backward the rest of the way, occasionally thumbing
bis nose at me and always arousing great enthusiasm
on the bleachers. About twice or three times a
season we were able to overtake Pat. These were
the times when Pat had been having a "drap." He
was always very repentant after these periods, and
often told me confidentially that he was siu'e it was
the "curse of God on him."

Pat was a thrifty soul and never willingly neglected
an opportimity to add to his dollars. Besides his act
he sold fake jewelry, and tickets to the concert. The
farther up tie Bayou Teche we went the rougher
seemed the people, imtil one day, when we still had
another town to make around a big bend, Al
Bichards said he would not risk setting up a candy
stand and was not going there. Pat heard of it and
went to Richards and made a trade with him for the
privilege of selling in that town. Richards readily
consented. Pat told him all he wanted was his

WANDERINGS BY RIVER, LAND, AND SEA

"jacks," oilcloth, and some stock. He could find
boards to spread on the jacks when he got there.
We supposed that Pat would go along with us on the
boat, but after his act at night he surprised us all
by saying he was going to take his things and "just
step over to that place." "Stepping over" meant a
walk of some twenty mfles, but Fat took an assort-
ment of his fake jewelry, a lot of candy, sheets of
gingerbread, and the two "jacks," and off he trudged.
The next morning when we reached the show groimds
the first thing we saw was the smiling face of Pat as
he stood behind a big bench, doing a flourishing
business.

Pat was always "just stepping over" to some place,
and nearly always it brought him returns. We were
out in Denver once, and Pat "just stepped over" on
the quiet to a landmark in the distance, and found
out how far it was and how long it would take him to
go to it. The next morning as he sat around the
hotel he offered to bet some of the townsmen that
he could walk to the landmark and back in a certain
length of time. They, supposing tl^at he, like all
strangers, was being deceived in his judgment of
distances by the clear air and the apparent nearness
of distant objects, put up generous stuns, which Pat
easily won. Almost every Sxmday Pat challenged
some of the local walkers in whatever town we hap-
pened to be in for a footrace. Pat invariably won,
helping both his reputation and his pocketbook.
When we were in Shreveport there were a great nima-
ber of bales of cotton on the dock. Pat put up a

himdred dollars that he could pick up and carry a
7 95

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

bale of cotton. There were a number eager to take
his bet. When the time came to make the test Pat
stood a bale endwise on another; then he backed up
to it and, with a pair of hooks, took hold of it well
down on the sides, bent over, and walked oflf with
the bale on his back, easily winning his wager. After
Pat had shown them how, any of the roustabouts
around the dock could do it.

Whatever Pat started he put through. Two years
later he quit the show and went to Leadville, Colorado,
where he opened a twenty-five, fifty, and seventy-five
cent store. After he was there a few years he was
made sheriflF of Leadville, but even then he con-
tinued to walk and, scorning the use of a horse, just
stepped over*' after his man.

Just where the Red River turns into the Mississippi,
as we were roimding a point, our flatboat ran upon
a snag. The monkey cage got loose and slid into
the river, but we were quick enough to get a hook
on it before it went under, and saved the cage, with
the rear wheels. The kingbolt pulled out and let
the front wheels drop to the bottom of the river, and
in spite of all our dragging with hooks we could not
find them and had to leave them there. Our diflS-
cidty furnished a good deal of fim for the natives,
and they nicknamed the point "Monkey Point,"
and the last I knew it was still called that.

At Shreveport we "billed in'* on an old townsman
of mine, John Robinson. A show "bills in" on
another when it follows that show in a town^ with
only a few days between the two. It is good strat^y
for the showman who is "billing in" to "put up"

96

WANDERINGS BY RIVER, LAND, AND SEA

the most "paper," for the pubKc is apt to conclude
that the man who has the largest display on the bill-
boards must also have the biggest and best circus.
Cole was noted for his advertising, and Shreveport
got a billboard a htmdred feet long, as high as the
second-story windows, with plenty of advice to
"wait for the big show."

John Robinson's home was on the comer of Sixth
and Vine Streets in Cincinnati, my native place. He
was said to have told the men who built it that he
wanted it "all red and gold like a damn pretty circus
wagon." He made his headquarters in Cincinnati and
owned a lot of theater property besides his circus.
Among other property he owned "Robinson's Opera
House, " which was the scene of a fatal panic once. A
show was going on, with the house packed to the limit.
Some thieves, in order to make an opportimity to
rob, started a cry of fire. In the rush to get out the
galleries broke down and many people were crushed
to death. He was the grandfather of the men who
are now traveling with a Robinson's Circus, and his
was the first show by that name. It was a wagon
show, which never traveled in the North, and until
about 'seventy-five was the show of the South. Every
darky below Cincinnati swore by John Robinson's
circus.

Robinson was a great character, a typical showman
of the old school, and a whole show in himself. He
had a long white beard and always wore a wide-
brimmed soft hat. His winter quarters were in
a big bam in Cinciimati. One day while he was
propped up against the bar in the Bumett House,

97

THE WAYS OF TH]E CIRCUS

stirring the sugar in his bitters, a panic-stricken
messenger brought word that a lion was loose, and
lu-ging him to come in haste to the rescue. He
finished dissolving the sugar in his glass and, bidding
the bartender to guard his toddy, wended his way
to the stable, where he found a frightened crowd,
through which he pushed his way with the query:
" Whar's your dam^ lion?''

He was assured that the raging beast was inside,
devouring the other animals. Opening the door, he
went in alone and unarmed to find a rather bewildered
king of beasts blinking in the half light. Taking Mr.
lion by the tail, he kicked him back into his cage,
bolted the sliding door which a careless hand had
left partly open, and went serenely back to the
Burnett to finish his dram.

At the time of which I am speaking he could not
go into Texas with his show, because some years
before, in a Texan town, he and his men had shot
into a crowd with which they were having trouble.
They used to tell a story about old John being chal-
lenged to a duel. It seems that he had ruffled some
one to such an extent that he sent a challenge to
fight. When John got the challenge he read it over,
looked at the bearer quizzically out the comer of
his eye, changed his quid from one side of his mouth
to the other, and said:

"Yes, , you tell him I'll fight. An' what's

more, you tell him I choose axes for wepins."

That ended the duel, for the challenger backed out.

We reached Helena, Arkansas, one morning just
as the day was breaking. The r^ular passenger

WANDERINGS BY RIVER, LAND, AND SEA

boat up the river had made its stop and gone an hour
or more before. As we started up the hill from the
river into the town one of the first things we saw was
a dead man lying by the side of the street. We
left him alone/ and went on about our biisiness. As
soon as the town woke up it blamed the show for the
murder and arrested two or rhree of our men. Cole
got them clear after some delay and diflSeulty. Months
after, the truth of the matter came to light. The
responsibility for the murder was placed on the
mayor of Helena and eventually he was himg for it.

It developed at the trial that the mayor owed the
miuxlered man a large sum of money. It was also
charged that he was overfond of the mayor's wife.
Whether she was equally fond of him did not appear,
but it was proven that he had received what he
believed to be a note from her, asking him to come to
Helena on that particular morning and boat, which
he did. As the passengers had gone up the hill in
the dark from the boat, they were looked over by a
gang of toughs who allowed everyone to pass without
question except this man. He was detained, and a
short time after his body was found by us. The
evidence showed that the mayor had hired the gang
to murder the man and the mayor had planned to
have it done at that particiilar time, thinking he
could shift the blame on to the circus.

When we left Helena the show was billed for' five
weeks and the agents were still "putting up paper."
A few nights later Cole called the whole show together
after the performance, and without any explanation
paid off everyone that woiild not be needed in the

90

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

winter quarters. The only thing he told them was
that the show had closed for the season and that in
about an hour two packet boats would stop, one
boiuid for New Orleans and the other for Memphis,
and they could take their choice as to which place
they went. Many of the show people had so little
due them that they had to borrow from their friends
in order to get to either Memphis or New Orleans.
As I had charge of the menagerie, I stayed on, and
the next day I found the explanation of the sudden
end of the season. That year there was an unusual
crop of cotton and it was bringing high prices. Every-
one was anxious to get his crop into market as soon
as possible. The boats could not begin to carry it
as fast as it was ready to be shipped, and sometimes
a man had to wait for weeks before his cotton would
be taken oflf the dock. Near this town lived a very
large planter who had a great deal of cotton which
he was anxious to ship, but saw no immediate
prospect of doing it by the r^ular river boats.
He had oflFered to buy the boat and barge and
would give Cole such a price in cash for it that he
accepted the oflfer.

We put all our things ashore the next day and
turned over the boat to its new owner. It was
several days before a freight boat came up the river,
but when one did we loaded all our stuff on board
and went up to Memphis. There we put the menag-
erie in a cotton shed and spent the rest of the winter.
The trip to Memphis on the freight boat was the last
of my travel by river with a circus.

I went to sea for the first time with the Cole show

100

WANDERINGS BY RIVER, LAND, AND SEA

in 1880. We safled from San Francisco on the
steamer Ciiy of Sydney ^ boimd for New Zealand and
Australia. I had eighteen cages of animals and
several elephants. I supposed that, because I was
so much on the river as a boy and had traveled on
rivers and canals a good deal, I woiild not be seasick,
and when some of our company b^an to show signs
of it before we got outside the Golden Gate I made
sport of them. It was not long, however, before I
fully sympathized with them. Inside the Gate the
water was somewhat rough and choppy. Outside
it was smooth as glass, but, oh! those swells! With
one exception, everybody belonging to the show was
desperately sick. The exception was "Woody"
Cooke, a gymnast and rider, and he had been so
drunk in San Francisco that it was necessary to carry
him on board. He had so far sobered up by the
time the rest of us were b^inning to feel as though
we were dying, that he plagued us immercifully by
repeatedly coming around with a big bottle of whisky
and a glass and saying: "Jest have a little whisky.
It 'II be good for you. It 'U settle your stomach."
The only reason he was not killed was because no
one could stop to do it. We had with us a band of
Ymna Indians led by Dick Deadeye. There was
a squaw among them called Indian Mary. Indian
Mary was just as sick as all the rest of us, and as she
lay in her bunk some one asked her, "What's the
matter, Mary?" Slowly she rolled her eyes and
answered, "Too, too, too much water," and for quite
a while we all agreed with Mary that there was "too
much" water.

»or a port ^ ,K„ Z,. T" '"r"'" ""e slings

«"■! they ,X «° <'-"™

with hZL "r^''"^:>"r'™«w«™p<inw

'«ho« for the iiS,t b?t r

the W^. „ho w.^ . ^eZ; irpir;,''^,
for COUB m the sh,.rk.infested water, and for the S

102

WANDERINGS BY RIVER, LAND, AND SEA

time I saw the crew of a whaler cutting up a thirly-
five-foot whale.

From Honoliilu we went directly to Auckland,
New Zealand, without a stop, which at the time was
said to be a record run. It took us a month. We
stopped in Auckland two weeks. One week was
spent in making repairs, getting the animals in shape,
etc.; the second week we showed all the week to
enthusiastic crowds. The first day I was ashore I
sent a man down into the town to buy some com to
feed the animals. He came back and reported that
he had been everywhere and there was not a pound
in the place. I was considerably puzzled to know
what I was going to do. An Englishman who over-
heard me talking about it said to me, Send your man
back and let him ask for maize." I did, and he
brought me all the com I wanted, and more, too.

Out in the harbor was a little island on which was
a sort of park and recreation place. We went out to
it often diuring the two weeks, and bought for a six-
pence great servings of the most wonderful, big
luscious strawberries covered with cream. In the
water of the harbor was a peciiliar species of snail
with a hard head which resembled a cat's eye. These
heads were often set in rings and other sorts of jewelry
in place of stones. I gathered and brought away
with me a quart of them. Some I afterward had
set and tl^e rest I gave away.

While on the City of Sydney I ate at the same table
with the mate and consequently got well acquainted
with him. One day he said to me, "When you leave
us at Auckland and start to travel around the islands,

103

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

how are you going to load and unload your elephants?"
At San Francisco I had driven them up a gangplank
on to the deck of the City of Sydney^ and it had not
occurred to me but what I could the same thing
wherever I went> and I told him so. He smiled and
went on to explain to me that the boats I would be
obliged to travel on woiild be small and that it would
not be possible to drive them on board. After leav-
ing me to wonder for a little what I was going to do,
he told me of his experience loading and unloading
elephants in India and Africa, and how I would have
to swing them on and off the boats with a sling and
tackle rigged to the mast. This was new business
to me and I was anxious to get all the benefit of the
mate's experience I could. I had a big horn-shaped
meerschaum pipe at the time, which the mate had
often admired, and so I told him if he would make
me a sling for the elephants I would give him the
pipe. He was more than glad to do it, and not only
made a nice one, but showed me just how to use it.
In some way the captain found out about it, and
because he envied the pipe or for some other reason
forbade the mate to give me the sling. So the mate
came to me and told me about it, but said I shoiild
have the sling, anyhow, and told me just what to do.
I followed his directions exactly. On the day the
CUy of Sydney sailed from Auckland I hired some of
the natives to row me out in the harbor near where
the ship would pass, and as soon as she did pass to
row after her as fast as they could. The mate was
as good as his word, for the ship did not get more
than a quarter of a mile ahead of us before I saw

104

WANDERINGS BY RIVER, LAND, AND SEA

something splash into the water, and when we came
up to it f oimd the sling all nicely tied up and afloat.

When we went to leave Auckland I realized how
great a kindness the mate had done me, for there
came steaming up to the dock a little boat called the
Rodymahamay which it woiild have been impossible
to have driven the elephants on board of. The crew
got a rigging ready and I led an elephant out on the
dock and adjusted the sling, the elephant standing
perfectly still for me to do it. When all was ready I
gave the word. The steam winch started up with
a rapid chug and away went the elephant swinging
through the air, kicking and yelling for all that was
in him. The rest went the same way, and we chained
them to the coal bimkers. When we reached the
first stop and wanted to take them out it was a differ-
ent matter entirely. They knew what the sling
meant, and as soon as they saw it they began to
squeal, and it was a lively time we had down in those
cramped quarters getting the sling on to those ele-
phants to swing them out on the dock. After a while
we did it; but we had an even worse time the second
time we put them on board, for they made so much
fuss that I had to put ringbolts in the floor of the
dock and fasten all four feet of each one before I
could get the sling on, and I had the same trouble
every time we loaded or imloaded them imtil the time
came to put them aboard the City of Sydney again,
to come back to the United States. As soon as the
elephants saw the boat they remembered it and went
up the gangplank almost at a gallop.

From Auckland we went aroimd both of the New

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

Zealand islands, stopping at the principal places, such
as Napier, Christchurch, Timaru, Omaru, Dunedin,
Invercargill, the last stop on the islands being at
Wellington.

I shall never forget the flies of Wellington. They
were small, but in great quantities, and stuck to you
so tightly that you could not brush them off. You
had to wipe them off. Everyone wore a cover of
fly netting over his head. It was at Wellington, too,
that Cole tried to improve on native methods, with-
out much success. He was having the boat loaded
by a lot of native stevedores in charge of a big colored
fellow. Every fifteen or twenty minutes the boss
stevedore woidd call out, "Smoko!" and every man
would drop whatever he was carrying, and all sit
down in a row and eat a bit of bread and cheese.
There was an old man on the dock with a barrel of
ale on a truck, and each time they stopped he would
trundle the truck along past the row of men, and each
one would have a swallow or two. After a few min-
utes the boss would call them back to work again.
Cole was in a hurry to get loaded and off, and as the
hours slipped away the alternate and nearly equal
periods of work and play got on his nerves, and, con-
trary to the captain's advice, he put a lot of his own
men to work loading. They had no sooner started
in than the native stevedores struck and b^an ston-
ing Cole's men. Here was a mess, indeed, and it
was not long before Cole promised the captain he
would stop his men and keep them on the boat if he
could get the natives to begin work again. The
captain undertook it, and was finally successful, but

106

WANDERINGS BY RIVER, LAND, AND SEA

only after a long palaver in which he said that Cole
did not know any better and was only trying to help.
When we at last got loaded and started we were ten
hours late.

From New Zealand we went to Tasmania and
Australia, meeting everywhere with great enthusiasm
and doing a big business. In Melbourne we had the
time of our lives. The mayor gave the show the
freedom of the city and everyone seemed to exert
himself to give us a good time. An ex-prize fighter,
Jem Mace, ran a big hotel and boarding house, or,
as the people there called it, a "pub." It resembled
"Jim Crow" places in the South, in a way, for he
had one part of the establishment for toughs and
another for gentlemen. Besides running the place
he trained prize fighters. Jem got up a big reception
and dinner for the performers and heads of depart-
ments of the show. The invitations were by cards
and it was a big affair, with many of the principal
people of the city there. At that dinner we had
some of the most wonderful mutton I ever tasted in
my life. Mace became fascinated with the show and
wanted very much to join it, but Cole did not let him.
Some years afterward I saw Mace in the United
States with John L. Sullivan. It was in Melbourne,
too, that I first saw "shandygaff," a popular simimer
drink which was a mixture of beer and soda water.
There was just one thing which detracted from the
enjoyment of our stay in Melbourne, and that was
the river Yarra, which flows through the center of
the city and which I think without exception was the
dirtiest and worst-smelling stream I ever saw in my life.

107

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

Sydney was the largest and last city we visited. It
reminded me of New York City as it was the first
time I ever saw it. The principal thing which I
remember about Sydney is the beautiful harbor,
which I suppose is the finest in the world. It cer-
tainly seemed so to me then.

We sailed from Sydney for San Francisco in the
early spring of 1881, on the same boat we had gone
out on in the fall before. At Honolulu we put into
the harbor for a few hours' stop. The captain
inquired of those who came out to the ship if there
was any sickness in the islands, and was told that
there was not. I needed fish to feed some of my
animals and went ashore to find some. Among the
first things I saw were yellow flags flying from various
houses, and learned they were having an epidemic of
smallpox. I foimd some fish, however, and when I
questioned if they were fresh the salesman bit off
the heads of two or three to show me that they were.
I got back to the boat as soon as possible, and when I
told the captain about the smallpox he was not long
in weighing anchor and getting under way.

On the way home we had almost daily entertain-
ments on board. There happened to be a good deal
of talent among the passengers, aside from that con-
nected with the circus, and it was all rounded up and
took turns ftunishing amusement. One of the dis-
coveries that we made among the passengers was
Teddy Davis, a noted ventriloquist who always
aroused a deal of enthusiasm with his two dolls
"Tommy" and "Joey." But he did not confine
liimself to formal entertainments tQ furnish ijs with

108

WANDERINGS BY RIVER, LAND, AND SEA

many a laugh. It was not an uncommon thing to
see one of the ladies give a sudden frightened start
at what she thought was some one just behind her, or
for a panic to start among the women at table because
they thought they heard a mouse squeak under their
chairs. At such times Teddy Davis could always
be found not far away.

There were also on board a munber of very English
Englishmen who were considerably annoyed to be
traveling on the same boat with a circus. All of
them had bought elaborate wicker steamer chairs,
and their dislike of the circus was not decreased by
frequently finding some member of the circus stretched
out in one. One Englishman especially was very
much annoyed, but was too proud to speak to any
member of the circus whom he foimd in his chair and
ask him to get out. As a result different members
of the circus frequently lay in the chair and enjoyed
watching his anger rise as he paced up and down,
waiting for them to get out. At last he plotted a
deep and dark revenge on the circus people. At a
moment when the part of the deck where the chairs
were was deserted he quickly threw a dozen or fifteen
of them overboard. Of course, as soon as the owners
of the chairs came to use them there was a great
commotion, and, as the Englishman had planned, the
circus people were at once suspected. The matter
was brought to the attention of the captain, who
b^an an immediate investigation; but just as it
looked as though the Englishman might succeed with
his design a member of the crew came forward and
testified that he had been on duty as "'lookout,'' and

109

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

from his place in the "crow's nest had watched the
Englishman throw the chairs overboard. So "me
lord," very much chagrined and humbled, had to
pay for the chairs.

It was early in the day when we sailed into the
Golden Gate, and everyone was more than anxious
to get ashore, and all expected to inside a few hours,
but the anchor chain had hardly commenced to rattle
through the hawse hole when a boat with a quaran-
tine officer ran alongside and the doctor shouted to
the captain, "Did you stop at Honolulu?"

"Yes."

"Thirty days* quarantine."

"I haven't got a single case of sickness."

" Can't help it. Thirty days."

"But I've got a circus on board and we are short
of food for the animals."

"Never mind, I'll send out food so your animals
won't starve."

"Will you take some letters ashore?"

As the quarantine boat headed for the shore a great
wave of indignation and disappointment went over
the ship. To stay there on board that boat for
another thirty days in sight of the city seemed an
outrage. More than that, the show was billed to
exhibit in San Francisco in two weeks, and the animals
must be rested from their voyage and many of the
wagons and much of the equipment repaired and
painted.

In a few hours a lighter came out with supplies, but
it would allow none of us on board and would take no

No.

99

110

WANDERINGS BY RIVER, LAND, AND SEA

mail ashore. Cole had in San Francisco at the time
three agents, Louis Cooke, "Dafey" Gaylord, and
Charles Sivels. It was not long before they appeared
in a rowboat and Cole managed to drop a note down
to them. They read it and made for the city. Soon
they were back again, and, rowing up as near the
ship as they could, went through a lot of pantomime
to Cole, who threw them another note, and they went
back to the city. A third time they came out, made
signs, and got a note which Cole threw down to them,
but this time when they went back to the city they
stayed there.
At twelve o'clock that night we went ashore.

8

Digitized by

THE ELEPHANT PEOPLE

VITCH erf my first knowledge erf traimng dephants
I got from Stuart Craveai. Without any excep-
tion I consida> him the best all-round dephant man
thCTe €V& was in this country. I had beoi with
Pogey O'Brien for two or three years when Craven
came to O'Brien's winter quarters for the first time,
to train an elephant for him. He came three different
winters for the same purpose, and in helping and
watching him I {Hcked up a good many points.

Craven was a big, slim, rawboned fdlow, very
strong and very determined. He was the only man
I ever knew who could ride an elephant standing up.
In my younger days, when I was supple, I tried and
tried to learn the trick myself. I even arranged
ropes and one thing and another to steady me, but
no use. I never succeeded. One not familiar with
elephants, and thinking of their great size, might
wonder what there would be difficult about it. The
secret of the difficulty is that an elephant's skin is
loose and as soon as he b^ins to move the skin rolls
all roimd, giving a man a footing about as secure as
water; but in spite of this Stuart Craven would ride
clear roimd the ring balanced on one foot.

Craven once trained a troop of elephants for Cooper

Digitized by

THE ELEPHANT PEOPLE

& Bailey. Old Ad Forepaugh was so much 1;aken
with their act that he told Craven that if he would
train him a troop that could do as well he would pay
him as much as Cooper & Bailey did, and if he trained
them so they were better than Cooper & Bailey*s he
would give him a thousand dollars extra. So Craven
went to work, and he succeeded in training some that
were much better than the ones Cooper & Bailey
had. He turned them over to Forepaugh, who was
pleased enough with them, but when it came to paying
for them he refused to give Craven the extra thousand
dollars, claiming that the elephants were no better
than those of Cooper & Bailey.

Forepaugh and Craven had some hot words and
Craven went away without his thousand dollars,
but he had not given up. He waited imtil Fore-
paugh's show went out on the road. Then he em-
ployed a clever lawyer. The first thing they did
was to send some strangers to attend one or two of
Forepaugh's performances, and they came back and
reported that the showman was boasting to the public
how much better his elephants were and how much
more Hiey could do than those of Cooper & Bailey.
The next move of the lawyer was to go himself with
two or three witnesses to the show, and after the
performance was over they managed to get round to
where Forepaiigh was, engaged him in conversation,
and began to praise his elephants.

"Those are pretty fine elephants youVe got, Mr.
Forepaugh. TTieir act was simply great."

"Yes, you bet they are!" Forepaugh replied.
"They are 'nuff sight better than those things that

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

Cooper & Bafley have got, an* they ought to be, too,
for I paid good money to have them trained and I
paid a thousand dollars extra to be sure they were

This was all Craven's lawyer needed and it was not
very long before Forepaugh was obliged to hand over
the thousand dollars.

It was only the next winter, though, that Forepaugh
had to get Craven to help him out of trouble. Fore-
paugh had a big elephant by the name of Romeo,
which b^an to be ugly, and all his help got afraid
of him. Finally it got so that none of them dared
to go near him, not even to clean out his paddock,
and all his food and water had to be put down through
a hole in the floor over him. At last they got Craven
to come and see if he could do anything with Romeo.

Craven took a shotgim and went in where the
elephant was, and b^an to give him orders. The
elephant showed no disposition to pay any attention
to them, so Craven b^an to fill bis hide with buck-
shot. Romeo did not care much about this, either,
until one of the shots hit him in an eye. Then he
gave in and Craven could do anything he wanted with
him. Craven taught young George Forepaugh to
handle Romeo after that, and the Forepaughs had
him for a good many years longer.

Not long afterward Craven gave up handling
elephants, went South, and bought a great deal of
land. The last time I saw him was a number of
years later. He was very anxious for me to buy
a lot of his land and offered to let me have it for
twenty-five cents an acre.

better.'

THE ELEPHANT PEOPLE

I had only been with Pogey O'Brien's show a few
years when I trained my first elephant. She was
called Queen Anne, and at the time I took her in hand
she was about thirty-five years old, stood some seven
feet high, and weighed about four tons and a half.
When I went into the ring to perform her I had a
black-velvet suit, with gold stripes running down the
sides of the pants.

The first thing I taught her to do was to walk roimd
the ring nicely. After that I trained her to do what
we called the Spanish trot. Li teaching her this I
placed a man on either side of her with an elephant
hook, while I stood in front with my whip. As I
moved the whip they would hook into first one and
then the other of her l^s, and lift them up. In a
very short time she learned what we wanted and the
moving of the whip or a stick was all that was neces-
sary to make her lift her feet. After that had been
accomplished it was simply a matter of practice to
train her so that when I walked beside her and beat
time with my stick she would follow its motions with
her feet, lifting them high in the air. As we came
into the ring this way the band would strike up
"Coming Through the Rye," and to the spectators
it seemed as if the dephant was really dancing to
the music, but as a matter of fact the music was
being very carefully played to her dancing.

Ainother act which I taught her was to fake lame-
ness on first one foot and then another as I walked
her round the ring. The crowd on the benches
thought she was making the changes to suit herself,
but she was strictly following the cues I gave her by

115

Digitized by

THE WAYS OF THE CIBCUS

my position. If I walked just ahead of her she
would go lame in the right front foot. If I dropped
back a little by her left side she would go lame in
her left front foot; if farther back opposite her hip,
in her left hind foot; and if I walked behind her she
would go lame in her right hind foot. After doing
this I would tie a handkerchief round her ankle,
which she would untie and give back to me.

For a grand finish for the act, which usually brought
down the house, I had a strip of carpet brought and
laid on the ground. I would stretch myself on the
carpet, and then Queen Anne would walk over me
boti ways, straddle me lengthwise, and end by kneel-
ing down over me crosswise until she almost or quite
touched me. In teaching her this part of the act I
at first used a dummy, then after she had become
accustomed to doing it I lay down myself. I taught
her to do the act very slowly, to increase the impres-
sion that it was very diflScult. It was not so dan-
gerous for me as it seemed, for I had my hook in my
hands all the time, and if Queen Anne had settled
down a little too heavy a touch from that would have
raised her very quickly.

When I went to the Cole show he had an Indian
elephant by the name of Tom. He was an especially
intelligent fellow and became my second -elephant
pupil. The first thing I taught him was to walk a
tight rope. He was about thirty-five years old at
the time and weighed three tons. We were all winter
teaching him the trick. It made quite a hit when
we brought it out, and so far as I know I was the first
man to teach it to an elephant.

116

THE ELEPHANT PEOPLE

The first step in getting him to walk the rope was
having him walk a six-inch plank we laid on the
floor. It took us a good many days to accomplish
this, but alter a while he could do it easily and carry
a balance pole in his trunk. Then we b^an and
blocked the plank up a little bit higher each day.
When we had got up high enough so we could, we
exchanged the plank for a six-inch timber. Grad-
ually we got him accustomed to walking the timber
• at quite a height. On either end of the timber we
placed an inclined platform for him to walk up to the
timber and away from it. After he had become
thoroughly trained in the act we took pieces of rope
and boimd them to the timber so that at a little dis-
tance it looked like a huge rope. When we put it
up we set four jacks tmder it to make it solid. We
found that we could only have him do the act in a
building where the floor was very solid. When he
attempted to do it on the groimd some of the jacks
would settle in the earth and throw him off. This
happened two or three times. It did not hurt him,
but it frightened him and made him trumpet in great

One season in winter quarters Tom was placed just
by the door which opened out into the yard and
through which the men wheeled out all the manure
from the place. He used to watch the men come
behind him with wheelbarrow loads of manure, turn
the key, open the door, and go out into the yard.
One day he tried turning the key and opening the
door. He found he could do it, and he did it so much
that we had to stop leaving the key in the door.

shape.

117

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

One day a stablanan came and unlocked the door
and left the key in the lock whUe he went out in the
yard. When he came in he could find no key. All
hands took hold and helped him hunt for it* Finally,
after more than an hour's hunt we discovered that
Tom was calmly standing on it and watching us. He
had evidently taken it out of the door, dropped it on
the floor, and put his foot on it. I always thought
that if we had gone away without finding it he would
have pickeil it up again and opened the door with it.

Tom was taught a mean trick by the canvasmen.
Fortunately, no one was ever hiu* by it, but it might
easily have been the cause of some one's death.
How they came to do it or what their object was I
never knew, but if a sledge hammer or a lai^e stone
or a wheelbarrow were left anywhere within Tom's
reach he would pick it up and throw it at whoever
happentnl to be in sight.

We had an amusing experience with Tom once out
in Seattle. We had to go to the next place by boat,
and tlie pier was quite large, built out over the water
quite a distance, and it shook a good deal when we
tried to walk Tom over it. This frightened him so
much that we had to coax him to make him move at
all. To make matters worse, some of the planks
broke and let his hind legs through. By the time
we got him up out of the hole he had no use for piers
and plank floors, so he bolted and ran.

On one side of the pier was a great sugar warehouse,
and into this he went just as far as the^ barrels and
sacks would let him. No amoxmt of lu^g could get
him to stir. Something had to be done, for the show

118

THE ELEPHANT PEOPLE

had to travel soon and he had to go with it. In
thinking of some way to get him started I spied one
of the boat's hawsers. I took an end of it across the
pier into the warehouse and fastened it roimd one of
Tom's hind feet. Then I put the other end round
the dnmi of the windlass and had the men turn on
it slowly while I went and talked to Tom. He was
in his place on board all right when the show was
ready to start. Cole kept Tom until after he bought
into the Bamum show, and then he sold him to Frank
Lemon, who changed his name to Rajah.

I once had an elephant that was very sick as the
result of eating tobacco. Her name was Lalla Rookh.
At that time the show was traveling by train. We
had a car on purpose for the elephants. Built into
one end of it was a stateroom for the use of myself
and my head elephant keeper, an Englishman who
went by the name of Printer. Printer sold tobacco
to the rest of the men in the menagerie, and he had
hidden away in the straw of his mattress his stock
of five poimds of plug. One morning when we went
to breakfast Printer forgot and left the door from the
stateroom into the elephant's quarters imfastened.
While we were away Lalla Rookh got her trunk
through the door into the stateroom and ate up the
straw in Printer's mattress, tobacco and all.

I did not know about it. We took her over to the
show grounds with the rest of the elephants and
b^an dressing her for parade. I noticed that she
did not act right, and soon she was all of a tremble
and could hardly stand up. We could not get her
to move and I was considerably alarmed. I had

119

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

another elephant push her into the tent, where she
lay down. Her eyes were rolled down until you
cxHiU see nothing but the whites. I gave her such
treatment as I could and after a time she began to
seem rdUeved and presently got over it, but it was not
until fall that I knew what was the matter with her.

We were going into winter quarters in St. Louis
when Printer said to me one day, "You never
knew what ailed Lalla Rookh that time, did yer, Mr.
Conklin?"

"No," I said. "Did you?"

"Yes. She ate five poimds of my tobacco," he
answered, and then he told me the whole story.

The tobacco must have been a kind of medicine
for her, for in spite of its making her so sick it seemed
to do her good. She b^an to pick up right away
after it, and from then on she was in better flesh and
general condition than she had ever been before.

When I went to California the first time with Cole
he had a little elephant that he called Tom Thumb.
He was a bright, good-natured youngster, but small
— so small that Mrs. Cole had made a big tick stuffed
with straw, which we fastened under his blanket
when on parade, to increase his apparent size. It
worked all right if it stayed tight, but sometimes the
fastenings would work loose, and then the pad got
out of place and made the elephant look lopsided.

Cole had advertised in San Francisco that he
wouW exhibit a trained elephant. As a matter of
fact* he did not have one, but he thought if we just
walked an elephant round the ring the public would
be satisfied.

120

THE ELEPHANT PEOPLE

We showed in Woodward's Garden, and when I
saw the great amphitheater crowded to its limit I
realized that it was going to hurt the show if we did
not put up some kind of a bluff for a trained elephant,
and determined to see if I could not make one that
would get by. I had little Tom Thiunb all brushed
up and I told one of my men — John Hadley, a red-
headed Irishman from Pennsylvania — to get ready
to go into the ring with me. John had no idea what
I wanted, and when oiu* turn came to go in he went
along quite willingly. I walked Tom Thmnb round
the ring a couple of times and into it. Then I told
John to lie down, and, taking the elephant by the ear
and trunk, I walked him over the man two or three
times lengthwise and crosswise. It satisfied the
crowd, but Hadley was a scared man and swore
roimdly after we got out of the ring, and declared to
me, "I sweat blood, Mr. Conklin, I'm sure I did.**

In teaching elephants to do various tricks and acts
the first and principal thing to accomplish is to make
them understand clearly what you want and to asso-
ciate that particular action with a certain command
or cue. Once the big fellows grasp your meaning it
is seldom that they will deliberately refuse to do what
you wish them to. In fact, the more intelligent ones
seem to take a certain pride in doing their stunts.
It will be readily seen, however, that it is a problem
not entirely free from perplexities to discover ways
to make an elephant imderstand what you are talking
about when, for instance, you ask him to stand on
his head.

My method of doing this was to stand him facing

THE WA^ OF THE CIRCUS

a strong brick wall, with his front feet securely
fastened to a couple of stakes clriven in the groimd.
A heavy rope sling was put roimd his hind quarters,
and from this a rope was run up to and over a pidley
high above him on the wall, then down through a
snatch block near the ground, and the end fastened
to a harness on another elephant. Wlien all was
ready I woidd take my place by him, strike him on
the flank, and say, "Stand on your head/* At the
same time an assistant would start up the other
el^hant and draw the pupil's hind quarters up until
he stood squarely on his head. The wall kept him
from going over forward. After a moment or two I
would tell him to get down. The assistant would
slack off on the rope and let him settle back on to
his feet. Then I would give him a carrot, or some-
thing of the kind. I did this two or three times every
morning and afternoon. It was not long before it
was possible to do away with the rigging, and at the
word of command he would put his head down and
throw his hind quarters into the air. Of course the
longer he practiced the more easily and siu'dy he
did it.

To teach an elephant to lie down, which one would
expect to be an easy matter, is, in fact, one of the most
difficult things for a trainer to accomplish. It is
usually necessary to fasten the animal's feet to stakes
and pull him over on his side with tackle, at the same
time giving him the proper command, and repeat
the lesson many times before he is ready to do it
without help when he is told.

Sometimes I used to arrange so an elephant could

THE ELEPHANT PEOPLE

learn certain things by himself. I used this method
in teaching them to let my horses alone. I always
kept my horse in the menagerie, saddled and ready
in case I needed it suddenly for anything. Every
time I had a new horse I had to get it and the elephants
acquainted with one another and teach the elephants
to leave the horse alone.

The first few days I tied the horse in front of the
elephants, but just out of their reach. Then I
lengthened his hitch so the elephant could just touch
him with the end of his trunk, and after a day or two
so he could feel the horse over. When he began to
do this the horse would usually kick and bite him.
In this way the elephant foimd out that it was better
to leave the horse alone, and the horse discovered
that he could master the elephant. It did not take
the horse long to learn to bite the elephant if it inter-
fered with him, and it was possible then to put the
horse alongside of the elephant. After being together
for a month or two the elephant and horse would
become the best of friends.

One winter in Utica I broke four elephants to do a
military drill — ^march, halt, wheel, and a few things
of that sort. In teaching them the meaning of the
different commands I had a driver by each one at
first, who made them go and stop as I gave the com-
mands. After a while the elephants began to imder-
stand what was wanted and the drivers had to guide
them less and less, until all they had to do was to
walk behind them and prod them when they did not
do their part promptly, and then finally they were
not needed at all.

M3

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCrS

Wh3e with the C<Je show I tjuii^t one ot his
elephants to sH at a table and do an act. Before I
went into the ring with him for the act there was
placed m it a table. On the table was a fan and a
bdl, and beside it were two heavy diairs. When we
reached the table the dephant would sit on one of
the chairs, pick up the bdl, and ring it, and then fan
himsdf imtil a clown dressed as a waiter appeared.
I would explain to the waiter that the dephant wanted
a drink, and he would go for it. While the waiter
was gone the dq)hant would ring again impatiently.
The down would come back with a big bottle made
of tin, and weighted so it would always stand up.
This was filled with molasses and wata*, and the
dq)hant would take it up and pour the contents into
his mouth. He was always eager for this part of
the act, as he Uked the sweet wat^.

After he had emptied the bottle he always rang
again vigorously, and I would get up and explain to
him that there was no more. As I did so I took off
my tall hat and put it on my chair. Then I moved
round to the side of the table with my back toward
the elephant. This was his cue to get up quickly
and sit on my chair, crushing my hat, which always
brought down the house.

In teaching this act I first got the dq)hant to sit
in the chair. This was done by placing the chair
next the side of the building, backing the animal up
to it and fastening his hind feet, and then working
him down into the chair with a hook. After he found
the chair was solid he willingly settled his wdght into
it. After a few times he found out what I wanted.

Digitized by

THE ELEPHANT PEOPLE

and then by rewarding him each time with a carrot
or a lump of sugar it was easy to get him to practice
until he was perfect. All that was needed to teach
him to ring the bell was to place it in his trunk and
shake it. This he learned in three lessons, but the
complete act took an entire winter's training.

We had an elephant with the O'Brien show called
Don, who would run at the drop of a hat. I was
taking the menagerie from the train to the show
grounds in Albany once, and in some way Don found
an opportunity to bolt, and started oflf down a road
which led to a rolling mill. A big gang of half -naked
men were busy rolling out and handling great bars of
white-hot iron, and a lot of red-hot bars lay scattered
round the floor. Seeing an elephant coming toward
them on the run, they simply dropped everything
and got out. Don was not fazed in the least by
having the mill left to himself, nor did he stop running,
but went in one end, came out the other, and kept
going. We found him later back in the yards, hang-
ing round the animal cars, and the singular thing was
that in going through the rolling mill among so much
hot iron he had not so much as singed a toe.

This same dephant was a part of the Bamimi &
Bailey show wheiTit went to England. Over there
he had several ugly turns, and Mr. Bailey, who never
was inclined to take any •chances, ordered him killed
in Stoke-on-Trent. This I did by choking him. I
had foimd this to be the easiest and most humane
way to bring about the death of one of the big animals.

In my first attempt to kill an dephant I tried
poison, but he simply ran his trunk down his throat

125

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

and pumped the poison all out» and that was all
there was to it.

In an open field I had two strong stakes driven
firmly into the ground. To these I securely fastened
Don's front feet. Three or foiu* rods away on either
side of him I had another stake driven. Then my
men brought a couple of ropes an inch and a half in
diameter. On one end of each of them I had made
a strong slip noose and thoroughly soaped it so it
worked freely and easily. These nooses I put round
the elephant's throat and carried the ends of the ropes
to the stakes at either side of him. The one on the
left I put roimd the stake, drew up snugly, and
fastened. On the right I seciu'ed a snatch block to
the stake, and, passing the rope through the block,
carried the end back to where I had another elephant
waiting, and fastened the rope to his harness. When
all was ready I gave the word, and the elephant b^an
to pull on the rope, which caused both nooses to close
round Don's throat with tremendous force. As he
felt the ropes tighten, instead of trying to pull away
he threw the whole of his weight against them. There
was nothing to indicate that the sensation was even
disagreeable to him, and in a few minutes, with no
struggle or apparent suffering, he gently settled down
into a big heap and it was all over.

When I went to the Bamum & Bailey show they
had a very intellig(ent elephant by the name of Fritz,
He was the largest in the coimtry at the time and
weighed five tons. I won a bet by teaching him in
three teaching periods to sit up, hold up his forel^s
and stretch his trunk straight up in the air, let me

THE ELEPHANT PEOPLE

climb up his back» stand on his head, and hold on to
his trunk.

One of my most popular acts was with this elephant.
He had a leading part with some other elephants in
a waltz and some pedestal work, after which I lined
them all up behind him. Then the one next behind
Fritz would put his front feet on Fritz's hips. The
next one would place his front feet on that one's back,
and so on imtil each elephant except Fritz had its
front feet on another elephant. When they were all
in position I would speak to Fritz. He then put his
head down for me to step on his tusks, and when he
had straightened up again I gave the word and the
whole line traveled to the exit, where all went out
except Fritz. He and I would start roimd the ring
again, and every little way I would stop him, lift my
hat to the spectators in acknowledgment of the
applause, at the same time saying, "Down,'' to
Fritz, who would lower his head and raise it again,
making it seem as though wq were both bowing to
the crowd. ,

Fritz had the principal part in several acts and I
used to ride out of the ring on his tusks. One night
in Madison Square Garden I had got the rest of the
elephants in line and was going to give Fritz the word
to lower his head for me to get on his tusks, when I
noticed that he was about to go for me. I did not
wait a second, but dodged between all four of his
l^s and made my way out of the ring. My helper,
who was beside the row of elephants to keep them
in line, saw that something was wrong, came up to
Fritz, started the line in motion, and marched them

9 127

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

out of the ring to their quarters without anything
happening. So quick had I been in dodging between
Fritz's I^s, and so prompt was the helper in marching
them out, that no one outside the show people mis-
trusted that anything was wrong. The next day
while he was tied up I gave Fritz a good punish-
ing, and for a long while his behavior was above
suspicion.

A few years later, however, he displayed his temper
in such a way that he got his death warrant. It
happened in Tours, France. The evening show had
commenced and I was getting the menagerie down
to the train. We had at the time some two dozen
elephants, and I was sending them down chained
together in twos and threes. Fritz was in the lead,
with 'babe and Coliunbia chained on either side of
him and in charge of driver George Bates. I was on
my horse, just behind the elephants and in front of
the line of cage wagons.

We were about halfway to the railroad and just
passing through a little park, with everything going
nicely, when all of a sudden Fritz made for Bates as
best he could with the other two elephants hitched
to him. At once the whole band of elephants was
in a mix-up. The road was more than full and the
whole outfit came to a stop. Bates ran for his life.
There were a half dozen other men with the elephants,
but at the first indication of trouble they all dis-
appeared, each looking for a hole. The only man
who stayed by me was a fellow known about the show
as Deafy. I rode up in front of Fritz as quickly as
I could and tried to calm him down, but I saw at

128

Digitized by

THE ELEPHANT PEOPLE

once it was no use, so I told Deafy to get some chains,
and be quick about it.

The chains we wanted were under some other stuff,
which had to be tmloaded to get at them, so it was
quite a few minutes before he came back with them.
Meanwhile I was doing what I could to keep Fritz
from bolting. I had done a good deal of work with
one of the elephants chained to him, called Babe,
and she would do anything I told her. So, keeping
Fritz's attention on trying to get me, I had Babe
pull round in the opposite direction, and in this way
hampered him and took up his attention until Deafy
came with the chains.

Then by the same methods I worked Fritz roimd
near a tree and gave Deafy a chance to get a chain
round his hind 1^ and the tree. The tree was some
inches in diameter, but Fritz snapped it off imme*
diately, and I had to work him roimd to a larger one.
Deafy managed to get a hitch roimd this, and it held.
With one leg fast, it was a simple matter to fasten
the other one. As soon as Fritz's hind feet were
fastened the men began to appear from various direc-
tions and I had plenty of help. Still keeping Fritz's
attention directed to me, I had Deafy, with some of
those who were now willing to help him, get chains
on Fritz's front feet and imfasten and take away
Babe and Columbia. Then with tackle I pulled him
to the groimd.

By this time word had reached Mr. Bailey of the
trouble with Fritz, and he ordered him killed. I
tried to convince McCaddon, one of the directors,
who had brought the word from Mr. Bailey, that it

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

was unnecfessary, and hegged him to leave the elephant
to me. I told hun that» now I had hun down, I could
pimish and r^ain control of him, and would guarantee
to have him on board the train before the show was
ready to start away in the morning. But Mr. Bailey's
orders were imperative, and McCaddon insisted that
Fritz be killed where he lay.

As there was no choice in the matter, I went about
preparing nooses. I had considerable difficulty in
getting them round the animal's neck, but after a
while I got them properly placed. By this time
everyone had plenty of courage and it was no trouble
to get upward of a himdred men to pull on the rope
with all their strength, and in less than fifteen minutes
after I gave the word poor Fritz was dead.

Mr. Bailey made a present of Fritz's body to a
sci^tific society of Tours. It sent men to take
charge as soon as he was dead. The body was care-
fully skinned, and afterward the skin was stuffed
and placed in the local museimi. I suppose it is
still there.

Fritz's tusks grew very rapidly and I cut about six
inches off them each year. A tuba player in the band
wanted me to give him a piece of one of them, out of
which to have a couple of mouthpieces turned for his
instrument. I gave him enough on condition that
he would have an elephant carved for me, which he
did, and I still have the little ivory, image three or
four inches high, cut from a piece of Fritz's tusk.

Not long before we came back to New York from
England I was in the animal quarters of the Olympia,
in London, talking with som^ carpenters who were

THE ELEPHANT PEOPLE

eating their lunch, when onie of the elephant men we
called Red came in and b^an to clean up roimd a
big elephant named Mandarin. For some reason
the elephant did not feel friendly toward him and
suddenly struck him a blow with his trunk that sent
him against the wall, and before! any of us could do
anything had crushed the life out of the poor fellow
with his great head. Mandarin was about forty-five
years old, all of eight feet high, and heavy in pro-
portion. We brought him to New York in a big
crate on the upper deck of the boat. On the way
over Mr. Bailey decided to have him killed, so instead
of imloading him on to the pier Mr. Bailey had a big
seagoing tug come alongside, and the crate, elephant
and all, was swimg down to the deck of the tug, which
then put out to sea. When far enough outside the
crate was loaded down with pig iron, swimg out over
the water, and let go. And so ended Mandarin.

Elephants can be taught useful tricks as well as
others. I always had at least one which I could use
for pushing wagons roimd and helping to lift them
out of the mud, and when I was in Australia, where
transportation conditions were bad, I used to hitch
seven and eight wagons together, put a man on each
to work the brake, and then had three elephants
broken to draw them, and a fourth to help by pushing
in the rear. I also used an elephant to move cars
on the sidings in the yards of the Bridgeport winter
quarters.

The elephant is the only animal that will make an
effort by itself to learn a trick. I have often noticed,
after I had been showing an intelligent elephant a

131

THE WAYS OF THE CIllCUS

new trick and he thought he was alone» that he
would keep trying it, and seemed really pleased if he
mastered it.

Most of the various harnesses, hobbles, tackle, and
so on, used in the handling and training of elephants
are either inventions of mine or adaptations of them.

An elephant lives to a great age and comes to
maturity slowly, not being full grown imtil from
thirty-five to forty years old. It is a mistake to think
an elephant is clumsy because he looks so. In pro-
portion to its size an elephant is much lighter on its
feet than a horse and can outrun most horses for a
short distance, and there is no one of an elephant's
four feet with which he cannot strike or kick quickly
and accurately. An easy rule to remember for an
elephant's height is that twice the circumference of
his front foot at the groimd equals his height at the
shoulder.

An elephant can stand considerable cold if he is
kept moving. I have taken elephants in Bridgeport,
fitted bags over their ears and tails, and worked them
up to their bellies in the snow, pushing cars, without
its doing them any harm. On the other hand, I lost
a fine elephant once as a result of exposiu'e to the cold.

It happened with the Cole show. We were in the
west near Denver, and had to go over the moimtains
on a narrow-gauge road over which we could not run
our elephant car. Cole had us take one of the narrow-
gauge flat cars, put stakes up roimd the sides, and
stretch canvas on them. On to this car we put Pete
and another elephant. During the night, while we
were in the mountains, there came on a very sudden

THE ELEPHANT PEOPLE

and unusual stonn of rain, hail, and snow. There
was no cover over the top of the car to shield the
animals and we were delayed and did not get to our
destination until several hours after we expected to.
In the morning, when we were able to take Pete off
the car, he was so cold and stiff that he could hardly
move, and in spite of all we could do he died almost
inunediately; but strange to say the other one did
not seem to mind it.

The elephant is the most affectionate of animals
and will watch over and protect a favorite keeper,
and he will also hold a grudge against one for some
time, watching for an opportunity to get even with
him. But I do not believe those popular stories of
elephants that have remembered being cheated by
a stranger and squirted water over him when they
had an opportunity after the lapse of years.

An angry elephant, however, is a dangerous thing,
and an elephant keeper who is rough is always running
a risk. A cross elephant is usually made so by the
keeper. Some men are naturally cruel and are will-
ing to do anything to satisfy their desire to show off.
This is apt to be a fault of new men round elephants.
They disobey instructions, and if nothing worse hap-
pens are quite likely in a short time to get a blow
from some elephant's trunk that bowls them along
the groimd and calls their attention pretty forcibly
to their bad manners. Qmte often they do not get
off so easily.

I knew of the case of a fellow called Bayo Bill, who
was with the Jerry Mabie show. An elephant put
her tnmk round his shoulders, pulled him off hi3

133

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

barse, and before anyone could prevent she put one
of her feet on his legs, pulled him in two, and threw
the pieces over h^ back. I have also known many
instances of men b^ng squeezed to death betweai a
wall and an elephant's head or under its foot. But
from a keep^ or trains who treats him properly an
dq>hant will accept punishmoit, and when he has
given in the man can do anything with him and the
animal will not lay it up against him.

In spite of his great size the dephant is quite timid.
A strange animal or an imfamiliar noise will start him
in a panic. Once Tody Hamilton, the Bamum &
Bailey press agent, had me demonstrate to a group
of New York reporters how esLsy it was to frighten
an elephant. It was at the winter quarters in Bridge-
port. We had at the time some two or three dozen
elephants and I let a pig loose among them. There
was a commotion at once. They snorted and squealed
and kicked — and by the way, they can use their hind
l^s like Gatling guns. I also put some rats in among
them and they were just as afraid of them. If they
had not all been well chained the whole bunch of
them would have run away.

Elephants are driven from the near, or left, side,
like oxen. The driver tells them to "shy" when he
wants them to go to the right, and says "come in"
to bring them toward him. "Mile" means to go
fast, "mule up" to trot, and when he wants them to
stop the driver calls out "tut."

In driving elephants on the road it is very necessary
to look out for their feet or they will get sore. If the
roads are very soft and sandy the driver is sometimes

THE ELEPHANT PEOPLE

compelled to put boots on them, otherwise the motion
of the foot on the sand, with the pressure from the
great weight of the animal, would soon grind through
the skin.

The carefid keeper will also lay the elephant down
on its side twice a year, and with a great drawing knife
cut the toenails. Each spring, too, he gives the
elephant a thick coat of neat's-foot oil. This keeps
the skin in good shape, and if there are any lice on
the animal it kills them as well. An elephant louse
is a very tiny thing, red in color, much smaller than
those which sometimes get on hiunans, and it lives
in the cracks and crevices of the skin round the
elephant's ears. Imported elephants are almost
always lousy, but those in this coimtry are usually
almost or entirely free from them.

Elephants are now fed nothing but hay. In the
old days, when they were driven from town to town,
they were fed grain in addition to the hay. The
ordinary elephant will eat about a hundred and fifty
pounds of hay a day. Each Sunday I used to give
my elephants a bran mash, using about five sacks of
bran to each dozen elephants.

It has always been a popular and paying thing for
a circus to advertise the birth of a baby elephant in
its quarters, and later on when the show goes on the
road the little elephant is always a drawing card; but
as a matter of fact, while there have been plenty of
very yoimg elephants exhibited, there were never but
two actually bom in the United States. The first
one was bom in Philadelphia and belonged to the
Cooper & Bailey show. It was named Columbia,

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

and its mother was Babe. The mother is still alive
and owned by the Ringling Brothers. The father was
Mandarin. The keepers became afraid of Colimibia
and she was killed in Bridgeport in 1907. The
other young elephant was bom at the quarters of
the Bamum show in Bridgeport.

During the last year I was with the Bamum &
Bailey show some New York animal dealer brought
over from the other side a baby elephant and sold it
to the show. It was smuggled up to Bridgeport and
then it was annoimced in the papers that it had been
bom there. When the show went down to Madison
Square Garden in New York a few weeks later for its
opening we took the yoimgster along. He was still
being fed on milk and I could pick him up in my
arms. I do not believe he was more than thirty
inches high. We had named him Abe.

One day I got orders to take him over to St. Mary's
Free Hospital for Children in West Thirty-fourth
Street, so I put Abe in a taxi and over we went. When
we got there I helped him out on to the street, and
then, taking him by the trunk and ear, led him up
the long flight of steps into the building, and then
into the wards and up and down between the rows
of beds, stopping a moment beside each one. Those
of the yotmgsters who were able to reached out and
touched the little fellow, and then followed him with
their eyes as he went on down the ward. From St.
Mary's we took him up to the New York Orthopaedic
Hospital in East Fifty-ninth Street, and led him
through the wards there before we took him back to
the Garden.

t

THE ELEPHANT PEOPLE

In all my experience I do not remember a more
touching sight than the wonder and happiness on
the faces of the two himdred children in those hospitals
as they watched that little elephant.

During my forty years in charge of circus menageries
I have handled more so-called bad elephants than
any man in the United States, and have killed five of
them. However, in my opinion it is a mistake to kill
them, for the bad elephant is only bad for a few weeks
in a year, and a clever keeper can detect the change
in the animal's manner soon enough to make it pos-
sible to confine him by himself imtil he is good-
natiu^ again. As a usual thing elephants do not
have bad spells before they are twenty-five or thirty
years old. The elephant that is bad first, last, and
all the time exists only in fiction.

The liveliest and most serious time I ever had with
an elephant occurred in Hailey, Idaho. He was
named Samson, and Cole had bought him from a
New York animal dealer in the fall before we went
into winter quarters at Utica. We had to have a
special car made for him in order to get him up to
Utica. There dm*ing the winter I got acquainted
with him, taught him some new tricks, and broke in
a fellow to drive him. As near as we could make
out, he was between forty and fifty years old at the
time Cole bought him, and he weighed almost five
tons. Previous to his purchase by Cole he had been
at Coney Island, carrying children on his back. His
owners for some reason had become afraid of him
and sold him.

At that time Bamum had a big elephant which he

137

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

called Jumbo and was billing extensively as the
largest elephant in the world. As soon as Cole bought
Samson he at once began to bill him as the largest
one in existence. I think probably Cole's statement
came nearer the truth, for while Bamum's elephant
may have measured a little more in height and had
larger ears, Cole*s had by far the greater bulk and
weight. In addition he was much more intelligent,
being an Indian elephant, than the Bamum elephant,
which was African. Some years later he became a
part of the Bamum show. Cole having bought an
interest in it.

Jack Shiunake was Samson's driver and I always
had Jack follow in the parade directly behind the
cage of lions in which I rode, so that I might keep an
eye on the elephant and tell Jack what to do if any-
thing happened, or even get out and help if it was
necessary. We had had no trouble with him, and
this day in Hailey we had put fifteen or twenty of
the children of the place on Samson's back and taken
them roimd on the parade. Just on the outskirts
of the town we had stopped and taken the children off.

The parade had reached the show grounds and was
breaking up. The other cages of animals had been
driven imder the canvas ahead of mine, but the
horses had not been taken away. My cage had no
more than stopped and I jiunped out than Samson
reached under it and threw it over on its side. Jack
tried to get him away, but I saw at once that he had
lost control of him. Samson turned from the cage
to the horses and knocked over four of them. To
save the horses I seized a pitchfork and b^an jabbing

1S8

THE ELEPHANT PEOPLE

the elephant in the hind l^s. He immediately
turned on me and to save myself I dodged behind a
cage. He threw this into the air with no apparent
effort and I realized that he must be got outside at
once or he woidd wreck the whole menagerie.

I shouted to Cole, the owner of th^ show, who was
trying to help, to get me my horse and gun. He was
only a few moments doing it, but in the meantime
Samson had thrown over twelve cages, trying to get
me. I jumped on the broncho and started out of
the door, and the elephant followed me, just as I
wanted him to do.

A few rods from the tent was a blacksmith shop,
and standing in front of it, waiting to be repaired,
was one of the huge gondola wagons used in that
section to haul ore in. Samson stopped long enough
to give this a shove, which sent one end of it crashing
through the side of the shop, and then he turned and
followed me. I headed for the open fields, and as
soon as I got away from the horses and crowd I turned
in my saddle and opened fire on him with charges of
buckshot. I hit him squarely in the trunk five or
six times, but he paid no more attention to it than
he would to so many raindrops. Two or three cow-
boys came following on and fired at him with their
rifles, but all they succeeded in doing was to make
a slight flesh woimd in his back.

I have often laughed when I have thought of the
spectacle we must have made. I was dressed in a
suit of tights covered with shining spangles, had a
great leopard skin round my waist and hips, and was
mounted on a broncho with a Mexican saddle and

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

bridle daboratdy omamentecL Tlie dephant had
on all his parade tn^pings and great saddle, and as
he ran the colored velvet blanket blew out from both
his sides like huge wings.

The broncho was going his best, but the d^hant
was close bdiind, and I knew that he would be able
to overtake us if we k^t the race up much of a dis-
tance. When I found that he paid no attrition to
the buckshot I b^an to look round for some means
of cornering him. OB across the field, something
less than a mile away, was the freight yard, and the
possibility of stopping him among the cars suggested
itself to me, so I headed for them. By the side of
the yard was a large water tank, on top of which
were a number of people who had been watching the
parade. As soon as they saw Samson and me turn
and come toward them they climbed down and ran
faster than I ever saw anyone run in my life.

As I got near the yard I noticed a lot of cars heavily
loaded with ore, standing on two tracks which met
in a V shape at one end. Both tracks were fuD of
cars, but at the point of the V the cars did not quite
meet. I made for this opening, with Samson right
after me. As I had hoped, the broncho and I just
squeezed through, but there was not room enough
for Samson.

An elephant never goes round anything. He
simply tries to push aside or crush whatever gets in
his way, and so Samson threw all his weight and
strength against the cars in an effort to crowd through
the opening and get at me, but the load of ore was so
heavy and the cars stood at such an angle to his pres«

140

THE ELEPHANT PEOPLE

sure that they held, and he was blocked. I let him
struggle away for a few minutes, and then I began
to talk to him. After a little he gave up his efforts
and b^an to calm down. Then I told him to back
up and lie down, both of which he did. Finding he
wotdd obey me once more, I rode round the cars to
where he was, and after making sure I could manage
him drove him back to the tent and tied him up.

Cole was very much disturbed over the matter and
wanted the animal punished. I remonstrated with
him, telling him that it was not necessary, that the
elephant had given in and was behaving himself,
and that it would do no good. But Cole thought
he must be pimished until he squealed. It was
too near time for the afternoon performance to do
anything about it then, so we tied him seciu*ely and
went on with the show. After that was over I
had another talk with Cole and tried to get him to
change his mind, but he insisted that the elephant
must be punished, so there was nothing left for me
to do but go about it.

I had my men drive stout stakes in two rows and
made Samson lie down between them. Then with
a quantity of inch-and-a-half rope I boimd him down
to the stakes, passing the rope back and forth over
his body so many times that he resembled the picture
of Gulliver on tibe old thread boxes. When at last
he was secure I put several men to belaboring him
with tent stakes. But though they winded them-
selves and others took their places, Samson showed
no signs of squealing. I heated some large bars of
iron red hot and held them within reach of his trunk

141

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

to see if he was still mad. He reached out and took
them, put them into his mouth, and tried to chew
them up. After about half an hour of this sort of
treatment I was able to convince Cole that the ele-
phant would let us kill him before he would squeal,
and Cole gave his consent for us to stop.

When we imfastened the ropes we had a pretty
thoroughly done-up elephant. He could hardly stand.
His tongue hung out of his mouth like a panting dog's
and he could not bend his trunk. For more than a
week we had to feed him by hand and give him water
with a force pump. I dressed and cared for the buck-
shot woimds and the btims on his trunk, and the cut
on his back where the cowboys had hit him. They
all healed rapidly and it was not long before he was
as good as ever again. I never had any more trouble
with him after that, but he always wanted to get out
of my way if possible. He used to have spells of
wanting to chase his driver, however, and once when
he tried to do it dmring the next siunmer he tipped
over a load of hay.

After Samson went on his rampage I got a couple
of dogs, one a white bull and the other a big fellow,
a cross between a St. Bernard and an Irish setter,
and broke them to stay near him and keep everyone
but myself and the keeper away.

Samson lost his life in the fire that burned the
Bamum & Bailey winter quarters in Bridgeport. I
was away at the time of the fire and there was no one
else who could unchain and get him out of the build-
ing, so all they could do was 'let him burn. After
the fire his bones were recovered* and moimted and

142

Digitized by

THE ELEPHANT PEOPLE

are now on exhibition in the Museum of Natural
History in New York City.

I had another lively experience with an elephant
in Madison Square Garden in New York City. We
called him Tom Thiunb. He was yoimg at the time
— ^probably not more than eight years old — and was
not very large. During the winter at the quarters
in Bridgeport I had been teaching him to walk on a
row of big wooden bottles. Toward spring a down
by the name of Reynolds was assigned to work Tom
Thumb in the ring, and he used to come up to Bridge-
port from New York every day to go through the act
with the elephant.

One day, after he had been coming up for some
time» I said to him: Reynolds, look out you don't
get too fresh with that elephant the way you give
him orders. If you do when you get down in the
Garden he'll knock you out. You won't have all
these men sitting round then. It will be new sur-
roimdings and he will be excitable.'*

"You leave that to me," he replied. "I know
what I am doing. I've got candy in my pocket and
he likes me fust rate.'*

I said no more to him about it. When we got
down to the Garden and ready to open up there was
a rehearsal for the benefit of the reporters and a few
others. Reynolds went into the ring to do his act
with Tom Thiunb, but had hardly more than com-
menced when the elephant hit him a blow that knocked
him clear outside the ring. If it had not been for
the ring bank he would have been killed. That pre-
vented the elephant from reaching him and crushing

10 143

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

him before he got on his feet. Of course Reynolds
would have nothing more to do with the act, and it
was arranged that another down, by the name of
Billy Burke, should take his place.

Burke was a sort of barroom down — ^that is, he
was a good deal fimnier in a barroom than he was in
the ring, but he had unlimited self-confidence. The
show was to open to the public the next day, and I
took Burke to one side and cautioned him about the
elephant; but he paid no attention and told me con-
temptuously that he could handle him. When it
came time for the act I put Tom Thumb's caretaker,
Otto Mopus, in the ring, thinking it would hdp to
keep the animal easy.

I watched just outside, and it was well I did, for
the elephant had hardly got in the ring before it
ttumed on the two men, and if I had not rushed in
and caught him by the ear with my hook he would
have killed both of them. He was so exdted that
instead of allowing me either to put him through his
act or take him out, he simply bolted, and while I
himg to his ear with my hook he dragged me into the
aisle and, before the spectators had time to be fright-
ened, up two flights of stairs and out on to Twenty-
sixth Street. There I regained control of him and
took him down into the cellar and chained him up.

Later Mr. Bailey came down and told me to chain
him to an old dephant and take him up to Central
Park — ^that he was going to make the city a present
of him. So tl^at night I fastened him to one of the
old dephants and took him up to the Park and
delivered him over to Bill Snyder, the head keeper

144

THE ELEPHANT PEOPLE

of the Park zoo. Snyder had been connected with
a show once and he used to take Tom Thumb out and
perform him for the benefit of the crowds on Sunday
afternoons, but in a few years the elephant grew so
ugly that it was thought best to kill him.

VI

FOLLOWERS, FREAKS, AND FAKERS

REGULAR part of the old-time show was the

lecture about the animals in the menagerie. Of
the many lecturers I have known, none was better
than John Childers, who traveled with the O'Brien
show. Besides lecturing, Childers announced the
performers and acted as ringmaster for the clowns,
but it was as a lecturer that he shone most. He was
followed from cage to cage every day by a crowd of
countrymen who tried strenuously to absorb the tor-
rent of amazing statements and descriptions which
he poured out. without a pause or a break. While
the greater part of his discourse was true, yet from
long practice he had become exceedingly skillful in
the art of giving truth those little additions and em-
bellishments which never failed to draw forth exclama-
tions of surprise and awe, and send his hearers home
feeling that the menagerie was indeed a collection of
wonders well worth the price of admission.

At the time Childers was lecturing for O'Brien we
had quite a large drove of camels. I had sixteen men
to care for them and lead them. They were men I
had picked up in one place and another from time to
time, and nearly all Irish, Each day a part of them
had to make up as Arabs and take some of the camels

FOLLOWERS, FREAKS, AND FAKERS

in for Chflders' lecture. It was arranged for them
in such a way that they took turns in doing this, and
no one had to go in oftener than every other day.
None of them had any great relish for this part of the
job, but everything went all right until one day
Childers in his enthusiasm called attention to them
as being from the desert. They were quite peeved
over it. Childers heard of it, and he kept on telling
the story, adding a little to it each day. This amused
Childers and fanned the anger of the Irishmen. The
matter reached a climax in Tifl^, Ohio.

That afternoon, after describing in detail the home
of the camel, his great usefulness and wonderful
ability to go for days and days without drinking,
because of the water stored in the compartments of
his stomach, Childers called the attention of his
audience to the fake Arabs. He told of their being
bom in the desert, of their life of constant com-
panionship with the camel, and how they could even
speak the language of the camel, and in proof of the
latter statement had them tell the camels to lie down
and get up. Then inspired by the effect his tale was
having on the audience, as well as on the Irishmen,
with a great burst of eloquence he pictured the ter-
rible sandstorms of the desert and told them how
often the very men that stood before them had lain
for days at a time huddled among their camels to
protect themselves from the flying sand, and had only
been saved from dying of thirst by killing one of the
faithful animals and drinking the water stored in its
stomach.

This was too much for the Irishmen. They were

147

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCDS

fighting mad, and as soon as they could get the Arab
togs off and wash up all sixteen men quit the show.
Nothing would induce them to stay. They said they

would "be if they were going to be made

laughing stock of by that Childers any more.'* So
off they went, and I was left without a single camel
man. Something had to be done, so at the evening
performance Childers annoimced to the crowd in the
"big top" that there was an opportunity for one or
two to connect themselves with the show if they cared
to, and so well did he set out the attractions and the
advantages of the opening for an ambitious young
man, that when we left the town that night I had
sixteen green men trying to help me with the camels,
and the next day Childers was pointing them out to
a gaping crowd as "children of llie desert/*

The menagerie was a sort of catch-all in the show.
Men and animals not definitely connected with some
other part of the aggregation, or which for some
reason or other could not be conveniently cared for
by their own department, traveled with the menagerie.
In this way we came to have Jeremiah Backstitch
with us in tibe O'Brien menagerie.

Jerry was a colored fellow who rode the trick mule.
The mule was a meek, innocent-looking creature
which was taken in at each performance and led
around. Then announcement was made that the
management would give five dollars to any person
who could ride the mule aroimd the ring. Various
ones were sure to come forward and try it, but none
of them got very far, for the mule had been broken
to kick and buck at certain snaps of the ringmaster's

14S

Digitized by

FOLLOWEBS, FREAKS, AND FAKERS

whip. If this was not enough to unseat the rider the
ringmaster would touch the mule in a certain spot
with his whip and the mule would lie down and roll
over; a feat which was sure to get rid of any rider.
After a while Jeremiah Backstitch would amble out
from somewhere in the audience and declare to the
ringmaster that he could "ride dat yere mule.** The
ringmaster would laugh at the idea, and after some
talk between the two would give his consent for Jerry
to try it. Jerry would climb on the mule> and, sitting
way back as far as possible on him, reach down and
take hold of the mule's flanks with his hands, put his
feet around the animal's neck, and away they would
go aroimd and aroimd the ring without a mishap.
Of course Jerry and the mule had been carefully
trained to do this act, but the audience, supposing
they had seen an outsider get the best of the circus,
always sent up a big shout when they saw Jeremiah
triumphantly walk up and take his five dollars.

For a while the boys in the Cole show had a common
black-and-white goat named Fritz for a mascot. It
was free to go about and stay anywhere in the show
that suited it, but it spent most of its time with the
camels. That season we put two horses on the band
wagon for wheelers and hitched six camels ahead of
them, and led the parade with this wagon. After
Fritz had been with the show awhile he got in the
habit of marching in front of the camels all the way
aroimd with the parade. He did this regularly until
it got to be very hot in the middle of the summer,
and then he would start out with the parade, but
after he had led it for a block or two would drop out,

149

Digitized by

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

go back to the grounds, and lie in a lap of the canvas
until he heard the parade coming back, when he
would go to meet it and lead it on to the grounds.
Late that fall the show was loaded on to a boat to go
down the Mississippi. The boat was crowded and
Fritz got pushed up against some horses that kicked
him overboard. Cole had the boat stopped, a skiff
lowered, and Fritz rescued before we started on again.

One fellow who made his headquarters in the
menagerie for years with the Cole and Bamum shows
was "Frenchie.** Frenchie had the balloon privilege
and employed five men to help him. Early in the
morning they began to prepare for the day's business
by filling a lot of balloons and tying them to the end
of strings about five feet long. When the crowd
began to gather for the parade Frenchie and his men
went among the crowd and sold as many as they
could before the parade started. As soon as they
heard the parade coming they spread out, and each
one himted some vantage-point, like a low balcony
or platform, past which the crowd was likely to /move
and where they would be a little above the people.
Each one was supplied with some of the smallest
tacks it was possible to buy, and whenever a balloon
came near one of these tacks, blown With great skill
from between the lips, burst it. After the parade
Frenchie and his gang divided up, and while a part
of it wandered around among the crowd, popping
balloons with tacks, the balance were busy selling
more to take their places.

As long ago as when I first went on the road with
the circus the privilege of selling candy in and aroimd

FOLLOWERS, FREAKS, AND FAKERS

the show often brought as much as five thousand
dollars for one season. The holder of the privilege
employed several men to go along with the show and
do the actual selling. They were known as "candy
butchers" and traveled with the menagerie. The
most of their sales in those days were "barber poles*'
— long, large sticks of white candy with winding red
bands which made them resemble a barber's sign.
Sticks that had become dirty from handling and
broken pieces were cut up into small bits and put
into paper "comies." These the "candy butchers"
had a trick of selling to "rubes" and their girls for
twenty-five cents each, and represented them as
being something "extra fine."

With the Cole show were a couple of men, Pat
Ford and Jack Rogers, who were said to have the
"clothes-line privilege." That is, when the show
was going on they woidd sneak around the town and
rob the clothes lines of anything which they wanted
.or thought they could sell. Rogers was an all-round
crook and I never knew what finally became of him.
He had charge of O'Brien's teams one winter in
Richmond, and when O'Brien wanted to use them
in the spring he had first to go all over Richmond and
find his harnesses, which Rogers had sold to different
dealers during the winter. Ford was the worst
fighter I ever saw. He did so much of it that O'Brien
would not have him, and Cole fired him for it, but he
b^ged so hard to come back that Cole allowed him
to on condition that he would not fight. One day he
climbed to the top of a big tent pole to fix something.
While doing it he lost his hold with his hands and

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

could not grip the pole ti^t enough with his legs to
keep {rom going down. He slid the length of the
pole so rapidly and struck the ground with such force
that it paralyzed him from the hips down. Cole gave
him a shooting-gallery privilege with the show. He
was able to support himself with it until he could
open a permanent gallery in SL Louis.

One season when we were traveling in the South
one of the *^ stands" was President Johnson's home
town. As we were going through the town on parade
I noticed the sign on Johnson's old shop, Andrew
Johnson — Tailor. I called the attention of Jack
Shumake, the driver of one of the menagerie wagons,
to it, and said, ''Jack, I wish I had that sign." I
thought no more about it, but after we left the town
Jack produced the sign from some hiding place around
the wagons and made me a present of it, and for a
long while I had it among my curios.

One season with the O'Brien show we had the
menagerie spread through seven tents set in zigzag
fashion in such a way that the crowd had to go
through all seven to get into the main show. At
night all of them were taken away before the show
was over, and when the people came out they were
greatly puzzled at the change, and sometimes they
did not know which way to go until they were
shown.

In both the O'Brien and Cole shows we had some
big mirrors which made a hit with the public and
often furnished a lot of fim for us. They were about
foiu" by six or eight feet in size and we used to set
them up between the cages. Instead of being flat,

15%

Digitized by

FOLLOWERS, FREAKS, AND FAKERS

their surfaces were slightly curved, some concave
and others convex, and as a result a person's reflec-
tion was distorted. In some one looked to be eight
feet tall, while perhaps in the one beside it a person
would not seem to be more than two feet in height.
Some made a person look very large, and others the
opposite. They never failed to attract attention,
and there was a constant chorus of exclamations
aroimd them whenever the crowd was going in or out.

The public were very funny about the animals.
The more you warned people about an animal and
said it was dangerous, the more most of them seemed
to want to get up to it and pet it. "Whar's your
damn painter?" Whar's your untamable hyena?"
the countrymen would ask. Such things appeared to
interest them most. As the O'Brien show had fifty
cages of animals, it is easy to see how busy we were in
answering questions and watching out that no one
got hurt. I remember one fellow who insisted on
feeding an elephant peanuts after we had told him
not to. He was letting the elephant reach into his
overcoat pocket and help himself. When the elephant
got them all eaten he was not satisfied, but wanted
more, and in hunting for them took hold of the pocket
and pulled it out, and a piece of the coat with it.
The man was very angry and went to O'Brien about
it and tried to make O'Brien give him a new coat, but
O'Brien would not listen to him, for, as he told him,
he should not have been feeding the elephant.

With so much money changing hands all around
them, it is not surprising that tiie workingmen of the
menagerie were on the lookout to find some way to

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

make a dollar. Many were the schemes that were
tried* One which was pretty successful untfl the
management stopped it was to sell ^Modestones'' to
the colored people in the South. These were sup-
posed to have magic powers which would keep bad
luck away and cause the death of an enemy. They
were just bits of ordinary heavy stone and sold for
fifty and seventy-five cents apiece.

Once I could not understand why my porcupines
seemed to be losing all their quills. I was afraid that
they might be sick. I did not know but possibly the
man who cared for them might be careless about
them, so I watched him working around them without
letting him know it. When he thought he was all
alone he reached a broom into the cage toward one
of them. As the broom came near the porcupine
there was a loud whir-r-r-r and the broom was stuck
full of quills. I found he had been selling them for
twenty-five cents apiece. As soon as I stopped his
doing it my porcupines were all right again.

In one of the shows I was with we had an emu, a
large bird from Australia. It lays an egg about the
size of a goose egg. This gave an enterprising keeper
an idea. He used to buy a couple of dozen goose eggs
and hide them away in the cupboard of the wagon.
Then he would shape a nest in one comer of the emu*s
cage and just before the show opened slip one of the
goose eggs into it. When some farmer came along
and showed a marked interest in the bird, this keeper
would surreptitiously inquire if he would not like to
raise one, and sell him the egg for a dollar and a half.
I have often speculated on just what those fanners

FOLLOWERS, FREAKS, AND FAKERS

said and did when they became convinced that their
emu was nothing but an ordinary goose

Whfle the side show and the exhibit of freaks in the
old days never reached the size and the importance
as money getters that they did in Mr. Bailey's time,
yet they were an essential part of the show. With
Pogey O'Brien, near the end of the afternoon per-
formance they were lined up in the ring and lectured
about. One of Pogey's most valuable freaks was
Hannah Battersby, the giantess. She was the largest
woman ever exhibited in the United States. She
was nearly seven feet tall and weighed five hundred
and odd pounds. Her home was in Frankfort, not
far from Philadelphk. They made her pay double
fare in the Philadelphia buses, she took up so much
room. For some unaccountable reason she and the
living skeleton had become enamored of each other
and married. The skeleton was all right so long as
he stood up or sat down, but let him lie down or fall
down and he could not get up again without help.
There was a third member of the side-show group
who was a friend of Hannah and her husband. A
short, thick-set fefiow called "Stub.** He was the
strong man of the show. His stunt was to hold a
barrel of water at right angles to his chest, supporting
it by a strap which ran from the outer end of the
barrel to his teeth. On the barrel he would balance
a man. Nothing seemed to be the matter with Stub
except that he occasionally had fits. Of course he
was temporarily incapacitated while the fit was on.
One never-to-be-forgotten afternoon Hannah and her
husband, Stub, and the rest of the freaks, were in the

THE WAYS OF THE CIBCUS

ring while the customary announcements were being
made. At that most inopportune time Stub feU in a
fit and a moment after Hannah's husband stumbled
to the ground. Hannah was not fazed, even for an
instant, nor did she hesitate, but, seizing one in each
hand by the seat of the pants, walked calmly out of
the ring with them, amid the applause of the audience,
who thought it a regular part of the show.

Another valuable card in the side show that traveled
with the O'Brien circus was "Spaf" Heiman. Spaf
was a sleight-of-hand performer and voluble "barker."
One of Spaf 's specialties was his tricks with pocket-
knives. After he had collected a crowd around his
lecture platform outside the tent he would call out:

Any of you fellers got a knife? Lend it to me and
I'll show yer a trick.**

Holding the knife up for the crowd to see, he would
have it suddenly disappear and as suddenly appear
again, perhaps dropping from his sleeve or out of his
pants 1^, or possibly he would produce it from one
of his pockets or discover it in Uie pocket or hat of
one of the crowd. Meanwhile Spaf had been sizing
up the knife, and if it was a poor or ordinary one in a
few moments its owner got it back again, but if it
was one worth having, with great deliberation Spaf
would hold it up in front of his face and, while the
astonished crowd gaped in wonder» swallow it.
Usually the owner was too surprised and too conscious
of the amusement of the crowd to demur. Occa-
sionally one would protest, but Spaf would look
solemn and throw up his hands with a gesture of
helplessness.

FOLLOWERS, FREAKS, AND FAKERS

''You saw the knife swallowed. What can I do?
Isn't it worth the price of a knife to see the trick?"

This was all unanswerable logic, and the chagrined
''gillie" would soon slink away, while the crowd was
all the more ready to be herded into the side show.
At rare intervals some fellow would put up a real
"holler" about his knife, but a few shafts of rough
wit from Spaf and the jeers of the amused crowd soon
silenced him. Anyone aroimd the show that wanted
a knife went to Spaf.

"Spaf, get me a good knife to-day," they would
say to him in the morning, and at night they always
had it.

While not strictly speaking a part of it, yet in the
old days the concert was more closely connected
with the side show than it is to-day. Pogey O'Brien's
show had a band of nineteen pieces. The leader was
one Michael Dultz, who lived on Callowhill Street
in Philadelphia. Michael played a yellow clarinet.
The boys used to tell him that yellow clarinets were
imlucky, that he should get a black one, but he only
shrugged his shoulders. "All right," they said,
"you'll be sorry some day and wish you had taken
our advice." A particularly favorite air with Michael
was called "Who's been here?" Seldom a day that
he did not have the band play it and frequently he
amused himself when alone by playing it softly on
his clarinet.

One Saturday night Michael left the show at Sham-
okin and hurried home to surprise his wife by spending
Sunday with her. Much to our surprise, he appeared
back at the show again the next forenoon with an

157

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

utterly dejected and forlorn air. When pressed £or
an explanation he exclaimed:

"Mine Gott! Mine Gott! What you dink I find?
What you dink I find mit my vife? Mine Gott! I
find dot tam' red-headed vig maker mit her! Oh,
dot clarinet! Dot tam' yaller clarinet! De boys iss
right. Dey told me. I am a tarn' fool ! Mine Gott !
Mine Gott!"

Michael for a long time was inconsolable and never
again was he known to play his favorite air.

The biggest couple which I ever saw traveled with
the Cole show. They were handled " with kid gloves."
We knew them as Annie Swann and Captain Bates,
and they were billed that way. She came from
Dumbarton on the Clyde, and he from Nova Scotia.
No performer with the show began to be treated as
well as they did. Cole carried along a carriage for
their especial use. As soon as they saw fit to leave
the berths, which had of necessity been built on pur-
pose for them, their carriage took them to the best
hotel in the town, where room had previously been
engaged. Here they rested, had the best of meals,
and entertained themselves until it was time for them
to be exhibited in the afternoon when the carriage
called for them and carried them to the menagerie.
They walked from the carriage to their platform on
a strip of carpeting. As soon as the perfomance
began they went back to the hotel and stayed imtil
just before time for the show to be over, coming back
then long enough to be on the platform while the
crowd was coming out. Bates was over eight feet
high. I think his exact measure was eight feet seven

158

FOLLOWERS. FREAKS, AND FAKERS

and a half inches. He made it a point every day to
invite the tallest man in the crowd to come up and
stand under his arm, and I never saw one that could
not do it.

An elaborate and extensively billed feature with
the Cole show was called the "cut-up act." A fel-
low known as "Cassanova" worked it. A cabinet
was set in the ring and the doors swung open for the
public to see that it was just a simple empty cabinet.
Then a man was put in the cabinet and the crowd
saw him sitting there as the doors were shut. Cassa-
nova next produced a murderous-looking big knife
and began a harangue. While he was doing this the
man in the box was busy opening a partition, slipping
a wax dummy, made up to resemble himself, out in
front of the doors, and hiding himself in the compart-
ment where the dummy had been. When Cassanova
got the signal from the man in the cabinet that all
was ready he reached in with the knife and in a
moment held the dummy head up to view. Realistic
blood, manufactured of water and aniline dye,

dripped from the stub of the neck. After waiting
long enough for the horror to have made sufficient
impression, he would reach in the second time and
bring out an arm. Then he opened the doors of the
cabinet for the audience to see the figure minus the
head and arm, with the fake blood flowing freely from
the two woimds. Then, lest the spell might be broken,
he would announce that unless he got the arm and
head on again in so many minutes it would be ''too
late," and with well-simulated haste he got them back
into the cabinet. Another bit of talk diverted atten-
11 159

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

tion from the time necessary for the live man and
the dummy to exchange places. At the signal Cassa-
nova once more opened the doors of the cabinet. The
living man walked out and made a bow to the amazed
crowd, many of whom really believed they had seen
a man dismembered and put together again without
injury, while nearly all the rest were uncertain
whether they had been fooled or not. At any rate,
they had a delicious mystery to discuss.

One day while Cassanova was getting his cabinet
ready to go in for the afternoon performance some of
the men began hectoring him by throwing a saddle
at him. He protested, but they repeated it, and
finally he threatened if they did it any more he would
not go in with his act that day. That night Cole
hunted him up and asked him why he did not go in
with his act. He explained, and Cole said:

"What's that got to do with me? I didn't throw
anything at you, did I? That act is billed heavy,
and the people want to see it, and if they don't it
makes trouble. Now, I'm going to fine you twenty-
five dollars for not going in to-day."

From that time on the "cut-up act" never failed
to go in.

Another "big hit" with the Cole show was known
as the "box trick." Tom Mclntyre worked it. A
large box with a hinged lid was shown the crowd, and
anyone who cared to was allowed to examine it. Then
Tom crawled into the box, the lid was shut, and
volunteers from the audience tied the box securdy
with a rope which was provided. The length of the
rope had been carefully calculated in order for it to

160

FOLLOWERS, FREAKS, AND FAKERS

be impossible to wrap it around the box more than
so many times. When it had been tied fast, the box,
Tom and all, were placed in a cabinet. While his
assistant was making a speech and flourishing a magic
wand Tom pressed a secret fastening which allowed
a portion of the box to open inwards, and he could
then easily crawl out between the ropes and close the
box together behind him. At the signal the cabinet
was removed and the audience saw the box still tied
as it was when put in the cabinet, while Tom was
outside making his bow. Then he and the box were
put in the cabinet again. He opened the box, crawled
back between the ropes, and shut his secret door. When
the cabinet was again removed men from the audience
untied the ropes and of course foimd Tom in the box.

Tom used to get drunk and it affected him at dif-
ferent times in three different ways. He might want
to sing or he might have a time of crying, or he might
have a spell of caring for nothing but hard work.
The winter we were in Utica, New York, he and Al
Richards filled in the time by running a saloon. Tom
was frequently drunk, and often wandered around
the block, singing as loudly as he could. At other
times he would cry and wail like an Irish banshee.
One day when his rum had fired him with ambition,
as he walked around the block he saw an old man
sawing away at a pile of cordwood. Steadying him-
self by the fence pickets, he watched the man for a
moment and, beckoning to him, said:

"Shay, old man, how much do you get for the
job? I say, old man, how mu-mu-mu-much do you
get for the job?"

161

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

The surprised woodcutter told him that he had
bargained to cut the whole pile for seventy-five cents.
This seemed to be a munificent sum to Mclntyre just
then, and, pulling himself together, he called again:

"Old man, w'at *11 you take for your saw an' your
job? I'll give a dollar. I'll give a dollar. Quick,
let me have 'em."

The old man, seeing the dollar in Tom's hand, readily
gave him the saw, and Tom worked away at the pile
of wood until the exercise sobered him. When he
quit there was not much for the old man to do except
take his saw back and collect for cutting the wood.

No one ever made the exhibition of freaks in con-
nection with* a circus such a feature as Mr. Bailey,
who took them out of the side show, where an extra
admission was required to see them, and put them on
a platform in the menagerie, where they were free to
all who paid the general admission. At times he
exhibited from a hundred to a hundred and fifty
people this way.

Among them was one of Mr. Bamum's earliest and
most extensively advertised "finds" known as "Zip."
This is the way he was described on the bills:

"Zip, Bamum's original, remarkable *what-is-it?'
A most curious living human being, without a language
and without a country. A brown-skinned man,
unlike any other being on earth, whose origin is,
possibly, lost in antiquity, and concerning whom
everything is purely conjecture. As he is speechless
and thus unable to tell where or from what part of
the world he came, savants and scientists have been
puzzled to accord him a country, as his counterpart

. 162

FOLLOWERS, FREAKS, AND FAKERS

has never been discovered, hence the name given him.

As a matter of fact there was no particular wonder
about poor Zip. He was dimply an unfortunate
of low mentality and peculiar appearance who was
"made " for the part. Years of practice had made it
easy for him to be mute when his manager or the
proprietor of the show or strangers were around. But
when alone with familiar faces he could chatter glibly
enough and swear like a pirate. He was bom some-
where in the United States, and it is my impression
in Bamum's own state of Connecticut. Although he
still looked and appeared young when I left the
show, he was in reality seventy or eighty years old.

Another freak in the Barnum & Bailey collection
which caused a gasp of amazement from many a per-
son was announced as "Mile. Ivy, who was bom with
a wealth of luxuriant hair, so closely resembling
ordinary moss that she is called *The Moss-haired
Girl.' She is a notable and pleasing addition to the
army of living monstrosities and living cm^iosities.**

How little the crowd, who gazed at the crinkly hair
standing out at right angles to the head of the appar-
ently guileless "Mile. Ivy/* and listened to the glib
story of the "barker," imagined that the secret of the
moss hair was nothing but stale beer. That when
the hair was washed it was like any other and that it
was only by constant care and treatment that "MUe.
Ivy" could keep her head in shape to earn her salary.

Another thing which caused many people to almost
doubt their senses, especially countrymen, were the
pigs which, with seeming ease and intelligence.

'What-is-it?'

163

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

answered all sorts of questions and did problems by
placing their noses on certain cards laid in a row in
front of them. How much less would have been their
astonishment if they could have known that the pigs
were simply following the cues given them by the
position of the performer's feet.

The smallest human being which I ever saw was
called for show purposes "Great Peter the Small."
Mr. Bailey foimd and leased him somewhere in
Europe, and exhibited him in this country, then took
him to England, and on the tour of the Continent.
He did not bring him back here the second time.
The circus press agent described him as follows:

"The smallest human being ever bom. All other
midgets veritable giants beside him. A mature and
perfect man in all respects save that of size. Weigh-
ing but half a dozen pounds; a high hat entirely
covers him. In very truth Nature's weakest effort.
Hands no bigger than shilling pieces; fingers no
longer than interrogation points; arms as small as
cigarettes; limbs the thickness of lead pencils; feet
the size of postage stamps; head only as big as an
orange. Just the same proportion as a child's small
doll. An animated little human toy. The person-
ification of the real pygmy."

While this description is exaggerated, as are all
descriptions from a circus press department, it is
nearer the truth than one who never saw Great
Peter would imagine. He could actually stand
comfortably in the giant's tall hat. I still have
among my curios the coat and pants belonging to a
uniform which he wore.

Digitized by

Google

Digitized by

Google

FOLLOWERS, FREAKS, AND FAKERS

To-day a show on the road carries its own corps of
detectives and there is no place from which "slick
gentlemen" are more persistently hoimded than the
grounds of a first-class circus. In the old days the
gambler, the pickpocket, the short-change artist,
and the faker traveled with the show and in return
for goodly sums of money, paid to its owner, were
left undisturbed to prey on the crowd which the circus
brought together. The roughest show on the road
to-day would not dare countenance the least of the
methods by which great sums of money were regularly
taken from the public by swindlers connected with
circuses in the late 'sixties and early 'seventies. Some
owners tried to justify the practice, in a measure, on
the ground that it reduced swindling to the minimum,
as crooks were sure to follow a show, and if certain
ones were allowed to go as a part of it, and pay
heavily for the privilege, their own interest would
force them to make sure that all others kept away.
Probably no show ever permitted and shared in
crookedness to the extent that the John O'Brien show
did, but in the end it was the means of its undoing.

No one connected with the show worked more
regularly or diligently than the crooks. From the
time in the morning when old deaf Santum perched
himself on a fence at the outskirts of the town to win
the confidence of some farmer with a "good roll" till
the ticket-seller for the concert after the performance
at night short-changed his last customers, no oppor-
tunity for "catching suckers" was neglected.

Contrary to popular belief, however, it was not the
"rube" from the country and the "guy" from the

165

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

town, alone, who fell for the wiles of the swindler. It
was astonishing to see the number of men with busi-
ness experience, seemingly possessed of intelligence,
who, fascinated by the lure of something for nothing,
paid wager after wager until their pockets were empty.
While it was a sordid business, there was both com-
edy and tragedy connected with it, and it required
men with iron nerves, agile-witted, and resourceful,
for in those "gim-toting" days it took real courage
to calmly look a man in the eye, and by so simple an
expedient as the manipulation of three cards take
all his money away, not knowing how quick he or his
friends were to shoot. It was seldom that the gambler
ever displayed arms, even if he carried them, although
I remember one, Sam Gibbons, an expert three-card-
monte man, who used to work his game with a pair
of "forty-fives" hanging from his belt.

A singular thing about the whole swindling fra-
ternity was the fact that, although they were regularly
employed in catching suckers," knew the inside'of
so many games, and secured large sums of money,
they very rarely kept them, for almost without excep-
tion they were faro fiends, and in the first large town
to which they went in turn became the "suckers"
and were cleaned out. i

A man known as "the fixer," an employee of the
show, traveled with it, and upon the skill with which
he did his work depended, to a great extent, the
measure of the opportunity and success of the crooked
gentry. The advance agent, arranging for the coming
of the show, before leaving a town would prepare the
way for the "fixer" and his work by intimating to

166

FOLLOWERS, FREAKS, AND FAKERS

the police authorities that some one would see them
in regard to certain little games of chance" which
went along with th^ show. As soon as possible after
the show reached the town the "fixer" saw the police
commissioner, the chief of police, or both, and by a
generous use of blanley and money endeavored to
secure immunity from police interference. If his
efforts were successful, and in those days they nearly
always were, the town was said to be "fixed" or "safe."
If it was not possible to "fix" a town the gamblers and
fakers usually "took a chance," perhaps being a
little more cautious and careful and on the alert for
trouble. Like all holders of concessions, they were
obliged to furnish their own transportation. Most
of them traveled with a fast horse and buggy, and, no
matter if the town were "fixed" or not, those parts
of the day when the crowd was being worked the
horses were kept harnessed and ready, with a driver,
so that at a moment's notice their owners could flee
the town. Whenever these precipitate flights oc-
curred any gambling equipment which could not
be easily slipped into a pocket was thrown in a heap
and left to be brought along in some wagon connected
with the menagerie. In the next town its owner
would be waiting for it.

Another task of the "fixer" was to mingle in the
crowd and take care of any victim who was partic-
ularly noisy about his losses or started for the police
station. If possible this was accomplished by pre-
tended sympathy and friendly advice, but, failing in
this, he would represent himself to be the owner of
the show and pay the man the amount of his loss.

167

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

calling it a mistake if it was a case of short change,
otherwise explaining his act as the result of his desire
to keep up the good name of the show.

Most of the gamblers used stool-pigeons or, as they
were known in circus parlance, "cappers.** Not
being suspected by the crowd of having any connec-
tion with the gamblers, their heavy winnings inflamed
the cupidity of the looker-on, while their occasional
losses tended to disarm suspicion.

As soon as the crowd commenced to gather along
the route of the parade, the "dips** b^an making
"touches,** and frequently by the time it was over
had quite a collection of "leathers.** Along with
them went the three-card-monte men to "spread the
brods,'* as they called their game. Standing an
empty barrel, with a board across its top, in some
convenient spot, they worked the game as hard as
they could or dared, until the passing of the parade
attracted the whole attention of the crowd and pro-
vided an opportunity to sneak imobserved away, to
appear later on the show groimds, either around the
main entrance, behind some side-show tent, or wan-
dering among the crowd, working on a shelf hung from
the neck by a strap. Less frequently a bold and
successful operator would work in a small tent of
his own.

About equally populaf with the three-card-monte
game was the shell game. As long as the crowd
stayed there could still be heard in some inconspicuous
comer the guttiu-al drone, repeated over and over
with slight variation: "Now, gentlemen, you see me
put the pea under this shell. Watch which one I

168

FOLLOWERS, FREAKS, AND FAKERS

put it under. Three shells — ^Hoeus, Mocus, Pocus.
Watch as I move them. Now Hocus is Pocus, Mocus
is Hocus, and Pocus is Mopus. See! Three in a row
again. Mocus, Pocus, Hocus. Now, gentlemen, put
up your money." Of course skillful manipulation,
aided sometimes by a long finger nail, kept the pea
in all sorts of places except where the watchers
imagined it.

A gambling device which drew a lot of money into
the hands of the men who operated it was known as
the "leary belt.** It was a circular box similar to a
cheese box, in two parts, one a trifle smaller than the
other and so arranged as to revolve inside the larger
one, which was stationary. The lower and stationary
half was divided into twelve numbered sections.
The upper revolving portion was marked only with
a vertical arrow. Twelve whips completed the outfit.
The operator made it a rule never to play with less
than twelve taking part, each one of whom paid a
dollar for a whip which he held on one of the num-
bered squares on the box. When all was ready the
upper part of the box was spun around and the num-
ber to which the arrow pointed when it stopped was
the winner. The player whose whip was on the cor-
responding niunber received six dollars. Seemingly
it was as fair as any game of chance could be, but as
a matter of fact the operator had a hidden squeeze
device with which he could stop the arrow at any
number he wished and the winner was almost always
a "capper."

AnoUier seemingly artless device was called the
innocent ball, but its innocence ended with its appear-

169

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

ance, for it could "trim suckers" as fast as they
appeared. It consisted of a small ball swinging by
a cord from a short wooden arm which extended at
right angles from an upright set in a table. A short
distance to one side a ninepin was placed. The
game was to swing the ball in a circle and knock over
the ninepin. Thc^ length of the cord was so adjusted
that it was perfectly easy to do this whenever the
"capper" tried it or the "sucker" before he had put
up his money, but once the money was put up the
operator had a means of shortening the cord just
enough so that the ball would almost, but never quite,
hit the pin.

It was not the "big sucker" alone that was fished
for. ^There were devices for all kinds of fortune
seekers, and if there came a day with few or no big
fish the bait was changed and an effort made to take
an extra large haul of small ones. When all else failed
the "innocent strap" was brought out. Nothing but
a plain piece of leather, perhaps three feet long and
an inch wide, without holes or markings, and which
anyone was welcome to examine, it was dangerous
because of its very simplicity.

Laying the strap edgewise on a board, the gambler
doubled it by bringing the ends together and begin-
ning with the loop thus formed in the middle of the
strap he would start to coil it up. Two exactly
similar openings would be left in the center of the coil.
One was formed by the two sides of the strap brought
together, the other by the loop as it was folded against
the doubled strap in the first turn of the coil. As he
worked he talked to the crowd gathered around him.

170

FOLLOWERS, FREAKS, AND FAKERS

"Now you see all IVe got here is just a little inno-
cent strap. Now I'm going to double it and coil it
up. Watch very close now. You see all I do is just
wind it up. It's just a little innocent strap, but I
don't believe any of you can tell which hole is the
loop. Somebody put their finger in the hole they
think is the loop."

There was never any lack of persons to try it. The
gambler would pull the ends of the strap and uncoil
it. The finger would be caught in the loop of the strap
and a grin go around the crowd.

"Wall, you beat this time, didn't you? You can't
never tell. It's just a little innocent strap, but I'll
tell you what I'll do. I'll bet you a dollar you can't
tell this time."

The dollar is put up; the strap pulled; and again
the finger is inside the loop.

"Wall, you won, didn't you? It*s a little innocent
strap. You can't never be sure. But I'll bet you
one, five, ten, or any amount you want to that you
can't tell this time."

Emboldened by his success and the admiration of
the onlookers, the "sucker" usually made a heavy bet.

"Now watch me close. You know it's for money
this time. It's just a little innocent strap that you
can't tell about. Sometimes — "

Again the strap was drawn, but this time it would
come clear of the "sucker's" finger, while in dumb
surprise he watched the gambler pocket his money
and heard the singsong voice commence over again:

"Now you see, gentlemen, this is just a little inno-
cent strap/'

171

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

It was not uncommon for a capper to make a ''big
holler" over a loss. I knew one that carried it so far
once that he came near being killed. We were show-
ing in a Western town. A capper by the name of
Camel discovered in the crowd a California ranchman
who had just sold some cattle and had two thousand
dollars with him. Without much difficulty he got
him to go back of a side-show tent where there was a
three-card-monte game going on. After Camel had
been allowed to win heavy two or three times he
induced the ranchman to follow his example and put
up his whole roll. Of course both lost and Camel, to
avoid suspicion, b^an to cry and bemoan his loss
bitterly, pretending he had lost his last dollar and had
no idea where he would go or what he could do, and
broadly hinted at suicide. His distress seemed so real
that the ranchman offered to take him home with him,
and when Camel demurred the ranchman became so
insistent that it was quite a time before Camel could
find an opportunity to escape him. When the ranch-
man finfJly realized how Camel had tricked him he
swore he would shoot him, and the only reason he did
not was because he could not find him, although he
hunted for him the rest of the day.

There was always a fellow along with the gamblers
who pretended to be a doctor. His medical knowl-
edge was limited to knowing how to bring a person
out of a faint, and his case never contained anything
more than some smelling salts and a few simple restor-
atives. It was no uncommon thing for a man to
faint away when he lost a large sum of money, and it
^83 at such times the pseudo-physiciaii held the

172

FOLLOWERS, FREAKS, AND FAKERS

center of the stage. Coming forward in response to
a loud inquiry if there was a doctor in the crowd,
with a grand flourish he would order the bystanders
to "step back and give the man air." Then he would
unfasten the man's collar, put the salts to his nose,
and as soon as he b^an to revive, call for a team to
send him home. This was always ready and waiting,
and in a few moments the man was off and away from
the grounds and the danger of his creating a dis-
turbance over. There was little likelihood that his
pride would allow him to mention his loss either to
family or friends that day, and by another the show
was miles away.

These " doctors'' were just as anxious asf any of the
rest of the swindlers to get out of the way if there was
any trouble. Once in a Pennsylvania, town, when I
was with the John O'Brien show, one of them fur-
nished us with a good laugh. It had not been possible
to "fix" the town, so the different games were "taking
a chance," after posting men to give warning if the
police came. They had just begun to do a good bus-
iness when they got the word "sherry your nibs."
In a moment tiiey were hidden in the "laps of the
canvas," all except the "doctor," a big, elegantly
dressed man, who was too late to hide himself before
the police reached the grounds. For a moment the
"doctor" was fazed; then seeing a large white house
just across the street from the show grounds, he calmly
walked over to it and rang the bell. Making a pro-
found bow to the woman who opened the door, he said:

''Madam, I feel faint. Would you give me a glass
of water?"

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

She brought him the water and showed hun into
the parlor, where he sat and watched the police search-
ing the show. As soon as he saw them go away he
told the woman:

feel better now. I think I can go on. I thank
you very much for your kindness.**

Once outside the door, he ran for his buggy and got
out of town as fast as his horse could go.

As soon as something of a crowd had gathered on
the grounds, but before the ticket wagon was opened
up, a "capper" mounted a convenient box or wagon
and made this announcement:

"Ladies and gentlemen, we warn you to look out
for pickpockets. This show does its best to keep
them away, but sometimes they do get on the grounds.
We don't want to have any of you lose your money
while coming to our show, so we tell you about them
and give you a chance to look out."

Seldom did it fail to have the desired eflFect. Each
one felt in his pocket to see if his money was still there,
thus showing the "dips" just where to look for it, and
they in turn got busy. ^ If a few people found that
they had already been "touched," it created the
proper amount of excitement to make the work of the
pickpocket still easier.

But no matter how fortunate one had been in
escaping pickpockets, how resolutely he had refused
to be drawn into games of chance, or purchase the
marvelous wares of the fakers, he still had to run the
risk of being robbed by the short-change artist in the
ticket wagon. This gentleman was waiting for him
with stacks of bills at his elbow, ready for making

FOLLOWERS, FREAKS, AND FAKERS

change. Scattered plentifully through them were
ones which had been folded across the middle so that
the two ends were brought together. In picking up
a handful of the bills to use he was careful to keep
two-thirds of their length in his hand and count them
out to the customer by turning back the ends. With
a deft twist he rolled the change into a wad, pressed
it into the customer's hand, and with a suave 'Hhank
you," turned to the next one. The pushing crowd
carried the victim quickly away from the ticket window
and if was rarely that he discovered his loss until later.

How profitable the practice was can be judged from
the fact that Steve Williams, who sold tickets for the
John O'Brien show, instead of drawing a salary for
his services, paid O'Brien a thousand dollars a season
for the privilege and boarded himself besides. Steve
came from Philadelphia. He was a most fastidious
dresser and always sold tickets in a cutaway coat and
striped pants, and it was seldom that he was seen
without a flower in the lapel of his coat. He would
trust no one but his wife to do his laundry, and, no
matter how far away from home, whenever he accu-
mulated a trunkful of soiled clothes he sent it on to
her by express and she returned it full of clean ones.

Once some person that Steve had short-changed
tried to get even with him by posting signs in several
of the towns in which we were to show that read:

"Beware of the two-legged hyena with the circus.
He is worse than the four-legged one. He is in the
ticket wagon."

With the W. W. Cole show one season were three
men. Woodward, Waddell, and Hickey, who sold

12 175

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

tickets among the crowd before the ticket wagon
opened up for business. Besides paying for the priv-
ilege by the season they had to buy the tickets at an
advance of ten cents each above the r^^ar price and
pay a certain per cent, of their profits as well. They
used to tell the crowd that by buying them it could
be sure of getting in and having a good seat, would
not have to wait in line at the ticket window, and by
thus avoiding the crush would escape the danger of
pickpockets. These methods enabled them to sell
on an average of from five to six hundred tickets a
day, and their profits were wholly from short-changing.

Once their greed came near being fatal. We were
the first show that went to Butte, Montana, after the
town was opened up. It was a pretty wild place.
The miners were eager to see the show and we had a
big crowd. The three ticket sellers, finding it so easy
to dispose of tickets, threw all restraints to the winds
and short-changed right and left. It was not long
before the victims began to discover their losses and
compare experiences, and as a result quite a while
before the show began a lynching party had been
formed and with ropes in their hands were hunting
for the three ticket sellers. It was no practical joke
or mere jest, either, that was intended. Woodward,
Waddell, and Hickey would surely have swung from
the most convenient poles if those miners had once
got hold of them, and the only way they escaped was
by paying a locomotive engineer a princely sum to
take them away as fast as he dared to drive his engine,
and did not stop until he was a hundred miles from
Butte. It was weeks before they dared to join the show

176

FOLLOWERS, FREAKS, AND FAKERS

again, and for two weeks the sheriflf from Butte came
and searched the show each day, hoping to find them.

In addition to the gamblers and other crooks there
were usually several who paid for the privilege of
going along with the show to sell various articles.
One of the most successful of these that I remember
dubbed himself "Doctor GrafiF,** and sold a solution
which he called "Wizard Oil." He claimed that it
would cure all kinds of pain, especially toothache and
rheumatism, instantly. What it was I never knew,
but it would deaden the feeling for a little time in
any part of the body to which it was applied. The
doctor traveled in a covered wagon of his own, from
the back end of which he used to harangue the crowd
and sell his oil. His favorite feat was to get some
fellow into the wagon, rub a little oil around a tooth,
and then pull it out. Occasionally he could get some
man on crutches to let him apply the oil to a stiff joint,
and when he admitted that it felt relieved seize his
crutch, snap it in two, and throw the pieces on top
of his wagon.

After a time he did such a business that he hired a
colored fellow to go along with him. Together they
used to entertain the crowd, the colored fellow playing
on a big banjo for the doctor to sing. Besides the
popular songs of the day he had a long one extolling
the virtues of Wizard Oil, between each verse of which
he vociferously sang the following chorus:

*• Oh! I'll take another bottle or two.
I'll take another bottle or two.
Oh! I'll take another bottle of Wizard Ofl,
J'U t|tke another bottle or two."

177

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

Finally the doctor got to taking in so much money
and keeping so many people away from the show that
Cole wanted to be rid of him and got some of the men
to put up all kinds of jobs on him in the hope that
he would get sick of it and leave the show on his own
account. But not even hiding the nuts which held
the wheels on his wagon, so that he lost a day in
overtaking the show, was enough to discourage him,
and in the end Cole had to tell him to leave.
- Another precious rascal that traveled with the Cole
show was "Soapy Jones/* Soapy bought common
washing soap in large quantities and cut it into cakes
about an inch square. These he scented with cologne
and wrapped in tin foil and sold for twenty-five cents
apiece as a valuable chemical composition to remove
spots from clothing.

vn

ESCAPES, BECAFTUBES, AND MONKEY TRICKS

TN spite of all precautions it sometimes happens
^ that animals escape from their cages and keepers.
It may be the result of carelessness on the part of the
keeper, some unsuspected weakness of a fastening or
bar, or an accident that breaks open the cage. What-
ever the cause, the knowledge that a great savage
animal is at large usually creates a panic and his size
and ferocity are not lessened by the telling of the
hysterical story that always spreads like wildfire.

An animal in a secure cage and the same animal
running loose are quite apt to be two entirely different
propositions, and even old and experienced menagerie
men are loath to attempt the capture of the larger
and more dangerous beasts that have broken out of
their confinement. As it is always imperative that
they be secured, and that as quickly as possible, and
as it has to be done by some one, it has fallen to my
lot a number of times during my forty years with
animals to be the one to face and drive back into a
cage captives that have escaped.

My first experience of the kind occurred the third
winter I was with Pogey O'Brien. The show was in
winter quarters in Philadelphia. A man by the name
of Scaddegood was night watchman at the time. He

179

THE WAYS OF THE CIBCUS

was alone in the big building in which the show was
quartered, with the exception of Henry, a colored
man who rode the trick mule and who was sleeping
upstairs on the hay. O'Brien's house was just across
file yard and I lived a block away on the next street.

Scaddegood made the rounds of the place about
midnight, looked after his lights, fixed his fires, sat
down beside one of them, and fell asleep without
meaning to. About two o'clock he woke up and was
much startled to see George, the lion, on the floor in
front of him and only a few feet away. In some way
the animal had managed to work tJie fastenings on
his cage loose, and it was probably his hopping down
from the cage to the floor that had waked Scadde-
good. At any rate the watchman was a desperately
frightened man and lost no time in grabbing up a
couple of chairs, which he held in front of him while
he backed out of the door on the double quick, ran
across the yard, and began pounding on the window
of the room in which O'Brien, who could not lie
down on* account of his asthma, was sleeping in his
chair. At the same time he called out, "Pogey!
Pogey! George is loose! Pogey! Pogey! I say George
is loose!"

O'Brien did not so much as get out of his chair,
but with a wheezy drawl answered, "Well, you tell
Henry ter lay low and then you go git Conklin."

I dressed as quickly as possible and hurried back
with Scaddegood, who was white as a sheet and
trembling from nervousness. I was afraid George
might wander upstairs and find poor Henry before I
got there, but much to my relief, as soon as I stepped

180

ESCAPES, RECAPTURES, AND MONKEY TRICKS

in the door I saw the lion quietly munching at a pile
of bones under the stairs that led to the hayloft. I
picked up a long iron scraper used to dean out cages
and gave George as hard a punch as I could with it,
at the same time letting out the worst yell I wajt
capable of. The lion, with a siuprised snarl, started
out from under the stairs.

Standing fastened in the middle of the floor by a
chain was the elephant. Queen Anne. With a great
spring George landed on her shoulder aind sank his
claws into the thick hide. Quick as a flash the ele-
phant wound her trunk round him and threw him to
the floor with such force that it knocked the wind
out of him. There happened to be some light wooden
doors standing handy, and, shielding myself with a
couple of them, I began to drive George toward his
cage as soon as he could stand on his feet. After a
few moments we had him securely locked in again.
Then we went to look for Henry. We could see
nothing of him when we got to the head of the stairs,
but after considerable calling and reassuring the hay
b^an to move in one comer and presently there
appeared a face as white as a colored man's ever gets.

After taking a careful look round to see that every-
thing was all right I went back to bed. O'Brien did
not appear at all until his usual time next morning.

*We had no further trouble with George, but Scad-
d^ood did not sleep any more that winter while on
duty.

My second experience with an escaped lion was
several years later at Defiance, Ohio. At that time
I was in charge of the menagerie of Cole's circus.

181

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

The show was over and we were getting our things
on board the cars in the freight yard, ready to start
away. I had my cages on the cars and the yard
engine was coupled on to move them over to the main
track. By the siding on which they stood to be
loaded was a long row of chutes used in filling cars
with coal. Dangling from the end of each chute was
a rope that when pulled released a trap and started
down the coal.

As the cars began to move out one of these ropes
caught on the top of a cage in which were three lions
and a leopard. This sent tons of coal down the chute
with a rush onto the top of the cage, which was broken
open and half filled by it. At the sound of the crash
the engineer stopped at once. We hurried up to see
what had happened. Crouching in the corner of the
cage was the leopard, but the three frightened lions
had made their way out over the coal and were
nowhere in sight. It was dark as pitch and we had
not the slightest idea which way they had gone.
Every man in the yard declared he had felt one of
them brush past him in the dark.

All hands took hold and helped hunt lions. With
such torches and lights as we could find we made a
systematic hunt over the freight yard and soon had
two of the lions caged again, but the third, which was
the largest and most dangerous, we could find no
trace of whatever. Finally I heard in the still night
air, from away in the distance across the Maumee
River, the muffled bellow of a cow. Taking a few
men with me, I hurried off in the direction of the
sound as fast as I could.

ESCAPES, RECAPTURES, AND MONKEY TRICKS

After considerable search we found a bam, attached
to which was a cowpen whose door was in two parts,
the upper half open and the lower closed. I crept
up quietly and looked over. There was my lion, and
in its great jaws the nose and mouth of a cow. I
shut and fastened the open half of the door and went
across the road to the house and routed the farmer
out and told him there was a runaway lion out in his
cowpen which had killed his cow, that I was going to
catch it again and would pay him for the cow, but I
did not want him to come out for fear he might get hurt.

"Don't you worry, son, about my coming out,"
he answered. "There ain*t no danger of that. You
jest go ahead and ketch your lion and when yer want
me you'll find me right here.'*

Leaving a couple of men to watch the stable, I
hurried back to the train, unloaded the sacred cow,
and took the cage over the river to the farmer's cow-
pen. Here we took the cage off its wheels and put
it down on the ground close up to the cowpen door.
When all was ready I opened the doors of both the
cage and the cowpen, climbed over into the pen, and
drove the lion into the cage. After the lion was
secure once more I went in and asked the farmer
how much the damage would be.

"Give me thirty dollars an' we'll call it square,*'
he said.

So I paid him the money and told him he was wel-
come to keep the carcass.

"It's youm now," he replied. "I don't want no
beef that no damned lion killed. Take her along
with yer."

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

I sent a wagon for the cow and had her dressed off
and we fed the meat to the animals. I exammed the
body carefully and could not find a scratch or a bruise
on it» but almost every drop of blood had been sucked
out. Evidently the lion, as he jogged along the road,
had smelled the cow, and, jumping over the closed
half of the door, seized her by the nose and brought
her down. It was his hold on her nose and mouth
that had given her bellow the peculiar muffled sound
which had attracted my attention.

Another one of my adventures with a loose lion
occurred on board the mail steamer City of^Sydney
while bound for Australia in charge of the menagerie
of the Cole show. We were about ten days out from
San Francisco and I was sitting for a little while on
an upper deck by the main hatch, to have a smoke
and get some fresher air than was down in the hold
where the animals were quartered. Suddenly there
was a lot of shouting and commotion from below. I
could not make out just what was the matter, but I
caught the words "lion*' and "loose,** and started
as fast as I could to go down. On the stairway I
met a couple of the mail clerks with faces pale as
chalk, who told me that one of the lions had suddenly
come into the mail room where they were working,
and they had escaped by jumping over the cases used
for sorting.

I hurried on down and found that none of the six
mail clerks had had forethought enough to dose the
mail-room door after they were all out, but left it
wide open for the lion to go out again if he wished,
while they were hunting for me. It proved to be

184

Digitized by

ESCAPES, RECAPTURES, AND MONKEY TRICKS

one of the largest lions we had and he was quietly
amusing himself by playing with a pile of newspapers
he had found in a comer of the room. I gently shut
the door and left him to play while I had my men
bring me a shifting box and place it in front of the
door* When all was ready I took an elephant hook
and went into the mail room and drove the lion into
the box. Then we moved the box in front of his
cage and drove him in without difficulty.

A careless keeper had left a broom standing near
enough for the lion to reach it and draw it into his
cage. Here he had bitten the handle off, and in play-
ing with it had in some way been able to pry the
door up and get out.

It was easier to catch the lion than it was to quiet
the panic on board. The news had spread rapidly
and no one seemed to relish the idea of being shut up
on a boat with a big lion roaming at will over it, but
after two or three hours of answering questions and
assuring people that there was no more danger, things
calmed down to their normal condition and I took
pains to see that there were no more brooms left
standing by cages during the rest of the trip.

Once something caused the train in which we were
crossing a meadow, not far from Chattanooga with
the Cole show, to stop so suddenly that it buckled
in the middle and sent several cars rolling down the
bank. In one of these was a large lioness, whose
cage broke open, and she went out on the meadow.
I was afraid she would run away and have to be shot,
but instead she just sat up among the grass and
looked round in a dazed way, not seeming to realize

185

THE WAYS OF THE CIECUS

that she was at liberty. As soon as possible I had
the side wall of the big tent unloaded, and then my
men, holding it up in front of them, circled out round
the lioness and brought the two ends together on
either side of the door of a whole cage. I had the
men stand on the canvas so she could not run under
it, and hold it as high above their heads as they could
reach, so there was little danger of her trying to jump
over it. Then I took my whip and went inside the
canvas indosure and drove her into the cage. When
I b^an to drive her she started in and did a lot of
snarling and growling, which tried the nerves of the
men holding the canvas pretty badly, and they were
very much relieved when they heard the dick of the
cage door shutting behind her.

One morning while at the Bridgeport, Connecticut,
winter quarters in charge of the Bamum & Bailey
menagerie, I received a telegram from Mr. Bailey
saying he wanted me to come down to New York as
quickly as possible, prepared to catch a loose lion.
The telegram gave me no idea where the lion was
or what I would need to get him, so I took a few
ropes, my pistol and whip, and was off on the next
train.

Mr. Bailey met me at the station and hurried me
down to a big livery and sales stable on the East Side.
There seemed to be policemen everywhere in and
round the block, warning people to keep away, and
each one had his gun out ready to shoot. I found
the lion belonged to a man by the name of Frank
Bostock, since become famous in this country as an
animal man, but at that time just over from England.

186

ESCAPES, RECAPTURES, AND MONKEY TRICKS

He had three or four lions and a trick horse, and this
comprised his entire menagerie. He was traveling
round with these and giving street shows wherever
he could. His largest lion he advertised as "Wallace,
the untamable lion," and claimed he had killed a
keeper or two. Bostock had put up his little menag-
erie the night before in the stable. The cages with
the lions had been left standing in the middle of the
floor and the trick horse tied in a near-by stall. Dur-
ing the night Wallace had got out and killed the trick
horse and was still loose in the building,

Bostock himself was afraid to go near the animal,
and warned me that if I did the blooming lion would
kill me. However, I went round to the rear side of
the stable and up by a ladder through a window to
the haymow. Here I found still more policemen
watching with drawn pistols. Everything was quiet
and nothing to be seen of the lion. I left my ropes
on the hay, and, taking my pistol loaded with blank
cartridges, and my whip, whose rawhide lashes were
wound with copper wire, I climbed carefully down a
ladder to the floor. Moving quietly along, I found
that Wallace was eating from the horse's neck, with
his back toward me. I crept along so quietly, and
he was so intent on his meal, that he did not notice me
until I had actually got in the stall and begun firing
at him with my pistol at such short range that the
hot wads stung him. He showed no signs of fight,
but turned and ran out of the stall like a big dog, and
jumped into his cage. It took only a moment to
follow and fasten the door, and the job was done.

Bostock, Bailey, and I all got a lot of free adver-

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

tising out of it, for there was a small army of reporters
gathered to watch what happened, and they all played
the story up to the limit. No one ever seemed able
to determine exactly how the lion got loose, but my
own opinion has always been that Bostock himself
let it out for the sake of the advertising value of the
notoriety that he knew was sure to follow.

The longest chase I ever had was after three ele*
phants that ran away from the Cole show near Green
River in Wyoming. We had to move the show
twelve miles, and the railroad wanted a thousand
dollars just to carry the animab. Cole told the
officiab that he did not want to buy their road — ^he
simply wanted to use it — ^but they would not give
him any better rate, so he decided to send all the
animals he could on foot and by wagon.

I got them off as early as I could, sending the
elephants in charge of a man by the name of Printer,
who rode a calico horse. Three of the elephants were
fastened together by chains and neck straps. When
about half the way the performing stallions came up
behind them and conunenced to make a lot of noise.
The elephants became frightened and, in spite of
anything Printer could do, they bolted to one side of
the road. He was able to follow them for only a
short distance, for in going through the brush Uiey
very soon broke their fastenings and disappeared
completely.

I had stayed with the train, and the first I knew of
it was when Cole came into the car where I was sickl-
ing, woke me up, and told me the elephants had run
ftway and that J would have to go find them. I

m

Digitized by

ESCAPES, RECAPTURES, AND MONKEY TRICKS

pulled on my clothes as quickly as possible and
started.

The first thing I did was to engage a couple of men
who knew the country to go with me as guides. One
of these traveled on foot, while the other one and
myself were mounted. They would agree to meet at
a certain point at a certain time. The one on foot
would start off in one direction and his mounted
partner and myself in the opposite, and just at the
agreed time we would all come together. I could
not understand at the time, and have never since
understood, how they did it.

Though we scoured over quite a large r^on the
first day, we found no tracks or any person who had
seen an elephant. We passed through a number of
camps of Digger Indians. The guides knew their
language and asked them for news of the elephants,
but they knew nothing of them. On the second day
we came on their trades, and from then on followed
them, but we could find no one who had seen them,
which led us to conclude that they must be staying
quietly in some out-of-the-way spot days and roaming
round nights.

The next day after they escaped Cole offered a
thousand dollars' reward for their capture, so we saw
plenty who were out looking for them, even if we
could not find anyone who had seen them. Many,
in fact most, of the searchers had a lot of apples in
their wagons or in bags across their horses. It seemed
to be the general impression that if the elephants were
found they could be coaxed to follow with the apples.
But the joke of the matter was that none of the people

ISO

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

could tell the heel from the toe m the tracks of the
elephants, and most of them were painstakingly fol-
lowing the tracks backward.

We came to places where they had slid down the
sides of the gulches into the streams and played in
the mud before going on, but still we could not find
anyone who had seen them. About five or six o'clock
one morning we found where they had gone through
the garden back of a little cabin and broken down
the fence. We wanted to find out, if possible, how
long it had been since they had passed, so we pounded
on the door, and after a little a big colored fellow
opened it, and we asked him if he had seen any
elephants go past.

"'Massa, dey ain't no sech thing roun' in dese yere
parts no more," he told us.

"But what's the matter with your fence?" we
asked him.

He looked at it in amazement and at the great
tracks through his garden, which evidently had not
been there the night before, and with a frightened
look exclaimed, ''Mah Gawd! man, they is somethin'
like that roun' here!"

We had been on their trail now for nearly a week
without seeming to come any closer to them, and I
had made up my mind that I would go back that night
and tell Cole it was no use. During the forenoon we
came to a steep hillside covered with manzanita
bushes on which I saw bits of fresh mud clinging
where it had been scraped ofif the elephants as they
made their way through. This gave me courage.
We found the only way in which we could get past

190

ESCAPES, RECAPTURES, AND MONKEY TRICKS

the dense bushes was to crawl under them on our
hands and knees, which we did, and got considerably
scratched and torn doing it. But when we finally
got out on the farther side we saw a large clear space
in the center of which was a burying ground, and
standing in the burying ground were the elephants.

They heard us working our way imder the bushes
and were just on the point of bolting again, when I
called them by name. They pricked up their ears
and stopped, and by working carefully and talking to
them I finally got up to them and fastened them
together again. We found a trail leading away from
the burying ground, and after a while got down and
out on a road once more. Here Jimmie tried to bolt
again and nearly got away from me. I had my hands
full for a time to keep him from acting badly.

When I reached the railroad with them I was a
week behind the show and anxious to get them into
a car and started, but the agent refused to do any-
thing about it unless I paid the freight in advance.
I had left the show in such a hiury that I did not get
any money, and ^all I had was a few cents in change.
The two guides had been furnishing money all the
week to buy food, and trusting to my honesty to get
it back. But I coiJd do nothing with the freight
agent, so I had to get in touch with Cole by telegraph
and he had to take the matter up with the superin-
tendent of the road, who sent the agent orders to
accept the elephants for shipment, so finally I got
under way with them and overtook the show.

I was on my way to the train in Denver one night
with a small elephant we called Pete. I was riding

13 191

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

a pony by his side. Of a sudden something — a dog,
a noise, a blowing paper, possibly, I never knew what
— ^frightened him and he bolted across an open lot.
I was riding after him as fast as I could, when suddenly
something lifted me off my pony and droj^ed me on
the ground. I got up quickly, and on looking round
found that it was a Chinaman's clothesline that had
unhorsed me. By the time I caught my pony and
got mounted again the little elephant had disappeared
and it was two hours before I found him standing in
an old opening in the side of a hill where earth and
stone had been taken out.

About the middle of the season, one year while I
was with the Bamum & Bailey show, when we were
at Somerville, New Jersey, there came up a sudden
and very hard thunderstorm. There was little or
no rain, but a great deal of thunder and lightning.
It got very dark and all at once the wind b^an to
blow a gale and the top of the menagerie tent puffed
up and down. There were twenty-two elephants in
the tent at the time, eight of them young ones, and
as soon as they saw the tent poles begin to dance they
all pulled their stakes, ran out on the grounds, and
began to race round and trumpet loudly. They had
hardly got outside the tent before it came down. As
quickly as they could my men gathered stakes, drove
them down outside, and as fast as possible caught
the elephants and chained them again. We got all
we could see, but were still two short. Though we
could hear them trumpeting, we were at a loss to
know what had become of them. Finally, after a
good deal of searching, we traced their cries and

ESCAPES, RECAPTURES, AND MONKEY TRICKS

found that in their fright they had tumbled into a
new cellar and could not get out. We had to build
up an inclined plane for them to get out on.

The third winter I was with O'Brien he furnished
some animals for Colonel Wood's museum at the
comer of Ninth and Arch Streets in Philadelphia,
and I was put in charge of them. In the lot was a
rhinoceros called Big Pete. He was placed on the
ground floor near the entrance, but had not been
there long when the colonel ordered him out, as he
was shaking the building so much with his moving
around that it was frightening the people. We got
him over to Frankfort to the winter quarters that
night, and left him there until we went on the road
in the spring. He traveled in an especially built
cage wagon, seventeen feet long by four wide, drawn
by twelve horses, driven by Jack Shumake. He
weighed some four thousand pounds, and if the
wagon were left standing a few hours without planks
under the wheels his movements would sink them to
the hubs even on hard ground. On a "run" in
Pennsylvania we had to cross a canal. Shumake
had got his horses and the front wheels of the wagon
over when the bridge collapsed, leaving the rear half
of the cage hanging in the air. Big Pete slipped
down against the end of the cage and began to make
vigorous efforts to get out. I climbed out and cut
the staples that held the door and let him slip into
the water. Nothing could have pleased him more.
He began to move around and have a fine time.
Then he started downstream. We fired stones at
him until he turned back. Then he started upstream^

193

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

and we turned him back again by stoning. Finally
he found a place where he could climb the bank and
he started for us.

Not far away was a bam with a fenced-in yard. I
headed for this with two or three of my men, and
Big Pete followed us. Scattered around the yard
were hay and cornstalks in plenty, and he went to
eating Uiese contentedly. Then we stood back on
one side and wondered how long he would be satisfied
to stay quietly eating, and what would happen if he
got the barnyard cleaned out before the boys got the
wagon out of the canal. Although there was a good
fence around the yard, it meant nothing for such an
animal as that if he put his strength against it.

He was still making the most of the barnyard,
however, when the cage was brought up and set on
the ground just by the open barway. Some carrots
were scattered in front of it and in it, and then every-
body waited to see what would happen. There were
a few anxious moments. ''I wonder if he'll go? I
wonder if he'll go?'* we were all saying to ourselves.
Slowly and deliberately he moved over to the carrots,
tasted of them, seemed to enjoy them, and kept on
eating and going until he was in the cage. With a
sigh of relief we slammed the door shut, got the cage
up and on to the wheels again, and were off once
more, after a five hours' delay.

One night our train was wrecked in a tunnel known
as No. 7, on the Cape Fear road not far from Parkers-
burg, North Carolina. A number of the cars were
smashed and many of the animals got out. I think
there were a lion and a tiger which had to be caught.

ESCAPES, RECAPTURES, AND MONKEY TRICKS

Among the rest, a couple of kangaroos were loose.
There traveled with the show at the tune two prize
fighters, John and George Wilbur, who did a boxing
act. I asked them to take the two kangaroos and
lock them in a compartment of one of the cars until I
could tend to them. I also explained to them the
proper way to handle kangaroos, which is to take
them by the tail. In this way you can steer them
like a wagon or a wheelbarrow, without any trouble.
If you attempt any different method they are liable
to spring upon you and, grasping you about the neck
with their short forel^s, balance themselves on their
tails, and with their long hind legs, ending in a single
sharp-pointed hoof, rip you to pieces. Feeling that
they were the equal of a kangaroo, the two men paid
no attention to my advice, but tried to pick the
animals up in their arms and carry them. I had to
go to their help, and before I got the kangaroos away
from them they looked like prize fighters indeed.

We had a lot of monkeys with us at the time, and
most of them escaped, and for several weeks we kept
receiving monkeys by express from people who had
succeeded in catching them.

In the old-time show all those animals which could
be driven from town to town were known as "led
stock.'' The name clung after shows gave up wagon
travel and began to go by rail, and to-day any animal
which can be led or driven between the freight yard
and the show grounds is said to be a part of the "led
stock." Not infrequently we had trouble with the
"led stock'*; some of it would become frightened and
bolt, or a man would get careless and give an animal

195

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

an opportunity to stray away, but I think of all the
''led stock" which I have had charge of no one animal
ever gave me so much trouble as a zebra named Jim
which we had with the Bamum & Bailey show. He
was very ugly and would kick the hat off your head
at any time, and every few nights he managed to
break away from the men who were leading him back
to the train and have a romp around the country, and
often he was three or four miles away from the train
when caught again. Mules are popularly supposed
to hold the record as kickers, but beside a zebra they
are mere amateurs. I always sent a man to lead the
zebra, but if he gave one a little too much rope, or
began talking with another man, or was a little smart
with the animal, quicker than a flash out would shoot
a foot, the man would be nursing a bruise^ and the
zebra roaming the town.

Although Jim was such a nuisance, he was val-
uable, for he was the only zebra I ever knew of in this
country who was broken to do an act. He had been
trained in Germany, where Mr. Bailey bought him
of Carl Hagenback. Jim's act always amused the
crowd a good deal. Bill Ducrow, Uie ringmaster,
performed him. He b^an by tying a handkerchief
around the zebra's ankle, which Jim untied. Then the
clown would come along and make a little talk about
it and offer to bet five doUars that the zebra could
not find the handkerchief if he bxuried it in the ring.
Ducrow, of course, accepted the bet, and while the
zebra was headed another way the clown scooped a
place in the sand of the ring and covered the handker-
chief. After pawing here and there in various direc-

106

ESCAPES, BECAPTURES, AND MONKEY TRICKS

tions, following the ringmaster's cues, the zebra
always threw out the handkerchief. Ducrow would
hold it up and ask the clown to pay his debt. This
the clown refused to do, and his r^usal was a cue for
the zebra to chase him out of the ring.

While I once broke six zebras so that they could be
driven like so many horses, I nor no other man was
ever able to train them enough to make it possible to
walk into a stall beside one and put a harness on as
you would do with a horse. It was always necessary
to have a partition between the man and the animal
while he was putting the harness on. If you were to
step up beside one and rub your hand down its mane
you would find yourself in a heap in the farthest
comer of the building.

Sometimes we had to put shoes on a couple of a
zebra's feet, and twice every summer we had to pare
their hoofs. We always planned to do it on a Sunday,
for it was a real job and we never knew how long it
would take. I never attempted it withqut eight or
ten men to help me. We first had to get a rope on
the animal and throw him, then bring his feet up
together and tie them. After that we held his head
down, rolled him over on his back, put bales of hay
on either side to keep his feet in the air, and then
cautiously did what was needed to the hoofs. We
were caring for the zebras' feet in DUsseldorf when a
German veterinary came in. He laughed at our
trouble and told us '"dot is noddings to hold a zebra
foot." He nettled me so with his cocksureness that
I told him, if he thought it was easy, to try it. Much
to my surprise, he walked over to a zebra, slipped his

197

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

liand down the leg to the fetlock, pinched it quickly
and securely, and lifted and held the foot with no
trouble. Not only that, but he held it for one of my
men to pare the hoof. The secret of it was that he
pinched a nerve in such a way that it numbed the 1^.
I never saw or heard of anyone ebe who could do it
with any sort of an animal.

Among other things with the Bamum & Bailey '*led
stock'' were some sacred bulls from India. They
were not very large — ^not more than thirty or forty
inches high — ^but one of them was a mean one and
nobody could lead him. I had a ring put in hi^ nose
and got a six-foot pole with a snap on the end of it
that a man could snap to the ring and in that way
manage the fellow. After a time a big German by
the name of Kluck came to work for me, and I put
him to leading this little bull back and forth between
the train and the show grounds. It was not long
before he got an idea that he was more than a match
for the bull.

**I don't need dot stick no more. He follows mit
me like a dog," he told me.

I cautioned him and told him of his danger.

^*Dot is noddings. I lead him,'' he insisted.

A few nights after, on our way to the train, I heard
a commotion among the led stock, and, riding up, I
saw some big black object rolling over, and over and
the little buH butting it. It proved to be Kluck. I
rescued him from the bull, but he was not able to do
anything for a month. When he came back to work
again I told him he might lead the bull. He turned
and, with a most determined look in his face, said:

s

I

ESCAPES, RECAPTURES, AND MONKEY TRICKS

**Mr. Conklin, I lead any oder animal in the show
you want, but I want no more mit the bull."

Sometimes we had trouble with the camels, for they
are very vicious at times and fight terribly among
themselves. A camel will take a man and shake him
like a rat. I knew a case of a man that a camel
seized by the arm and shook, and the man lost his
arm as a result. They frequently have tusks three
or four inches long.

The giraffes which I brought back from Europe
with the Bamum & Bailey show lived longer than
any others which were ever in this country. I was
the first man to breed giraffes in this coimtry, and at
one time the Bamum & Bailey show had so many
that we drove them through the streets with the
"led stock." In stormy weather we put on "wet-
weather" blankets, but they were not naturally
tough enough to endure such treatment, and after
the first season many of them died. The giraffe
is the only mute among animals. It can make no
kind of noise, no matter what happens or how much
distress it is in.

Some of the curiosities traveled with the "led
stock," as, for instance, the double-headed cow which
Cole had for a season. It was the only one I ever
saw, and was genuine. It had two well-developed
heads. Cole paid a thousand dollars a week for the
use of it, and made a lot of money on it.

Another animal which was of intense interest to
the farmers was a three-homed Durham bull. He
had a third hom between the two normal ones, and
a third nostril between and a little above the regular

199

THE WAYS OF THE CmCUS

two, and also a rudimentary tlurd eye. In other

respects he was just a fine fat animal.

The hairless horse Mr. Bailey sent me to buy in
Iowa. It was a big, fine horse and did not have any
hair at all. The story they told about it was that it
was very much overheated and allowed to cool sud-
denly. As a result it had a severe fever, and when
it was recovering lost all of its hair.

I was always glad that I did not have many horses
in my charge, for I was afraid of them and never went
through the horse tent when it was full if I could help
it, for fear one of them would reach back and kick me.

One winter in Bridgeport I broke a couple of Indian
cattle to drive in harness like horses. Mr. Bailey
had a wagon built especially for them, which cost a
thousand dollars. At another time he bought in
Kentucky a pair of Durham steers which had been
broken to drive in harness. They wore dutch collars
and were guided by rein and bit. It was said that
they could trot a mile in three minutes. The first
time we went to Europe we went from Brooklyn to
the boat. I led the procession one night, driving this
pair of steers hitched to a sulky. A strange proces-
sion it was, perhaps the strangest that ever crossed
Brooklyn Bridge in the moonlight. Back of me were
twenty-four elephants, followed by eighteen camels,
two sacred cattle, six llamas, three rhinoceroses, a yak,
water buffalo, the hairless horse, the three-homed
steer, and all the wagons. When we got out on the
Bridge we made it sway.

Johanna, a gorilla that was for a time a part of the
Bomum & Bailey menagerie, probably received dur-

m

ESCAPES, RECAPTURES, AND MONKEY TRICKS

ing her twenty years of life more newspaper notoriety
than any other animal that ever lived. She was
picked up in Lisbon, Spain, by Carl Hagenback, the
famous animal dealer, and soon after sold to Mr.
Bailey. At the time Mr. Bailey bought her she had
not learned any of the tricks that afterward attracted
so much attention, but how valuable she became can
be judged from the fact that only a short time before
her death, while we were in Berlin, I heard Hagenback
offer Mr. Bailey six elephants for her, and the only
answer to the offer was a laugh.

Working for me at the time the big five-foot monkey
came to the show was a fellow by the name of Mat
MacKay, whose home was in Meriden, Connecticut.
He was a good-natured, well-informed, likable chap,
and I taught him to take care of Johanna. It was
quite by accident that MacKay discovered her apti-
tude for learning tricks. He had not been caring for
her long before she became very fond of him, and one
day he noticed that she was trying to imitate some-
thing which he had been doing. Just for amusement
and to see what he could do, MacKay then experi-
mented with teaching her to do a few simple things.
Finding how readily she learned them, I had MacKay
begin training her seriously under my directions.

He taught her to dress herself like a woman. She
would first put on a pair of stockings and fasten them
up with garters. Then she had a pair of Douglas
shoes, made especially for her, which she could draw
on and lace and tie herself. A skirt and waist fol-
lowed, and the outfit was completed by a hat with
feathers on it. When all fixed up in this fashion

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

Johanna looked for all the world like an African lady.

Another thing which MacKay did was to make a
hod for her and some wooden bricks. Then he built
a little scaffold with a ladder going up to it and taught
her to put the bricks in her hod, put it on her shoulder,
go up the ladder, and dump the bricks on to the
scaffold like a professional.

Johanna would also thread a needle and sit and
pretend to sew. While she could not sew a seam, she
did put her needle in the doth and draw the thread
through and keep repeating it for some time.

Her most popular stunt was to fix herself up in her
finery and then sit up to a table and eat like a human
being. She would use a knife and fork very cleverly.
Beside her plate each meal was set a bottle of wine, out
of which she poured herself a small glassful, sipping
it along with her meal, but she never attempted to
pour the second glass. While we were in Stoke-on-
Trent, England, where there are great potteries, some
of the pottery people had a set of dishes made espe-
cially for Johanna, with her name on them. I still
have the cup, saucer, and plate.

Another thing which MacKay taught Johanna,
and which showed her great strength, was to take part
in a tug-of-war. He would pass one end of a rope
into her cage, which she took a good hold of, and then
he had several men get hold of the other end and at
the word all pull. I have seen Johanna pull as many
as six strong men right up to the bars of her cage.

MacKay behaved himself and took good care of
Johanna until we got over to London. Then he got
to drinking hard and began to neglect her. Besides

ESCAPES, RECAPTURES, AND MONKEY TRICKS

what drink he got outside he used to steal from the
demijohn of port wine which we carried for Johanna.
He was bad enough in England, but when we got on
to the Continent he became much worse. I had a
good many talks with him and tried to get him to
stop it, but all to no purpose. As MacKay was one
of Mr. Bailey's favorites, I hesitated to fire him with-
out saying anything to Mr. Bailey about it, so one
day I broached the matter to him, but he would not
listen to anything against MacKay and told me to keep
him and let him continue to take care of Johanna; so
all I could do was to warn him that he would lose his
gorilla if he did not change keepers, and let MacKay
stay on. As a result it was not long before the animal
was taken sick. Mr. Bailey then was very much
alarmed and called in some noted veterinarians, who
did all they could for Johanna. But in spite of their
efforts she died in a few days. They told Mr. Bailey
that her death was due to some unconmion cause
with a long and very learned name, and charged him
a good big price, but I knew that it was simply neglect
and improper feeding that had killed her. We were
in Nuremberg at the time of her death. Mr. Bailey
told me to bury her, and beside hiding the place, to
so mutilate the body that if it should be disinterred
no one could stuff and use it for exhibition purposes.

When Johanna died MacKay was in the hospital
with delirium tremens. After he got over them and
joined the show again I put him to helping care for
the giraffes, and he was still doing this when we got
back to New York. We had been there only a little
while when one day Mr. Bailor came into the menag-

y

Digitized by Google

THE WATS OF THE (3BCIS

crie qoftrtcn at Miwiwon Squre GsideB and can^t
MarKay rery drank, and dinJtaigcd him on the spot.
Then KacKay got a position with MiDcr Brothers'
show, but he had not been with them very long before
the show went to pieces. Mr. Baiky boq^t acxne
of the animalu and MacKay was sent with them to
the Bridgeport winter quarters. After ddivering
the animals to the Baraum k Bailey employees in
BridgiqxMt he was throng hot he hung around for
a few days and was allowed to sleep on the hay. One
morning he was missed, and later in the day they
found him dead irfiere he had curled up to deep
among the bales ot hay.

The biggest animal of the monkey kind whidi I
ever saw was another gorilla which we had and called
Chioo. He was chiefly interesting for his size, being
five feet and two indies tall and wei^iing at least a
hundred pounds. One day while I was sedng to
having the dq>hants watered he got out of his cage.
I think he must have turned the nuts off the bolts
that held the fastenings to his cage door^ and then
wrenched it open. At any rate» he suddoily i^peared,
running all around the menagerie and letting out yells
that would make an Indian war whoop seem quiet
by comparison. It was just b^ore the time for
parade and there was quite a crowd scattered over
the show grounds; but where it and my men dis-
appeared to I could never figure out. At any rate, I
suddenly found myself alone and the big goriUa mak-
ing for me, evidently with no kind motives. I got
in between a couple of the elq[>hants, and the gorilla
did not dare to go past them, seemingly having great

ESCAPES, RECAPTURES, AND MONKEY TRICKS

respect for their swinging trunks. In a few moments
he went in under a big stand that had been built on
the grounds. I drove the elephants up behind the
stand. Chico saw their feet and went out the other
side, and with the elephants I drove him into a
''moving-box/' and then it was easy to get him into
his cage again. You can be sure that after that we
put some fastenings on the door which were too much
for his strength and cunning. After that incident
Chico never seemed to like me. If I went up near
his cage he would spring and grasp the bars of the
cage and shake them until the whole wagon rocked,
and undoubtedly would have killed me instantly if
he could have gotten hold of me. On the other hand,
he used to put his arms around his keeper's neck as
affectionately as could be.

A small monkey of mine was the victim of one of
Tody Hamilton's pranks to get a write-up in the New
York papers. We were down in New York with the
show, and Hamflton sent me word that he wanted a
monkey for a little while, so I had a keeper named
Billy Nolan go up to the oflSce with a kudge monkey
we had nicknamed Fitzsimmons. In the office a
photographer from the New York World made a
picture of Fitzsimmons, and then Tody and a reporter,
with Billy Nolan's help, took him to a near-by barber's
shop and had him shaved. From what Nolan told
me afterward I guess they had a lively time and the
barber's chair and shop were pretty well mussed up
before they got through. After it was all over they
took the monkey back and made another picture of
him. When Nolan got back the change in the

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

monkey was almost unbelievable. He looked for all
the world like a little old Irishman. When we put
him back in the cage the rest of the monkeys would
have nothing to do with him, and for a long time he
had to live by himself in the comer of the cage; but
after his hair began to grow out again they gradually
accepted him back into their society.

The next Sunday the World published a story
describing the performance as a scientific experiment
to test some of Darwin's theories regarding animal
expression, and said that he had been turned over to
college professors to study at their leisure. With
the story were a couple of large pictures showing the
unfortunate monkey "before** and "after" shaving.

One winter when I was with the Cole show the
Coles, my helpers, and myself had quarters in the
same building with the menagerie, a door and pas-
sageway leading directly from the animals* quarters
into ours. Just inside the menagerie, near this door,
I had a cage in which was a mandrill monkey. He
was a big male, stood about three feet high, weighed
some seventy-five or eighty pounds, and was nine years
old. We called him Jim. He had a pair of great
canine teeth which made his cheeks stand out. The
mandrills are the most brilliantly colored of all the
African monkeys. Jim was a fine specimen and most
gorgeous in his fantastic stripes of blue and green,
golden yellow and vermilion. It is said that the
mandrills are the terror of the n^roes of the west
coast of Africa, where they run together in large
troops and often plunder villages and cultivated fields
with impunity. While Jim never gave us any trouble.

ESCAPES, RECAPTURES, AND MONKEY TRICKS

he looked the part, all right. At that tune Mrs. Cole
had a German servant girl about twenty years old.
This girl used to go in and out past the mandrill's cage
very frequently, and she often stopped and gave him
some sweet bit. Sometimes as she went to pass the
cage without stopping, Jim would reach out and
catch her by the sleeve or skirt and pull her up to the
cage. Toward spring I was waked up one night with
a start in the middle of the night by most horrible
screams. I listened a moment and decided they
came from the servant girl's room, which was near
mine. The cries were so terrified and piercing that I
knew something serious was the matter, so I went to
the girl's room as fast as I could, and when I opened
her door there in the middle of the floor, in the moon-
light, stood Jim, profoundly bowing over and over
again, and each time the long hair on his head waved
up and down with a funny little air. I led him out
and back to his cage without any trouble. I never
knew just how he managed to get his cage door open,
but after he was out it was an easy matter for him to
get the door into our living quarters open, and he
had climbed into the servant girl's room through the
transom over her door. After that night she did
not care so much for Jim.

The winter quarters was one great room, across the
top of which were a lot of big girders and trusses
which carried the roof. One afternoon, about a
month before we planned to go on the road in the
spring, I was busy at something, when all of a sudden
the elephants b^n to jump around, squealing and
trumpeting. I hurried over to where they were, to

14 207

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

find out what was the matter, just in time to see a
little capuchin monkey jumping from one to another
of the big fellows. When he saw me coming for him
he gave a big jump to the side of the building, and
away he went up among the girders and trusses, and
in spite of anything which we did there he stayed^
He would come down and get food, and he would
come down and sit on the top of the monkey cage,
but just the moment I or one of my men started
toward him he would spring up into the girders
again. Some of the time he would sit on one of them
with his arms folded, and make a sort of whistling
noise with his mouth. Once in a while if we were
sitting down quietly he would shy a little stone or
lump of coal at us to attract our attention. X got a
box and fitted up a figure-four trap, baited with an
apple, thinking I would be able to trap him in the
box; but he got the apple and never got into the box
once. He managed to keep out of our reach and stay
up there for about three weeks, until the men began
to come back to start out on the road. Then I put
a man on the end of each girder and we closed in on
him. Finding himself cornered, he dropped down on
the elephants and began running across their backs.
They set up such a hubbub that he was frightened oflF
into the hay, and we circled in on him and got him.
I suppose he must have wedged his way out of the
cage between the bars.

We wintered once in St. Louis in an old stove
foundry. The monkey cage was placed under the
stairway which led to the second story. In it at the
time was quite a large miscellaneous collection of

208

Digitized by

ESCAPES, RECAPTURES, AND MONKEY TRICKS

capuchm, kudge, big-spider, long-armed, gibbons,
and what we called '"organ" monkeys. My men had
gone out for their supper, and as they went had flung
their old coats on the top of the monkey cage. The
watchmen had not come, and, as we never left the
place alone, I was staying until they returned. I
was getting impatient because they were gone so long
and 1 wanted to get my own supper and go down to
Pope's Theater, when I began to smell smoke. In a
moment I saw it coming from around the monkey
cage. I ran for the hose which we always kept coupled
on to the water plug, and in five minutes had the fire
out. If I had not been right there, or had had to
stop to couple up a hose, the whole place would have
gone. As it was several of the monkeys were burned
to death. When I investigated, I found that the fire
had been caused by the monkeys drawing the coats
of the men into the cage and finding matches in the
pockets, rubbing them as they had seen the men do.

One season with the Bamum & Bailey show a down
by the name of Conreid was teaching a chacma baboon
to ride a horse. He intended it for a "'principal act''
and was taking great pains with him. Eadi after-
noon as soon as the show was over he took the chacma
into the ring and put it through its lessons. At the
same time a horse-and-dog trainer. Bill Organ, was
breaking some dogs. One afternoon out in Kansas,
while Conreid was working the chacma, it broke a
""lunge" rope and bolted. Bill and I jumped on
horses and followed. Talk about catching a pig!
That chacma kept us on the go, doubling back, over
fences^ off at right angles, for two Jiours, until, just

m

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

as we were within a few rods of a big woods and
thought we were beaten, he settled down on the
ground, exhausted. He was panting for breath and
terrible heated. Contrary to my advice. Bill threw
water on him to cool him off. He had a chiU after
we got him back in his cage, and in a few days pneumo-
nia set in and we lost him.

For a number of seasons one of the features of the
Bamum & Bailey show was a pony race in which the
ponies were ridden by monkeys. These monkeys
wore little red coats and we fastened them on the
ponies by means of a short chain fastened to a loop of
iron which projected straight up from the pommel of
the saddle. On the end of the chain was a snap into
which we slipped the ring on the monkey*s collar. I
had a great deal of trouble caused by the canvasmen
petting the monkeys that did this act. As soon as
they had become pets they were no good for the riding.
At last I bought some chacmas of Reiche, the animal
dealer in New York, and broke them in. Chacmas
do not make pets, but will fight if meddled with.
They cost me a good deal more money, but I broke
the canvasmen of petting the monkeys.

Out in Indiana at an afternoon performance one of
the chacmas found that his snap had in some way
become unfastened from the ring on his collar, but he
stayed on his pony until the race was over and the
ponies were outside the tent; then just as the grooms
went to take the chacmas off the ponies this fellow
bolted, jumped on a guy rope, and in a moment had
run clear to the top of the tent and sat down with his
arm around the center pole. After a little he came

ESCAPES, RECAPTURES, AND MONKEY TRICKS

down to the edge of the tent, cocked his head over on
one side, and eyed us. Then he lifted up the edge of
the canvas and looked in the tent to see what was
going on in there. When we tried to get near him he
would scamper back up to the top of the tent by the
center pole; so I sent a man up each pole, but the
chacma drove them down. Then I sent Nolan, his
keeper, up with a man, and BiUy drove him down,
but just as we thought we had him he gave a spring
and, running about a hundred yards, went up a big
tree that stood by a creek, and out on a limb. Here
he stayed. I told a couple of fellows to go up and
saw the limb off, but the chacma drove them down,
saw and all. Then Nolan went up, and he succeeded
in sawing the limb off. I had nearly every man from
the menagerie in a circle imder the limb, ready to
grab the monkey as soon as he touched the ground, but
before the limb hit the ground he made a big jump
which carried him outside the circle of men, swam the
creek, and went in under a boathouse. In order to
get him Nolan, his keeper, had to crawl in where he
was and bring him out.

vra

BOME INCIDENTS BT THE WAT

¥N travelmg pretty much aU over the earth with
shows I never but once reaUy longed to have a
supply of firearms handy. The one time was in
Arizona. I was with the Cole show and we were on
our way East from California. In order to rest,
water the horses, and feed the men, a stop was made
near a lonely watering tank at the edge of the desert,
and the horse and cook tents set up.

Near the tank was a little adobe hut in which lived
five or six tough-looking cowboys who sold White
Tom" whisky and, as we discovered later, made a
business of waylaying and murdering emigrants and
settlers in the region. They managed to do their
crimes in such a way that the Indians on the near-by
reservations got the credit for them. We had hardly
begim to set up our tents before they came over and
began to make themselves decidedly at home. One
of the first things which they did was to give us an
exhibition of their shooting ability by tossing tin
cans into the air and filling them full of holes before
they struck the ground and by making a can roll
along the ground just by shooting behind it. Pulling
a trigger was too slow business for them, so they had
fixed their big "forty-fives" in such a way that they

SOME INCIDENTS BY THE WAY

did not use the trigger at all, but simply pulled back
the hammer with the thumb and let it go. As soon as
they saw preparations made in the cook tent they
went over and seated themselves at one of the tables
without any invitation, and ordered up whatever
they wanted.

At that time the Indians from the different reser-
vations in the region were allowed to ride free on the
trains if they did not go into the cars, and not long
after the cowboys had their meal a train came along
and stopped. On the platform of the baggage car
was a big Indian buck. As soon as he climbed down

one of the cowboys exclaimed, "There^s the

that stole my horse!" and started for him. The

two grappled, and after wrestling for a few minutes
the Indian bit the cowboy in the thumb, broke away
and ran. The cowboy picked up a Winchester rifle
and shot the Indian dead as he was running. Then
he went over and began to cut off the great black
locks of the Indian's hair. I asked him to give me
one of them, but he told me to mind my own business
and get out or he would shoot me, too. One of his
companions whom they called Rattlesnake Jack,"
spoke up and said: ''Oh, that's Mr. Conklin. He's
all right. Give him one." So the fellow gave me one,
but how Rattlesnake Jack knew who I was I could
never imderstand.

We were a pretty nervous set after we saw the
Indian killed. There was plenty about the show to
arouse the envy of such men, besides the money that
we had. Many of the show people owned valuable
jewelry. I, for one, was wearing a diamond stickpin

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

worth five hundred dollars, and there was not a single
pistol in the whole outfit. But nothing happened.
We got all packed up and on the train, said good-by
to the cowboys, and everybody breathed easier as
we saw the big tank and the adobe hut slipping back
into the distance and the twilight as the train picked
up speed. In the next town in which we stopped
Cole went round and bought all the guns and pistols
he could find, and the rest of the time we were in the
Western country the show was a r^ular traveling
arsenal, but we never had any occasion to use our
weapons.

Not far from Yuma, Arizona, was a large Indian
reservation, and when we showed in Yuma, large
numbers of the Indians came in to the town to
watch the show. They had no money and of course
did not go in to see the performance, but they saw
the parade and hung around the train and saw a good
many things which to them seemed wonderful. We
took the elephants down to the tank to water them.
There was a crowd of the Indians watching, and we
noticed that most of them had great, handsome
blankets over their shoulders. When the elephants
finished drinking we started them toward the Indians
on the trot, at the same time making them squeal.
The Indians ran as fast as they could and many of
them were so frightened that they threw away their
blankets. After we had got them nicely on the run
we turned the elephants back and picked up some of
the blankets as we went along and kept them for
souvenirs. While the show was going on I saw some
Squaws around the tent, wearing coats with quantities

SOME INCroENTS BY THE WAY

of elk teeth sewed on to them. I held up an edge of
the canvas so the squaws could peek under, and while
they were intent on what they saw one of the canvas-
men cut oflf a handful of the elk teeth for me.

We showed m Salt Lake City for a week. At that
time I thought it was the cleanest city I had ever
seen. I was much interested in the Mormons and
their ways. Mr. Cole gave Brigham Young the use
of two tiers of seats for himself and family and any
friends he wanted to bring with him. There were
about two hundred seats that he had the use of.
Cole made a separate entrance to them, and draped
it with a great American flag, and Brigham Young
furnished a doorkeeper of his own. It was an inter-
esting sight to me to watch the Mormon men come
in with their families, each with several wives apiece,
the last bride on the husband's arm, and the rest of
the wives following in the order of their marriage.
During the week we were in Salt Lake City I had a
pair of boots made by an Irish shoemaker who had
become a convert to Mormonism. He told me many
things about the Mormons and their beliefs, and was
very enthusiastic over the advantages of plural
marriage.

It used to be customary for us to have a porter to
each two cars while we were on the road. In the fall,
at the end of the season, the men were in the habit
of tipping the porters substantially. One season
with the Bamum & Bailey show, however, we got
hold of a porter who wanted to be tipped each week.
There were about twenty men whose beds he had to
care for. He put his weekly tipping proposition up

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

to them, but they refused to do it. He felt sore over
their refusal, but did not say much. We had got out
near Chicago when one night we found, on going to
our sleeping car to go to bed, the water cooler and
the chairs heaped on top of the beds, the mirror
broken, and the beds and bedding soaked with ker-
osene, and sifted over all a lot of insect powder. On
top of the heap was a sign which read: ""this is

WHAT YOU GET FOR NOT TIPPING THE PORTER." That

night we could not go to bed at all. It was fortu-
nate for the porter that he had gone so far away that
we could not get hold of him.

Considering the amount of traveling I have done»
and the conditions under which it was done, I have
been remarkably lucky in avoiding train wrecks, but
of course I have been in a few. One of the first which
I remember happened near Parkersburg in North
Carolina. It was at night, and in a tunnel on the
Cape Fear road known as tunnel number seven. It
was a wonder that no one was killed, for several of the
cars were smashed to pieces. The railroad men built
great bonfires at either end of the tunnel to warn
other trains not to enter it.

Another wreck which occurred in my early days
of travel by rail was at Devil's Gap in Louisiana. It
was a rear-end collision and several men were killed.
One poor fellow had both legs crushed oS. "Do you
think I'll die, Conklin?" he asked me. I did not
have the courage to tell him the truth, so I said, "No."
In ten minutes he was dead. In a rear-end collision
in Kansas no men were killed, but we lost fifty or
sixty horses.

SOME mCIDENTS BY THE WAY

The most peculiar and serious wreck I was ever in
happened in Canada while I was traveling with the
Bamum & Bailey show. In the end of my car I had
a stateroom. Next to it was a room with six double
bunks; beyond that we carried my horse and twelve
camels, and over the camels fifteen men slept. Just
back of my car was the car in which were the ele-
phants, and it was the breaking of an axle on this
which caused the wreck. When the crash came my
end of the car was thrown up on top of the car next
ahead, and the elephant car was driven under it in
such a way that it killed my horse and the twelve
camels, but did not hurt one of the twenty-eight men
who were asleep in the car. As soon as I realized
that something was wrong I opened the door of my
stateroom and jumped down. It was a wonder that
I was not killed, for in the dark I did not see that the
end of my car was several feet in the air over a mass
of wreckage, but fortunately I dropped between a
couple of wheels and was not hiurt at aU.

There were twelve horses killed outright and many
injured. As soon as Mr. Bailey came up he sent a
man into the nearest town to get two or three gallons
of whisky and put a lot of aconite into it to give the
horses. Some of the men got hold of it, and began
drinking it. Soon they were foaming at the mouth
as a result of drinking the aconite. Bill Smith, the
boss hostler, scornfully refused to believe that it was
the aconite and whisky which was making the men
sick, and saying, "I'll show you 'tain*t the aconite,"
drank more of the mixture than any of them had.
It was not long before Bill was in such distress that

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

it was necessary for the doctor to use a stomach pump
on him and walk him around to save his life, and it
was a long time before the effects of the dose entirely
wore away.

Possibly the most imique experience in the way of
raikoad delays that I ever had was when, once out
in Kansas, we traveled through a part of the state
where the grasshoppers were so thick that they
stopped the train and we had to get out and shovel
dirt on the rails in order to go on.

On one of my many stops in Kansas City we reached
there on a Sunday. We had not been on the grounds
long, had not even got the tents up, when it began
growing dark as night and I saw every one running.
I did not have to wait long to find out why they were
ail running. All of a sudden I saw my cages roll,
and I had to hang to a tent stake with all the strength
I had to keep from being blown away. After a few
moments the wind let up and I saw, only a few rods
from where I was, a house that had been cut in two.
The cyclone had cut a swath not over three hundred
yards wide, destroying everything in its path. We
were just enough at one side not to get the full force
of it. Had we been in its path there would have been
nothing left of the show. As it was it did consid-
erable damage to the cages. At that time we had a
wagon sixteen feet long, filled with wax figiu*es. A
boy had hidden behind it for shelter, but the wind
tipped it over and crushed him to death. At another
time I was in St. Paul when a cyclone passed over
Minneapolis, and we had to clear a way through the
streets in order to get our stuff over the river into

218

itized by

Google

SOME INCIDENTS BY THE WAY

that city, and could not have a parade because there
was so much debris in the streets.

When the show is on the road it is, of course, impos-
sible to have mail delivered to it by the regular car-
riers in the diflferent towns, and equally out of the
question for each person connected with the show to
hunt up the post office and ask for this mail, so it is
customary for the show to have a mail carrier of its
own, who goes to the post office in each town and gets
all of the mail for the show, deposits outgoing mail,
and leaves a forwarding address for any that may
come after the show has left. Many times this work
is done by some member of the band that can be
spared from parade, and he makes the distribution
while the parade is out, those taking part in the
parade finding their letters on their trunks when they
come in.

When the Bamum & Bailey show came back from
England it brought a little Englishman who acted as
mail carrier. With the show was also a lot of English
ballet girls. The little mail carrier very soon became
bewitched with them and they in turn were charmed
with the little attentions of their countryman and his
willingness to do so many favors and accommodations
for them. Confidence increased with acquaintance,
and it was not long before they were intrusting him
with the money which they were sending home.
After a while there began to come complaints that
some of the money had never reached England.
Then some of the girls ceased to hear from home.
As the difficulties increased the little mail carrier*s
interest and sympathy increased in proportion. He

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

told long drannstantial tales <tf his tirdess ettorts to
locate the troubles and the losses, and seemin^y he
was more distressed than the girk thraisdves. One
mining no one had any maiL The show was searched,
but no mafl carri» coold be foond. The little Eng-
lishman had jumped the circus. Thai the truth
came to lighL He had been putting in his pocket all
the money the girls had giy» him for some time, and,
when he realized that it would not be possible to keep
the matter secret any longer, had disappeared. After
he left there was no more trouble with the mails to
England.

The master of transportation for a long while with
the Bamum & Bailey show was Byron Rose. He
was a pompous, overbearing fellow, always butting
in where he did not belong, making lots of hard feel-
ings and many enemies. One season he made a
practice of helping take the '*kid money." "Sad
money" is the circus term for money that is collected
at the door from persons who are trying to pass in
children who are over age. Frequently thare is a
good deal of it collected. Rose always had a large,
round, broad-topped cane with him when he was
engaged in taking kid money, and stood with his left
hand resting on the top of it. He would manage to
slip a part of what he was collecting between his hand
and the top of the cane and hide it there until he had
an opportunity to put it in his pocket. There were
a number who knew perfectly well what Rose was
doing, but no one cared to make it his business and
go to Mr. Bailey about it. After a while, however,
]Rose began to tell around the ^QW some very dis«

SOME INCroENTS BY THE WAY

agreeable things, -with little or no foundation, about
one of the detectives. The detective heard of it and
swore he would get even with Rose, so he went to Mr.
Bailey and said :

''Mr. Bailey, Rose is knocking down on the kid
money."

"I don't believe it," he answered.

"I can prove it."

"I doubt it."

"Will you give me a chance to?"

"Yes. But you will have to prove it so there is
no doubt about it before I'll believe that Rose is
crooked."

"All right, then. To-night when they b^gin to
come in you get where you can see Rose and you
watch what happens when I kick the cane from his
hand."

Mr. Bailey agreed, and when the crowd got to
coming in rapidly that night, the detective mixed
into it and as he passed Rose suddenly gave his cane
a kick tiiat sent it spinning, and as it did so there was
a little shower of quarters and half-dollars from under
Rose's hand. Mr. Bailey could not avoid believing
what the detective had told him. What he said to
Rose no one ever knew, but Rose let the "kid money"
alone afterward.

It was in Defiance, Ohio, that the pickpockets got
my diamond scarf pin. The detective who traveled
with the show had said to me frequently:

"Conklin, if you don't stop wearing that 'shiner'

all around everywhere, the 'dips' will get it."

I had told him that nobody could get it away from

m

Digitized by

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

me, and I had believed it, but that afternoon in
Defiance I learned better.

The food in the cook tent had not been very good
for a while, and during the concert I thought I would
slip into the town, get something to eat at a res-
taurant, and be back at the show again before I was
needed. A trolley car was standing just outside the
show ground, and I boarded it. The only passengers
were two men. The car had not started before there
was a little flurry of wind and I saw the canvas begin
to flap. Fearing that there might be a heavy blow
and I would be needed, I started to get off again. As
I did so the two men got up and followed me, and
when I reached the steps there were two more men
about to get on. Instead of waiting until I was off
the car and out of their way, they crowded in against
me while the other two were crowding me from
behind. The conductor shouted at them, "Why
don't you let that man off?" and in a moment they
did. The instant I was free I noticed that my pin
was gone and I grabbed the two men who had held
me in the door and accused them of taking the pin.
They pulled in opposite directions to get away. The
two of them were more than I could hold with the
grip I had on their coats and they got loose and
started to run toward the town as fast as they could
go, and I after them. In the outskirts of the town
they ran down opposite streets and I lost track of
them. I went on into the town and got my meal and
started to walk back to the show, feeling pretty sore
over the loss of the pin, for it was not only a handsome
pin, but I had paid seven hundred doUars in cash for it.

SOME INCIDENTS BY THE WAY

I had only gone two or three blocks when, as I
turned a corner, one of the men whom I had tried to
hold almost ran mto me. I seized him again and
accused him of taking my pin. He stoutly denied it
and we were soon the center of a crowd. When a
policeman came up to see what caused the crowd, I
had the fellow put under arrest. At the station he
still protested his innocence and the local detectives
were inclined to believe him and let him go. I sent
for our detective and told him what had happened.
As soon as he looked at the "dip" he called him by
name. The fellow would not admit that the detective
was right, even after he had told him where he had
been arrested and done time, so our man sent for a
railroad detective, who also recognized the fellow.
Seeing that there was no longer any possibility of
bluffing it through, he admitted his identity, but said
that his partner had the pin and that he would get it
back for us if we would not push the case against him.
I agreed to it and left .the matter for the detective to
see to. That night after I was in bed the detective
opened the door of my stateroom and handed me the
pin. It cost me fifty dollars to get it back, and I put
it in the bottom of my trunk and let it stay there.

I never remember of a show being beaten by pol-
itics but once. That was in Canton, Ohio. We
struck the town soon after McKinley had been nom-
inated for the presidency. The town was full of
delegations who had come by special trains to pay
their respects to him. While Jie was receiving one
crowd and making them a speech, another was waiting
at the station for their turn. We had to delay our

15 223

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

parade for quite awlule unt3 some of them went away
and made room for us. The town was so full of
people that we did not think we would be able to
accommodate them all in the "big top'' in the after-
noon. We learned our mistake when we opened the
doors. The tent looked deserted when the show com-'"
menced and I do not think there were over two him-
dred and fifty spectators. At night it was worse.
The delegations had all gone home, the place seemed
deserted, and you could have fired a cannon in any
direction without hitting anyone.

Whenever we went to Indianapolis, and he was at
home, Vice-President Hendricks always came to the
show. He used to tell us that he enjoyed coming
because he knew that we were all "good Democrats.'*
A circus man has no opportunity to be anything in a
political way, for he is always on the move. I was
never in one place long enough to become a voter
until I had retired from the show business, after forty
years on the road. The only. vote I cast during the
forty years was in one of the Southern states. We
came into a town there on Election Day, and some of
the election workers came out to the show and wanted
we should go into town and vote the Democratic
ticket. We said that we were not entitled to, but
they insisted that we were. That sailors voted, and
if they could we could. They said so much and were
so anxious to have us that most of the men around
the show went and voted, as they wanted we should.
It was the means of their winning heavily, but we
heard afterward that the matter was taken into the
courts and the vote of the whole county thrown out.

SOME INCroENTS BY THE WAY

A popular feature of every circus at one time was
leaping. We had for a time a fellow who could leap
over twelve elephants standing side by side. In
doing it he used an inclined runway and a big, pow-
erful springboard. Starting at the top of the run-
way he rushed down and gave a big jump on to the
springboard, which bounded him high enough in the
air to clear the elephants. One day the runway
and springboard were left in the ring for practice
work after the afternoon performance. After the
performers were through the property men came in
to take the runway and springboard out. One of
them, a great six-footer called ''Big Slim,'' declared
he was going to try the board and that he would turn
a somersault in the air or ''break his damned neck."
It was a foolhardy thing for an inexperienced person
to do, but he was not to be stopped by anything his
fellow workers could say, and he proceeded to climb
to the top of the runway. When he jumped on the
board it sent him high in the air, and, not knowing
how to handle himself, he struck the groimd on his
head and it did break his neck. "I'm so cold! I'm
so cold!" was all he could moan as they carried him
into the dressing room. In a few minutes he was
dead.

One of the last times I was in Colimibus, Ohio,
wiUi the Bamum & Bailey show, we went out to the
penitentiary and gave a performance for the benefit
of the convicts. As I looked over the crowd I saw
the face of "Tom Pepper." No one in the country
who had been long connected with a circus but knew
Tom Pepper. He was one of those roving characters

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

who drifted horn show to show, never staying with
any more than a month, and never having money.
He was known from coast to coast as the worst liar
that ever existed. But in spite of all his faults he
was one of the best tumblers, leapers, and all-round
gynmasts that ever went into a ring. His method
of securing an engagement was unique. He would
appear in the dressing room just before time for a
performance, with as much unconcern as though he
had been coming to that particular dressing room
regularly for a whole season.

Boys, I want a set of tights. I'm going in to-day,"
he would announce.

The tights would always be forthcoming, he would
get himself ready, and, although the management of
the show did not know he was around, go in and
attract the attention of the audience with his feats.
After the show he would go around to the manager's
office and ask for a job. Usually he got it, and he
was just as sure to jump it after two or three weeks
as he was to get it. I had first seen him back in the
early part of my connection with the Cole show, and
had run across him in various places since then, so
when I saw his face among the convicts in Columbus
I asked the warden for permission to speak to him.

"Hullo, Pepper! What you doing in here?" I
asked him.

It's all wrong, Conklin. I'm in wrong. It was
all a mistake, George," he answered.

"You see, I was stopping at a hotel, and when I
was leaving I picked up what I supposed was my grip,
but when I got away I found I had some one else's.

SOME INCroENTS BY THE WAY

What was I to do? I couldn't go back with it, could
I? You see, probably the man that it belonged to
had mine and he might have been miles away on a
train. Ji I took it back to the hotel they woidd keep
it and I wouldn't get mine and I'd be out both.
Don't you see? So I thought it all over and I see I
couldn't do anything but keep it. You see, don't
you? So I opened it and there wa'n't a thing in it
but just men's gloves. So then what was I t(^do?
I couldn't wear all those gloves. One pair would
have been all I could wear, and, George, you know I
was never very much on wearing gloves. Don't you?
So as long as I couldn't take 'em back, and I couldn't
wear 'em, why, don't you see all I could do was to
try and get a little money for them to make up for
the loss of my grip? You would have done the same
wouldn't you, George? So I took them to a pawn-
shop and asked uncle what he would give me for them.
The old fellow took out a handful of the gloves and
looked at them, and I saw he looked queer, and he
asked me where I got the gloves. So I told him I
took 'em for a debt, an' he didn't say much for a
minute or so, and then he told me that they seemed
like pretty good gloves and that he would have to
look up and see what such gloves was worth before
he could tell how much to let me have on them. He
went in a back room for a minute or two and, say,
George, there must have been a telephone in there,
for inside five minutes a cop come in and pinched me.
You see, George, them was sample gloves, and all
right-handed, and that pawnbroker smelled something
as soon as he saw them. I told the judge just how

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

it was, just as I'm telling you» George, but he only
laughed and give me a year."

I talked with him for a few minutes about old times
and asked about a few people that I had not seen for
some years, and then I left him. As I started down
the corridor he called after me:

"George, tell the boys that Fm in wrong."

Everyone knows that for many years it would be
no less surprising to find a circus without a clown
than for one to appear without a plentiful supply of
"pink lemonade," but very few, even among circus
people, know its genesis. The fact that lemonade
of a pink color would be more popular and sell faster
than the ordinary variety was discovered quite acci-
dentally in 1857 by my brother Pete. He was
traveling with the Jerry Mabie show, which at
that time was the leading show in the country. The
Mabie show traveled in the North summers and in
the South winters. Its record of seven years of con-
tinuous travel without "laying up" has never been
broken. Pete at that time had not begun to aspire
to the role of "cap and bells," but was content with
doing a tumbling and acrobatic act. The show was
down in Texas. One day just before the time for
the afternoon performance Mabie went to Pete in
great distress and told him that Tony Pastor, the
down, had jumped the show. It was a serious
matter anywhere for a show to appear without a
clown, and doubly so in Texas, where the people were
apt to make it hot for a show if it did not make good
the billboard annoimcements. Pete made up as a
clown, and without any preparation or rehearsing

SOME INCIDENTS BY THE WAY

went into the ring, made a hit, and saved the show.
When he came out Mabie complimented him and told
him that he had done as well as Tony Pastor. Pete
played down for a few days and then asked for a
clown's rate of pay. Mabie told him that he was
getting a good salary as it was, and refused to give
him any more. Pete replied: You say I do as well
as Tony Pastor. Well, if I do as well as Tony Pastor
I want Tony Pastor's salary," To which Mabie
answered: "I sha*n't give you Tony Pastor's salary.
I sha'n't give you any more than I'm giving you now,
and if you're not satisfied you can quit." Mabie
supposed this would end the matter and that Pete
would stay on and play clown, for Texas at that time
was not the sort of place that the average young
fellow would care to be left behind in, but Mabie had
guessed wrong, for my brother left him then and
there.

Pete was a youngster and did not mind taking long
chances, and, besides, he had saved a little money,
so he bought a couple of mules and an old covered
wagon and had enough money left to lay in a stock
of peanuts, sugar, tartaric acid, and one lemon. In
telling the story Pete always says that "that lemon
was the best example of a friend I ever met. It
stayed with me to the end." With this outfit he
followed the circus, and every time the tents were
pitched he would mount his box and begin to sing:

"Here's your ice-cold lemonade
Made in the shade.

Stick your finger in the glass.
It '11 freeze fast.**

m

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

The lemonade sold splendidly and he could not
wait on the crowd fast enough. One day he was sur-
rounded by a mob scrambling for the liquid refresh-
ment, when he found that his water supply had run
out. There were no wells or springs near. He
rushed all around the show for water, but could find
none. In his eagerness for it, and as a last resort, he
went into the dressing tent. Fannie Jamieson, one
of the bareback riders, had just finished wringing out
a pair of pink tights. The color had run and left the
water a deep pink. Without giving any explanation
or stopping to answer her questions, Pete grabbed the
tub of pink water and ran. It took only a minute
to throw in some of the tartaric acid and the pieces
of the "property" lemon, and then he began to call
out, "Come quickly, buy some fine strawberry lem-
onade." That day his sales doubled and from then
on no first-class circus was without pink lemonade.

The recipe for circus lemonade has not changed
from that day to this. A tub of water — ^with no par-
ticular squeamishness regarding its source — tartaric
acid, some sugar, enough aniline dye to give it a rich
pink, and for a finish some thin slices of lemon. The
slices of lemon are known as "floaters," and any
which are left in the tub at the close of a day's bus-
iness, together with those which have come back in
the glasses, are carefully saved over for the next day's
use. In this way the same floaters may appear before
the public a considerable number of times. The
lemonade glasses, too, by the way, like some other
things in this world, "are not what they seem." Tall
and large in appearance, they give the impression of

Digitized by

SOME INCIDENTS BY THE WAY

a generous drink for "only a nickel!" but if examined
they are found to taper very rapidly toward the base,
to have extra-thick sides, with the bottom nearer the
top than it looks, and the thirsty customer actually
gets no more of the enticing pink liquid than could
easily be poured into an ordinary drinking glass.

While as a usual thing there is water enough around
the show for a lemonade vender to get all he needs
without any trouble, there are times and places when
it is a difficult matter and he has to resort to various
devices to obtain the necessary supply. I remember
one season in California when water was scarce and
we frequently had to carry our supply from one place
to another. The lemonade man oft^n came to me
that season in great perturbation because he could
procure no water, and for a price I relieved his dis-
tress by knocking out the plug and letting him fill
his cans from the sea-lion's tank.

Singularly the laboring men and the canvasmen
around a show are as eager for the circus lemonade
as the public, with this difference, that they have no
idea of buying it. It therefore becomes necessary
for the lemonade man to watch out or he will find
that while his back has been turned much of his stock
has disappeared.

The most laughable thing in connection with circus
lemonade which happened in my experience occurred
in a West Virginia town on the Ohio River. Al
Richards got out of tartaric acid and he sent Buddy
Williams, a colored fellow, down iitto the town to get
a fresh supply. The druggist was out, as it developed
later, but he did not want to lose a good sale, 30 hQ

THE WAYS OF THE CmCUS

compounded something to take its place, gave it to
Buddy, and said nothing. Buddy took it to Richards
and they mixed a quantity of lemonade. It was a
hot day and the lemonade sold readily. As the
crowd gathered in the '"big top'' Richards's men
climbed over the bleachers and did a good business
there. The show had been going on for about half
an hour when we noticed here and there a person
make his way down and out. Soon people were
dropping right and left, and many were vomiting
before tliey could get away from the seats. I went
outside and there was a long row of people on the
grass and all the doctors in the town working over
them. It was not long before the police arriv^ and
put Richards under arrest. This aroused the show's
detective, and he assured them that he knew it was
not the lemonade that made the people sick, and to
prove his contention he drank two or three glasses
of the lemonade. It was not long before he was in
distress and drinking all the milk he could, for he
"knew milk was good for poison." When the author-
ities found out that the mixture had been bought in
the town and which druggist Buddy went to, they
questioned him and found out what was the trouble
with the mixture and let Richards go. Fortunately
no one died, but I have often wondered what happened
to that druggist when all those people got able to
walk again.

IX

"hey! bxtbe!" and the clown

TOURING those first years of my experience on
the road a circus had to be an efficient fighting
unit. Those were rougher days than now and a
majority of the towns in which we showed were rougbi
towns. While such places as Allentown, Scranton,
and Pottstown, in Pennsylvania, cities like Baltimore,
and the Canadian towns, were the worst, yet it was
seldom that we went to a place in which there was
not some gang anxious to try its hand at ^Mickin' the
circus." They always looked for a fight, they always
got it> and they always got the worst of it. There
was practically no police protection as we know it
now. At most a marshal with a few constables, all
very much impressed with their importance, very
much flustered and excited, and very useless. So it
fell to the lot of the canvasmen to protect the show.

They were a husky lot, those fellows who put up
and took down the tents and watched around them.
Six-footers mostly, broad-shouldered and heavy
in proportion, with muscles that laughed at an
eighteen-poimd sledge. In winter they worked in
the logging camps; in summer traveled with the show.
A red flannel shirt, corduroy pants, cowhide boots,
and a slouch hat made a costume which added con-

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

siderably to the color and picturesqueness of the outfit.
During the day it did not require as many to watch
around the tent, but at night the canvasmen were
as near together as twelve or fifteen feet. Otherwise
the tent would have been cut to pieces and a crowd
would have crawled in, without paying. As it was,
the lower part of the tent guys had to be made of
chains to prevent their being severed with a knife
and letting the tent fall on the crowd as a joke.

It did not need much of an excuse to start a fight.
Frequently it would result from some chap a canvas-
man had foimd crawling imder the tent and pulled
out by the ankles, bringing a bunch of his friends to
help him " do up the canvasman. If there were only
a few in the town gang the nearest three or four can-
vasmen could usually take care of it, but if there was
a crowd and things began to get too hot, one of the
canvasmen would shout "Hey, Rube!" This was
the "SO S" call of the circus, and everyone who
'could leave what he was doing would grab a stake
from the stake wagon and rush into the fracas. The
town gang was always the loser. If it had not been
the circus could not have stayed on the road long.
Black eyes, bloody noses, bruised heads, and broken
bones were common. Often there were more serious
injuries and sometimes a man was killed. Very often
men connected with the circus were arrested, but
they were seldom convicted, for in such a rough-and-
tumble fight it was almost impossible to tell which
man inflicted a particular injury and the authorities
usually got the wrong one.

Sometimes we would find such a crowd when we

HEY! RUBE!" AND THE CLOWN

reached the show grounds in a town that it was impos-
sible to work. Then it was necessary to clear the
^ space. Doing this was liable to provoke a fight which
might require the combined efforts of every man in
the outfit. One of the shows with which I was con-
nected had an old, trusty elephant by the name of
Queen Anne, which I trained to be a help at such
times. I would give her a twelve-foot tent pole and
she would start slowly through the crowd, swinging it
right and left in her trunk. It was not often that this
failed to make plenty of room in short order, but if the
toughs were especially disagreeable and persistent I
would say, "Mihiel, " to Queen Anne, and she would go
in so fast that the bimch would be piled up in heaps.

In some instances trouble was due to sectional
prejudice. This was true in the South in the years
directly after the war. In spite of the fact that the
show, as a show, was popular and well patronized
by the people, nevertheless they looked on us as
"damned Yankees" and treated us accordingly, as
much as they were able and dared. I have often seen
what appeared to be first-class gentlemen and sub-
stantial citizens aiding the roughs in trying to start
a scrap with us. This feeling was especially strong
in the small towns. At first we tried to fly the Stars
and Stripes from the top of the tent, but it was the
cause of so much trouble that we gave it up. Some-
times they would come and ask us to take them down,
and if the owner of the show refused they would get
a gang together and attempt to take them down by
force. More often they would make a rush for the
flag without any warning.

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

For several years after the war it was dangerous
for any one connected with the circus to leave the
show grounds in Richmond. Even for their meals
at the hotel the men had to go in squads, protected
by ten or fifteen big canvasmen armed with clubs.
The first time we showed in Richmond after the war
the toughs boasted they were going to capture the
show and beat up the "damned Yanks." They
waited imtil the show was over at night and we were
packing up before they made the attempt. Then
we heard them coming up the hill singing,

Hurrah! hurrah! for Southern rights hurrah!

Hurrah for the Bonnie Blue Flag that bears a single star."

Every man of us was ready for them with clubs,
sticks, stones, chunks of coal, anything and every-
thing we could lay our hands on, and as soon as they
struck the edge of the show grounds we let them have
it. It was a warmer reception than they had counted
on, and they went down the hill a good bit quicker
than they came up, while the show pulled out of
town on schedule time with every man able to do
his work.

It was not always just the persons of the showmen
that the toughs tried to damage. I have known
many instances where they deliberately endeavored
to destroy the property of the show. Once when we
were in Quebec they tried to run all our wagons
down the hill into the St. Lawrence River, and they
nearly succeeded, too. Fortimately they were dis-
covered just in time. There was a loud cidl of, "Hey,
JElube!*' and the wagons stayed on top of the hill.

HEY! RUBEl" AND THE CLOWN

Once when we were in Montreal an amusing inci-
dent occurred which ended in a lively fight. The
show was set up about half a mile from the town and
in the early evening Tom Foy, boss canvasman, and
Bill Ellinger, a property man, went into the edge of
the town for a drink. They were recognized as
showmen by the Canadians, and invited to fight.
As they were outnumbered six to one, they judged
discretion the better part of valor and started for the
show grounds on the run, with the Canadians after
them. Nearly every one along the way joined in the
chase, so by the time Foy and Ellinger reached the
show ground they had quite a crowd at their heels
and just wind enough left to holler, "Hey, Rube!"
We answered the call at once, and, although there
were many in the crowd who had no idea what the
rumpus was all about, but had just trailed along to
see what was doing, our clubs, like the rain, fell on
the just and the unjust, and it was a choice collection
of broken heads and damaged noses that presently
went hustling back to town.

We showmen used to consider miners a nasty,
trouble-making class of people, no matter in what
part of the world you found them. In Pennsylvania
they would come to the show black and dirty with
coal dust, and lamps on their hats just as they come
from the mine. I remember in particular one scrap
we had with them at Scranton. I was with the
O'Brien show and it was the first year we had a cook
tent. Such great steam cookers as are now in use
were undreamed of then. Our food was cooked in
big kettles hung over fires and it took a good many

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

kettles to cook enough meat and vegetables for a
show, even in those days.

It was nearly five in the afternoon and we
had just sat down to eat when a bunch of miners
gathered around and began to annoy us with stones
and gibes. O'Brien himself was at the table with us
and he called out: "Never mind, boys. Don't let's
have any fight here." Everyone kept as still as he
could, but in a minute or two big stones began to
knock over the kettles of food and O'Brien started
out to remonstrate with the miners. He had no
more than stepped outside the tent when a stone laid
him flat. Some one shouted, **Hey, Rube!" and the
fight was on. We grabbed whatever was handiest,
and for a few minutes the air was full of coffee cups,
knives, stones, sticks, and whatever else we could
find. After a few very busy minutes it was all over
and we were not bothered any more while we stayed
in Scranton.

The most singular fight I ever took part in was
with members of the famous Ku-Klux Klan. It
happened in a little town in Maryland, not far from
Baltimore, on a Sunday night in August. We had
been billed to show in the town on Saturday, but there
was such an uncommonly hard rainstorm all that
day and night it was out of the question. Sunday
morning the storm cleared and most of the show
started for Monday's stand. This gave a chance to
travel by daylight and take more time, on account of
the damage done the roads by the storm.

A fellow by the name of Wordsworth had the con-
cert concession that year. As he was paying five

238

Digitized by

HEY! RUBE!** AND THE CLOWN

thousand dollars for it and hated to lose any oppor-
tunity to give a performance, he had hurridly made
arrangements and billed the town for a "nigger
minstrel" show on Sunday night in a little church
which was not far from the hotel where we were
stopping. The menagerie, of which I was in charge,
had stayed behind, to come along with the band
and the concert performers as soon as Wordsworth's
show was over. Altogether there were some twenty-
five or thirty of us. As the little village hotel could
not furnish rooms for all the men, a large part of them
were given bunks in the attic, but a one-armed song-
and-dance man by the name of Schriemer had a room
with outside stairs leading up to it. We were all
packed up and ready to go just as soon as the minstrel
show was over, and all the men except those taking
part in the performance were gathered in the attic.
Wordsworth had just got nicely started with a fairly
good house, when a band of the Ku-Klux, dressed in
long white robes, white hoods over their heads, and
whips in their hands, burst into the church and
emptied it of both performers and audience in short
order. The first that we at the hotel knew of
the trouble was Schriemer coming on the run with
three of the white figures after him, and hollering,
"Hey, Rube!" at the top of his voice. Halfway up
the stairs to his room they caught him and gave him
a throw over the railing of the stairs. Fortunately
for Schriemer an old pear tree stood at the end of the
building, and he landed in its branches. If he had
not he probably would have been killed.

A few minutes after Schriemer landed in the pear
16 239

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

tree the rest of the performers came rushing in and
fastened the door behind them. The Ku-E3ux, not
satisfied with having broken up the show, but deter-
mined to give us a thrashing as well, gathered in a
bunch at the front of the hotel. The proprietor
of the place, fearing his establishment would be
wrecked, went out and begged them to go away,
but they paid no attention to him. Meanwhile we
inside, knowing that we were in for it, got ready.
We discovered that the chimney in the attic was
old and the bricks loose, so each man as he started
for the stairs pulled out an armful. A colored fellow,
called Jeremiah Backstitch, who rode the trick mule,
found a four-pound scale weight and added it to his
armful of bricks.

We had only got part way to the bottom of the
stairs when the Ku-Hux broke in the door and started
for us. We let go at them, and for a few seconds all
you could see was flying bricks. Jerry's scale weight
stretched one of the white figures out by the foot of
the stairs. The rest made a dive for the oflSce. We
followed them and made such good use of the few
bricks we had left that they were forced out-of-
doors, where they scattered and ran. We did not
follow, but went back inside, where we found three
Ku-IGux spread out on the floor of the office. These,
with the one on the hall floor, we piled under the
office counter. A few minutes was all we needed to
get our things together and we were soon on the road.
We saw no more of the Ku-Klux and never knew how
badly the four were hurt whom we left under the
counter in the hotel office, but we heard a few days

240

"HEY! RUBE!" AND THE CLOWN

later that most of the people in that town were glad
that we did them up.

The following verses, written by William Devere,
which I put away in my scrapbook years ago, are so
true to the circus life in the old days that I quote
them in full:

" 'Twas just about ten years ago —
Too early yet for ice or snow —
Through bounteous Texas coming down,
A circus with a funny clQwn —

*Hey. Rube!'

"The boys wam't feeling very well —
The reason why I cannot tell;
And, as they 'made' each little town.
They whispered, as the gawks came round.

•Hey, Rube!*

They didn't say it, mind you now.
But if you scanned each frowning brow
When pestered by some 'budgy' guy.
You'd almost read it in their eye —

•Hey, Ruber

''It's but a little phrase, 'tis true —
Its meaning well each 'faker' knew;
And e'en the weakest heart was stirred
At mention of that magic word —

'Hey, Rubel*

"* They'll eat yer up in this 'ere town —
The boys '11 tear yer circis deoun/
Thus spoke a man with hoary head;
The 'main guy' winked and softly said~

'Hey, Rube!*

They gathered round, about twoscore —
I am not sure but there were more —
Red hot and eager for the fray;
The boys all thought, but didn't say —

'Hey, Rube!'
241

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

"The ball was opened. Like a flash.
Above the battle's din and dash.
As thunderb<^t hurled from the sky.
Rang, long and loud, the battle cry —

•Hey, Ruber

"Twas but a moment; in they went.
Each man on life and death intent;
They periled there both life and limb.
Twas wonderful to hear them sing —

•Hey. RubeP

**Twas finished. The smoke rolled away
As clouds before the sun's bright ray.
That Texan chivalry were gone;
They couldn't sing that circus song —

•Hey, Rube!'

Moral.

" •Gawks,* •guys,' and 'Rubes,* another day
Whene'er a circus comes your way
And you are *sp'ilin' * for a *clim,*
Be sure they haven't learned to sing —

•Hey, Rube!' "

There is nothing which more strikingly emphasizes
the diflFerence between the old-time circus and that
of to-day than the changed relation which the clown
holds to the show. In the old days he was the prin-
cipal attraction, and oftentimes the success or failure
of a show depended on the ability and reputation of
its clown. He told stories, cracked jokes, sang songs,
and very often composed them as well, commented
to the audience on the diflFerent acts, and drew the
largest salary of anyone on the pay roll. To-day the
clown is a fifteen-doUar-a-week man, whose part is
reduced to a little rough-and-tumble ^nd cheap

slap-stick'' pantpmime.

Digitized by

HEY! RUBE!" AND THE CLOWN

One of the most famous clowns there ever was in
the United States was "Dan Rice." His real naiv.e
was Daniel McLaren. He was bom in New York
City and his father nicknamed him Dan Rice after a
a famous clown he had known in Ireland. One of
Dan's specialties was a trained pig, which he exhibited
in the ring for a number of years. When I joined the
O'Brien show Dan was drawing a thousand dollars
a week, and he was worth it to the show. Dan's
great misfortune was drink. He made the statement
once, toward the last of his life, that he drew a thou-
sand dollars a week for nine years, and at the end of
that time had to borrow car fare to get home. Fore-
paugh once oflFered to let Dan fix his own terms for
a season in California if he would engage to stay sober
the whole season, and another show once oflfered to
pay him anything he asked for four weeks if he would
let his pay stand until the end of the four weeks as
a bond that he would be sober, but Dan refused both
offers. It is said that he made and lost three for-
tunes and died in poverty. When he was with the
O'Brien show he had a fine horse and buggy of his
own with which he traveled from stand to stand.
After Dan's affairs began to go downhill he waa
employed for a while by my brother. In 1878, when
Dan was in St. Louis, completely down and out, he
became reformed and, except for a few slips, stayed
comparatively sober for some time. During this
period he went out giving temperance lectures.
Whenever he lectured he had a half -filled glass pitcher
and a drinking glass on a table, and from time to time
he would stop and pour himself a drink, saying he

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

must have another drink of water and commenting
on the virtues of water and water drinking. As a
matter of fact the pitcher held gin instead of water.
Afterward Dan would chuckle over it, saying: "What
fools people are, anyway!'*

My older brother, Pete Conklin, made a reputation
as a "Shakespearean clown." In his talks and jokes
he worked in a great many quotations of Shakespeare
and parodies of his verses. It was all very popular
in the old days and made a great hit, but it would not
go now, for it would be over the heads of the audience.
There is not enough familiarity with Shakespeare in
a circus crowd now to catch the point. He used to
sing a lot of songs, many of which he wrote himself.
He was the first to bring out the popular war-time
song, "I Go to Fight Mit Sigel." After a time he
got out a book of his songs and sold it to the crowds
that came to the show. The one-armed Schriemer
used to help him. Schriemer did a song-and-dance
in the concert. He had lost the arm in some railroad
accident. Pete paid him a regular wage to help him,
and every performance Schriemer came into the ring
dressed in the blue uniform of a Union soldier, a
knapsack on his back and a shelf full of the song books
strapped on in front of him. Pete would stand up
beside the fellow and make a talk to the audience,
which went something like this:

"This man that you see here is a soldier. You see
he has lost an arm. He lost it fighting at Gettysburg
in the thickest of the battle. Now he has no means
of earning a living, and so I have given him some
books, and by selling them he can get a little money

HEY! RUBE!" AND THE CLOWN

for himself. He is going to come around among you
and I know you won't go back on an old soldier, but
will buy his books."

Then Schriemer would work his way around among
the audience and they would buy quantities of the
books, sometimes as many as a hundred dollars'
worth in a day.

When the show went South my brother would pack
away the blue uniform and have Schriemer appear
in Confederate gray, carrying an edition of the song
book from which everything that would offend
Southerners had been eliminated, and instead of
being the hero from Gettysburg Pete would tell a
touching tale of how bravely Schriemer had fought
under Stonewall Jackson. The Southerners always
fell for it and bought generously.

One Fourth of July while we were in England we
had for dinner some sweet com and watermelon.
The English performers made sport of us and said
that "maize" and watermelon were pigs' food. One
of these Englishmen was a clown called "Frisky." He
was a terribly conceited fellow and considered him-
self a great clown, but as a matter of fact all he could
do was a little pantomime, and that not any too well.
Later on he came to New York with us, and while
there learned to like watermelon himself. We had
it on the table almost every day, but one day there
was none, and after making considerable talk about
what he was going to do Frisky went out on the street
to get one. In a few minutes he came back and we
were all nearly convulsed to see that instead of a
watermelon he had a great pumpkin. No one said

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

a word, however, and with all the assurance in the
world Frisky cut his melon and took a big bite. A
roar went up and the funniest kind of an expression
went over Frisky's face.

"There must be something wrong. It dawn*t
seem the same,'* he observed.

After a time some one explained to him what was
the matter with his melon, but never again after that
was he known as Frisky. From that day on through
all the years that he stayed with the show he was
called "Punk."

Another droll clown whom I knew when we were
both with the Bamum & Bailey show was Harry
Wardsworth. Harry had a big make-believe camera
with which he used to furnish a lot of fun after the
crowd had begun to come in, but before the show had
commenced. Harry would wait around one of the
entrances until some "rube" and his girl came in.
Going up to the couple, he would make a profound
bow and ask for the privilege of taking their pictures.
He would then manage to get them out where a good
part of the audience could see him and set up his fake
camera. After a good deal of make-believe focusing
and arrangement he would tell the couple he was
ready, point to some object near the top of the tent,
and ask them to look steadily at it until he told them
to stop. Then he would pick up the camera and sneak
quietly away, leaving the couple standing "rubbering"
at the top of the tent, much to the amusement of the
crowd while he hunted another victim.

A clown whom we knew as Bill World was con-
nected with the Cole show for a time. He was a

m

HEY! RUBE!" AND THE CLOWN

Scotchman, a small man not much over five feet tall,
very fussy about his dress and appearance, and whose
one great interest in life was hunting. . He was all
the time talking about his various hunting trips, and
whenever there was an opportunity, if only for a
couple of hours, he would take his gun and be off after
"plubber,** "med larks," etc., as he called them.
One day somebody made him a present of a nice black
dog, an Irish setter, and Bill returned to the show,
bringing it with him. He came to me and wanted to
know if he might put it in the elephant car. I sup-
posed he only wanted to keep it there a day or two
and readily gave him permission. The dog did not
seem happy there. He was surly to everyone who
went near him and barked all night long, every night.
It soon became evident that it was the clown's inten-
tion to keep the dog with him right along, and he was
cordially hated by everyone who rode within sound
of his bark. We had put up with the dog for two
weeks or more. At that time we were not far from
Yuma, Arizona, traveling through a section where
there had just been a very unusual rain, and the first
in two years. Everything was flooded and it was
like riding across a lake. I thought I saw an oppor-
tunity, so I untied the dog, opened the car door, and
threw him out into the water. It seemed that Bill,
whose car was one of the last on the train, was riding
on the platform of the car to watch the uncommon
sight of the flooded country and he saw and recognized
his dog in the water. At the next stop he came rush-
ing up with war in his every look and movement, and
asked where his dog was. When I told him that

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

some one threw the dog off the train he swore that he
would murder whoever did it, and insisted that I tell
him who it was. So I finally told him that it was
"Big Babe." Big Babe, the boss canvasman,
stood six feet three in his stockings and was a pretty
rough specimen of a pretty rough class, and it seemed
very funny to think of little dapper Bill World doing
him any harm. Nevertheless, Bill went away declar-
ing he would find him and kill him, and, more than
that, he would "kill the goose that eats the grass off
his grave." Something must have changed his mind,
however, for I never heard of his doing anything to
Big Babe, not even so much as to ask him about it.

Clowns are not much given to having "cold feet,"
but I knew three to be troubled that way badly once.
It was on the first trip of the Cole show to San Fran-
cisco. When we arrived there the local show people
were positive that we would never be able to draw
and hold a San Francisco crowd with any such show.
They were equally positive that our clowns did not
understand the Califomians and would not be able
to amuse them. So much of this kind of talk got on
the nerves of Jimmie Reynolds, the head clown, and
he began to fortify himself by drinking; but instead
of putting its courage into him it did just the
opposite, and by the forenoon of the day the show
was to open he had got into such shape that he went
to Cole and told him he could not work in San Fran-
cisco. Cole informed him that he would either work
or get through, and Jimmie quit rather than face a
San Francisco audience. Then Cole went to Bill
World, who played second clown; and told him that

"HEY! RUBE!" AND THE CLOWN

he must go in and be first clown, but Bill was jealous
of Jimmie and sore because Cole had made Jimmie
first clown instead of himself, and so he refused to
play, and quit his job. Then Cole tried to have the
third clown, Deafy Varrol, tackle the job, but he
was so deaf that he could not hear anything that was
said to him in the ring by the ringmaster and he did
not dare to attempt the job alone, so he quit, leaving
Cole without a clown, and his first performance only
an hour or two away. It would never do to put on
the first performance without a clown, so something
had to be done, and that quickly. Cole succeeded
in finding a song-and-dance man in the concert by
the name of Tommy Mclntyre, who was willing
to try it. Tommy hurried around and got some
stuff to make up with and was ready when the time
came for him to go into the ring. Not only did the
audience never mistrust that he was not an experienced
clown, but it was perfectly satisfied with him and he
was the only clown Cole had during the whole seven-
teen days that the show was open in San Francisco.
In spite of the local prophets, the show was able to
draw and hold a San Francisco crowd, and we did a
big business each day.

Meanwhile the three clowns who quit were hanging
around and using up their resources. Jinunie
Reynolds pawned his diamond cross scarf pin with
me, and the other two had borrowed what they could
from different ones, and they were beginning to be
pretty anxious for fear Cole would go away and leave
them stranded in San Francisco. When they saw us
getting ready to leave, and Cole had not said a word

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

to them, they could stand it no longer and hunted
him up and begged him to take them back. After
some talking he consented to do it, but on condition
that they work for a good bit less money than their
original contract. This they agreed to do and stayed
with the show all summer. Tommy Mclntyre went
back to the concert. He preferred this to staying in
the ring as clown, for he sold tickets with the concert
and he could make considerably more "short chang-
ing^' than he could with a clown's salary.

X

GREAT BRITAIN AND THE CONTINENT

MY first trip to England was made in the fall of
1889 with the Bamum & Bailey show. This
invasion of the "Old Country*' was the idea of Mr.
Bailey who worked out the plans for the undertaking,
which was in the nature of an experiment, for no large
American circus had ever before been to Europe, and
just what its reception would be was problematical.
It was a daring venture. If it "took,'' there were
limitless possibilities in the way of success; if it did
not, there was not only a diminishment of prestige,
but a staggering financial loss to face.

We sailed from New York October 20, 1889, m
especially chartered boats, and reached London with-
out mishap. Of course our coming had been much
heralded in England, but there was a certain amount
of skepticism as to our show being any better than
the English, a feeling which of course was most pro-
nounced among the British showmen themselves.
The feeling was well shown by an incident that
occurred soon after we docked and before we had
begun to unload. A fellow who was proprietor of a
small menagerie somewhere near London came on
board, full of curiosity. It was Frank Bostock, later
well kngwtt m this oountry, but at tbrt time wAe^rd of,

m

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

"What 'ave you got to hexcite the Henglish people?"
he asked me.

"Oh, weVe got some elephants, and some lions
and tigers, some giraffes, some monkeys, and a lot of
other animals, and a first-class circus," I told him*

"Why, weVe got loyns and toigers and helephants,
and all those things over 'ere. You cawn*t interest
the people with those things, you know," Bostock
answered, and Willie Sholes, a rider, who had been
listening, broke in:

"Never mind, Johnnie Bull, we've got a Yankee
circus here, and we're going to show you fellows a
thing or two."

Bostock went ashore, convinced that we were
doomed to failure, but after he saw the show and the
crowds that came to it he arranged his affairs and
came to the United States as soon as he could and
began business here in a small way.

We opened on November 11th in the Olympia,
a mammoth building near Hammersmith Road, Ken-
sington. The building was somewhat similar to
Madison Square Garden in New York. Besides the
large menagerie and circus we had with us the huge
spectacle called "Nero." There were nineteen hun-
dred people in the cast and it was one of the greatest
things I ever saw under a tent. A person could see
it every night and not get tired of it.

The show was a success from the first day the doors
were thrown open, and the crowds were so great that
day after day during the whole of our stay, while we
were letting one audience out at the side doors another
crowd was coming in at the front. All the time the

252

Digitized by

GREAT BRITAIN AND THE CONTINENT

menagerie was open it was also crowded, and I began
to notice, when it was most densely packed, here and
there a cap held high above the heads of the crowd,
on an umbrella or cane. I could not imagine why it
was done. I finally got so curious that I asked a
policeman, and he explained to me it was people who
had become separated from their friends or family.
If they stood still in one place and held up their caps,
friends would see, locate, and make their way to them.
After that I watched a few times and found that it
was as the policeman had told me.

During that winter Mr. Bamum came to nearly
every performance of the show, a very unusual thing
for him to do. Soon after the show began he arrived
in an open carriage drawn by two horses, with a coach-
man and footman in full livery on the box. The
whole performance came to a stop while he was
driven slowly around the hippodrome track. At in-
tervals he would have the carriage stop, and standing
up in it call out in his squeaky voice:

" I suppose you come to see Bamiun, didn't you?
Wa-al, I'm Mr. Bamum."

Then he would make a profound bow, the carriage
would go on to the next stop, where he repeated the
same question and answer, and so on until he reached
the exit and went out. The show would then go on.

The success of the show was so great and hurt the
London theaters so much that they became very bitter
against us and did everything they could to drive us
out of London. They did not make much headway
at first, but after a while they hit on the expedient of
having the authorities constantly adding to the

253

Digitized by

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

requirements that the show must comply with.
Most of them were not only unjust and annoying, but
involved considerable expense. After they seemed
to have exhausted their ingenuity in every other way
they decided that, in order to make the building
safe with such crowds in case of fire, there must be
several new exits built in. This would reduce the
seating capacity of the place and make it necessary
to close up while the work was being done, besides the
expense involved, which was heavy. Mr. Bailey at
first demurred and tried to have them leave it as it
was for the rest of the season, but he found they were
determined to enforce the changes. Then he played
for time. He made some of the minor alterations
which they asked for, and kept putting oflf the build-
ing of the new exits. At last the authorities became
insistent and told Mr. Bailey the exits must be put
in, and they would only wait a certain time longer
for him to start about it. He assented to the arrange-
ment, but when the time limit was up, much to the
surprise of the Englishmen, simply closed up, several
weeks sooner than he had planned to and began to
make preparations for the trip to the United States.

We sailed from London for New York late in Feb-
ruary on the Fumessia. The afternoon we left Mr.
Barmmi gave a supper on board the boat to the Lon-
don reporters. Just as they reached the deck of the
Fumessia an incoming ship from Australia, loaded
with dressed meats, was run into by an outbound
boat and the Australian boat was sunk. The report-
ers, of course, were much interested in watching the
affair as a matter both of curiosity and of business.

GREAT BRITAIN AND THE CONTINENT

This irritated Bamum. He had a fine feed ready
for them, and although he never drank himself and
had an American reputation as a temperance lecturer,
he had not neglected to provide plenty to drink.
After waiting a few minutes the old man's impatience
got the best of him and up he went to the deck where
the reporters were, and greeted them with:

"Come, come, boys! That's nothing but mutton!
Come on down and have some wine and something
to eat."

When we got to New York we found that the old
Madison Square Garden had been torn down and
workmen were busy on the foundations of the present
one. On that account we had to go uptown to a ball
ground and set up oiur tents. That was the only
time I ever showed under canvas in New York City.

The great popularity which the Bamum & Bailey
show had acquired in its few weeks' stay at the
Olympia, together with the financial success of the
venture, determined Mr. Bailey to repeat the visit,
and in addition to take along the necessary equipment
to tour Great Britain and exhibit in all her principal
cities after the close of another winter season in
London; but it was not until the summer of 1897 that
definite dates were set and the arrangements com-
pleted for the second trip. Meanwhile Mr. Bamum
had died, and Mr. Bailey had become the sole owner
of the show. It was the most gigantic circus under-
taking ever attempted, and as early as July, while
the show was still on the road in the Middle West,
the preparations were begun for the joumey late the
following fall. At Cherokee, Iowa, a notice wa^

17 2^

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

posted notifying all perfonners and others connected
with the show, who desired to make the trip, to apply
to Mr. Bailey's office, and long before the end of the
season the entire company had been booked.

It was known that the tunnels on the English rail-
ways were lower than those in this country, and while
we were still on the road the work of cutting down the
height of many of our cages and wagons was com-
menced, and much of it done before we got into winter
quarters in Bridgeport, early in October. Once
housed there, the overhauling process commenced in
earnest. Everything that would be used during the
winter was gone over. Cages were repainted and
gilded, new costumes made, and everything done
that was possible to make the show look spick and
span when it made its second bow in London.

A group of agents, some of the performers, and the
bill posters sailed as early as the middle of October.
More of the performers and the freaks went the last
of that month, but it was not until November that
I got word to start the menagerie. The Massachu-
setts of the Atlantic Transport Company had been
selected to carry the menagerie and the show proper.
On the 7th of October it reached New York and
early on the morning of the 10th I started my animals
from Bridgeport by train for New York and Europe.

We hauled our animals and material from the rail-
road yards down to the Transport Company's docks
at the foot of West Houston Street, where the Massa-
chusetts lay, and began the task of putting everything
aboard and in such shape that it would withstand an
ocean voyage. The task of stowing away such a

GREAT BRITAIN AND THE CONTINENT

cargo was so large and unusual an undertakings (hav-
ing been attempted only once before, and that on a
much smaller scale) that the New York papers gave
columns of space to describing our methods and the
progress of the work. Some of them even sent men
across to write the story of the trip.

Some idea of the job of loading can be- gathered
from the fact that besides the wagons and equipment
which we carried we had twenty-five cages of wild
animals, some three dozen of ^Med stock/' twenty
elephants, and several hundred horses. All these
live creatures must not only be securely stowed, but-
in such a way that their keepers and attendants could
get to them at any time to feed and care for them.
In addition, space must be planned to store away the
great quantity of food required to feed so many
animals for nearly two weeks. It was probably the
biggest undertaking of the kind since Noah loaded
the Ark. Nor was it an altogether easy task to get
the animals from the dock into the boat. Some, of
course, were led easily over the gangplank and down
inclined planes to their places, others had to be urged,
and some had to have the argument of ropes and
force. The smaller elephants were driven on board
and put in a row of narrow stalls in the after part of
the hold. The big fellows had especial cages* in
which they traveled all the way across. These cages,
elephants and all, were swimg from the dock one by
one to the deck of the boat by the great Chapman
derrick which lay alongside.

Finally the last thing was on board and seemingly
there was not an unoccupied foot of space either in

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCrS

the hold or oo the deda. Sardy tlds wbs the strmn-
gest load that ever crossed the water. Bed wagons,
white wagons, chariots of gold, p ardr obe vans, fairy
Boats, canvas-covered cages, and other drcus equi-
page tacked into every possible comer and place,
and somewhere among it all canvasmen, mechanics,
property men, hostlers, grooms, and jockeys, almost
two hundred beside the crew. Half an hour after
the last wagon was rolled into place, at dusk of the
second day after leaving Bridgeport, the order was
given to ""cut loose." As the great boat slq^>ed out
of her dock the side-show band strudL up ^Mr.
Johnson, Turn Me Loose," the giant engines began
to throb, and we were off.

The first event on the vc^age was a tragedy.
Hardly had the lights of New YoA disappeared
behind us before we saw the red light of the small
boat coming toward us to take off the pflot. We
watched the frail thing as it danced up and down on
the water like a leaf and drifted under the ship's
quarter. Suddenly we heard a clanging of bells, a
rushing to and fro on the bridge, and for a long while
the ship lay idly rocking. Aiter it was on its way
again we learned that the little boat had in some way
been caught in one of the great propellers and smashed
to pieces, and the two sailors who were in it drowned.

The first three days out we had bad weather — a
high wind and a rough sea. As a result there was
plenty of seasickness on board, but after the fourth
day the weather and the sea were all that could be
desired. The third day out it was discovered that
Paisy, the giraffe, was dead^ This wa^ ^ ^eat

GREAT BRITAIN AND THE CONTINENT

loss to the show, for Daisy was an unusually fine
specunen, measuring eighteen feet from the ground
to the tips of her ears. At that time she was the only
giraffe on exhibition with any traveling show, and one
of the only three known to be in captivity. Mr.
Bailey had bought her from the Cincinnati Zoo
especially to take on this trip, paying something like
eight or ten thousand dollars for her. She had been
heavily "billed'* in London. MacKay, her keeper,
had left her all right the night before, but when he
opened her cage in the morning she was down, with
her head doubled under her and her neck broken. I
concluded that during the night she must have
attempted to lie down, and just as she was doing so
^been caught by a lurch of the ship in the heavy sea
and thrown. We swung her body with a tackle to
the top of the elephants' cages on the upper deck and
carefully skinned her, and as the boatswain's mate
sung out, "Good-by, old sport!" her carcass went
overboard. Her skin was given to the British
Museum, which stuffed and mounted it.

The first day or two out we were busy tightening
all of the lashings and chocks which held the cages
and wagons in place, but after that they gave us little
trouble. I realized, after we had been at sea for a
few days, that a storm such as old sailors tell of would
have carried all the stuff on the decks overboard and
made a horrible mess in the hold. Fortunately we
were not even threatened with such a disturbance,
and the captain went a hundred and fifty miles farther
south than the regular course in order to be sure that
we did not run into a cold snap.

250

Digitized by

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

Among other things on board was the "forty-horse
team/* which created a sensation in England. The
forty horses were all great, fine bays, and had been
broken in Bridgeport by Tom Lynch and Jim Thomas.
Jim was the driver and there were so many reins
needed to drive the forty at one time, and they were
so heavy, that he had to have a man stand behind
him and help hold them. The horses were hitched
four abreast to one of the biggest band wagons there
ever was and which had been built on purpose for
this team. In making a turn once around a corner
in one of London's narrow streets, the horses swung
in too close and the band wagon took out the whole
comer of the building. The comer was occupied by
a "pub, " or saloon, as we know them in America.

Another group of horses which had especial care
was the seventy which had been trained by John
O'Brien for a single act. For this act a series of cir-
cular platforms were placed in the ring, one on top of
another, and each one smaller than the one under it.
The topmost one of the series was just large enough
for one horse to stand on, and at the beginning of the
act O'Brien, astride a beautiful pure white horse,
rode in and took his position on it. Then one at a
time, as he called them by name, the rest of the seventy
trotted in and took their places on the different plat-
forms. O'Brien's white horse was a big fellow, those
oij the next level not quite so large, and each descend-
ing level smaller, until on the "ring curb" they were
ponies. When all was ready and O'Brien gave the
word, all of the seventy trotted round and round the
circle, altemate levels in opposite directions. It was

GREAT BRITAIN AND THE CONTINENT

a very pretty sight and always won great applause,
A beautiful black stallion named Eagle, whose
especial accomplishment was to dance the "couchee-
couchee*' with John O'Brien on his back, died after
we got within sight of the English coast. He was
thirty-six years old and came originally from Ham-
burg. As his body was slid overboard his groom
stood in the shadow of a wardrobe wagon and wept
like a woman. Of the animals we had on board, this
stallion, two baggage horses, and the giraffe, Daisy,
were all we lost, and only the hippopotamus was
seasick.

After we reached the English Channel, fog added
twenty-four hours to the time it took us to reach
London, but before noon of the 25th we had tied to
the Albert Docks, and night of the 27th found all
of our belongings in the Olympia at West Kensing-
ton. One of the first men to greet me while the
work of unloading the animals was going on was Carl
Hagenback, the famous animal dealer of Hamburg,
It was a wet, nasty morning, and the first thing he
said to me was, "Conklin, where is your rubber
coat?" I explained that I had neglected to bring
one with me, and thought no more about it. In a
short time he came back again and made me a
present of as fine a rubber coat as could be bought in
London.

It had been Mr. Bailey's plan to open at the
Olympia on December 15th, but the London County
Council kept putting so many obstacles in the way,
in the shape of added requirements, that he was
obliged to postpone the opening until the 27th,

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

Besides the many smaller things which the Council
insisted on having done, it demanded a huge asbestos
curtain with great iron supports across one entire
side of the amphitheater, a distance of two hundred
and forty-two feet. Not only did it involve an out-
lay of amost a hundred thousand dollars, but it
seemed at first as though it would be impossible to
get anyone to do the work. Firm after firm refused
to take the contract and agree to have it done in the
short time allowed. Findly the W. R. Renshaw &
Sons Company, of Stoke-on-Trent, who were building
cars and winter quarters for Mr. Bailey, took the
contract and began on the work. As fast as the iron
was machined it was brought up to London and men
worked night and day to assemble it. Our men took
hold and helped get the frame into position. When
it came time to hang the great asbestos curtain the
English workmen refused to climb up to do it, claim-
ing the risk was too great, but it took no urging to
get our canvasmen to do it, and the curtaia worked
perfectly at the first test.

The day we opened is known in London as ''Boxing
Day," and everyone goes to some kind of amusement
place if they can. All of our seats except the cheap
ones, which are never sold except at the door, had
been taken, and the Olympia was crowded to its
limit. The people were enthusiastic over the show,
and from then until the first of April, when it closed,
we had a full house every day. ^

The show was well attended by the royal family,
some members of which came several times. When-
ever they attended a special box and entrance wfts

GREAT BRITAIN AND THE CONTINENT

set apart for them, thick Brussels carpeting laid for
them to walk on, and our men stood at "attention**
while they passed. Visits of members of the royal
family to the menagerie were private. My recol-
lection of the Prince of Wales, later King Edward
Vn, is of a democratic sort of man who went from
cage to cage, talking with me about the different
animals and asking questions of the keepers, so much
so in fact that one of my men refused to believe it
was the Prince, saying, "Why, he*s just like any
other 'gillie M" The Princess of Wales, afterward
Queen Alexandra, came often to the menagerie, for
there was a sculptor working from one of our lions
on a piece of statuary which she was having done
for Windsor Castle, and she enjoyed watching the
progress of the work. I have a pocket piece which
she made me a present of. It is copper, about the
size of an American quarter. Embedded in the
center of it is a circle of silver whose diameter is per-
haps half that of the whole piece, and in the center of
the silver is a relief of the Queen. I was told that
she had a number of these pieces struck purposely
to give away as little complimentary reminders.

I did not enjoy London from the first, and did not
learn to like it in the three winters I was there. At
first I tried having my meals at restaurants, but I
foimd that they did not open until nine o'clock in
the morning, and I concluded to try a boarding house.
A cigar dealer who had a shop near the Olympia
recommended one, and I and four other men went
around to look it over. The lady told us she would
take us for six dollars a week, but we must furnish

Digitized by

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

our own butter for one meal each day, and candles
to light us to bed. We decided we would try it.
The first meal we found a great mutton pie in the
center of the table, which we were expected to carve
ourselves. We picked Joe Ennis to be our carver.
Joe took up the big knife which the boarding mistress
had provided and plunged it into the pie. We heard
it hit something hard and saw a queer look come over
Joe's face. He broke away a piece of the crust and
exposed an egg cup. He tried it on the opposite side,
and found another. While expressing in good strong
Yankee his opinion of English cookery in general and
of mutton pies in particular, he cut again and found
a third cup. This was too much for Joe. Throwing
down the knife and grabbing his hat, he started for
the door, shouting: "Come on, boys! IVeseen
enough of that pie." We followed him out and all
made for the cigar dealer, demanding that he explain
why he sent us to any such place. He commenced
to laugh immoderately, which angered us still more,
but after a little he explained that it was customary
for London housewives, when they built a pie, to put
in some such thing as an egg cup to hold the crust
up while it was baking. We went back and excused
ourselves the best we could, but we did not have
anything else for a main dish until we had eaten the
mutton pie up.

Later on during my stay in London I got hungry
for some apple pie. I went into a little bakeshop
and asked if they had some. The lady said she did
not, but would make one if I wanted. I asked her
if she knew how to make one American style. Cerr

m

GREAT BRITAIN AND THE CONTINENT

tainly she did. She was positive. So I gave her an
order and went back at the appointed time for my
pie. What I got was a thick, soggy crust, which had
been supported on something while it was baking, as
the mutton pie had, and away in the bottom of the
dish were a few little pieces of apple. I did not tell
the woman what I thought of her apple pie, but I
gave up attempting to get Yankee dishes on Ham-
mersmith Road.

During the winter while the show had been at the
Olympia, an English firm had been building cars for
our use, so that when we closed the season we were
able to start out on the road with a train of our own,
as we had been accustomed to in the United States.
Not all of the cars were ready, but enough so we
could get along by using a few of the regular vans
belonging to the railroads. The last performance in
the Olympia was on a Saturday night, and before
three o'clock Sunday morning all our stuff was on
board, ready to start out and show the English people
what could be done with a big circus on the road.
Our first stop was Manchester. The tents had been
up for four weeks. This had been done with a double
purpose. One reason was to try them out, stretch
the ropes, and get everything in shape for the season's
use. Another, and perhaps the principal one, was to
get the curiosity of the people properly aroused. The
show spent a week with rehe^sals and then it showed
the people of Manchester what a parade was. The
people were eager enough, and never did I see such a
crowd, not even in New York. They filled every
available spot clear to the middle of the street, and

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

it was with difficulty that the police made a lane. for
us to get through.

There was a Captain Webb with us who had some
trained seals. He thought it would be a good thing
for the seals to have the run of a little pond near the
tents the week that the rehearsals were going on, and,
not supposing he would have any more trouble calling
them out of the pond than out of their cage» he put
them in. The seals had a fine time, but not so the
captain when he went to get them out. A part of
them came all right, but after spending a day and a
night coaxing he was obliged to make a big seine to
get the rest.

When we showed in Sheffield I remembered the
reputation of Sheffield cutlery and bought a half
dozen razors in one of the factories. I have never
tried but one of them. That proved excellent. A
lot of the men around the show were not so fortunate.
Instead of going to the factory to buy, they secured
a supply of a fellow who came on the grounds and
asked them a good price for '"famous Sheffield razors
made in the town." After he had gone a very careful
examination disclosed the fact that the razors had
been manufactured in Philadelphia, U. S. A.

It was our first Fourth of July in England, and, the
Fourth being Mr. Bailey's birthday as well, we cel-
ebrated with a big dinner. In order to have a real
American dinner there was sent over from this country
a generous supply of sweet com, watermelons, and
a barrel of peanuts.

At that time in England there was a veteran show-
man. Lord George Sanger, who was known as the

GREAT BRITAIN AND THE CONTINENT

'^Bamum of England." He was in the neighborhood
of eighty years old. His show, like all English shows,
while on the road lived like gypsies, in wagons called
"living vans," and all the performers cooked their
own meals. His tent only had two center poles, and
at the most would not seat more than two thousand
people. Lord George was a droll, genial old fellow
who wore a long coat and tall hat, and had a funny
little pointed beard. It so happened that in several
places during our two tours of Great Britain, he
exhibited the same day and date with us, but the old
man was nothing daunted, trailing his little parade
along in the wake of ours. We got the crowds, and
he got the employees of the Bamum & Bailey show
who could get away for an hour.

The custom of selling liquor at the circus was so
thoroughly established in England that Mr. Bailey
leased a concession for that purpose, and a bar was
set up in the menagerie, and sales were made on the
seats while the performance was going on. No
American bartender was ever kept tab of so closely
as the ones who ran that bar in my menagerie. After
each show every barrel was gauged and every bottle
measured, and the result compared with the receipts.
The first day the bar was set up I heard patrons call-
ing for "allslops" and I wondered what kind of liquor
"allslops" could be. A little later I found out. A
large tub was kept back of the bar into which any
drink which had been left in a glass was thrown, as
well as the rinsings from the glasses. When the tub
was full its mixture of ale, wine, whisky, water, etc.,
was poured into ^ oask and was th^ "ajlslops'" whiifik

Digitized by

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

I had heard asked for and which sold for a little less
than the straight liquors.

Another thing which an Englishman loves, and
expects to buy when he goes to the circus, is indi-
vidual mutton pies. There was an Englishman had
the beef and mutton pie concession. The first thing
he and his man would do each morning was to
get out and dust his big sign "'fresh mutton
PIES.*' Then they would open one of the big boxes
in which he carried his stock and take out as many
as he judged he would need for the day. The mold
on them was so thick that it looked like hair, but
with a couple of little dust brushes they soon made
it disappear, and as I never heard anyone kick about
the pies, I suppose they must have given satisfaction.

We had a fellow along with us who was a wig maker
and barber. He not only cared for the wigs used
in the show, sometimes as many as five hundred, but
he did a general barber business. He was called
"Amiel, the barber." He was a good barber and
the performers, superintendents, etc., began to give
him generous tips. He had never had such pros-
perity, and he soon got so he did not want to shave
or cut the hair of a laboring man. As a result they
got very down on him. He was a great boaster and
was continually boasting about his ability to ride in
a first-class coach with a third-class ticket. Many
warned him that he would get into trouble some'day,
but he simply laughed at them. It seemed for a
time that he was able to do it whenever he tried, but
at last his turn came and he was caught. It not

only cost him five pounds, but he nearly went to jail

m

Digitized by

GREAT BRITAIN AND THE CONTINENT

besides. There was considerable satisfaction among
many of the show people> and Amiel was a good deal
more humble afterward.

We had crowds in practically every place we went,
and almost every day the "full house" sign was
hung out. In Edinburgh I had an interesting expe-
rience. I hired a room in a house in the town. When
I went to it at night I saw no bed, so thought I must
be in the wrong room. On inquiry I found the bed
was built into the wall and that you opened a door
to it as you would to go into a closet. I had to
climb up on a chair to get into the bed, and there
was a transom over the door to give air after the
door was shut. As there was a stock of vegetables
stored imder the bed, I preferred to leave the door
open.

It was in Edinburgh that I met an old friend,
"Uncle Henry," with whom I had traveled in the
Cole show. His son, John Henry Cooke, was the
greatest bareback rider in England in his day. At
that time he had a permanent show in Edinburgh.
I had known him years before in Philadelphia, when
I was with Pogey O'Brien, and Cooke had a show at
the comer of Tenth and Callowhill Streets, opposite
Ridge Road. Uncle Henry came to see me in the
show, and I went to his home with him. The old
man was happy and contented with his birds and
his dog and his fiddle. He had his seventy-fifth
birthday while I was there. Each birthday he went
into the ring and rode an act to show that he could
still do it. This day I saw him leap in the air and
dick his heels three times before he touched the floor

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

again. **Damn me old toes! I can still do it," he
chuckled. When I came away the son went to the
station to see me off. The Cookes were the oldest
family of show people in England.

The show was of great interest to the army officers,
and there was seldom a day that one or more did not
come around to study and ask questions. I taught
the English army how to carry Gatling gims on
camels. I had a saddle shaped something like a
sawbuck, which I strapped on the camel, and then
when I said to him ^'kush," he would lie down, and
I lashed the barrel of the gun and the axle of its
carriage to the top of the saddle, and the two wheels
of the carriage to either side, like a couple of great
shields, and the gun was ready to go anywhere a
camel could.

The last winter we spent in Bridgeport, before
going to London, the men had a ''fat-tailed'' ram,
for a pet. He had the run of the winter quarters,
doing about as he liked. He spent a considerable
part of his time lying behind my stove. Sometimes
he got so close that he singed his wool. Once in a
while he would run into the paint shop and the men
would daub him with paint. We took him over to
London with us, and when we went out on the road
left him with Mr. Bartlett, the superintendent of
the Zoological Park. He was allowed the run of the
park, and soon was on the best of terms with all the
workmen. Some of them, prompted either by spite
or mischief, taught him to butt anyone who had his
hands behind them. Mr. Bartlett was much given
to walking that way, and one day the ram spied him

\

GREAT BRITAIN AND THE CONTINENT

with his hands behind him and tumbled him over,
breaking a wrist. When we got back to London
Mr. Bartlett told us, with emphasis: "You may
have your ram again. IVe had all I want of him."

Toward the end of November we reached our new
winter quarters at Stoke-on-Trent, but only stayed
there a matter of two or three weeks, just long enough
to freshen up our equipment, and then on to the
Olympia once more. A huge tanl^ had been provided
and a number of aquatic events added to the pro-
gram, which had also been changed in many other
particulars for the new season of 1898-99. The
show proved as popular as the year previous, and
played to crowded houses all winter. Meanwhile,
at the quarters in Stoke-on-Trent, the usual winter
work of a circus, overhauling and putting in shape
the traveling equipment, was going on. It was dur-
ing this winter that the Benevolent and Protective
Order of Tigers was organized, a mutual benefit
society which has done much good in caring for
members who have been sick or met with accident.

Early in the season the British public were given
a specimen of American press-agent methods by that
master of the art, Tody Hamilton, but so skillfully
was the matter handled that no one on the outside
ever even mistrusted that there had been a purpose
behind any of the events which attracted attention.
The collection of human abnormalities exhibited in
the menagerie, and always known in America as
"freaks," proved a drawing card from the first, and
Mr. Bailey had added a number of new ones. We
had been open at the Olympia less than two weeks

18 «71

THE WAYS OF THE CmCUS

when, on a Friday, the freaks held a solemn meeting
and decided that the term "freak" was not only
meaningless as applied to them, but opprobious as
well, and that they would endure it no longer. A
committee was chosen to take up the matter and
select a new name to take the place of the objection-
able word "freak/* With singular promptness the
story of the meeting leaked out to the papers, and
the whole London press gave columns to airing the
grievances of the unfortunates. As a result, letters
began to come in by the hundreds from all over
Great Britain, expressing sympathy and suggesting
all sorts of new names. Many of these letters found
their way into the daily papers and helped to fur-
ther increase the popular interest in the matter and
keep it alive. After about two weeks a second meet-
ing was staged, at which the many suggestions for
a new title were discussed, with the result that the
word "prodigies,** said to have been suggested by
Canon Wilberforce of Westminster Abbey, was
adopted. The committee waited upon Mr. Bailey,
with a request that the new name be substituted for
the old one. He granted the request and ordered
that the change be made in all the printing concern-
ing the show. The papers were able to get an account
of this second meeting and its decision, which they
told in great detail, and the subject was then aUowed
to die out; but the "prodigies** did a land-office
business all winter.

We closed the winter season in the Olympia on
the 8th of April, and on the 10th opened at Bir-
mingham, which was the first stand of our summer's

GREAT BRITAIN AND THE CONTINENT

toup. The route for the season followed very nearly
that of the year before, and everywhere we went the
show drew great crowds.

The freaks were always allowed to sell as many
pictures of themselves as they could to the crowds,
and in that way add something to their salary. This
season the "living skeleton," who only weighed
fifty-nine poimds, worked a new and profitable
scheme in addition to the sale of his photographs.
His name was John W. Coffey, but in the show he
was known as the "skeleton dude." When up and
around he seemed fairly well and vigorous, but if
he lay or fell down he could not get up again without
help. Soon after he first came to England he had
married an Englishwoman, and a girl had been bom
to her, so the skeleton conceived the idea of writing
a pamphlet on "The Raising of Children." All
summer long, as the crowds made their way past the
freak's platform, Coffey hawked his pamphlet, much
to the amusement of us all, and the most singular
part of the whole thing was that the pamphlet sold
well and he made a lot of money.

While the show was on the road during the summer
of 1889 plans were being worked out for a tour on
the Continent in the summer of 1900, and when we
reached winter quarters at Stoke-on-Trent in No-
vember, instead of preparing for another season at
the Olympia the whole winter was given to over-
hauling the show for its trip to Germany in March.

Somewhere on the ledgers of the British Empire
is a bill against me. Much to the disgust of the
American members of the Bamum & Bailey show,.

THE WAYS OF THE CmCUS

everyone whose salary was over a thousand dollars
a year had to pay an income tax. I was there twice
whe!n the time came to make the payment, and in
spite of any objections had to pass the amount over;
but when the third tax day came I had left England,
and although the bill followed me to the United
States, I have never found time to send over the two
pounds ten shillings and sixpence.

One of the last things we did before leaving England
was to have the passports for the show made out.
It was being billed in Germany as an ^'aU-American
show," and Mr. Bailey was anxious to have it appear
so in the passports, and the superintendents were
told to go to the American consul's office and swear
that all of their help were Americans. When Mr.
Bailey spoke to me about it I said:

"Mr. Bailey, I can't do that, for I've only got two
American men imder me. The rest are all foreigners."

"Never mind," he replied, "go up then, and hold
up your right hand and swear in yoiur mind that
you haven't got them."

I never heard that there was any question about
the passports either in England or Germany, but I
have often wondered how Mr. Bailey could have had
them made to suit him if the consul was not crooked.

When the show left England, besides the two sea-
sons at the Olympia, it had exhibited in almost a
hundred and fifty different cities, given over seven
hundred performances on the road, and traveled
seven thousand miles.

The transporting of the show from England to
^Germany was more of an imdertaking that it was to

GREAT BRITAIN AND THE CONTINENT

take it from America to England, for there was added
to it complete railroad equipment, which had been
built in England, under Mr. Bailey's direction. It
was the first time that anyone had attempted to put
cars on board ship without taking them apart, and
there were nearly seventy of them, sixty feet long.
The Atlantic Transport Company was again engaged,
for it was found to be the only one that could handle
the contract. A new fourteen-thousand-ton boat,
the Michigan, had hatches large enough to swing
the cars through, wheels and all, to the second deck,
where they were placed side by side and securely
fastened for the trip across the North Sea to Ham-
burg. In spite of the great carrying capacity of the
Michigan, she was obliged to make two trips to get
all of the big show over. The menagerie was left
for the second trip, and when I reached Hamburg
the tents were all up and ready for the animals.

While we did a good business in Hamburg, it was
not up to what the management had expected.
There were several reasons for this, but one of the
principal ones was the fact that the show was boy-
cotted by the office-holding class and their friends,
as well as many of the most well-to-do in the city.
This was partly due to an unfortunate slip of Director
McCaddon. Soon after the show reached Ham-
burg, he was waited on by some of the city officials,
or their representatives, for complimentary tickets,
and a lot of them. The request was made in German,
and McCaddon's interpreter translated it to him.

"If they want to see the show let 'em go buy
tickets. We are not here to give tickets away. We

THE WAIS OP THE CIBCCS

did not come aver here for the Dutchmen

to see the show for nothing,'' he commented to the
interpreter, who gave the German callers something
very different from a literal translation; but cme, at
least, ot the Germans onderstood English, and ow-
beard what McCaddon had said. As a result, his
statement traveled all over G^many ahead of ns,
causing no end (tf trouble with unreasonable restric-
tions, and lost us a lot of business.

The street parade which we made in ELamburg was
the only one made on the ContinenL Some one told
Mr. BaOey that if he gave a parade he would drive
away business. That people would say, afta seeing
the parade, that they had seean all there was, and would
not go to the performance. Mr. Bailey acted on the
tip, and not only did away with the parade in Europe,
but when he came back to the United States he tried
doing without it here, and, finding that he had a
tentful at the performance, gave up the parade
entirely and never used it again as long as he was in
the business.

We were in Hamburg four wedcs. The weather
was cold and bad, and several times there was a
heavy snowsquall while the show was going on.
While there I was much interested in the grounds
and animals of Carl Hagenback, the famous animal
dealer, an old acquaintance of mine. His place,
known as "Thier Park," was near the show grounds,
and I went there several times.

Our first railroad journey in Europe was from
Hamburg to Berlin. All our cars, as soon as they
reached Hamburg, had been sent to the Prussian

276

Digitized by

GREAT BRITAIN AND THE CONTINENT

Railway shops at Altona for government inspection
and such minor changes and extra attachments as
were necessary to satisfy the inspectors that they
were fit to nm on German roads. The authorities
in Berlin, at the first, had flatly refused to let us
exhibit there, and it was only after considerable
argument that permission was finally granted. As
it was, we were confronted with all sorts of restric-
tions and conditions which must be complied with.
No big exhibition had ever set up a tent in the dty
before. We reached Berlin early on a Monday after-
noon, but the city oflScials could not believe it possi-
ble for us to be ready to show for several days, and
fixed Tuesday afternoon as the time for their official
inspection. It is needless to say that the tents were
up and ready for them at that time. After the most
minute and fussy examination, official permission
was given for us to go ahead, and we gave our first
performance on Wednesday afternoon.

The tents were pitched in that portion of Berlin
known as Charlottenburg, and while the Kaiser did
not come to any of our performances, he rode slowly
past almost every day, eying sharply everything
connected with the show, and always acknowledged
the salutes of any of our men who happened to meet
him on the street. But if the Kaiser did not come
on to the show grounds, his army officers made up
for it by being there most of the time, watching
closely to see just how everything was done and
making notes continuously. So interested were the
army heads in our methods that on the night^ we went
away from Berlin one group of officers belonging to

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

the General Staff came to the show grounds and
watched us take down the tents and get things
started for the train, while another group went to
the railroad yards and watched the arrival of the
teams and the loading of the show on the cars.

In one of the German towns in which we stayed
two days, soon after we left Berlin, a curious oflScer,
wandering around the show after its arrival in the
morning, saw two fine large pigs tied to the back of
a wagon near one of the tents. The next morning
when he inspected the cook tent he saw a butcher
cutting up a lot of pork. Nearly bursting with the
secret of his great discovery, he hurried into the
city as fast as he could, secured a warrant, came
back, and arrested the butcher, and, without a hear-
ing, had him fined fifty marks for killing swine inside
the city limits without a license. Later on, German
punctilio received a rude shock when it developed
that the pigs which the zealous officer had seen
hitched to the wagon were a pair of trained animals
used every day in the ring by Harry Wentworth,
one of the clowns, and the pork in the cook tent had
been supplied from a butcher's shop in the town.

In the old German town of Braunschweig we had
an experience such as seldom, if ever, happened to a
show. The officials of the town showed an antipathy
toward the show from the first, and when it came
time for them to inspect the tent and arrangements
in order to give the final permission for exhibiting,
they chose to be dissatisfied with almost everything.
Many foolish things were done at their suggestion,
l^ut nothing seemed to fully satisfy them. Wh^n 1%

^9

GREAT BRITAIN AND THE CONTINENT

came to the matter of seats, they seemed to think
that they should be as solid as those in an opera
house. In spite of all arguments and demonstra-
tion, they insisted that the supports must be stronger
and that all the seats be fastened down. So Mr.
Bailey had all the seats tied to the supports, and
when it was done the officials put men to running up
and down on the seats to see if they were secure.
Then the officials demanded backs to the seats, and
Mr. Bailey had poles put up at either end of the seats,
and ropes run back and forth for people to lean
against. As a final demand, the officials required
that there should be inclined planes built for the
public to walk from the ground to the top rows of
seats, instead of walking up on the steps in the good
old American fashion. By the time all this had been
accomplished, Mr. Bailey had used up most of his
patience, besides being afraid that so many contrap-
tions would be the cause of a lot of accidents; so
when the officials finally told him he might go on
with his show he told them that he had decided not
to show in their town and gave orders to his men
to that effect. Meanwhile a large and enthusiastic
crowd had collected, and all the high-priced seats
had been sold long in advance of the opening time,
and when it became known that there would be no
show, owing to the exasperating requirements of the
town's officials, but that aU the ticket holders would
get their money back, there was a near-riot. How-
ever, the officials held their ground, and the show
pulled down its tents and went on, and all the Braun-
schweigers saw of the show was just the little to be

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

s^en as it went to and from the train. Among the
show people the town was always known as "Mr.
Bailey's Waterloo."

The middle of November found us in Vienna. We
were housed in the colossal imperial building known
as the Rotunde, which was originally constructed
for the International Exposition of 1873. It had
taken three months to prepare the building for the
circus, but it was the finest place I was ever quartered
in with a show in all my experience. In the center
of the building was a large circular space, where the
show was given, and in the wings, which extended
each way from this circular portion, had been fitted
up stables for all the stock and the menagerie.

It was the coldest winter I ever experienced, and
I had a fur coat made, and bought myself a sealskin
cap. The trees were covered with a thin glaze of
ice all the winter long. There were a good many
crows around the city, and when I went to my board-
ing place I filled my pocket with grain and scattered
it along for them to pick up. It was not a great while
before I had a flock of crows following me every time
I went out on the street in the daytime. We had
"big business" all winter. Seldom a performance
that the house was not crowded, but I think the
audience on the opening night was probably the
most remarkable which I ever saw, for practically
all the diplomats in the city, as well as all the most
prominent people, socially, were there. Frequently
during the winter we were favored with royal patron-
age.

Some proprietor of a small circus opened his show

280

Digitized by

GREAT BRITAIN AND THE CONTINENT

but a short distance from the Rotimde and had
much to say about our being unable to attract the
attention of and interest the Austrian people, and
publicly prophesied that we would not last a month,
but before the month was up he had shut his doors
and gone away.

While in Vienna Mr. Bailey received the unusual
compliment of a personal gift from the Emperor
Francis Joseph I. It was a cigar case of gold, on one
side of which was modeled in relief the royal insignia.
The case was enriched with jewels, and the catch was
a single large sapphire. The case, aside from its
sentimental value, was of great intrinsic worth as
well, and was probably one of the most striking
expressions of commendation ever given to a circus
manager.

We left Vienna early in April, and made the first
stand of the summer season of 1901 in Budapest.
After a seven weeks' tour in Hungary, where we
seemed to be everywhere welcome and did a great
business, we went into Austria. The route there led
through Bohemia, Moravia, and Galicia. July found
us again in German territory and still going east.
It was soon after that we acquired a reputation as
fire fighters. We had reached one of the small cities
early in the morning, and the canvasmen had just
begun to get the " big top" up, when a fire was dis-
covered in a peasant's house at one side of the show
grounds. Director McCaddon at once ordered the
entire working force of the show to the fire, where it
was divided into two parts, one group fighting the
fire and saving what it could in the way of furniture

281

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

and belongings, whfle the rest of the men spread
themselves over the adjoining buildings and poured
water on them to prevent their catching fire. By
the time the local fire department arrived, trundling
its primitive little outfit, the fire was out and most
of our men back at their own work again. Besides
doing a good turn we had given the show some very
valuable advertising, for the story of the fire and our
putting it out was told in every paper in Germany
the next morning, and they frankly admitted that
the local forces could not have prevented a serious
conflagration.

The advertising department had a strange experi-
ence in Breslau. The police authorities had given
the necessary permission for the putting up of the
advertising matter, but for reasons best known to
themselves ordered it down again a few days after
the work of putting it up had been completed, so
there was nothing for the men to do but go around
and remove it. However, its benefits were not lost
to the show, but if anything were greater than they
would have been if the lithographs had been allowed
to stay up, for the people had seen them and the
taking of them down again created a great deal of
talk.

The farthest point east in our travels was Tilsit.
From that city we tiUTied sharply bade and followed
a line that nearly paralleled the shore of the Baltic
Sea, imtil we came to Kiel, where it bent to the south-
west and led down into Holland. My principal
recollection of the journey through Holland is of
rain and mud and still more mud. At Amheim ^

282

Digitized by

GREAT BRITAIN AND THE CONTINENT

the mud was so deep and it rained so hard that the
evening show was canceled, and at four o'clock in
the afternoon we commenced to get off the lot and
to the train, but it was seven o'clock the next morn-
ing before the last wagon was on board. Many of
the wagons went to the hubs in the mud and it took
more than thirty horses and a hundred men to lift
them out; others it was impossible to lift out with
their loads, and they had to be unloaded, moved on
to hard ground, and their loads carried and put
in them again. Corduroy roads and quantities of
straw were required in many of the places in order
to make it possible to show at aU. The menagerie
felt the effects of the bad weather, and while in Hol-
land we lost a camel.

From Holland we went to Belgium, stopping first
at Li^e. Here there were so many more people
who wanted to see the show than could be accommo-
dated, that it caused a riot when we started to take
the show to the train. The menagerie was the first
thing to go, so my men got the worst of it. The
mob called us "The great American Himibug,"
stoned a lot of the drivers, and pulled some of them
off their wagons. The driver of the wagon in which
was the hippopotamus, was pulled from his seat, the
reins taken from him and aU cut to pieces, and the
team left to go by itself. As soon as the trouble
commenced I slipped off my horse and lost myself
in the crowd, and in that way was able to escape
injury, and at the same time make my way along
toward the train as fast as the teams did. It was
a trick I had learned years before in the tough

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

towns of Pennsylvania when the rowdies stoned the
menagerie.

In Belgium, as in the other countries on the Con-
tinent, our methods were constantly under observa-
tion and study by high army officers. At Brussels,
besides the conmianding general of the Belgian army
and his staff, the Minister of War as well came to
see the packing up of the show the night it left.
While in Brussels King Leopold came to see the show,
and made friends with all the men.

Our last stand for the season was at Mons, and
from there we went directly to Paris. Arrangements
had been made for us to spend the winter in Uie huge
Gcderie des MachineSy one of the buildings which
had been built for the World's Fair. It was the
largest inclosed space I ever saw, and after the show
was all quartered and the rings set up> there was still
room under the roof for another show.

We were never allowed to open the doors and let
the crowd in until the fire chief gave the word, and he
did not do this until after he had made a toiur of in-
spection and found his men in their places. Among
other things which he did as a precaution was to
place men under the seats, a short distance apart,
with barrels of water, to be ready to put out at once
any fire that should get started. The firemen were
all in gay uniforms and very much impressed with
their importance, and wanted our men to stand at
attention" when they came in, and to be saluted
whenever they met one of us. Of course our fellows
merely laughed at the idea, which only aggravated
the firemen the more. Finally the fire chief went

GREAT BRITAIN AND THE CONTINENT

to Mr. Bailey in his oflSce about it. "Those men
are all Americans," Mr. Bailey told him, "and they
don't salute me, and I couldn't make them if I wanted
to, which I don't. Neither could I make them salute
your men, and I sha'n't try." That was the last
that was heard about saluting the firemen.

A German contractor, a very pompous, overbearing
sort of man, had the contract for putting in the steam
heat. He annoyed Mr. Bailey very much by con-
stantly coming to him and going through a lot of
unimportant talk concerning his contract. Mr.
Bailey had repeatedly told his interpreters to tell
him to stay away or he would have him put out, but
the interpreters either softened the statement down
or left it out altogether, and the man kept coming.
One day Mr. Bailey was talking with Mr. Hyat, and
told him he did not know what he would do if he
could not find some way to tell the German contractor
to stay away.

"Why don't you get Conklin and tell him what
you want. He can speak German and will tell the
fellow what you want," Hyat said.

In a few days Mr. Bailey sent for me, and when I
got in his office I found the German fellow there too.

"Conklin, will you tell this man what I say?" he
asked.

I told him that I would, and he said:

"All right, then. You tell him that I say if he
comes in here again that I am going to have him
thrown out, and I'll put a man to keep him out, too."

I turned to the fellow, and, looking as fierce as
possible, I gave it to him in good circus style as lit-

THE WAYS OF THE CHICUS

erally as I could. He turned and ran out, and Mr.
Bailey was never bothered any more by him.

So far as the show was concerned, the winter in
Paris was a repetition of those in England and the
one in Vienna — ^a crowded house every performance,
and frequently a "turn away." We did not find
living in Paris pleasant except in boarding places
run by Americans, or at least in American ways. The
personal habits of the French did not appeal to us,
and in the strictly French lodging houses the sanitary
arrangements, or rather the lack of them, prevented
oiu* staying in them any longer than it took to find
American-style quarters.

Early spring found us on the road again, com-
mencing a tour that covered all parts of France. In
almost every town the show was set up on the drill
grounds, and we had soldiers to help with the work.
They were detailed for the work, and Mr. Bailey
paid them each twenty-five cents apiece for their
services. There were always two shifts. Those that
worked in the morning and afternoon went in to the
show in the evening, while those that went to the
afternoon performance worked at night. The soldiers
came with full equipment of knapsack, tent, and food.
On the edge of the parade ground they set up their
tents, cooked their food, and took care of themselves.

All through France, as everywhere else on the Con-
tinent, we were not allowed to open up the show until
the firemen had come and completed all their arrange-
ments, the fire chief had made his last inspection
and told Mr. Bailey that he was at liberty to go
ahead. With few exceptions the fire arrangements

GREAT BRITAIN AND THE CONTINENT

included the laying of a line of hose around each
tent. It was aknost always necessary to sprinkle
down the track before the opening of the show, and
Mr. Bailey carried for the purpose a large-sized
sprinkling cart, such as are used on city streets.
This would be sent to some convenient hydrant or
stream to be filled, and then driven aroimd the track
just before the doors were opened. One day we
were late in getting set up, and Mr. Bailey, seeing the
quantities of hose that laid all aroimd, and thinking
to save time, told the fire chief that if he would have
his men wet down the track for him he would pay
him well for it. The fellow hesitated, made some
evasive answer, and then sheepishly admitted that
he could not do it, for there was not a hydrant or bit
of water nearer than two miles.

As we went south and southwest in France, it be-
came impossible to take care of all the people who
wanted to see the show, and as a result hundreds
could not buy tickets. This left them in a nasty frame
of mind, and we had considerable trouble with them
on the streets and around the grounds. When we got
down near the Spanish border, where there was a very
mixed population^ the matter became serious and we
had some real fights. These assumed such proportions
at Montpellier, B&siers, and Carcassonne, that the
matter was taken up with the French government
by the American ambassador at Paris, with the
result that we were promised, and received, more
adequate police protection. To avoid the possibility
of the show being proved to be the aggressor, copies
of the following notice were posted all about the show.

19 287

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

NOTICE

All Emplotebb:

During the past two weda we have passed through the South
and Southwest of France, where there is a mixed population, in
some districts the Spanish and Italian nationalities predominating.
As we leave the proximity to Spanish border after Toulouse we
do not anticipate a repetition ol the disturbances that have
occurred almost daily.

Our request to the French government through our ambassador
at Paris for ample protection has been met in a prompt and most
kindly manner and we are assured the scenes of disorder such
as have occurred at Montpellier, Hosiers, and Carcassonne will
not again happen, as ample force will be provided to insure order.

To largdy prevent the cause of these disturbing incidents and
assbt the Management in the preservation of order, the attention
of all Employees is hereby called to the necessity of avoiding any
altercations with the public, as they are likely to lead to personal
encounters and the usual result a "fight," which in any foreign
country (and especially in France, owing to the large number of
different nationalities in our employ) is almost sure to result in
stone-throwing at innocent parties, destruction ol property, and
the arrest of employes of the Show.

A small fight is apt to lead to a general fight and the result
might be serious for the company? for after the action we have
taken with the government, we are i^t to be blamed by the
authorities, whether rightly or wrongly, and might even attain
such serious results as an order on the company of expulsion
from France. Employees are cautioned to use care and not run
against any person while carrying seat material, properties, etc.,
and are especially cautioned against throwing stones at any person
who might have lifted the side canvas or who is encroaching
within the Show. Care must be taken in the performance of
your duties and at all times keep in mind that politeness will
accomplish a great deal more than harsh treatment.

The attention of all Department Superintendents is called to
the necessity of enforcing this regulation, violation of which will
be dealt with by instant dismissal.

By order

J. T. McCaddon,

Dindor

LuBu May IMh, 190g.

288

Digitized by

GREAT BRITAIN AND THE CONTINENT

The same day the notices were posted I received
a letter from McCaddon calling my attention to the
"warning notice," and asking that I assist in secur-
ing the observance of the new regulations, not only
among my own men, but all the employees of the
show as well. While the friction was not entirely
removed, careful watching of the men and the over-
looking of a good many things done by the French
crowds, together with the added police protection
which was given us, avoided any more serious trouble,
and as we got farther north we f oimd that we had less
and less cause of annoyance.

When we reached Dunkirk we found the city imder
martial law and the streets full of soldiers, because of
a big strike. We were advised not to set up our tents,
because it was thought that we would have no busi-
ness. Mr. Bailey paid no attention, but set them up
as though there was no trouble in the city, and as a
result we had to turn away people.

Dunkirk was our last stand on the Continent.
When the tents came down they were packed for the
trip home. No show before or since ever made such
a tour in Europe, but after four years of it we were
glad to turn our backs on it and head for America
once more.

XI

BARNUM — BAJLET — COLE

IHE first time I saw Bamum was in Colonel

Philadelphia. He had just be» married and was
making a tour of the country with his bride. Along
with a lot of others in the museum, I was introduced
to him, and we shook hands. I remember him at
that time as a big, healthy-appearing man, wdghing
round two hundred, with a nose so prominent that
the boys remarked, behind his back, that ''the old
man had quite a snitch on him." There was nothing
particularly striking about his dress except the shirt
ruffle which filled the opening in his vest and spread
out on his coat. The tall hat and the frock coat
were nor especially different from those worn by
most showmen of the period.

The second time I saw him was also in Philadelphia,
but quite a number of years later. He was there
with his circus early in the season. There came an
unusually late snowstorm which broke down and
nearly ruined his tent. This was on a Saturday,
and a hurry call was sent out in every direction for
all the tent makers and every man who knew anything
at all about working on canvas. In this way a great
gang of men'was quickly brought together^ and they

Ninth and Arch Streets,

BARNUM— BAILEY— COLE

worked all day on Sunday, and had the tent remade
and up in time for the performance on Monday.

After that I did not see him again until I had been
working some time for the Bamum & Bailey show,
when one day he wandered through the animal house
at the winter quarters in Bridgeport. He had very
little to say to anyone and did not seem particularly
interested in the animals.

He stopped before several of the cages and, point-
ing to the name plate, squeaked out, ''That ain't
spelled right."

In spite of his criticism the spellings were never
altered, as the managers of the show preferred to
have the names agree with Webster rather than
Bamum.

In the several years that I was with the Bamum &
Bailey show before Mr. Bamum died, he never came
into the menagerie more than two or three times.
He was said to visit the office at the winter quarters
once or twice a week, but never while I was attached
to the show did he travel with it in the United States.
One season he attended most of the performances
in Madison Square Garden in New York, occupying
a special box which was nearly always filled with
reporters and friends or special guests. That year
we had as an attraction a white hippopotamus, tjie
only one in the country. We called her Babe, and
in the grand entrance I drove her roimd the hippo-
drome track just behind the Zulus. She paid no
attention to white men, but had no use for the Zulus,
and I had to watch out sharply and discourage her
frequent attempts to get at them.

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

Each time as I came in front of Mr. Bamum he
would lean over the edge of his box and call out
to me, "Keeper, keeper, make her open her mouth."

I would stop and make her open her great jaws.
Bamum would chuckle, and then we would move on.

With the Bamum show was a good-hearted,
simple-minded fellow known among the men as Old
Man Scott. He came to the show with Jumbo. He
was working, as a yoimg man, for Mr. Bartlett at
Regent Park, in London. Mr. Bartlett put Jumbo
in Scott's care when Jumbo was small. Jumbo
grew up, and Scott grew old, and to the day of his
death Jumbo never knew any other keeper. Scott
shared everything he could with the elephant.

"Does my Jummie want some sugar? Does my
Jummie want an apple?" he would ask. Even his
regular hooker of whisky was divided with Jummie.

"My Jummie likes it, too," he told us.

In some way he acquired the idea that Bamum
was going to leave him money when he died. In a
back office at the winter quarters, under a stairway,
was a great packing box securely nailed up. Care-
fully painted on one side of the box in black letters
was the command, "Not to be opened until after the
death of P. T. Bamum."

The box and its contents were a mystery to most
of us around the show, and there was much specula-
tion concerning the contents. In some way poor
old Scott got it into his head that his legacy from
Bamum was in that box and when it was opened he
would be a rich man, and nothing that any of us
could say to him changed his belief. When, a few

BARNUM— BAILEY— COLE

days alter Mr. Bamum's death, the box was opened,
it was found to be full of copies of his life, written
by himself, and each of the old men round the show
was given a copy. I have mine yet.

When Scott foimd that there was no money in the
box for him it broke him all to pieces and he never
got over it. He began to go downhill, and not long
afterward died in the Bridgeport poorhouse. The
circus people made up a purse and kept him from
being buried in Potter's Field, 'Biit to the day of his
death he suspected the men who opened the box
of having stolen his money.

When we went into the winter quarters a couple
of years before Mr. Bamum's death, I noticed a big
packing case which had been stored there since we
went away. I became so curious to know what was
in it that one day I pried off a couple of boards and
looked in. What I saw was a bronze statue of the
old showman himself, that had been modeled by
Thomas Ball and cast by von Miller in Munich. I
put the boards back and nothing was done about the
statue. It stayed in its case in the quarters until
after Mr. ' Bamum's death. Then Benjamin Fish,
who had been his private secretary, came to the
show with a paper soliciting subscriptions to build a
pedestal for it. He told us that all those who gave
five dollars or more would have their names placed
on a bronze tablet on one side of the base. Many
gave as much as twenty-five dollars. All gave some-
thing. The monument was soon up, but it is inno-
cent of any name of a contributor. It stands in
Seaside Park, Bridgeport, just back from the edge

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

of Long Island Sound and directly across the park
from Bamum's old home. The bronze is a perfect
likeness of the man and represents him seated in an
easy and characteristic position, holding pencil and
paper and looking reflectively toward the blue line
of the Long Island shore.

Bamum was bom, made his home, and died in the
state of Connecticut. His birthplace was Bethel,
some thirty miles northwest of Bridgeport. While
still a very yoimg man he became the owner and
editor of a paper in Danbury, which is but three miles
from his native town. His original comments on
men and events were of such a nature that he fre-
quently had libel suits on his hands. Finally he got
a sentence to spend a certain period in the seclusion
of the Danbury jail. He tells in his autobiography
of the triumphant procession "which escorted him to
his home in Bethel on the day of his release. Louis
Hedges, one of the superintendents of the show, gave
me a piece of board, perhaps a yard long and three
or four inches wide. It was from the old Danbury
jail in which Bamum was confined. I have it still
among my curios.

Bamum died in Bridgeport on April 7, 1891. On
the following July 5th he would have been eighty-
one years old. The show was at Madison Square
Garden at the time, and the performance was can-
celed on the day of his fimeral. A large number of
the men connected with the show, I among the rest»
went up to Bridgeport to attend.

Probably the name of no showman was ever so \
widely known as that of Bamum, but the coming of

BARNUM— BAILEY— COLE

Mr. BaUey and the forming of the Bamum & Bafley
show marked a turning point in the show business.
It was the beginning of the show and the methods
of to-day, and the ending of the show and the methods
which had made Barnum's name a household word.

Bamum's name is indelibly stamped on Bridgeport
and its surroimdings. Wherever one turns he is
met with it in streets, parks, buildings, and organiza-
tions, and the old-time Bridgeporter cherishes the
memory of the showman who brought the town
prosperity and fame.

The great showman whom the world knew as
James Anthony Bailey was bom in Detroit, Michigan,
on July 4, 1847. He was not, however, a Bailey by
birth, but a McGinnis. It was a circumstance known
only to a few and never referred to by himself, nor
did he care to have it mentioned by others. His
feeling in regard to it is well illustrated by an incident
which occurred one season in the Madison Square
Garden.

It was a practice of his, at the opening of the season,
to employ for the six weeks we would be at the Gar-
den considerably more talent than he could use,
either in the Garden or on the road. After the first
two or three performances he began to weed out the
undesirable acts, pay the performers for the six
weeks, and let them go at once. The process was
known round the show as '"the bouncing of the rubber

This particular season Billy Dutton, a famous
rider, had been hired for the six weeks, fully expecting
9X the end of that time to procure a contract for th^

baU.

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

whole summer season on the road, and there is little
doubt that Mr. Bailey intended giving it to him.
Dutton had known Bailey when they were boys and
lived for a time in the same town. One afternoon
a large group of performers were sitting in the dressing
room, discussing the prospects of different performers
and commenting on some of the discharges that had
taken place, when some one remarked, ''I wonder who
the baU will hit to-day?"

Dutton was among the group and observed, *'Well,
that old cuss that's bouncing the ball, his name ain't
Bailey, anyway. Did you know that? His name's
McGinnis."

Then he told the story to the half-incredulous
performers. Some one carried the yam to Mr. Bailey,
and that night the rubber ball hit Billy.

The father of yoimg McGinnis died in the cholera
epidemic of 1852, and about two years later the
mother also died, leaving a family of several girls
and two boys. There was a comfortable amoimt of
property, but for some reason life was not pleasant
for the future showman. He was small and frail,
and once referred to himself as ''the Cinderella of
the family." The teachers in the school picked on
him. He stood it until the summer he was eleven.
He was on his way to school late one morning. The
vision of the teacher and his probable greeting loomed
up in front of him. He began to think over his
whole situation in life, and the more he thought
the more he determined to take a radical step. He
never reached the school, but spent a day or two
looking round the city, and then struck boldly out

BARNUM— BAILEY— COLE

into the country on foot. A farmer on his way home
from market overtook him and invited him to ride.
As the old horse jogged along the farmer drew out
the boy's story, and before the place was reached the
boy had accepted his offer of a home.

Three seasons he stayed with the farmer, then
struck for more pay, was refused, and walked ten
miles into Pontiac, where he foimd work round a
hotel. Two months later Frederick H. Bailey and
Benjamin Stevens, advance agents of the Robinson
& Lake show, came to Pontiac. Bailey was much
taken with young McGinnis and took him along
with him. The name of McGinnis was dropped.
Prom then on he was known as a Bailey and his
career as a showman had b^un. He stayed on with
the show, doing various jobs> wintering in Cincinnati,
and sometimes in winter doing billposting, and once
in a while the waiting act. For a time during the
Civil War he was a sutler's clerk with the army, and
discharged his duties with credit and ability. After
the war he found his way back to the show business
again.

In 1873 he invested his savings in a quarter interest
in the Hemming, Cooper & Whitby show. The
next year Whitby was killed while collecting tickets
at the door, and Bailey acquired his interest. The
year following he bought out Hemming's rights, and
it was then known as the Cooper & Bailey show.
In 1876 Mr. Bailey took the show to Australia,
coming home by the way of South America.

After the return of the Cooper & Bailey show to
the United States there commenced a bitter rivalry

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

between it and that of Barnum. It was so bitter
that it bid fair to be financially disastrous to both.
Just at the critical moment in the Cooper & Bailey
show a big female elephant gave birth to a baby
elephant, the first ever bom in captivity. Mr.
Bamum was quick to see the enormous advantage
it would give his competitors, and he wired them an
offer of a hundred thousand dollars for it. Bailey
also grasped the opportunity. He refused the offer,
and as soon as he reached the territory of his rival
he covered everything in sight with paper headed,
"What Bamum Thinks of the Baby Elephant,*' and
followed with a reproduction of Bamum's tel^am
offering the big price for the youngster. It brought
him immense business, and for once Bamum was
beaten at his own specialty — publicity.

By the end of the season Bamum was very anxious
to make peace, so much so that he offered J. L.
Hutchinson an interest in his show, without money,
if he could induce Bailey to join hands with him.
Hutchinson took hold of the matter and was suc-
cessful. The firm then became Bamum, Bailey &
Hutchinson. Subsequently Hutchinson retired. Bailey
bought out what was left of the Cooper interest,
and the combination became Bamum & Bailey.
"The Greatest" had been formed.

From the moment the junction was effected,
innovation was the order. The practical Manage-
ment of the show slipped, as a matter of course, into
the hands of the junior partner, and he began a
series of new and novel undertakings in the show line
which have made the name Bamum & Bailey more

BARNUM— BAILEY— COLE

widely known than any amusement aggregation that
ever existed; and though Bamum and Bailey are both
dead, and the circus has been owned for more than
^ ten years by the Ringlings, it is still known to the
public as the Bamum & Bailey show.

I joined Bamum & Bailey soon after the fire at the
Bridgeport winter quarters in which most of the
animals perished. I was living in St. Louis when
Mr. Bailey telegraphed that he woidd like to have
me take charge of a menagerie for him. After I had
accepted his offer he sent me word to find and buy
four white mules and bring them east with me. I
was two or three weeks finding four that matched
sufficiently well, but at last satisfied myself. That
summer I was frequently away from the show, buying
animals to add to the menagerie.

There was a striking contrast between Bamum and
Bailey. Bamum was a big, strong man; Bailey was
small and thin; Bamum was seldom troubled;
Bailey was always anxious. There was never a man
who loved publicity more than Bamum, while Bailey
disliked personal notoriety to such an extent that he
seldom permitted the use of his photograph. He
enjoyed best being the great silent power that made
the show go and grow. Bamum was seldom roimd
and paid little or no attention to details. Bailey
was the first man to appear in the moming, and no
detail was too small for him to consider. He took
especial delight in waking men up on a Sunday
moming and getting them busy.

Mr. Bailey was generous with his superintendents
and foremeui and would spend any amount of money

m

THE WAYS OP THE CIRCUS

tx> keep the show up to the standard he had set for

it, but he objected to paying the workingman much
or raising his pay, holding that it spoOed hinu No
matter how often, or under what circumstances, he
passed one, would he give him a ride.

He considered Friday his lucky day and would
start new projects then if possible. He liked to be
able to begin the season by moving from Bridgeport
to Madison Square Garden in New York on a Friday.
It was Mr. Bailey who did away with the custom of
putting the names of individual performers on his
posters. Now the billboards only tell of the wonders
of the show, not of individuals.

Mr. Bailey came often to the menagerie, and always
discussed special matters with me. One season an
emu was taken sick while we were on the road. Mr.
Bailey was positive it was going to die.

I said to him one day when he had been imusually
siu'e it was nearly done for, "'Mr. Bailey, that bird
will live to go into winter quarters."

"Conklin," he replied, "if that bird lives to get
back to Bridgeport I'll give you a nice present."

After a time the bird became as well as ever. Mr.
Bailey seemed to have forgotten what he had said,
and I did not mention it.

After we had got nicely settled in winter quarters,
one day when he was going round the building with
me, and we had stopped in front of the emu's cage,
I observed, "Mr. Bailey, there's your bird."

He made no reply, but the next time he came to
Bridgeport I said the same thing. He paid no
attention, but the third time it happened h^ turned

800

BARNUM— BAILEY— COLE

to me and said, "By the way, Conklin, didn't I
promise you something in connection with this

I admitted that he had, and when he went away I
was fifty dollars richer.

Frequently between the afternoon and evening
performances some of the men would gather in groups
and play checkers. Though Mr. Bailey never joined
in the game, he enjoyed watching it, and it was no
unusual sight to see him seated where he could watch
each move, chewing away on an elastic band, and
slowly turning his pocketknife between a thumb and
forefinger. He never had anything to say about the
game; in fact, he seldom spoke to anyone roimd the
show except on business, but if one of the players
lost his temper Mr. Bailey would laugh heartily.

Mr. Bailey was always nervous about storms,
especially when the performance was going on. If
it began to look black he would sit outside on some
convenient wagon and watch the clouds. Every
canvas foreman and every superintendent who came
within speaking distance of him he would call to and
ask, "What do you think of it?"

If they replied that it looked bad he would turn
the knife faster and chew harder on the rubber band,
and just as soon as he felt the wind begin to blow he
would shout, "Conklin, get the elephants outside."

Mr. Bailey, like Mr. Barnum, died while the
show was in Madison Square Garden. Both left us
in the month of April, Mr. Bamum on the 7th,
and Mr. Bailey on the 11th. But Mr. Bailey
outlived his partner fifteen years, his death not

bird?'

301

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCrS

occurring until 1906. Another singular thing about
the important dates of their lives was that Mr.
Bailey's birthday was on July 4th, and Mr. Bamum's
on the 5th of the same month.

Mr. BaOey's death was the result of the bite of
some sort of an insect. He had gone early to the
Garden to superintend the placing of earth that was
being brought in to make a ring. While there some-
thing bit him on the nose. Either the bite of the
insect was poisonous, or it became infected, for
trouble developed soon after, erysipelas set in, and
in a few days he was dead.

I saw Mr. Bailey for the last time on the afternoon
before he gave up to his illness. He overheard me
discussing the arrangement of the cages with one of
the superintendents, and called us both into the
ojQSce, saying, "Perhaps I can help you." He showed
the same amount of interest as usual, and gave me
directions to put more animals in the cages than I
had. We little thought, as we left the oflSce, that
he was a mortally sick man, but it was only a few
days later that we went to Mount Vernon to attend
his funeral.

Cole was bom in New York City, in a house on
Houston Street, in 1847. He came of a race of show
people. The father was a contortionist. The
mother, before marriage, was a Cooke, a member of
the famous circus family of the same name in Scot-
land. She was a high-school rider and wire walker
of considerable reputation. When young Cole was
a few years old his father died. Later on his mother
married Miles Orion, another circus man, who had a

302

BAKNUM— BAILEY— COLE

small shoT^ of his own. Orton was what was known
as a four-and-six-horse rider. Cole and his mother
traveled with Orton and his show. Here Cole learned
the rudiments of the show business, trying his hand
at one time and another at all the various angles of
it. He had not been long with the Orton show before
he began rimning a gambling device for himself in
the side show, called a "spindle and eight-die case."
He was very successful with it and made a lot of
money from the start.

After Orton had been living with Cole's mother a
few years he became enamored of the snake charmer,
and his wife left him, got a divorce, and took back
the name of Cole. Then she and her son started out
with a small show of their own. At first they had no
animals. Later they hired some for one season
from a man in Detroit, and a fellow by the name of
Paulschoff went with them to perform the lions.
It was the next season that Cole bought a number
of cages of animals from Pogey O'Brien, started a
menagerie of his own, and I went to him.

Cole's show was very successful from the start.
It was a fixed policy with him to hunt new territory.
He not only carefully studied the map, but he kept
close note of conditions in different sections of the
country, and tried to keep his show in the most
prosperous. He also closely watched the develop-
ment of new regions, and often billed a town before
the railroad into it was completed, in order to be the
first one to show there. His show was the first to
travel over the Southern Pacific from Los Angeles
to El Paso, and it was also the first to make a tour

20 303

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

over the Northern Pacific, taking in the Puget Sound
country. He took his show to New Zicaland and
Australia in 1880, returning to San Francisco in the
spring of 1881.

Cole looked the least like a showman of any person
I ever saw engaged in the business. He much more
resembled a clergyman or a scholar, or even a poet.
In fact, I have known him to be mistaken for a
minister.

I never knew anyone who disliked to be known so
much as he did. He would never tend door, though
his mother and Uncle Henry did almost every day,
and he issued strict orders to his men that if any
person asked which was Mr. Cole to say they did
not know. It was no idle conmiand, as many who
disobeyed it found to their sorrow. Pictures of him
are very rare. The one I have was taken in 1876,
and was given me by his mother.

The Cole show was very different from all others
in that it was very democratic. It was known far
and wide as the "home show." Cole used to eat
with the men in the cook tent. The tables were all
set alike. The laborers fared as well as the per-
formers. I have often seen Cole sitting on a trunk
in the baggage car, munching a great slab of pie,
watching some of his men gamble, and laughing when
they fell out over their losses. Cole had the reputa-
tion of being tight, and by many of his men he was
called Chilly Billy. Some of the canvasmen called
him "the man with the brass collar." Nevertheless,
for a number of years his mother had a Christmas
tree for all the show that was at the winter quarters.

804

BARNUM— BAILEY— COLE

and she and her son both put something on the tree
for each one.

It was customary with his show for the members
of the band to sell tickets for the concert which took
place after the show was over at night. They were
not required to turn over their receipts to Cole imtil
the next day. Frequently they got to playing poker
after the concert, and some would lose their own
money, and Cole's, too. The next morning they
would be rushing round trying to borrow enough
from their friends to settle with Cole. He, knowing
their predicament, used to watch them and laugh
and have lots of sport at their expense. As the sums
rarely ran more than fifteen to twenty-five dollars,
they were usually able to fix the matter up.

Cole built the Delphi Theater in Chicago, and ran
it two seasons, then sold it to the United States for
a post-office site. He had me ship an elephant from
Utica, New York, for the opening. It was in the
winter, and the weather was so cold that I had to
take the elephant into a blacksmith shop on the way
to the train to warm it up, and we put a stove in the
box car in which we shipped it.

Cole was unusually devoted to his mother. She
was here, there, and everywhere about the show,
looking into and after things. Her coming into the
menagerie and interfering with things annoyed me
greatly until I got to know her well. She would
take feed out of cages and put it into others, regard-
less of how much or how little I had been giving the
inmates, and tell the men to do various things.
Finally ope day I got so nettled I went to Cole about it^

305

THE WAYS OF THE CIRCUS

"Mr. Cole, I'm going to get through," I told hun.
"I'm going to quit the show. I can't stand it to have
anyone coming round and interfering with my
animals."

He wanted to know all about it, so I told him in
detail.

When I was through he said to me, "Mr. Conklin
that's my mother, and she can do just as she wants
to. Don't you pay any attention to it. If she puts
hay in where you don't want it, why, as soon as she
is gone have your men take it out. But whatever
she wants to do let her do it. If she comes in and
tells you to kill one of the animals you kill it, and I'll
stand back of you."

I did as he told me, and Mrs. Cole and I later
became the best of friends

She said to me once, "Conklin, don't ever leave
Will. As long as Will has a show you stay with him."
And I did.

Cole was not married until 1885. On Christmas
Day of that year he wedded Miss Margaret Koble
of Quincy, Illinois. He gave a big dinner to the
show to celebrate the event. His wife never traveled
with the show, and after a few years she got Cole to
give up the show business. Relations between the
wife and the mother were not cordial, and the mother
did not live in the son's family, but his attention to
her was constant and loyal, and they were seen
riding together almost daily.

Cole died of pneumonia at his winter home in the
Biltmore Hotel, Madison Avenue and Forty-third
Street, New York City, on March IQ, 1915, His

306

BARNUM— BAILEY— COLE

estate was estimated at more than five million dollars.
Li his will he left five thousand dollars to the Trinity
Episcopal Church of Paterson, New Jersey » as a
memorial to his mother, who was actively connected
with it for thirty-five years. There were also bequests
to other churdies, hospitals, and various charitable
organizations.

xn

l'enyote

IV/TR. BAILEY'S death back in 1906 left the

-"^ great show without a head for the first time.

William Washington Cole took charge of it for the

rest of that season. During the summer it was sold

to the Ringling brothers. One day Otto Ringling

came and arranged with me to stay in charge of the

menagerie after he and his brothers took over the

show. That fall we returned to the winter quarters

in Bridgeport. When the horses were in their stalls,

the animals in their places, and the wagons backed

under cover, it became the property of the Ringlings.

For various reasons, among which my poor health

was chief, I left the show in the spring of 1907. We

went to New York, as usual, for the opening in the

Madison Square Garden, and from there to Brooklyn.

It was then that I decided to leave, so one day I told

Otto Ringling that I was going to quit the show.

He urged me not to, but I insisted. However, I

agreed to stay the week out in order to give him an

opportunity to arrange for some one to take my place.

It was finally decided that John Patterson, an elephant

man, who had been with the Ringlings some time,

should be raised to the position.

Saturday night came. It was not only the en4

90s

Digitized by

L'ENVOIE

of the week, but the end of the stop in Brooklyn.
The next day the show would be away over in Jersey,
starting on its summer tour. There was the usual
rush of the crowd through the menagerie as the doors
were opened. I watched it swell and surge, slacken
and die out. When the band struck up for the grand
entrance I blew my whistle and the boys b^an to
put up the side doors to the cages and drop and tie
the covers. The led stock was made ready. The
elephants came hurrying out from their act, were
stripped of their saddles and tied in pairs. The
boss canvasman's shrill whistle sounded, and the
side wall of the menagerie tent dropped.

I looked everything over to see that it was lined
up properly, stepped over to Patterson, and said:
"Here's the men and the stuff. They're yours now."

I stood back and watched them move out — the
led stock first, then the elephants, followed by the
cages. Soon they were all gone. Again Happy
Jack blew his whistle, and the tent top came down.
Accustomed hands unlaced it quickly, stowed it and
the poles aboard the wagons, and presently they, too,
were gone. The ground where the great menagerie
had stood was clear and deserted. I paused a moment.
Cracks of light showed through the "big top" where
the show was going on. Otto Ringling came across
the field, stopped, said good night, and passed on.
There came a blare of the band. I turned and
walked slowly toward my lodgings. My career as
a showman was over.

THE END

Digitized by

Google

Digitized by

Google

STANFORD UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES
CECIL H. GREEN LIBRARY
STANFORD, CALIFORNIA 94305-6004
(415) 723-1493

All books may be recalled offer 7 doys

.DATE DUE

Digitized by

Google