Francis Metcalfe

“ Madam Morelli always goes through her performance in an evening dress, and she stood on the bed, her long train gathered closely about her, trembling like a leaf, when the Proprietor finally separated the combatants and restored peace.
"You wouldn't think that a woman who had just come from a fight with a two hundred pound jaguar, which could easily tear her to pieces, would be scared at a scrap between a toy terrier and a mongrel cat," said the Proprietor, laughing, as he led the way to the café table. "But she makes a specialty of the larger species." ”

“ THE SAD FATE OF BIG PETE Like the pitcher which went to the well until it met the proverbial fate, the trainer entered the lion's den once too often, and what remained of him was placed in an ambulance and taken to the hospital. After the performance for the evening was over, Baltimore, the bad lion, who had suddenly developed a craving for human flesh, had been dealt with by the Proprietor of the menagerie in a manner which would spoil his appetite for many a day to come and make him remember that trainers cannot be mangled with impunity. ”

“ It is one of the thousand things about animals and the million things about women which no mere man can understand," replied the Proprietor laughing. "I have simply given you the facts of the situation and you can draw your own conclusions, but the bear's blindness upsets my plans and possibly prevents a sensation in circles which approach royalty."
"Women are difficult to understand," agreed the Press Agent as the Proprietor paused to moisten his throat, "and a man who is in love with one of 'em is just about as unaccountable for his actions. ”

“ You know that the dime museum business was run to death while the craze lasted in this country, and freaks got so common that you couldn't throw a stone in the streets of any large city without hitting one of 'em. When the fickle public tired of giving up its dimes to see 'em, a guy named Merritt and myself had a choice collection on hand, and we went on the road with the big show for the summer, thinking perhaps our business would pick up in the fall. ”

“ The ungainly pachyderm was standing on its hind legs, trumpeting through its upraised trunk a protest against the prodding of the sharp goad which was forcing it to walk backward in that absurd position. The voice of the Proprietor, who was using a megaphone, came to them distinctly as he invited the people to look at "One of the greatest triumphs of the animal trainer's art; something which has never been exhibited in any country—an elephant WALKING UPON ITS HIND LEGS, BACKWARD!" ”

“ There was no desire to fight left in them, but when they collided with each other they snapped and struck with the instinct of self-preservation, their sharp claws and teeth cutting gashes in the sleek striped coats. It was [217] evident that all training had been forgotten, that fear of anything so puny as man had departed from the minds of the tigers, and a groan went up from the audience when the door was opened and quickly closed behind Miller, the trainer, who stood, whip and training rod in hand, in the cage with the maddened animals. ”

“ The opened jaws were within a foot of the trainer's throat when the muzzle of the pistol went between them, and Depew, coughing and choking, drew back, his throat scorched by the burning powder, his eyes momentarily blinded by the stream from a fire extinguisher, while Miller struggled to his feet.
"People who see the crowds at my show think that I must coin money," said the Proprietor as he joined the Press Agent and the Stranger after the performance. "But that accident in the Arena to-night means a loss of fifty thousand dollars to me." ”

“ Two French clowns and a performing dog.
"It was nothing," she said laughing. "He jumped at me from the top of a cage when I came in, but I beat him off and whipped him back into his cage. It was only the close quarters which made it bad, for I am used to fighting them." She was interrupted by a yapping and caterwauling in the doorway, and sprang on the bed, her face white with terror, as a small terrier and the menagerie cat rolled into the room in a clawing, biting [9] mix-up. ”

“ Snakes are more particular feeders than any other animals, and they will not touch anything which is not alive when it is brought to them. This is the night for feeding them, and if you care to remain until the crowd has gone you can see how it is done. Long as I have been in the business, I learn something new every day, and I never saw a cobra fed artificially until last week, when Brandu, my Hindoo snake charmer, received one direct from India. ”

“ I knew a good deal about handling animals, but not as much about managing men as I have learned since, and I used to forget that giving an order was not the same thing as seeing that it was executed. There was a trainer named Barton in my employ who did a pretty fair act with a group of six lions, but he was a brutal sort of a chap and punished his animals so severely that they went through their performance on the jump so as to get out of the exhibition cage, where blows were more plentiful than kind words. ”

“ There was intense rivalry between the two big shows, the P. T. Barnum and the Forepaugh aggregations, and the bitter feeling between the proprietors was transmitted to the employees. The advance agents would steal each other's printed matter and posters out of the express offices, and you could always count on a fight between the canvas [169] men whenever the two shows were close enough together. They would damage each other's property, loosen nuts on the wagons so that the wheels would come off and cause upsets, and do anything to embarrass the rival show. ”

“ INCONSIDERATE PYTHON The conventional skirt dance has long ceased to be a novelty on the vaudeville stage, but as it is performed by "La Belle Selica" in the Arena at Dreamland it holds the interest of that most exacting audience—a crowd of Coney Island pleasure seekers. It is not because Selica is pre-eminent among dancers, but on account of the unusual and dangerous stage setting; for she performs in the large exhibition cage, surrounded by a half dozen lionesses, each animal seated on a separate pedestal. ”

“ They are as tame as kittens: [224] undersized brutes which have been raised in captivity and which go through their act like domestic cats. That isn't what the public wants. A sensation—the realization that every animal in the cage is a wild animal and that he is liable to remember it at any minute—is what holds attention. That is why I always use jungle animals when I can get them, for, although they can be as well trained, they always perform under protest and it makes it exciting. ”

“ REBELLION OF FUZZY WUZZY Madame Morelli, the pretty little Frenchwoman who makes a half-score of leopards, panthers and jaguars do things which nature never intended them to do, had finished her act and driven the snarling performers through the narrow runway to their separate cages, fastening each one, as she thought, securely. ”

“ I would rather train one taken in the jungle than an animal born in captivity. They do raise the pumas in South America and have them about the houses as we do cats; but I wouldn't trust one of 'em. And as for the bigger cats, the lions and tigers, there is no such thing as taming them. They may be trained to do certain things, but they are never trustworthy. We had a queer illustration of that when I was traveling with a caravan circus in France. One of the lionesses had a litter of three cubs, and in the excitement of the moving and strange surroundings, she killed two of them. ”

“ When the Arena is lighted up [121] and filled with people, the attention of the animals is distracted and they forget their nervousness, but a rehearsal at night is a lonesome proceeding, at best, and as the trainer devotes his attention to a single animal at a time it leaves the others free to think up mischief or to give way to their unreasoning fear. ”

“ For those eight, yes, although a trained tiger is worth all sorts of money, but I have purchased twenty-eight in all for that group, and the others have been killed one by one, fighting among themselves. They average over a thousand apiece, for I bought only the best, and figure up the cost of their keep, transportation and trainer's salaries for three years and you will find that I am not far out. That is the difficulty of the show business in America, the public demands so much. It is a marvelous thing, when you come to think of it, to see one educated tiger ”

“ The money for the Seaman's Home went flying to the four corners of the salon and the trainer had a difficult time in persuading Consul to retire without tearing the clothes off of the man whose only offense was his color. This was Consul's last voyage, for he contracted pleurisy and died in Berlin, and I felt worse over his death than I did over the burning of my whole menagerie in Baltimore a few years ago."
"Have you found that early association with human beings makes the other animals easier to train?" asked the Stranger, and the Proprietor shook his head. ”

“ Its head reared up above the edge, the spectacled hood distended in anger, but Brandu quickly clapped on the cover and the snake feeding was finished for two weeks.
"You're a blame fine figure of a fat man."
"That is a great performance of Brandu's," said the Press Agent, "but it profits us nothing because the best part of it cannot be shown to the public. I never see a snake fed without thinking of something which happened when I was running a side show with the Greatest Show on Earth. ”

“ Animal trainers need to think quickly and to seize the slightest moment of hesitation or [221] indecision on the part of their pupils if they wish to be long-lived, and Miller, as he fell, had thrown his useless pistol out of the cage and uttered the one word "Load!" There was no time for that, but Tudor, seeing that the trainer had one arm free, threw his own pistol through the bars and it slid across the floor of the cage straight as a die to the outstretched hand. It was a time when fractions of a second count and Depew's hesitation robbed him of his revenge. ”

“ When such a spot occurs in the center of the forehead the Buddhists regard the beast as sacred, from the fact that the god, Buddha, is always depicted as wearing a jewel in that position and it is looked upon as his special mark of protection. It is the ambition of every Indian Rajah to possess one, for then he is billed as 'The Lord of the Sacred White Elephant,' a title which seems to fill a long-felt want in the heart of an Oriental potentate. ”

“ Depew was the central figure in the group which Miller, the trainer of tigers, had worked so hard to educate, and it was his rebellion which made the teacher's labors of years come to naught. Late in the season, after months spent in giving the finishing touches to their education while they were with a small part of the show which was exhibited near Cleveland, the tigers were brought to Dreamland; a group of eight magnificent beasts, all jungle bred and each worthy of a place in any menagerie. ”

“ The worst sight I ever saw was about five years ago, when one of our performing bears turned on its trainer and seized [27] his arm. He worried it as a terrier would a bone for a good twenty minutes before we could drive him off, and the bear died from the punishment we gave him. The man's arm isn't much use to him now, but he is crazy for me to give him another group of animals to train, which I can't do because a man needs two good pairs of limbs when he gets into the exhibition cage. ”

“ Say, if you want to count the idle people in New York just get up a free show at any hour of the day or night and they will all come. There must have been over a thousand loafing about the street all night. ”

“ We used to get a new lot of freaks each week; our agent in New York engaged 'em and sent on the advertising matter ahead, and when we looked over the list I could see Merritt's face brighten up if there happened to be one of the fuzzy blondes included in the bunch.
"Business was good, in spite of Merritt's poetry, so that I didn't kick when I saw that another one was coming. It was a good assortment: a Legless Wonder, The Man Who Breaks Paving Stones With His Bare Fists, a pair of Siamese Twins, a Leopard Boy and a particularly fuzzy Circassian Beauty. ”

“ Maybe you think snakes are stupid, but they aren't, and the boa got the hump and refused to uncoil himself to show his length unless he got his full share of the spiel. It cheered Avoirdupois up, though, and when we moved to the next town he stood around to gloat over Jake when he was being moved from the traveling box to the exhibition cage. The snake hadn't been fed for ten days and he was good and lively as well as being out of temper, so when he caught sight of the Signor he scattered the boys with one flip of his tail and went for him. ”

“ A man in the show business has to study everything which may influence the attendance, but the behavior of my animals is a better barometer for local conditions than any aneroid which the Weather Bureau owns. In spite of the clear sky and the official predictions, I would wager that we shall have a bad storm within the next twenty-four hours, for those lions have the inherited knowledge of hundreds of generations of jungle-bred ancestors whose food supply depended largely upon the weather conditions. ”

“ I confess that until I was able to obtain this unique specimen, which was captured while basking in the sun and singing a love song upon an iceberg in the Antarctic Ocean, I shared the opinions of my fellow scientists that the mermaid was a fabulous or extinct creature; for during a lifetime devoted to exhibiting the mysterious marvels of nature to the American public it had never been my good fortune to acquire one. ”

“ A jungle-bred lion is pretty much cock o' the walk until he is snared or trapped, and in his first experience with men he is vanquished and realizes how useless is his great strength against the nets and ropes which entangle him. The cub born in captivity is familiar with men from the first, and plays with them like a kitten until one day he is out of sorts or is accidentally hurt in a frolic and the swift cut of his razor-like claws makes his playmate or tormentor drop him and leave [99] him in peace. ”

“ As he joined the Proprietor the sound of hammering mingled with the noise of the blatant brass band and the cries of the ballyhoo spielers for the other Dreamland attractions, which came in through the open windows, and he saw that Stevenson, the mild eyed quiet man who is always on hand to rescue imperiled trainers and keepers when their own carelessness, or unexpected revolt on the part of the animals, leads to a fight, was rapidly nailing boards over the ventilating spaces above the cages. ”

“ Most of the show people look anxiously at the sky before retiring for the night, but there is one of them who finds an absolutely reliable forecast within the [116] walls of his own building. Perhaps the signs and portents could not be translated by the weather clerk, but the Proprietor of the trained animal exhibition at Dreamland has been all of his life the companion of his charges, and has learned to recognize the meaning of unusual behavior or the shade of change in their voices which indicates an approaching storm. ”

“ It was before the days when they were so common and we had spent a lot of money to have her decorated and made her our star attraction. Of course, none of the tattooing was visible when she was in street costume, but when she sat on the platform dressed in low neck and short skirts the lecturer had something to talk about, for the menagerie pictured on her was a thing of beauty, and the few choice texts like, 'Be good and you will be happy,' [61] which were scattered in between the animals, were highly moral and elevating, and that was one of the strong points of our show. ”

“ Give me the jungle-bred lion to train, every time, for after the manhandling and discomfort of his capture and transportation to the coast by the natives, he appreciates the care and humanity of a civilized trainer. These cubs which are raised in captivity are always played with and teased by the employees and visitors, and their first knowledge of their strength comes to them accidentally when they hurt a man without meaning to do it ”

“ She can whip considerably more than her own weight in wild-cats, and there was not the slightest danger to the audience, but not many men would have relished her task of going into that passage with the beast loose on top of the cages." He negatived the Press Agent's suggestion to make a scare-head story of the escape for the papers, and suggested that they should go up and hear Madam Morelli's account of it. She was sitting on the edge of her bed, mending a rip which the jaguar's sharp claws had made in her gown, and she shrugged her shoulders when the Stranger inquired if she had been hurt. ”