Circus life and circus celebrities

3GII ^^

0'?'-

Circus Life and

Circus Celebrities

THOMAS FROST

AUTHOK or 'the OLD SHOWMEN AND THE OLD LONDON FAIRS,' ' LIVBS
OF THE CONJURERS,' ETC.

A If E IV EDITIOfT

iLonUon

CHATTO AND WINDUS, PICCADILLY
1881

a\j

PREFACE.

There are probably few persons who do not
number among tbe most pleasant recollections of
their youth their first visit to a circus^ whether
their earliest sniff of the saw-dust was inhaled in
the building made classical by Ducrow, or under
the canvas canopy of Samwell or Clarke. In my
boyish days, the cry of ' This way for the riders ! '
bawled from the stentorian vocal organs of the
proprietor or ring-master of a travelling circus,
never failed to attract all the boys, and no small
proportion of the men and women, to the part of
the fair from which it proceeded. Fairs have
become things of the past within twelve or fifteen
miles of the metropolis; but ever and -^non a

vi Preface.

tenting circus pitches, for a day or two, in a meadow,
and the performances prove as attractive as ever.
The boys, who protest that they are better than a
play, — the young women, who are delighted with
the ' loves of horses,' — the old gentlemen, who are
never so pleased as when they are amusing their
grandchildren, — the admirers of graceful horseman-
ship of all ages, — crowd the benches, and find the old
tricks and the old ' wheezes,' as the poet found the
view from Grongar Hill, * ever charming — ever new.'
What boy is there who, though he may have
seen it before, does not follow with sparkling eyes
the Pawnee Chief in his rapid career upon a bare-
backed steed, — the lady in the scarlet habit and
high hat, who leaps over hurdles, — the stout farmer
who, while his horse bears him round the ring, di-
vests himself of any number of coats and vests, un-
til he finally appears in tights and trunks, — the jug-
gler who plays at cup and ball, and tosses knives in
an endless shower, as he is whirled round the arena ?
And which of us has not, in the days of our boyhood,
fallen in love with the fascinating young lady in short

Preface. vii

skirts who leaps througli * balloons* and over ban^
ners? Even when we have attained man^s estate,
and learned a wrinkle or two, we take our children to
Astley's or Hengler's, and enjoy the time-honoured
feats of equitation, the tumbling, the gymnastics,
and the rope-dancing, as much as the boys and
girls.

But of the circus artistes — the riders, the clowns,
the acrobats, the gymnasts, — what do we know ?
How many are there, unconnected with the saw-
dust, who can say that they have known a member
of that strange race ? Charles Dickens, who was
perhaps as well acquainted with the physiology of
the less known sections of society as any man of his
day, whetted public curiosity by introducing his
readers to the humours of Sleary's circus ; and the
world wants to know more about the subject.
When, it is asked, will another saw-dust artiste give
us such an amusing book as Wallett presented the
world with, in his autobiography ? When are the
reminiscences of the late Nelson Lee to be published ?
With the exception of the autobiography of Wallett,

-i

viii Preface,

and a few passages in EUiston's memoirs, the circus
has hitherto been without any exponent whatever.
Under the heading of 'Amphitheatres/ Watts' s
Bibliotheca Britannica, that boon to literary readers
at the British Museum in quest of information upon
occult subjects, mentions only a collection of the bills
of Astley's from 1819 to 1845.

Circus proprietors are not, as a rule, so garrulous
as poor old Sleary ; they are specially reticent con-
cerning their own antecedents, and the varied for-
tunes of their respective shows. To this cause must
be ascribed whatever shortcomings may be found in
the following pages in the matter of circus records.
Circus men, too, are very apt to meet a hint that a
few reminiscences of their lives and adventures
would be acceptable with the reply of Canning's
needy knife-grinder, — * Story ! God bless you ! I
have none to tell, sir.' There are exceptions, how-
ever, and as a rule the better educated members of
the profession are the least unwilling to impart
information concerning its history and mysteries to
those outside of their circle. To the kindness and

Preface, ix

courtesy of several of these I am considerably
indebted, and beg them to accept this public expres-
sion of my thanks.

T. FROST.

Long Ditton, Od. \st, 1873.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.

PAGE

Beginnings of the Circus in England — Tumblers and Per-
forming Horses of the Middle Ages — Jacob Hall, the
Rope-dancer — Francis Forcer and Sadler's Wells — Vaux-
hall Gardens — Price's Equestrian Performances at John-
son's Gardens — Sampson's Feats of Horsemanship — Philip
Astley — His Open-air Performances near Halfpenny
Hatch — The First Circus — Erection of the Amphitheatre
in Westminster Road — First Performances there — Rival
Establishment in Blackfriars Road — Hughes and Cle-
mentina ... ... ... ... 1 — 37

CHAPTER II.

Fortunes of the Royal Circus — Destruction of Astle/s Amphi-
theatre by Fire — Its Reconstruction — Second Conflagra-
tion— Astley in Paris — Burning of the Royal Circus —
Erection of the Olympic Pavilion — Hengler, the Rope-
dancer — Astle/s Horses — Dancing Horses — The Trick
Horse, Billy — Abraham Saunders — John Astley and
William Davis — Death of Philip Astley — Vauxhall Gar-
dens — Andrew Ducrow — Jolm Clarke — Barrymore's
Season at Astley's — Hippo-dramatic Spectacles — The
first Circus Camel ... ... ... 38—57

CHAPTER III.

Ducrow at Covent Garden — Engagement at Astley's —
Double Acts in the circle- Ducrow at Manchester — Rapid

xii Contents.

Act on Six Horses — ' Raphael's Dream ' — Miss Woolford
— Cross's performing Elephant — O'Donnel's Antipodean
Feats — First year of Ducrow and West — Henry Adams —
Ducrow at Hull — The "Wild Horse of the Ukraine —
Ducrow at Sheffield — Travelling Circuses — An Entree at
Holloway's — Wild's Show— Constantine, the Postiurer —
Circus Horses — Tenting at Fairs — The Mountebanks 58 — 72

CHAPTER IV.

A few words about Menageries— George Wombwell — The
Lion Baitings at Warwick— Atkins's Lion and Tigi-ess at
Astley's — A Bull-fight and a Zebra Hunt — Ducrow at the
Pavilion — The Stud at Drury Lane— Letter from Wooler
to EUiston — Ducrow and the Di-ury * Supers ' — Zebras on
the Stage — The first Arab Troupe — Contention between
Ducrow and Clarkson Stanfield— Deaths of John Ducrow
and Madame Ducrow — Miss Woolford ... ... 73—87

CHAPTER V.

Lions and Lion-tamers— Manchester Jack— Van Ambiu-gh—
Carter's Feats — What is a Tiger % — Lion-driving and Tiger-
fighting — Van Ambiu-gh and the Duke of Wellington-
Vaulting Competition between Price and North — Burn-
ing of the Amphitheatre — Death of Ducrow — Equestrian
Performances at the Surrey Theatre — Travelling Circuses
— Wells and Miller— Thomas Cooke — Van Amburgh—
Edwin Hughes— William Batty— Pablo Fanque ... 88—99

CHAPTER VL

Conversion of the Lambeth Baths into a Circus— Garhck and
the Wild Beasts— Batty's Company at the Surrey— White
Conduit Gardens— Re-openmg of Astley's— Batty's Circus
on its Travels— Batty and the Sussex Justices — Equestri-
anism at the Lyceum— Lions and Lion-tamers at Astley's
— Franconi's Circus at Cremome Gardens— An Elephant

Contents. xiii

PAGE

on the Tight-rope— The Art of Balancmg — Franconi's
Company at Drury Lane— Van Amburgh at Astley's— The
Black Tiger— Pablo Fanque — Rivah-y of Wallett and
Barry— Wallett's Circus— Junction with Franconi's ... 100—122

CHAPTER VII.

Hengler's Circus — John and George Sanger — Managerial
Anachronisms and Incongruities — James Hernandez —
Eaton and Stone— Horses at Drury Lane — James New-
some— Howes and Cushing's Circus — George Sanger and
the Fighting Lions — Crockett and the Lions at Astley^s —
The Lions at large — Hilton's Circus — Lion-queens — Miss
Chapman — Macomo and the Fighting Tigers ... 123 — 134

CHAPTER VIIL

Pablo Fanque — James Cooke — Pablo Fanque and the Celes-
tials— Ludicrous affair in the Glasgow PoUce-court — Batt/s
Transactions with Pablo Fanque — The Liverpool Amphi-
theatre— John Clarke — "William Cooke— Astley's—Fitzball
and the Supers — Batt/s Hippodrome — Vauxhall Gardens
— Ginnett's Circus — The Alhambra— Gymnastic Perform-
ances in Music-halls — Gymnastic Mishaps ... 135 — 155

CHAPTER IX.

Cremome Gardens— The Female Blondin — Fatal Accident at
Aston Park— Reproduction of the Eglinton Tournament —
Newsome and Wallett— Pablo Fanque's Circus— Equestri-
anism at Drury Lane— Spence Stokes— Talliott's Circus—
The Gymnasts of the Music-halls— Fatal Accident at the
Canterbiuy— Gymnastic Brotherhoods— Sensational Feats
—Sergeant Bates and the Berringtons— The Rope-trick —
How to do it ... ... ... ... 156—173

xiv Coiitents.

CHAPTER X.

PAGE

Opening of the Holbom Amphitheatre— Friend's Season at
Astley's — Adah Isaacs Menken— Sanger's Company at the
Agricultural Hall — The Carr6 Troupe at the Holbom
Amphitheatre — Wandering Stars of the Arena— Albert
Smith and the Clown — Guillaume's Circus— ^The Circo
Price — Hengler's Company at the Palais Royal — Re-
opening of Astle/s by the Sangers — Franconi's Circus —
Newsome's Circus — Miss Newsome and the Cheshire Himt
— Rivalry between the Sangers and Howes and Cushing 174 — 193

CHAPTER XI.

Reminiscences of the Henglers — The Rope-dancing Heng-
lers at Astle/s — Circus of Price and Powell — Its Acqui-
sition by the Henglers — Clerical Presentation to Frowde ,
the Clo^vn — Circus Difficulties at Liveipool — Retu'ement
of Edward Hengler — Rivahy of Howes and Cushing —
Discontinuance of the Tenting System — Miss Jenny
Louise Hengler — Conversion of the Palais Royal into an
Amphitheatre — Felix Rivolti, the Ring-master ... 194 — ^213

CHAPTER XII. '

The Brothers Sanger— First Appearance in London — Vicis-
situdes of Astley's — Batty and Cooke — Purchase of the
Theatre by the Brothers Sanger — Their Travelling Circus
—The Tenting System— Barnum and the Sangers ... 214—222

CHAPTER XIII.

American Circuses— American Performers in England, and
English Performers in the United States— The Cookes in
America — Bamum's Great Show — Yankee Parades — Van
Amburgh's Circus and Menagerie — Robinson's Combined
Shows — Stone and Murray's Circus — The Forepaughs —
Joel Warner— Side Shows — Amphitheatres of New York
and New Orleans... ... ... ...223—253

Contents, xv

CHAPTER XIV.

PAGE

Reminiscences of a Gymnast — Training and Practising — A
Professional Rendezvous — Cii'cus Agencies — The First
Engagement— Springthorp's Music-hall — Newsome's Cir-
cus— Reception in the Dressing-room — The Company and
the Stud — The Newsome Family— Miss Newsome's won-
derful Leap across a Green Lane — The Handkerchief
Trick — An Equine Veteran from the Crimea — Engage-
ment to Travel ... ... ... ... 254r-267

CHAPTER XV.

Continuation of the Gymnast's Reminiscences — A Circus on
the move — Three Months at Carlisle — Performance for
the Benefit of local Charities — Removal to Middles-
borough — A Stockton Man's Adventure— Journey to York
— Circus Ballets — The Paynes in the Arena — Accidents in
the Ring — A Circus Benefit — Removal to Scarborough — A
Gymnastic Adventure — Twelve Nights at the Pantheon —
On the Tramp— Return to London ... ...268—279

CHAPTER XVL

Continuation of the Gymnast's Reminiscences— Circus Men
in Difficulties — Heavy Security for a Small Debt — The
Sheriff's Officer and the Elephant — Taking Refuge with
the Lions— Another Provincial Tour — With a Circus in
Dublin — A Joke in the Wrong Place — A Fenian Hoax —
A Case of Pikes— Return to England— At the Kentish
Watering-places— Off to the North ... ...280—290

CHAPTER XVII.

Lions and Lion-tamers — Lorenzo and the Lions — Androcles
and the Lion — The Successor of Macomo — Accident in
BeUand Myers's Circus — Lion Hunting — Death of Macar-
thy — True Causes of Accidents with Lions and Tigers —

xvi Contents.

PAGB

Performing Leopards— Anticipating the Millennium —
Tame Hyenas — Fairgrieve's Menagerie — Performing
Lions, Tigers, Leopards, and Hyenas — Camels and
Dromedaries— The Great Elephant ... ...291—304

CHAPTER XVIII.

Circus Slang — Its Peculiarities and Derivation — Certain
Phrases used by others of the Amusing Classes — Tech-
nicalities of the Circus — The Riders and Clowns of
Dickens— Sleary's Circus— Circus Men and Women in
Fiction and in Real Life — Domestic Habits of Circus
People— Dress and Manners— The Professional Quarter of
the Metropolis ... ... ... ... 305—318

CIRCUS LIFE

A>T)

CIRCUS CELEBRITIES.

CHAPTER I.

Be^nnings of the Circus in Englanii — Tumblers and Perform-
ing Horses of the Middle Ages — Jacob Hall, the Rope-
dancer — Francis Forcer and Sadlei-'s Wells — Vauxhall
Gardens — Price's Equestrian Performances at Jolmson's
Gardens — Sampson's Feats of Horsemanship — Philip Astley
— His Open-air Performances near HaKpenny Hatch — The
First Cu'cus — Erection of the Amphitheatre in Westminster
Road — First Performances there — Rival Establishment in
Blackfriars Road — Hughes and Clementina.

Considering the national love of everything in
which the horse plays a part, and the lasting
popularity of circus entertainments in modern
times, it seems strange that the equine amphi-
theatre should have been unknown in England
until the close of the last century. That the Ro-
mans, during their occupation of the southern por-
tion of our island, introduced the sports of the
arena, in which chariot-racing varied the combats
1

V

2 Circus Life

of the gladiators, and the fierce encounters of
wild beasts, is shoAyn by the remains of the Amphi-
theatre at Dorchester, and by records of the ex-
istence of similar structures near St Alban's, and
at Banbury and Caerleon. After the departure
of the Romans, the amphitheatres which they had
erected fell into disuse and decay ; but at a later
period they were appropriated to bull-baiting
and bear-baiting, and the arena at Banbury was
known as the bull-ring down to a comparatively
recent period. An illumination of one of the
Anglo-Saxon manuscripts in the Harleian collec-
tion shows one of these ancient amphitheatres,
outside a town ; there is a single musician in the
arena, to whose music a man is dancing, while
another performer exhibits a tame bear, which
appears to be simulating sleep or death; the
spectators are sitting or standing around, and
one of them is applauding the performance in the
modern manner, by clapping his hands.

But from the Anglo- Saxon period to about
the middle of the seventeenth century, the near-
est approximation to circus performances was
afSbrded by the ' glee-men/ and the exhibitors of
bears that travestied a dance, and horses that
beat a kettle-drum with their fore-feet. Some of
the ' glee-men ^ were tumblers and jugglers, and

y

And Circus Celebrities.

their feats are pourtrayed in several illuminated
manuscripts of the thirteenth and fourteenth cen-
turies. One of these illuminations, engraved in
Strutt's SiJorts, shows a boy leaping through a
hoop ; another, in the Cottonian collection, re-
presents a juggler throwing three balls and three
knives alternately. What is technically called
' the shower ' is shown in another illumination of
mediaeval juggling ; and that there were female
acrobats in those days appears from a drawing in
one of the Sloane collection of manuscripts, in
which a girl is shown in the attitude of bending
backward. One of the Arundel manuscripts, in
the British Museum, shows a dancing bear ; and
other illuminations, of a later date, represent a
horse on the tight-rope, and an ox standing on
the back of a horse.

Strutt quotes from the seventh volume of the
Archceologia, the following account of a rope-flying
feat performed by a Spaniard in the reign of Ed-
ward YI. ' There was a great rope, as great as
the cable of a ship, stretched from the battle-
ments of PauFs steeple, with a great anchor at
one end, fastened a little before the Dean of
PauPs house-gate ; and when his Majesty ap-
proached near the same, there came a man, a
stranger, being a native of Arragon, lying on the

4 Circus Life

rope with his head forward, casting his arms and
legs abroad, running on his breast on the rope
from the battlement to the ground, as if it had
been an arrow out of a bow, and stayed on the
ground. Then he came to his Majesty, and
kissed his foot; and so, after certain words to
his Highness, he departed from him again, and
went upwards upon the rope, till he came over
the midst of the churchyard, where he, having a
rope about him, played certain mysteries on the
rope, as tumbling, and casting one leg from an-
other. Then took he the rope, and tied it to the
cable, and tied himself by the right leg a little
space beneath the wrist of the foot, and himg by
one leg a certain space, and after recovered
himself again with the said rope, and unknit
the knot, and came down again. Which stayed
his Majesty, with all the train, a good space of
time.*

Holinshed mentions a similar feat which was
performed in the following reign, and which,
unhappily, resulted in the death of the performer.
In the reign of Elizabeth lived the famous Banks,
whom Sir Walter Raleigh thought worthy of
mention in his History of the World, saying that
'if Banks had lived in older times, he would
have shamed all the enchanters in the world;

I

And Circus Celebrities.

for whosoever was most famous among them
could never master or instruct any beast as lie
did.' The animal associated with the performer
so eulogized was a bay horse named Morocco,
which was one of the marvels of the time. An
old print represents the animal standing on his
hind legs, with Banks directing his movements.

Morocco seems to have been equally famous
for his saltatory exercises and for his arithmetical
calculations and his powers of memory. Moth,
in Love's Labour Lost, puzzling Armado with
arithmetical questions, says, ' The dancing horse
will tell you,' an allusion which is explained by a
line of one of HalFs satires —

* Strange Morocco's dumb arithmetic'

Sir Kenelm Digby records that the animal
'would restore a glove to the due owner after the
master had whispered the man's name in his ear ;
and would tell the just numberof pence in anypiece
of silver coin newly showed him by his master.'
De Melleray, in a note to his translation of the
Golden Ass of Apuleius, says that he witnessed
the performance of this animal in the Rue St
Jacques, in Paris, to which city Banks proceeded
in or before 1608 ; and he states that Morocco
could not only tell the number of francs in a

6 Circles Life

crown, but knew that the crown was depreciated
at that time, and also the exact amount of the
depreciation.

The fame which Banks and his horse acquired
in France, brought the former under the imputa-
tion of being a sorcerer, and he probably had a
narrow escape of being burned at a stake in that
character. Bishop Morton tells the story as
follows : —

'Which bringeth into my remembrance a
story which Banks told me at Frankfort, from
his own experience in France among the Capu-
chins, by whom he wias brought into suspicion
of magic, because of the strange feats which his
horse Morocco played (as I take it) at Orleans,
where he, to redeem his credit, promised to
manifest to the world, that his horse was no-
thing less than a devil. To this end he com-
manded his horse to seek out one in the press of
the people who had a crucifix on his hat ; which
done, he bade him kneel down unto it, and not
this only, but also to rise up again and to kiss
it. And now, gentlemen (quoth he), I think
my horse hath acquitted both me and himself;
and so his adversaries rested satisfied ; conceiv-
ing (as it might seem) that the devil had no
power to come near the cross.*

And Circus Celebrities.

That Banks travelled with his learned horse
from Paris to Orleans, and thence to Frankfort, is
shown by this extract ; but his further wander-
ings are unrecorded. It has been inferred, from
the following lines of a burlesque poem by Jonson,
that he suSered at last the fate he escaped at
Orleans ; but the grounds which the poet had
for supposing such a dreadful end for the poor
horse- charmer are unknown.

' But 'mongst these Tiberts, who do you think there was ]
Old Banks, the juggler, our Pythagoras,
Grave tutor to the learned horse ; both which,
Being, beyond sea, burned for one witch,
Their spirits tmnsmigrated to a cat.'

These itinerant performers seem to have
divided their time between town and country, as
many of them do at the present day. Sir William
Davenant, describing the street sights of the
metropolis in his curious poem entitled The
Long Vacation in London, says —

' Now, vaulter good, and dancing lass
On rope, and man that cries, Hey, pass !
And tumbler young that needs but stoop,
Lay head to heel to creep through hoop ;
And man in chimney hid to dress
Pi^pet that acts our old Queen Bess ;
And man, that while the puppets play,
Through nose expoundeth what they say ;
And white oat-eater that does dwell
In stable small at sign of Bell,

Circles Life

That lifts up hoof to show the pranks
Taught by magician styled Banks ;
And ape led captive still in chain
Till he renounce the Pope and Spain ;
All these on hoof now trudge from town
To cheat poor turnip-eating clown.'

About the middle of the seventeenth century,
some of these wandering performers began to
locate themselves permanently in the metropolis.
Jacob Hallj the rope-dancer, was scarcely less
famous as an acrobat, being clever and alert
in somersaults and flip-flaps, performing the
former over naked rapiers and men's heads, and
through hoops. He is mentioned by contem-
porary memoir writers as the first lover of Nell
Gwynne, who appears, however, in a short time
to have transferred her favours to Harte, the
actor. In 1683, one Sadler opened the music-
house at Islington which, from the circumstance
of a mineral spring being discovered on the spot,
became known by the name of Sadler's Wells,
which it has retained to this day. It was not
until after Sadler's death, however, that rope-
dancing and acrobats' performances were added
to the musical entertainments which, with the
water, were the sole attraction of the place in its
earliest days. The change was made by Francis
Forcer, whose son was for several years the prin-
cipal pez'former there. Forcer sold the establish-

And Circus Celebrities.

ment to Rosamond, the builder of Eosamond's
Row, Clerkenwell, who contrived, by judicious
management, to amass a considerable fortune.

Of the nature of the amusements in Forcer's
time we have a curious account in a communica-
tion made to the European Magazine by a gentle-
man who received it from Macklin, the actor,
whom he met at Sadler's Wells towards the close
of his life. ' Sir,' said the veteran comedian, ' I
remember the time when the price of admission
here was threepence, except a few places scuttled
off at the sides of the stage at sixpence, and
■which were usually reserved for people of fashion,
who occasionally came to see the fun. Here we
smoked and drank porter and rum-and-water
as much as we could pay for, and every man had
his doxy that liked; and, although we had a
mixture of very odd company, — for I believe it
was a good deal the baiting-place of thieves and
highwaymen, — there was little or no rioting.'

During the period between Rosamond's man-
agement and the conversion of the place into a
theatre for dramas of the kind for which the
Adelphi and the Coburg became famous at a later
day, the entertainments at Sadler's Wells con-
sisted of pantomimes and musical interludes.
In Forcer's time, according to the account said

10 Circus Life

to have been given by Macklin, they consisted of
' hornpipes and ballad singing, with a kind of
pantomime-ballet, and some lofty tumbling ; and
all done by daylight, with four or five exhibitions
every day. The proprietors had always a fellow
on the outside of the booth to calculate how
many people were collected for a second exhibi-
tion ; and when he thought there were enough,
he came to the back of the upper seats, and cried
out, '' Is Hiram Fisteman here ? " That was the
cant word agreed upon between the parties to
know the state of the people without : upon
which they concluded the entertainment with a
song, dismissed the audience, and prepared for a
second representation/

Joseph Clark, the posturer, was one of the
wonders of London during the . reigns of James
II. and William III., obtaining mention even in
the Transactions of the Philosophical Society, as
having ' such an absolute command of all his
muscles and joints that he could disjoint almost
his whole body.' His exhibitions do not seem,
however, to have been of a pleasing character,
consisting chiefly in the imitation of every kind
of human deformity. He could produce at will,
and in a moment, without padding, the sem-
blance of a Quasimodo or a Tichbome Claimant,

And Circus Celebrities. ii

his 'fair round belly, with, good capon lined,'
shift his temporary hump from one side to the
other, project either hip, and twist his limbs into
every conceivable complication. He could change
his form so much as to defy a tailor to measure
him, and imposed so completely on Molins, a
famous surgeon of that time, as to be regarded
by him as an incurable cripple. His portrait in
Tempest's collection shows him shouldering his
leg, an antic which is imitated by a monkey.

There was a famous vaulter of this time,
named William Stokes, who seems to have been
the first to introduce horses in the performance ;
and in a book called the Vaulting Master, pub-
lished at Oxford in 1652, boasts that he had
reduced vaulting to a method. The book is
illustrated by plates, representing different ex-
amples of his practice, in which he is shown
vaulting over one or more horses, or leaping
upon them ; in one alighting in the saddle, and
in another upon the bare back of a horse. It is
singular that this last feat should not have been
performed after Stokes's time, until Alfred Brad-
bury exhibited it a few years ago at the Amphi-
theatre in Holborn. It is improbable that Brad-
bury had seen the book, and his performance
of the feat is, in that case, one more instance

li Circus Life

of the performance of an original act by more
than one person at considerable intervals of
time.

May Fair, which has given its name to a
locality now aristocratic^ introduces us. in 1702
— the year in which the fearful riot occurred in
which a constable was killed there — to Thomas
Simpson, an equestrian vaulter, described in a
bill of Husband's booth as * the famous vaulting
master of England.' A few years later a bill of
the entei'tainments of Bartholomew Fair, pre-
served in Bagford's collection in the library of
the British Museum, mentions tight-rope dancing
and some performing dogs, which had had the
honour of appearing before Queen Anne and
'most of the quality.' The vaulters, aud postur-
ers, and tight-rope performers of this period were
not all the vagabonds they were in the eye of
the law. Fawkes, a posturer and juggler of the
first half of the eighteenth century, started, in
conjunction with a partner named Pinchbeck, a
show which was for many years one of the chief
attractions of the London fairs, and appears to
have realized a considerable fortune.

The earliest notice of Vauxhall Gardens
occurs in the Spectator of May 20th, 1712, in
a paper written by Addison, when they had

And Circus Celebrities. 13

probably just been opened. They were then a
fashionable promenade, the entertainments for
• which the place was afterwards famous not being
introduced until at least a century later. In 1 732
they were leased to Jonathan Tyers, whose name
is preserved in two neighbouring streets, Tyers
Street and Jonathan Street ; and ten years later
they were purchased by the same individual, and
became as famous as Ranelagh Gardens for
musical entertainments and masked balls. Ad-
mission was by season tickets only, and it is
worthy of note that the inimitable Hogarth, from
whose designs of the four parts of the day
Hayman decorated the concert-room, furnished
the design for the tickets, which were of silver.
Tyers gave Hogarth a gold ticket of perpetual
admission for six persons, or one coach ; and the
artist's widow bequeathed it to a relative. This
unique relic of the departed gl(lfies of Yauxhall
was last used in 1836, and is new in the posses-
sion of Mr Frederick Gye, -who gave twenty
pounds for it.

Hogarth's picture of SoutWwark Fair intro-
duces to us more than one of imat generation of
the strange race whose severaPvarieties contri-
bute so much to the amusement of the public.
The slack-rope performer is Yiolante, of whom

14 Circus Life

"we read in Malcolm's Londinium Redivivua that,
'soon after tHe completion of the steeple [St
Martin's in tlie Fields], an adventurous Italian,
named Yiolante, descended from the ai'ches, head
foremost, on a rope stretched thence across St
Martin's Lane to the Hoyal Mews ; the princesses
being present, and many eminent persons.' Ho-
garth shows another performer of this feat in the
background of his picture, namely, Cadman, who
was killed in 1 740, in an attempt to descend from
the summit of a church-steeple in Shrewsbury.
The circumstances of this sad catastrophe are
set forth in the epitaph on the unfortunate man's
gravestone, which is as follows : —

' Let this small monument record the name
Of Cadman, and to future times proclaim
Here, by an attempt to fly from this high spu-e
Across the Sabiine stream, he did acquire
His fatal end. 'Twas not for want of skill
Or courage to perform the task, he fell :
No, no— a faiilty cord, being drawn too tight
Hurried his soul on high to take her flight,
Which bid the body here beneath good night.'

The earliest advertisement of Sadler's Wells
which I have been able to find is one of 1739,
which states that ' the usual diversions will begin
this day at five o'clock in the evening, with a
variety of rope-dancing, tumbling, singing, and

And Circus Celebrities. 15

several new entertainments of dancing, both
serious and comic ; concluding with the revived
grotesque pantomime called Happy Despair, with
additions and alterations/ An advertisement of
the following year introduces Miss Eayner as a
performer on the tight rope, who in 1 748 appeared
in conjunction with a younger sister. The acro-
bats of the latter period were Williams, Hough,
and Rayner, the latter probably father or brother
of the fair performers on the corde elastique.

The New Wells, at the bottom of Leman
Street, Goodman^s Fields, were opened at this
time, and introduced to the public a French
rope-dancer named Dugee, who also tumbled, in
conjunction with Williams, who had left the
Islington place of entertainment, and another
acrobat named Janno. Williams is announced
in an advertisement of 1748 to vault over the
heads of ten men. The admission here was by
payment for a pint of wine or punch, which was
the case also at Sadler's Wells at this time ; but
in an announcement of a benefit the charges for
admission are stated at eighteen-pence and half-
a-crown, with the addition that the night will be
moonlight, and that wine may be obtained at
two shillings per bottle.

Twenty years later, we find announced at

1 6 Circus Life

Sadler's Wells, ' feats of activity by Signer
Nomora and Signora Rossi, and many curious
and uncommon equilibres by Le Chevalier des
Linges.' In 1771 the rope-dancers here were
Ferzi (sometimes spelt Farci) and Garmon,
who was, a few years later, a member of the
first company formed by the celebrated Philip
Astley for the Amphitheatre in the Westminster
Road.

The first equestrian performances ever seen
in England, other than those of the itinerant
exhibitors of performing horses, were given on
the site of Dobney's Place, at the back of
Penton Street, Islington. It was then a tea-
garden and bowling-green, to which one John-
son, who obtained a lease of the premises in
1 767, added such performances as then attracted
seekers after amusement to Sadler's Wells. One
Price, concerning whose antecedents the strictest
research has failed to discover any information,
gave equestrian performances at this place in
1770, and soon had a rival in one Sampson, who
performed similar feats in a field behind the Old
Hats.

About the same time, feats of horsemanship
were exhibited in Lambeth, in a field near Half-
penny Hatch, which, it may be necessary to

oL

And Circus Celebrities. 17

inform ,our readers^ stood where a broad ditcli,
which then ran through the fields and market
gardens now covered bj the streets between
Westminster Road and Blackfriars Road, was
crossed by a swivel bridge. There was a narrow
pathway through the fields and gardens, for the
privilege of using which a halfpenny was paid
to the owners at a cottage near the bridge. In
one of these fields Philip Astley — a great name
in circus annals — formed his first ring with a
rope and some stakes, going round with his hat
after each performance to collect the loose half-
pence of the admiring spectators.

This remarkable man was born in 1742, at
Newcastle-under-Lyme, where his father carried
on the business of a cabinet-maker. He received
little or no education, and after working a few
years with his father, enlisted in a cavalry regi-
ment. His imposing appearance, being over six
feet in height, with the proportions of a Hercules,
and the voice of a Stentor, attracted attention to
him ; and his capture of a standard at the battle of
Emsdorff made him one of the celebrities of his
regiment. While serving in the army, he learned
some feats of horsemanship from an itinerant
equestrian named Johnson, perhaps the man under
whose management Price introduced equestrian

i8 Circus Life

performances at Sadler's Wells, — and often ex-
hibited them for the amusement of his comrades.
On his discharge from the army, he was pre-
sented by General Elliot with a horse, and there-
upon he bought another in Smithfield, and com-
menced those open-air performances in Lambeth
which have already been noticed.

After a time, he built a rude circus upon a
piece of ground near Westminster Bridge which
had been used as a timber-yard, being the site
of the theatre which has been known by his
name for nearly a century. Only the seats were
roofed over, the ring in which he performed
being open to the air. One of his horses, which
he had taught to perform a variety of tricks, he
soon began to exhibit, at an earlier period of
each day, in a large room in Piccadilly, where the
entertainment was eked out with conjuring and
ombres Chinoises — a kind of shadow pantomime.

One of the earliest advertisements of the
Surrey side establishment sets forth that the
entertainment consisted of ^horsemanship by
Mr Astley, Mr Taylor, Signer Markutchy, Miss
Yangable, and other transcendent performers,' —
a minuet by two horses, ' in a most extraordinary
manner,' — a comical musical interlude, called
The AuJcward Becruit, and an ' amazing^ exhibi-

And Circus Celebrities. 19

tion of dancing dogs from France and Italy, and
other genteel parts of the globe/

One of the advertisements of Astley^s per-
formances for 1772, one of the very few that can
be found of that early date, is as follows : —

'Horsemanship and New Feats of Activity.
This and every Evening at six, Mr and Mrs Ast-
ley, Mrs Griffiths, Costmethopila, and a young
Gentleman, will exhibit several extraordinary
feats on one, two, three, and four horses, at the
foot of Westminster Bridge.

' These feats of activity are in number up-
wards of fifty ; to which is added the new French
piece, the different characters by Mr Astley,
Griffiths, Costmethopila, &c. Each will be dressed
and mounted on droll horses.

' Between the acts of horsemanship, a young
gentleman will exhibit several pleasing heavy
balances, particularly this night, with a young
Lady nine years old, never performed before in
Europe ; after which Mr Astley will carry her on
his head in a manner quite different from all
others. Mrs Astley will likewise perform with
two horses in the same manner as she did before
their Majesties of England and France, being the
only one of her sex that ever had that honour.
The doors to be opened at five, and begin at six

20 Circus Life

o'clock. A commodious gallery, 120 feet long,
is fitted up in an elegant manner. Admittance
there as usual.

' N.B. Mr Astley will display the broad-sword,
also ride on a single horse, with one foot on the
saddle, the other on his head, and every other
feat which can be exhibited by any other. With
an addition of twenty extraordinary feats, such
as riding on full speed, with his head on a com-
mon pint pot, at the rate of twelve miles an
hour, &c.

' ^S^ To specify the particulars of Mr Astley's
performance would fill this side of the paper,
therefore please to ask for a bill at the door, and
see that the number of fifty feats are performed,
Mr Astley having placed them in acts as the
performance is exhibited. The amazing little
Military Horse, which fires a pistol at the
word of command, will this night exhibit up-
wards of twenty feats in a manner far superior
to any other, and meets with the greatest ap-
plause.'

An advertisement issued at the close of the
season, in 1775, announces 'the last new feats of
horsemanship, four persons on three horses, or a
journey to Paris; also, the pynamida on full
speed by Astley, Griffin, and Master Phillips.'

And Circus Celebrities. 21

This curious word is probably a misprint for
' pyramids/

In tbis year, Eicher, the famous harlequin,
revived the ladder- dancing feat at Sadler's Wells,
where he also joined in the acrobatic perform-
ances of Rayner, Garmon, and Huntley, the last
being a new addition to the trow^e. Other ' feats
of activity ' were performed by the Sigols, and
Ferzi and others exhibited their evolutions on
the tight-rope. The same names appear in the
advertisements of the following year, when rivals
appeared in vaulting and tight-rope dancing at
Marylebone Gardens.

'As Mr Astley's celebrated new performances
at Westminster Bridge draws near to a conclu-
sion,' says one of the great equestrian's adver-
tisements of 1776, 'it is humbly requested the
present opportunity may not escape the notice of
the ladies and gentlemen. Perhaps such another
exhibition is not to be found in Europe. To the
several entertainments of the riding- school is
added, the Grand Temple of Minerva, acknow-
ledged by all ranks of people to be extremely
beautiful. The curtain of the Temple to ascend
at five o'clock, and descend at six, at which time
the grand display will be made in a capital man-
ner, consisting of rope-vaulting on full swing.

22 Cirms Life

with many new pleasing additions of horseman-
ship, both serious and comic ; various feats of
activity and comic tumbling, the learned little
horse, the Roman battle, le force d'Hercule, or the
Egyptian pyramids, an entertainment never seen
in England ; with a variety of other performances
extremely entertaining. The doors to be opened
at five, and begin at six precisely. Admittance
in the gallery 2s., the riding school Is. A price
by no means adequate to the evening's diver-
sion.'

Having saved some money out of the pro-
ceeds of these performances, Astley erected the
Amphitheatre, which, in its early years, resem-
bled the present circus in Holborn more than the
building subsequently identified with the eques-
trian triumphs of Ducrow. Chinese shadows
were still found attractive, it seems, for they con-
stitute the first item in one of the programmes of
1 780, in which year the Amphitheatre was opened.
Then came feats of horsemanship by Griffin,
Jones, and Miller, the clown to the ring being
Burt. Tumbling — ' acrobatics ' had not been
extracted from the Greek dictionary in those
days — ^by Nevit, Porter, Dawson, and Garmon
followed ; and it is worthy of remark that none
of the circus performers of the last century seem

And Circus Celebrities. '23

to have deemed it expedient to Italianize their
names, or to assume fanciful appellations, such as
the Olympian Brothers, or the Marvels of Peru.
After the tumbling, the feat of riding two and
three horses at the same time was exhibited, the
performer modestly concealing his name, which
was probably Philip Astley. Next came ' slack-
rope vaulting in full swing, in different attitudes,'
tricks on chairs and ladders, a burlesque eques-
trian act by the clown, and, lastly, ' the amazing
performance of men piled upon men, or the
Egyptian pyramid/

About the same time that the Amphitheatre
was opened, the Royal Circus, which afterwards
became the Surrey Theatre, was erected in Black-
friar's Boad by the elder Dibdin and an eques-
trian named Hughes, who is described as a man
of fine appearance and immense strength. The
place being unlicensed, the lessees had to close
it in the midst of success ; but a license was
obtained, and it was re-opened in March, 1783.
Burlettas were here combined with equestrian
performances, and for some time a spirited com-
petition with Astley's was maintained. The
advertisements of the Circus are as curious for
their grammar and strange sprinkling of capitals
as for their personal allusions. A few specimens

24 Circus Life

culled from tlie newspapers of the period are
subjoined : — '•

No. 1. — 'The celebrated Sobieska Clementina
and Mr Hughes on Horseback will end on Monday
next, the 4th of October ; until then they will
display the whole of their Performances, which
are allowed, by those who know best, to be the
completest of the kind in Europe. Hughes hum-
bly thanks the Nobility, (fee, for the honour of
their support, and also acquaints them his An-
tagonist has catched a bad cold so near to "West-
minster bridge, and for his recovery is gone to a
warmer Climate, which is Bath in Somersetshire.
He boasts, poor Fellow, no more of activity, and
is now turned Conjuror, in the character of
' Sieur the Great.^ Therefore Hughes is unri-
valled, and will perform his surprising feats
accordingly at his Horse Academy, until the
above Day. The Doors to be opened at Four
o'clock, and Mounts at half-past precisely. H.
has a commodious Room, eighty feet long.
N. B. Sobieska rides on one, two, and three
horses, being the only one of her Sex that ever
performed on one, two, and three.'

No. 2. — ' Hughes has the honour to inform the
Nobility, &c., that he has no intention of setting
out every day to France for three following Sea-

Aftd Circus Celebrities. 25

sonSj his Ambition being fully satisfied by the
applause he has received from Foreign Gentle-
men who come over the Sea to See him, Cle-
mentina, and Miss. Huntly ride one, two, and
three horses at full speed, and takes Leaps sur-
prising. A little Lady, only Eight Years old,
rides Two Horses at full gallop by herself, with-
out the assistance of any one to hold her on.
Enough to put any one in fits to see her. H.
will engage to ride in Twenty Attitudes that
never were before attempted; in particular, he
will introduce his Horse of Knowledge, being
the only wise animal in the Metropolis. A Sailor
in full gallop to Portsmouth, without a bit of
Bridle or Saddle. The Maccaroni Tailor riding
to Paris for new Fashions. This being Mr Pot-
tinger^s night, he will speak a Prologue adapted
to the noble art of Riding, and an Epilogue also
suited to Extraordinary Leaps. Tickets (2s.) to
be had of Mr Wheble, bookseller. Paternoster-
row, and at H.^s Riding School. Mounts half-
past four.'

No. 3. — 'Hughes, with the celebrated Sobi-
eska Clementina, the famous Miss Huntly, and
an astonishing Young Gentleman (son of a Person
of Quahty), will exhibit at Blackfriars-road more
Extraordinary things than ever yet witnessed.

a6 Circus Life

such as leaping over a Horse forty times without
stopping between the springs — Leaps the Bar
standing on the Saddle with his Back to the
Horse's Tail, and, Yice-Yersa, Rides at full speed
with his right Foot on the Saddle, and his left
Toe in his Mouth, two surprising Feet. Mrs
Hughes takes a fly and fires a Pistol — rides at full
speed standing on Pint Pots — mounts pot by
pot, higher still, to the terror of all who see her.
H. carries a lady at full speed over his head —
surprising ! The young gentleman will recite
verses of his own making, and act Mark Antony,
between the leaps. Clementina every night —
a commodious room for the nobility.'

The excitement of apparent danger was evi-
dently as much an element of the popular interest
in circus performances a century ago as at the
present day.

Colonel West, to whom the ground on which
the circus was erected belonged, became a partner
in the enterprise, and invested a large amount in
it. On his death the concern became very much
embarrassed, and struggled for several years
with a load of debt. Hughes was succeeded as
manager by Grimaldi, a Portuguese, the grand-
father of the famous clown whom some of us
remember at C event Garden ; and Grimaldi, in

And Circus Celebrities. 27

1 780, by Delpini, an Italian buffo singer, under
whose management the novel spectacle of a stag-
hunt was introduced in the arena.

Sadler's Wells continued to give the usual
entertainment, the advertisements of 1780 an-
nouncing ^ a great variety of singing, dancing,
tumbling, posturing, rope-dancing,' &c., by the
usual very capital performers, and others, more
particularly tumbling by Rayner, Tully, Huntley,
Garmon, and Grainger, 'pleasing and surprising
feats of strength and agility' by Richer and
Baptiste, and their pupils, and tight-rope danc-
ing by Richer, Baptiste, and Signora Mariana,
varied during a portion of the season by the last-
named artiste's 'new and extraordinary per-
formance on the slack wire, particularly a curious
display of two flags, and a pleasing trick with
a hoop and three glasses of wine.'

Astley's soon became a popular place of
amusement for all classes. Horace Walpole,
writing to Lord Stafford, says : —

'London, at this time of the year [Septem-
ber], is as nauseous a drug as any in an apothe-
cary's shop. I could find nothing at all to do,
and so went to Astley's, which, indeed, was
much beyond my expectation. I do not wonder
any longer that Darius was chosen King by the

28 Circus Life

instructions lie gave to his horse; nor that
Cah'gula made his Consul. Astley can make his
dance minuets and hornpipes. But I shall not
have even Astley now : Her Majesty the Queen
of France, who has as much taste as Caligula,
has sent for the whole of the dramatis personce
to Paris.'

Among the expedients to which Astley occa-
sionally had recourse for the purpose of drawing
a great concourse of people to the Surrey side
of the Thames was a balloon ascent, an attraction
frequently had recourse to in after times at
Vauxhall, the Surrey Gardens, Cremorne, the
Crystal Palace, and other places of popular
resort. The balloon was despatched from St
George's Fields on the 12th of March, 1784, 'in
the presence,' says a writer in the Gentleman's
Magazine, ' of a greater number of spectators
than were, perhaps, ever assembled together on
any occasion ; ' and he adds that, ' many of the
spectators will have reason to remember it ; for
a more ample harvest for the pickpockets never
was presented. Some noblemen and gentlemen
lost their watches, and many their purses. The
balloon, launched about half-past one in the after-
noon, was found at Faversham.' This ascent
took place within two months after that of the

And Circus Celebrities. 29

Montgolfiere balloon at Lyons, and was, there-
fore, probably the first ever attempted in this
country; while, by a strange coincidence, the
first aerostatic experiment ever made in Scotland
was made on the same day that Astley's ascended,
but about an hour later, from Heriot^s Gardens,
Edinburgh.

Horace Walpole writes, in allusion to a
subsequent balloon ascent, and the excitement
which it created in the public mind, —

' I doubt it has put young Astley's nose out
of joint, who went to Paris lately under their
Queen^s protection, and expected to be Prime
Minister, though he only ventured his neck by
dancing a minuet on three horses at full gallop,
and really in that attitude has as much grace as
the Apollo Belvedere.' The fame of the Astleys
receives further illustration from a remark of
Johnson's, that ' Whitfield never drew as much
attention as a mountebank does : he did not
draw attention by doing better than others, but
by doing what was strange. Were Astley to
preach a sermon standing on his head, or on a
horse's back, he would collect a multitude to
hear him; but no wise man would say he had
made a better sermon for that.'

The earliest displayed advertisement of Ast-

30 Circus Life

ley^s which I have been able to discover, is as
follows, which appeared in 1 788 :

Astley's Amphitheatre, Westminster Bridge.

YOUNG ASTLEY^S

Surprising Equestrian Exercises.

In the intervals

A NEW WAR ENTERTAINMENT,

In which will be introduced a SINGLE COM-
BAT with the BROADSWORD between Young
AsTLEY,,as a British Sailor, and Mr J. Taylor,
as a Savage Chief ; after which a General Engage-
ment between British Sailors and Savages. The
Scenery, Machinery, Songs, Dances, and Dresses,
adapted to the manners of the different Countries.

TUMBLING .

By a most capital Group.

A New Comic Dance, called

THE GERMAN CHASSEURS,

With New Music, Dresses, &c.

A Musical Entertainment, called

THE INVITATION.

The Songs and Choruses, together with the

Dresses, entirely new.

A7td Circus Celebrities. 31

A GEAND ENTRY OF HORSES.
A Minuet Dance by Two Horses,

And other extraordinary performances by the
Horses.

A New Comic Dance, called

THE ETHIOPIAN FESTIVAL,

In wliich will be introduced a New Pas de
Trois, never performed in London, Composed by
Mons. Vermigli, 'Eieve de VOjpera, and danced by
him, Mr Marqui, and Mr J. Taylor, represent-
ing the whimsical Actions and Attitudes made
use of by the Negroes. After which a Pas de
Deux, composed by Mons. Ferrer, and danced
by him and Mad. Fuzzi, in the character of an
Indian Prince and Princess. The Music and
Dresses entirely new.

A New favourite Song, by Me Johannot, Called

Bo w- wo w- wow .

HORSEMANSHIP.

AND OTHER EXERCISES,

By Master Crossman, Mr Jenkins, Mr Lons-
dale, Mr J. Taylor, and Miss Vangabel ; Clown,
Mr Miller.

The whole to conclude with a New Entertain-

32 Circus Life

ment of Singing, Dancing, and Dumb -Shew to
Speaking Music, called the

MAGIC WOELD.

In which will be introduced, behind a large
transparent Painting, representing the enchant-
ed World, a variety of Magical, Pantomimical,
Farcical, Tragical, Comic Deceptions ; together
with a grand Procession of Caricature Figures,
displaying a variety of whimsical Devices in a
manner entirely New.

Doors to be opened at half-past Five, and to
begin precisely at half-past Six.

BOXES 3s.— PIT 2s.— GALL. Is.—
SIDE GALL. U.

I found this advertisement, and the follow-
ing one, which was issued in the same year, but
at a later period, in a collection of similar liter-
ary curiosities purchased at the sale of the effects
of the late Mr Lacey, the well-known theatrical
bookseller, of the Strand.

THIS EVENING, will be presented at

ASTLEY^S,

An entire new pantomimic Dance, called

THE HUMOURS OF GIL BLAS

(A Parody)

And Circus Celebrities. 33

As performed with applause at the Theatres on
the Boulevards, Paris.

Gil Bias, Mr Jenkins — His Father, Mr Henley
— Uncle, Mr Lonsdale — Servant, Mr Bell — Flash
the Spaniard, Mr Ferrere — Mungo, his Servant,
Master Collet — Doctor, Mr Fox — Maria (fat Cook),
Mr Connell — Spanish Lady, Mrs Stevens — Gil Bias
Mother, Mrs Henley — Post Boy, Master Grossman —
Captain of the Banditti, Mr Joha/nnot — Lieutenant,
Mr Fox — Signal Man, Mr Be Castro — Spy, Mr
Millard — Captain of the Cavern, Mr Wallack.
The Rest of the Banditti, by the Remainder of
the Company. Dancers, Mons. Vermi^li, Madame
Ferr&re, and Mademoiselle Meziere.

To conclude with

A SPANISH FAIR,

In which will be introduced a multiplicity of Drolls,
Shews, &c., with a surprising Real Gigantic Spanish
Pig, measuring from head to tail 12 feet, and 12
hands high, weighing 12 cwt., which will be rode by
a Monkey.

HORSEMANSHIP

By YOUNG ASTLEY, and other Capital

Performers.
3

34 Circus Life

A Musical Piece, called

THE DIAMOND RING :

Or, THE JEW OUTWITTED.

Israel, Mr Be Castro — Harry, Mr Millard —
Feignlove, Mr Fox — Maid, Mrs Wallach — Lucy
Feignlove, Mrs Henley.

TUMBLING

By Mr Lonsdale, Mr Jenkins, Mr Bell, Master
Grossman, Master Jenkinson, Master Collet, and
others.

A favourite Dance, composed by Mons. Vermigli,

{Eleve de VOjpera) called

THE SPOETS OF THE VILLAGE.

A Musical Piece, called
THE BLACK AND WHITE MILLINERS.

Tiffany, Mr Connell — Myrtle, Mr Wallach —
Timewell, Mr Miller — Doctor Spruce, Mr Fox —
Sprightly, Mr Johannot — Nancy, Mrs Wallach —
Fanny, Mrs Wigley — Mrs Tiffany, Mrs Henley.

The whole to conclude with a Pantomime, called

THE MAGIC WORLD,

In which will be introduced behind a large trans-

And Circus Celebrities. 35

parent Painting, representing the enchanted World,
a variety of magical, pantomimical, farcical, tragical,
comic Deceptions, together with a Grand Procession
of Caricature Figures, displaying a variety of whim-
sical Devices, with the Emblems of the Inhabitants
of the Four Quarters of the Globe, in a Manner
entirely New.

To finish with
THE GIBRALTAR CHARGER:

Surrounded by a Chain of Fire.

Equestrianism does not make a very important
figure in the announcements of the Royal Circus at
this period, which simply inform the public that
' the performances will commence with horsemanship
by Mr Hughes and his unrivalled pupils.* The .
programme was chiefly musical, and concluded with a
pantomime, in which Rayner, the acrobat, from Sad-
ler's Wells, sustained the part of Harlequin. At
the latter place of amusement, charges ranging from
a shilling to three shillings and sixpence were now
made for admission, and the performances, other
than music and dancing, consisted of posturing by
a boy called the Infant Hercules, and tight-rope
dancing by Madame Romaine, another female artiste

36 Circus Life

known as lia Belle Espagnole, and two lads, one of
whom was a son of Richer, the other known as the
Little Devil. Grimaldi the Second, son of the man-
ager of the Royal Circus, and father of the famous
Joey Grimaldi, was clown at this establishment for
many years, commencing, it is said, at the muni-
ficent salary of three shillings per week, which was
gradually raised until, in 1794, we find him re-
ceiving four pounds per week.

I cannot better conclude this chapter than with
the following strictures upon the places of amuse-
ment to which it chiefly relates, culled from a news-
paper of 1788:—

' If the objections which are made to permitting
the present existing theatres or places of public
amusement to continue arises from a principle of
morality, which indeed is the only plea of opposition
which can be alleged, it is somewhat strange that
the only exception should be made in favour of
Sadler^ s Wells, at which alone, it is worthy of re-
mark, a man may if he chooses get drunk. A pint
of liquor is included in the price of admittance, but
as much more may be had as any person _ chooses
to call for. The heat of the place is a great induce-
ment, and we believe tusltij females have from that
cause drank more than has let them depart in their
sober senses, the consequences of which are obvious.

And Circus Celebrities. 37

This is not permitted at Astley^s, the Circus, or
the Eoyalty.'

The last-mentioned place of amusement was a
Variety Theatre, in Wells Street, Goodman's Fields,
which had risen out of the New Wells, and gave
entertainments similar to those of Sadler's Wells and
the Eoyal Circus.

38

CHAPTER II.

Fortunes of the Royal Circus — Destruction of Astley's Amphitheatre
by Fire — Its Reconstruction — Second Conflagration — Astley in
Paris — Burning of the Royal Circus — Erection of the Olympic
Pavilion — Hengler, the Rope-dancer — Astley's Horses — Dancing
Horses — The Trick Horse, Billy— Abraham Saunders— John
Astley and William Davis — Death of Philip Astley — Vauxhall
Gardens — Andrew Ducrow — John Clarke — Banymore's Season
at Astley's — Hippo-dramatic Spectacles — The first Circus Camel.

Foe nearly forty years after the opening of Astley's
Amphitheatre, the performances did not differ, in
any respect, from the usual entertainment of the
smallest tenting company now travelling. The
earliest bill of the collection in the library of the
British Museum was issued in 1791, when the
great attraction of the place appears to have been
the somersault over twelve horses, called le grand
saut du Trampolin, of James Lawrence, whose
vaulting feats gained him the name (in the bills) of
the Great Devil.

In 1792, the entertainments comprised a con-

Circus Celebrities. 39

siderable musical element, and concluded with a
pantomime. One of the advertisements of this
year announces the performances in the arena as
follows ; —

' Horsemanship, and exercises for the Light
Dragoons — Ground and lofty tumbling — A grand
entry of horses — Equestrian exercises, particularly
the metamorphose of the sack — Wonderful equili-
bres on a single horse — Whimsical piece of horse-
manship, called The Taylor riding to Brentford.'

Sadler's Wells continued to vary its programme
with tumbling and rope-dancing, and in 1792 gave
' a pleasing exhibition of strength and posture-
work, entirely new, called Le Tableau Chinois, by
Signer Bologna and his children, in which will be
displayed a variety of curious and striking man-
oeuvres. Tight-rope dancing by the Little Devil
and Master Bologna, with the comic accompaniment
of Signer Pietro Bologna.*

From the Royal Circus announcements of the

following year, I select the following two, as good

illustrations of the kind of performances then given,

and curious examples of circus bills eighty years

ago:—

ROYAL CIRCUS.

The Company at the Circus beg leave to
acquaint the Nobility, Gentry, and Public, that

40 Cirms Life

young Ceossman will appear this present Evening,
August 1 , on Horseback, and challenge all the
Horsemen in Europe.

Feicapee Dancing, Vaulting, Tight-eope

Dancing, Pyramids, Geound and

Lofty Tumbling, &c. &c. &c.

The performance will commence with a Grand Entry
of Horses, mounted by the Troop. Young Ceoss-
man's unparalleled Peasant Hornpipe, and Hag
Dance, not to be equalled by any Horseman in this
Kingdom.

Le Grand Saut de Teampoline by Mr Poetee,
(Clown) who will jump over a garter 15 feet from
the ground, and fire ofl" two Pistols.
The Musical Child, (only nine years of age) will
go through his wonderful Performance. Mr
Smith will go through a variety of Performances on
a Single Horse.

THE HUMOURS OF THE SACK,

Oe, The Clown deceived by a Woman.

FRICASSEE DANCE,

By Mr Ceossman and Mr Poetee.

Mr Ingham (from Dublin) will throw an innumer-
able Row of Flipflaps.

And Circus Celebrities. 41

Mr Grossman will vault over the Horse back-
wards and forwards, with his Legs Tied, in a man-
ner not to be equalled by any Performer in this
Kingdom.

GROUND AND LOFTY TUMBLING,

by the whole Troop.

The Afeican will go through his astonishing Stage
and Equestrian Performances.

LA FOECE DE HERCULES :

Or, The Ruins of Tkoy.

Mr PoRTEE will perform on a single Horse, in a
ludicrous manner.

Young Grossman will leap from a single Horse over
Two Garters, 12 feet high, and alight again on the
Saddle, and Play the Violin in various Attitudes.

THE TAYLOR^S DISASTER,

Or, his Wonderful Journey to Brentford,

By Mr Porter.

To conclude with a Real Fox and Stag Ghase, by
twelve couple of Hounds, and two real Foxes, and
a real Stag Hunt, as performed before their
Majesties.

Grossman, it will be seen, had transferred his
services from Astley's to the rival establishment.

42 Circus Life

where he must have been an acquisition of some
importance. The Ducrow mentioned in the second
bill, must have been the father of the celebrated
equestrian of that name.

Change op Peefoemakces.

THE WINDSOR HUNT.

This and every Evening, until further Notice,

at the

ROYAL CIRCUS,

In which will be introduced a Representation of
THE DEER CARRIAGE AND STAG,

With Horsemen and Women coming out of Holy-
port Mead to see the Stag turned out; the Hunt
will be then joined by Ten Male and Three Female
Equestrians. The Stag will be Twice, and the
Horsemen and Horsewomen Five Times, in Full
View.

An Entieb New Dance, called

THE CROATIAN MERCHANTS,

Composed by Mons. Fereere. Principal Dancers,
Mons. Ferrere, Madame Ferrere, Mons. D'Egville,
and Signora Fuzi, with Six Couple of Figurants.
The Dresses and Decorations entirely New, by Mr
Risleben.

And Circus Celebrities. 43

YOUNG GROSSMAN

Will appear this and every Evening on Horseback,
and challenge all the Horsemen in Europe.

TIGHT-EOPE DANCING,

By the celebrated Saxoni, from Rome.

Pyramids, Ground and Lofty Tumbling, &c.

The Grand Leaps over Seven Horses.

Also, through the Hoop on Fire, fourteen feet
high, by Mr Porter and Mr Ducrow. The former
will leap over more Horses than any Man in Europe.

Mr Franklin's inimitable Performances with

THE CHILD OF PROMISE,

In various attitudes. Playing on the violin, &c.,
Mr Smith, Mr Ingham, Mr Porter, Mr Ducrow, Mr
Meredith, Mr Allers, Mr Jones, Mr Benqe, Mr
QuiN, Mr Francis, and

THE FAMOUS AFRICAN,

(Who is not to be equalled) will go through the
Tilts and Tournaments, and Military Exercises, as
performed on Horseback, in the Field and Manage.

To which will be added,

THE TAYLOR'S DISASTER !

44 Circus Life

AND FOX HUNT.
By the above Male and Female Equestrians.

The performances at Sadler's Wells this year
included ' a series of varied equilibres and posture-
work, called Le Tableau Chinois, by Signer Bologna
and his children/ and ' a capital display of agility
on the tight-rope by the inimitable Mr Richer, from
Petersburgh ; also the pleasing exertions of La Belle
Espagnole.' There does not appear to have been
many changes in the programme of this establish-
ment, which in the following year presented ' a new
and picturesque exhibition, called the Pastimes of
Pekin, or Kien Quangos Family Tree ; in which
will be displayed, by a group of ten capital per-
formers, under the direction of the Great Kien
Quang, a variety of entertainments and active
manoeuvres, a la Chinois, with banners, garlands,
and umbrellas ; ' and ' the pleasing and varied
exertions of Messrs Bologna and La Belle Espag'
nole.'

Astley's Amphitheatre was destroyed by fire in
1794, to the serious loss of the proprietor, who was
not insured ; but such was his indomitable energy
and enterprise that it was rebuilt in time to be
opened on Easter Monday, in the following year.
In the mean while, in order to keep his company

And Circus Celebrities. 45

and stud employed, lie had converted the Lyceum
into a circus, in conjunction with a partner named
Handy.

The Royal Circus was far from prosperous. The
load of debt upon it kept the lessees in a position
of constant difficulty and embarrassment, and in
1795 Mrs West levied an execution on the pre-
mises. It was then opened by Jones and Cross,
the latter a writer of spectacles and pantomimes for
Covent Garden ; and in their hands it remained
until it was destroyed by fire in 1805.

Handy was still Astley's partner in 1796, when
the advertisements announce ' thirty-five new acts
by Astley's and Handy's riders, and two surprising
females,^ in addition to pony races, the perform-
ances of a clever little pony, only thirty inches in
height, a performance on two ropes, and a novel act
by a performer named Carr, who stood on his head
in the centre of a globe, and ascended thirty feet
^ turning round in a most surprising manner, like a
boy's top.' Later advertisements of this year
describe the Amphitheatre as ' under the patronage
of the Duke of York,* and announce the special
engagement of two Catawba Indians — both chiefs,
of course, as American Indians and Arabs who ap-
pear in the arena always are represented to be.
These copper-coloured gentlemen gave their war

46 Circus Life

dance and tomahawk exercise, and performed feats
of dexterity witli bows and arrows. The only
mention of equestrianism at this time is, that
^various equestrian and other exercises' will be
given ' by pupils of both the Astleys/

Sadler's Wells gave this year ' various elegant
and admired exercises on the tight-rope, by the
inimitable Mr Richer and lia Belle Espagnole, par-
ticularly Richer's astonishing leap over the two
garters, with various feats of agility and comic
accompaniment by Dubois/ This establishment
and the Royalty gradually abandoned entertainments
of this kind, and were at length converted into
theatres; and the like change was effected at the
Royal Circus, or rather at the building which rose
upon the ruins made by the conflagration of 1805.

Astley's was burned again in 1803, when Mrs
Woodhams, the mother of Mrs Astley, perished in
the flames. Astley was again a heavy suSerer, the
insurance not covering more than a fourth of the
damage ; but once more the building rose from its
ruins, and it was again re-opened in 1804. Astley
being occupied at the time with the construction of
a circus in Paris, since known as Franconi's, the
new Amphitheatre was leased by him to his son,
John Astley, with whom William Davis soon became
associated as a partner.

And Circus Celebrities. 47

In 1805, the Royal Circus having been destroyed
by fire, Philip Astley leased the site of the Olympic
Theatre from Lord Craven for a term of sixty-one
years, at a yearly rental of one hundred pounds,
with the stipulation that two thousand five hundred
pounds should be expended in the erection of a
theatre. It was an odd-shaped piece of ground,
and required some contrivance to adapt it to the
purpose ; but Astley, who was his own architect and
surveyor, and indeed his own builder, for he is said
to have employed the workmen he required without
the intervention of a master, overcame all difficulties
with his usual energy and fertility of resource.

He bought the timbers of an old man-of-war,
captured from the French, and with these built the
framework of the theatre, a portion of which could,
it was said, be seen at the rear of the boxes of the
old Olympic Theatre before it was destroyed by
fire. There was very little brickwork, the frame
being covered externally with sheet iron, and
internally with canvas. The arrangements of the
auditorium were very similar to those of the
provincial circuses of the present day ; there was a
single tier of boxes, a pit running round the circle,
and a gallery behind, separated from the pit by a
grating, which caused the 'gods' to be likened to
the wild beasts in Cross's menagerie, Exeter

48 Circus Life

Change. There was no orchestra, but a few
musicians sat in a stage box on each side. The
chandelier was a present from the king. The
building was licensed for music, dancing, and
equestrian performances, and called the Olympic
Pavilion. It passed in 1812 into the possession of
Elliston, who purchased it, with the remaining term
of the lease, for two thousand eight hundred pounds
and an annuity of twenty pounds contingent on the
continuance of the license. The annuity soon ceased
to be payable, for Elliston opened the theatre for
burlettas and musical farces in 1813, and it was
closed a few weeks afterwards by order of the Lord
Chamberlain, on the ground that the license had
been granted on the supposition that the theatre
was to be used for the same kind of entertainment
as had been given by Astley, and only during the
same portion of the year.

The Amphitheatre continued to be conducted in
the same manner as it had been when in the hands
of the proprietor, and brought before the public a
succession of clever equestrians, tumblers, and rope-
dancers. In a bill of 1807 we first meet with the
name of Hengler, its then owner being a performer
of some celebrity on the tight-rope. The travelling
circuses which were springing into existence at this
time, both in England and on the continent, furnished

And Circus Celebrities. 49

the lessees with a constant succession of artistes ;
and the admirably trained horses fairly divided
the attention of the public with the biped per-
formers.

Philip Astley was the best breaker and trainer of
horses then living. He bought his horses in Smith-
field, seldom giving more than five pounds for one,
and selecting them for their docility, without regard
to symmetry or colour. He seems to have been the
first equestrian who taught horses to dance, the
animals going through the figure, and stepping in
time to the music. One of his horses, called Billy,
would lift a kettle off a fire, and arrange the tea
equipage for company, in a manner which elicited
rounds of applause. He was a very playful animal,
and would play with Astley and the grooms like a
kitten. His owner was once induced to lend him
for a week or two to Abraham Saunders, who had
been brought up by Astley, and was at that time, as
well as at many other times, involved in pecuni-
ary diflSculties. While Billy was in the possession
of Saunders, he was seized for debt, with the bor-
rower's own stud, and sold before his owner could
be communicated with. Two of Astley's company,
happening shortly afterwards to be perambulating
the streets of the metropolis, were surprised to see
Billy harnessed to a cart. They could scarcely be-

50 Circus Life

lieve their eyes, but could doubt no longer when the
animal, on receiving a signal to which he was ac-
customed, pricked up his ears, and began to caper
and curvet in a manner seldom seen out of the circle.
His new owner was found in a pubhc-house, and
was not unwilling to part with him, as Billy, 'though
a main good-tempered creature,' as he told the
equestrians, ' is so full o' all manner of tricks that
we calls him the Mountebank/

Saunders, at this time a prisoner for debt in the
now demolished Fleet Prison, was well known as a
showman and equestrian for three quarters of a cen-
tury. Many who remember him as the proprietor
of a travelling circus, visiting the fairs . throughout
the south of England, are not aware that he once
had a lease of the old Eoyalty Theatre, and that in
1808 he opened, as a circus, the concert-rooms
afterwards known as the Queen's Theatre, now the
Prince of Wales's. After experiencing many vicis-
situdes, he fell in his old age into poverty, owing
to two heavy losses, namely, by the burning of the
Royalty Theatre, and by the drowning of fifteen
horses at sea, the vessel in which they were being
transported being wrecked in a storm. In his latter
years, he was the proprietor of a penny 'gaff' at
Haggerstone, and, being prosecuted for keeping it,
drove to Worship Street police-court in a box- on

And Circus Celebrities. 5 1

wheels, drawn by a Shetland pony, and presented
himself before the magistrate in a garment made of
a bearskin. He was then in his ninetieth year,
and died two years afterwards, in a miserable lodg-
ing in Mill Street, Lambeth Walk.

There is a story told of Astley, by way of illus-
tration of his ignorance of music, which, if true,
would show that the Amphitheatre boasted an
orchestra even in these early years of its existence.
The nature of the story requires us to suppose that
the orchestral performers were then engaged for the
first time ; and, as we are told by Fitzball that the
occasion was the rehearsal of a hippo- dramatic
spectacle, it seems probable that there is some mis-
take, and that the anecdote should be associated
with Ducrow, instead of with his precursor, no per-
formances of that kind having been given at the
Amphitheatre in Astley's time. But Fitzball may
have been in error as to the occasion. As the story
goes, Astley, on some of the musicians suspending
their performances, demanded the reason.

' It is a rest,^ returned the leader.

* Let them go on, then,* said the equestrian. * I
pay them to play, not to rest.'

Presently a chromatic passage occurred.

' What do you call that ? ' demanded Astley.
* Have you all got the stomach-ache ? '

52 Circus Life

' It is a chromatic passage/ rejoined tlie leader,
witli a smile.

' Rheumatic passage ? ' said Astley, not compre-
hending the term. ^It is in your arm, I suppose;
but I hope you'll get rid of it before you play with
the people in front.''

' You misunderstand me, Mr Astley,' returned
the leader. ' It is a chromatic passage ; all the in-
struments have to run up the passage.'

' The devil they do ! ' exclaimed Astley. ' Then
I hope they'll soon run back again, or the audience
will think they are running away.'

Hitherto the quadrupeds whose docility and in-
telligence rendered them available for the entertain-
ment of the public had been limited to the circle ;
but in 1811 the example was set at Covent Garden
of introducing horses, elephants, and camels on the
stage. This was done in the grand cavalcade in
Bluebeard, the first representation of which was
attended with a singular accident, A trap gave
way under the camel ridden by an actor named
Gallot, who saved his own neck or limbs from dislo-
cation or fracture, by throwing himself off as the
animal sank down. He was unhurt, but the camel
was so much injured by the fall that it died before
it could be extricated. The elephant, though docile
enough, could not be induced to go upon the stage

And Circus Celebrities. 53

until one of the ladies of the ballet, who had become
familiar with the animal during the rehearsals, led
it on by one of its ears. This went so well with the
audience, that the young lady repeated the perform-
ance at every representation of the spectacle.

Philip Astley died in Paris, at the ripe age of
seventy-two, in 1814, — the year in which the cele-
brated Ducrow made his first appearance on the
stage as Eloi, the dumb boy, in the Tlie Forest ofBondy.
The Amphitheatre was conducted, after the death of
its founder, by his son, John Astley, in conjunction
with Davis ; but not without opposition. The Surrey
had ceased to present equestrian performances under
the management of Elliston ; but in 1815, on his
lease expiring, it was taken by Dunn, Heywood, and
Branscomb, who were encouraged by the success of
Astley to convert it into a circus. The experiment
was not, however, a successful one.

In the following year, Vauxhall Gardens assumed
the form and character by which they were known
to the present generation; and the celebrated
Madame Saqui was engaged for a tight- rope per-
formance, in which she had long been famous in
Paris. She was then in her thirty-second year, and
even then far from prepossessing, her masculine,
cast of countenance and development of muscle
giving her the appearance of a little man, rather

54 Ch'cus Life

than of the attractive young women we are ac-
customed to see on the corde elastique in this country. .
Her performance created a great sensation, however,
and she was re-engaged for the two following
seasons. She mounted the rope at midnight, in a
dress glistening with tinsel and spangles, and wear-
ing a nodding plume of ostrich feathers on her
head ; and became the centre of attraction for the
thousands who congregated to behold her ascent
from the gallery, under the brilliant illumination of
the fireworks that rained their myriads of sparks
around her.

Andrew Ducrow, who now came into notice, was
born in Southwark, in 1793, in which year his
father, Peter Ducrow, who was a native of Bruges,
appeared at Astley^s as the Flemish Hercules, in a
performance of feats of strength. Andrew was as
famous in his youthful days as a pantomimist as he
subsequently became as an equestrian, and was the
originator of the poses jolastiques, the performance
in which he first attracted attention, and which was
at that time a novel feature of circus entertain-
ments, being a series of studies of classical statuary
on the back of a horse. He appeared at the
Amphitheatre during only one season, however,
leaving England shortly afterwards, accompanied
by several members of his family, to fulfil en-

And Circus Celebrities. 55

gagements on the continent. The first of these was
with Blondin's Cirque Olympique, then in Holland.
He had at this time only one horse ; but, as his
gains increased with his fame, he was soon enabled
to procure others, until he had as many as six.
After performing at several of the principal towns
in Belgium and France, he was engaged, with his
family and stud, for Franconi^s Cirque, where he
was the first to introduce the equestrian pageant
termed an etitree. There he exhibited his double
acts of Cupid and Zephyr, Eed Riding Hood, &c.,
in which he was accompanied by his sister, a child
of three or four years old, whose performances were
at that time unequalled.

Simultaneously with the rise of Ducrow, the
well-known names of Clarke and Bradbury appear
in circus records. When Barrymore, the lessee of the
Coburg Theatre (now the Victoria), opened Astley's
in the autumn of 1819 for a limited winter season,
his company was joined by John Clarke, fresh from
saw-dust triumphs at Liverpool, and Bradbury,
who was the first representative on the equestrian
stage of Dick Turpin, the renowned highwayman,
whose famous ride to York had not then been re-
lated by Ainsworth, but was preserved in the six-
penny books, with folding coloured plates, which
constituted the favourite reading of boys fifty years

^6 Ci7'acs Life

ago. Clarke's little daughter, only five years of
age, made her appearance on the tight- rope in the
following year, when Madame Saqui re-appeared at
Vauxhall, and was one of the principal attractions of
that season.

John Astley survived his father only a few years,
dying in 1821, on the same day of the year, in the
same house, and in the same room, as his more
famous progenitor. After his death the Amphi-
theatre was conducted for a few years by Davis
alone; and by him hippo- dramatic spectacles, the
production of which afterwards made Ducrow so
famous, and which greatly extended the popularity
of Astley' s; were first introduced there. Davis also
signalized his management by the introduction of a
camel on the stage for the first time in a circus, the
occasion being the production of the romantic specta-
cle oi Alexander the Great and Thalestris the Amazon.

In the circle a constant variety of attractive, and
often novel, feats of horsemanship and gymnastics
continued to be presented. All through the season
of 1821 the great attraction in the circle was the
graceful riding of a young lady named Bannister —
probably the daughter of the circus proprietor of
that name, whose name we shall presently meet
with, and who had, shortly before that time, fallen
into difficulties. During the following season the

And Circus Celebrities. ^y

public were attracted by the novel and sensational
performance of Jean Bellinck on the flying rope,
stretched across the pit at an altitude of nearly a
hundred feet, according to the bills, in which a little
exaggeration was probably indulged. The great
attraction of 1823 was Longuemare^S ascent of a
rope from the stage to the gallery, amidst fireworks,
which had been the sensation of the preceding sea-
son at Vauxhall Gardens, where, at the same time,
Kamo Samee, the renowned Indian juggler, made
his first appearance in this country.

58

CHAPTER III.

Ducrow at Covent Garden — Engagement at Astle/s — Double Acts
in the cii'cle — Ducrow at Manchester — Rapid Act on Six Horses —
' Raphael's Dream ' — Miss Woolford — Cross's performing
Elephant — O'Donnel's Antipodean Feats — First year of Ducrow
and West — Henry Adams — Ducrow at Hull — The Wild Horse of
the Ukraine — Ducrow at Sheffield — Travelling Cu-cuses — An
Entree at Holloway's — Wild's Show— Constantine, the Posturer
— Circus Horses — Tenting at Faii-s — The Mountebanks.

When Elliston produced tlie spectacle of the Cata-
ract of the Ganges at Drury Lane Theatre, in 1823,
Bunn, who was then lessee of Covent Garden
Theatre, was induced by its success to engage
Ducrow, who made his first appearance at that
theatre on Easter Monday, 1824, in the lyrical and
spectacular drama of Cortez. Davis, fearing a rival
in the famous equestrian, offered him an engage-
ment at Astley's, where he soon became the chief
attraction.

The double act of Cupid and Zephyr, now repre-
sented by himself and his wife, was received with
as much applause as it had elicited at Franconi'sj

Circus Celebrities. 59^

and a perfect furore was created when he appeared
on two bare-back horses, as an Indian hunter.
Cline's rope- walking feats varied the programme of
the circle in 1826, and in the following year Ducrow,
having first given the performance with immense
success at Manchester, introduced his great feat,
then unparalleled, of riding six horses at the same
time, in his rapid act as a Russian courier.

Fresh novelties were produced in 1828, the most
attractive being the equestrian act called ' RaphaeFs
Dream,^ in which Ducrow reproduced, on horseback,
the finest conceptions of the sculptors of ancient
Greece, receiving immense applause at every exhibi-
tion. Miss Woolford and George Cooke made their
first appearance at Astley^s in this year, in a double
performance on the tight-rope, in which the former
artiste was for a long time without a rival. Apti-
tude for this exhibition seems, as in other branches
of circus business, to be hereditary; and a Miss
Woolford may have been found as a tight-rope per-
former in some circus or other any time within the
last half- century. I remember seeing a tight-rope
performer of this name in a httle show which at-
tended the July fair at Croydon about thirty years
ago.

3>ucrow's stud was engaged this year for Vaux-
hall Gardens, where the hippo-dramatic spectacle of

6o Circus Life

Tlie Battle of Waterloo was revived, and proved as
attractive as it had been some years previously at
Astley^s. The year 1828 is also memorable for the
first introduction of an elephant into the arena, a
colossal performing animal of that genus being
brought, with its keeper, from Cross's menagerie,
which many readers, even old residents in the me-
tropolis, may require to be informed had its location
on the site of what afterwards became Exeter
Arcade, in the rear of the houses on the north side
of the Strand, between Exeter Street and Catherine
Street. The elephant was also led in the bridal pro-
cession which constituted one of the displays of the
quadrupedal resources of the establishment in the
spectacular drama of Bluebeard.

In travelling over the records of saw-dust per-
formances, we are frequently remindeii of the saying
of the wise monarch of Israel, that there is no new
thing under the sun. The bills of Astley's, the ad-
vertisements of the Eoyal Circus and the Olympic
Pavilion, the traditions of travelling circuses, pre-
sent us with the originals of almost every feat that
the acrobats and posturers of the present day have
ever attempted. Ducrow, it has been seen, was the
originator of the poses 'plastiques, revived and made
famous a quarter of a century ago by Madame Whar-
ton and troupe, at the Walhalla, in Leicester Square,

And Cimis Celebrities. 6i

and subsequently by HaiTy Boleno, the clown, at
the Alhambra. Another instance comes under no-
tice in 1829, when a performer named O'Donnel
exhibited at Astley's the antipodean feats performed
a few years ago at the London Pavilion, and other
music-halls, by Jean Bond. O^Donnel mounted a
ladder, stood on his head on the top of one of the
uprights, kicked away the other, with all its rungs,
and in that position drank a glass of wine, and
performed several tricks. The kicking away of
the unfixed portion of the ladder invariably cre-
ates a sensation among the spectators, but adds
nothing to the difficulty or danger of the per-
formance.

'" On the lease of the Amphitheatre expiring in 1 830,
the owner of the premises raised the rent so much
that Davis relinquished the undertaking. Ducrow,
who possessed much of the energy and enterprise by
which Philip Astley had been distinguished, saw his
opportunity at once, and, obtaining a partner in
William West, took the lease on the terms which his
less enterprising predecessor had shrunk from. He
produced a gorgeous Eastern spectacle, and engaged
Stickney and young Bridges for the circle. Stick-
ney was an admirable equestrian, the first of the
many famous riders who have learned their art on
the other side of the Atlantic, where he had already

6a Circus Life

achieved a considerable reputation. Bridges was a
rope-dancer, and gained great applause by turning
a somersault on tlie rope, a feat whicb he appears to
have been the first to perform. Later in the season,
Henry Adams (the father of Charles Adams) made
his appearance as a performer of rapid acts of equi-
tation, the travelling circus which he had lately
owned having passed into the possession of his late
groom, John Milton.

During the portion of this year when Astley's
was closed, Ducrow and his company, bipeds and
quadrupeds, performed for a short time at HulL
Returning to the metropolis, he opened the Amphi-
theatre for the season of 1831 with the spectacular
drama of Mazeppa, the only enduring performance
of the kind with which Astley's was for so many
years associated. Most of them, elaborately as they
were got up, — for Ducrow never spared expense, —
and attractive as they proved at the time of their
production, owed their popularity to recent military
events ; but the fortunes of the daring youth immor-
talized by the genius of Byron, and the headlong
flight of the wild horse of the Ukraine, have proved
an unfailing source of attraction, and made Mazeppa
the trump-card of every hippo- dramatic manager
who possesses or can borrow a white horse qualified
to enact the part of the ' fiery, untamed steed ' upon

And Circles Celebrities. 6^

whose bare back tbe hero is borne into the steppes
of the Don Cossack country.

Adams and Stickney continued to attract in the
circle, but Ducrow engaged in addition an acrobatic
performer named Williams, who turned tourbillions
at the height of twelve feet from the ground, and
repeated them through hoops at the same height,
over a tilted waggon, over eight horses, and,
finally, over a troop of mounted cavalry. The
famous performing elephant, Mdlle Jeck, also made
its appearance during this season. When the
Amphitheatre closed, Ducrow took his company and
stud to SheflBeld, where he had had an immense
structure of a temporary character erected for their
performances. He ruined the prospect of a suc-
cessful provincial season, however, by indulgence of
his overbearing disposition, which manifested itself
on all occasions, in and out of the arena. The
Master Cutler and Town Council determined to
patronize the circus officially, and appeared at the
head of a cortege of between forty and fifty
carriages, containing the principal manufacturers
and their families. But, on the Master Cutler
sending his card to Ducrow, in the anticipation of
being personally received, Ducrow replied, through
one of his subordinates, that he only waited upon
crowned' heads, and not upon a set of dirty knife-

64 Circus Life

grinders. The astounded and indignant chief
magistrate immediately ordered his coachman to
turn about, and the entire cavalcade returned to the
Town Hall, where a ball was improvised, instead of
the intended visit to the circus. Thus Ducrow's
prospects in the hardware borough were ruined by
his own hasty temper and overbearing disposition.

It is now time to say a few words about the travel-
ling circuses that had been springing into existence
during the preceding fifteen or sixteen years, and
some of which have already been mentioned. The
northern and midland counties were travelled at
this time by Holloway^s, Milton's, ' "Wild's, and
Bannister's ; the eastern, southern, and western by
Saunders's, Cooke's, Samwell's, and Clarke's. We
find HoUoway in possession of the circus at Shefiield
after its vacation by Ducrow. Wallett, who first
comes into observation about this time, was one of
Holloway's clowns, and also did posturing, and
played Simkin in saw- dust ballets. He states, in his
autobiography, that they opened with a powerful com-
pany and a numerous stud ; but it seems that there
were not a dozen of the troupe, including grooms,
who could ride, The first item in the programme for
the opening night was an entree of twelve, five of
whom were thrown off their horses before the round
of the circle had been made, one of them having

W^ ^

And Circus Celebrities. 65

three of his fingers broken. The horses do not
appear to have been in fault, for they continued
their progress as steadily as if nothing had hap-
pened. WaUett accounts for this untoward incident
by stating that the dismounted cavaliers were
clowns and acrobats^ and that few members of those
sections of the profession can ride ; but, considering
that grooms could have been made available, a
'powerful company' should have been able to
mount twelve horses for an entrie without putting
into the saddle men who could not ride.

James Wild's show was a small concern, com-
bining a drama, a la Richardson^ with the perform-
ances of a tight-rope dancer and a fortune -telling
pony. Wallett, who had made his first appearance
before the public as a ' super ' at the theatre of his
native town, Hull, when Ducrow was there, and
had afterwards clowned on the outside of Charles
Yeoman's Royal Pavilion at Gainsborough fair,
joined Wild's show at Leeds, but soon transferred
his talent to a rival establishment. Both shows
were soon afterwards at Keighley fair, for which
occasion Wild had engaged four acrobats from
London, named Constantino, Heng, Morris, and
Whitton. The popularity of Ducrow's representa-
tions of Grecian statuary had induced Constantino
to study them^ and having provided himself with

L

66 Circtts Life

the requisite properties, he exhibited them very
successfully in Wild's show.

The proprietor of the rival establishment was in
agony, for his loudest braying through a speaking-
trumpet, and the wildest beating of his gong, did
not avail to stop the rush to Wild's which left the
front of his own show deserted. Wallett ruminated
over the situation, and at night sought Constantino,
and made overtures to him for the purchase of his
tights and ' props/ The acrobat entertained them, —
perhaps the bargain was very liberally wetted, —
and Wallett became the triumphant possessor of the
means of personating Ajax and Achilles, and all the
gods and heroes of Homer's classic pages. Next
day, the show in which he was engaged was crowded
to see him 'do the Grecian statues,' while Wild's
was deserted, Constantino dejected, and his em-
ployer despairing.

Bannister's circus travelled Scotland and the
northern counties of England, and it is a noteworthy
point in his history that David Roberts was engaged
by its proprietor as scene painter when he added a
stage and a company of pantomimists to the attrac-
tions of the ring. This was in 1817, when the
circus was located in Edinburgh, and the future R.A.
had just completed his apprenticeship to a house-
painter. Roberts says, in his diary, that he could

And Circus Celebrities. 67

never forget the tremor he felt, the faintness that
came over him, when he ascended to the second
floor of the house in Nicholson Street in which Ban-
nister lodged, and, after much hesitation, mustered
courage to ring the bell. Bannister received him
very kindly, looked at his drawings, and engaged
him to paint a set of wings for a palace. The
canvas was brought, and laid down on the floor, and
Roberts began to work there and then. At the
close of the circus season, he was engaged at a
salary of twenty-five shillings a week to travel with
the company into England, paint all the scenery
and properties that might be required, and make
himself generally useful. Roberts says that he
found that the last clause of the contract involved
the necessity of taking small parts in pantomimes,
which, he says, he rather over-did than under-did.
His circus experiences were brief, however, for
Bannister became bankrupt before long, and
Roberts betook himself to house-painting again
until he was engaged by Corri to paint scenery for
the Pantheon, at Edinburgh, It may be remarked
that he received no higher salary from Corri than
from Bannister, and did not reach thirty shillings a
week until he was engaged as scene-painter to the
theatre «,t Glasgow.

The tenting circuses of those days were on a

68 Circus Life

more limited scale than those of the present time,
and were met with chiefly at fairs. They had seldom
more than three or four horses, of which perhaps
only two appeared in the circle. Their proprietors
were not so regardless of colour as Philip Astley
was, and favoured cream-coloured, pied, and spotted
horses. While the acrobats performed ^ flips ' and
hand springs, and the clown cracked his ' wheezes,'
on the outside, while the proprietor beat his gong,
or bawled through a speaking-trumpet his invita-
tions to the spectators to ' walk up,' the horses stood
in a row on the platform ; and when the proprietor
shouted ' all in, to begin ! ' the animals were led or
ridden down the steps in front, and taken round to
the entrance at the side, whence they emerged on
the conclusion of the performance, to ascend the
steps, and resume their position on the platform.
The performances were short, consisting of two or
three acts of horsemanship, some tumbling, and a
tight-rope performance ; but they were repeated
from noon till near midnight as often as the seats
could be filled.

Even in the palmy days of fairs, the vicissitudes
of showmen were a marked feature of their lives,
owing, in part at least, to their dependence upon the
weather for success, and the variability of the
English climate. A wet fair was a serious matter

And Circus Celebrities. 69

for them, and the October fair at Croydon, one of
the best in the south, seldom passed over without
rain, which sometimes reduced the field to such a
state of quagmire that hurdles had to be laid down
upon the mud for the pleasure-seekers to walk upon.
Saunders, as we have seen, was seldom out of difl&-
culties ; and Clarke had not always even a tent, but
pitched his ring in a field, or on a common, in the
open air, after the manner of Philip Astley and his
predecessors. Price and Sampson, in the early days
of equestrian performances. He did not, however,
make a collection — called in the slang of the pro-
fession, ' doing a nob,^ — but made his gains by the
sale, at a shilling each, of tickets for a kind of ' lucky-
bag ' speculation among the spectators whom the
performances attracted to the spot. Sometimes
additional eclat would be given to the event by the
announcement that a greasy pole would be climbed
by competitors for the leg of mutton affixed to the
top, or a piece of printed cotton would be ofiered as
a prize for the winner in a race, for which only girls
were allowed to enter. Then, while the equestrian
of the company enacted the Drunken Hussar, or the
Sailor's Return, or Billy Button's ride to Brentford,
the acrobats would walk round with the tickets ; or
the equestrian would condescend to do so, while the
Polish Brothers tied themselves up in knots, or

70 Circus Life

wriggled between the rungs of a ladder, or Miss
Clarke delighted the spectators by her graceful
movements upon the tight-rope. The business
concluded with the drawing for prizes, which were
few in proportion to the blanks, and consisted of
plated tea-pots and milk jugs, work-boxes, japanned
tea-trays, silk handkerchiefs, &c. This kind of
entertainment was given within the last forty years;
but Clarke was then an old man, and with his death
the race of the mountebanks, as they were popularly
called, became extinct.

The last section of a mock Act of Parliament
published about this time gives a good idea of the
clown's business five-and- thirty years ago, and
affords the means of comparing the circus wit and
humour of that period with the laughter- provocatives
of the Merrymans of the present day. It runs as
follows : —

'And, he it further enacted, that when the scenes
in the circus commence, the Merriman, Grotesque,
or Clown shall not, after the first equestrian feat,
exclaim, " Now Pll have a turn to myself," previous
to his toppling like a coach- wheel round the ring ;
nor shall he fall flat on his face, and then collecting
some saw-dust in his hands drop it down from the
level of his head, and say his nose bleeds ; nor shall
he attempt to make the rope-dancer's balance-pole

And Circus Celebrities. 71

stand on its end by propping it up with the said
saw-dust ; nor shall he, after chalking the perform-
er's shoes, conclude by chalking his own nose, to
prevent his foot from slipping when he treads on it ;
nor shall he take long pieces of striped cloth for Mr
Stickney to jump over, while his horse goes under ;
previous to which he shall not pull the groom off the
stool, who holds the other end of the same cloth,
neither shall he find any difficulty in holding it at
the proper level ; nor, after having held it higher
and lower, shall he ask, " Will that do ? '* and, on
being answered in the affirmative, he shall not jump
down, and put his hands in his pockets, saying, " Fm
glad of it ; " nor shall he pick up a small piece of
straw, for fear he should fall over it, and afterwards
balance the said straw on his chin as he runs about.
Neither shall the Master of the Eing say to the
Merriman, Grotesque, or Clown, when they are leav-
ing the circus, "I never follow the fool, sir;" nor
shall the fool reply, '' Then I do,' and walk out after
him ; nor, moreover, shall the Clown say that '' the
horses are as clever as the barber who shaved bald
magpies at twopence a dozen ; " nor tell the groom
in the red jacket and top boots, when he takes the
said horses away, to " rub them well down with
cabbage-puddings, for fear they should get the
collywobbleums in their pandenoodles ; " such

72 Circtis Life.

speeches being manifestly very absurd and incom-
prehensible.

'Saving always, thai the divers ladies and gen-
tlemen, young ladies and young gentlemen, maid-
servants, apprentices, and little boys, who patronise
the theatre, should see no reason why the above
alterations should be made ; under which circum-
stances, they had better remain as they are.'

73

CHAPTER IV.

A few words about Menageries— George "Wombwell — The Liou
Baitings at Warwick — Atkins's Lion and Tigress at Astle^s —
A Bull-fight and a Zebra Hunt — Ducrow at the Pavilion — The
Stud at Drury Lane— Letter from Wooler to EUiston— Ducrow
and the Drury ' Supers ' — Zebras on the Stage — The first
Arab Troupe— Contention between Ducrow and Clarkson Stan-
field — Deaths of John Ducrow and Madame Ducrow — Miss
Woolford.

Circuses and menageries are now so frequently
associated, and the inmates of the latter have at
all times Been so frequently brought into connection
with the former, that it becomes desirable, at this
stage of the record, to say a few words about the
zoological collections of former times. Without
going back to the formation of the royal menagerie
in the Tower of London in the thirteenth century, it
may be stated that, when that appendage of regal
state was abolished, most of the animals were pur^
chased by an enterprising speculator named Cross,
who located them at Exeter Change. The want of
sufficient space there subsequently induced Cross to

74 Circus Life

remove the collection to the site afterwards known
as the Surrey Gardens, where, under the more
favourable conditions as to space, light, and air
afforded by that locality, it long rivalled that of the
Eoyal Zoological Society, which had, in the mean
time, grown up on the -north side of Eegent's Bark.
The travelling menageries probably grew, on a
small scale, side by side, as it were, with the royal
collection at the Tower, until they developed into
such exhibitions as, half a century ago, travelled
from fair to fair, in company with Richardson's and
GyngelPs theatres, Cooke's and SamwelFs circuses,
Algar's dancing booth, and the pig-faced lady.
WombwelPs menagerie was formed about 1805, and
Atkins's must have begun travelling soon after-
wards. These two shows were for many years
among the chief attractions of the great fairs, in
the days when fairs were annual red-letter days in
the calendar of the young, and even the upper
classes of society did not deem it beneath their
dignity to patronize the itinerant menagerie and the
tenting circus.

' Wombwell's,' said the reporter of a London
morning journal, about three years ago, by way
of introducing a report of the sale of Fairgrieves's
menagerie, ' had its great show traditions ; for
its founder was a showman of no ordinary enter-

And Circus Celebrities. 7^

prise and skill. He built up the menagerie, so to
speak, and he made it by far the finest travelling
collection of wild animals in the country. His heart
was in his work, and he. spared nothing that could
help it forward. Tales of his enterprise are many.
He never missed Bartlemy fair as long as it was
held ; once, however, he was very near doing so.
His show was at Newcastle within a fortnight of
Bartlemy's, and there were no railways. He had
given up all intention of going to the fair ; but,
being in London buying specimens, he found that his
rival — a man named Atkins — was advertising that
his would be the only wild beast show at the fair.

* Forthwith Wombwell posted down to New-
castle, struck his tent, and began to move south-
ward. By dint of extraordinary exertions he reached
London on the morning of the fair. But a terrible
loss was his. The one elephant in the collection —
a fine brute — had so over-exerted itself on the
journey that it died just as it arrived at the fair.
Atkins thought to make capital of this, and placarded
at once that he had " the only live elephant in the
fair." Wombwell saw his chance, and had a huge
canvas painted, bearing the words that within his
show was to be seen " the only dead elephant in the
fair." There never was a greater success; a live
elephant was not a great rarity, but the chance of

7 6 Circus Life

seeing a dead elephant came only once now and
then. Atkins's was deserted; WombwelFs was
crowded/

It is not easy to reconcile the keen rivalry be-
tween the two shows which this story is intended to
illustrate with the fact that they never visited
Croydon fair together, but always agreed to take
that popular resort in their tours in alternate years.
The story may be true, or it may be as apocryphal
as that of the lion and dog fights with which the
readers of another London morning journal were
entertained three months previously, when the tra-
gical incident of the death of the lion-tamer,
Macarthy, had invested leonine matters with more
than ordinary interest.

' Did you ever hear of old Wallace's fight with
the dogs ? ' an ex-lion-tamer was reported as having
said to the gentleman by whom the conversation
was communicated to the journal.

' George Wombwell was at very low water, and
not knowing how to get his head up again, he
thought of a fight between an old lion he had some-
times called Wallace, sometimes Nero, and a dozen
of mastiff dogs. Wallace was tame as a sheep — I
knew him well — I wish all lions were like him. The
prices of admission ranged from a guinea up to five
guineas, and had the menagerie been three times as

I

And Circus Celebrities. 77

large it would have been full. It was a queer go,
and no mistake ! Sometimes the old lion would
scratch a lump out of a dog^ and sometimes the dogs
would make as if they were going to worry the old
lion, but neither side showed any serious fight ; and
at length the patience of the audience got exhausted
and they went away in disgust. George's excuse
was, "We can't make 'em fight, can we, if they
won't ? " There was no getting over this ; and
George cleared over two thousand pounds by the
night's work.'

In this account two difierent animals are con-
founded ; the old lion, whose name was Nero, and a
younger, but full-grown one, named Wallace. The
blunder is strange and unaccountable in one who
professes to have known the animals and their
keeper, and renders it probable that he is altogether
in error about the fight he describes. The news-
papers and sporting magazines of the period — about
fifty years ago — describe two lion-baitings, which
took place in Wombwell's menagerie in the Old
Factory Yard, at Warwick ; and some vague re-
port or dim recollection of them seems to have
been in the mind of the 'ex-lion-king,' when he
dictated the graphic narrative for the morning
journal. The fights were said to have originated in
a bet between two sporting gentlemen, and the dogs

78 Circus Life

were not mastiffs, but bull-dogs. The first fight,
the incidents of which were similar in character to
those described by the ' ex-lion-king/ was between
Nero and the dogs ; and, this not being considered
satisfactory", a second encounter was arranged, in
which Wallace was substituted for the old lion, with
very different results. Every dog that faced the lion
was killed or disabled, the last that did so being
carried about in the lion^s mouth as a rat is by a
terrier or a cat.

I may add, that I have a perfect recollection of
both the lions, having made their acquaintance at
Croydon fair when a very small boy. I remember
the excitement which was once created amongst the
visitors to that fair by "WombwelFs announcement
that he had on exhibition that most wonderful animal,
the ' bonassus,' being the first specimen which had
ever been brought to Europe. As no one had ever
seen, heard, or read of such an animal before, the
curious flocked in crowds to see the beast, which
proved to be a very fine male specimen of the bison,
or American buffalo. Under the name given to it
by Wombwell, it found its way into the epilogue of
the Westminster play as one of the wonders of the
day. It was afterwards purchased by the Zoological
Society; but it had been enfeebled by confinement
and disease, and died soon after its removal to the

And Circus Celebrities. 79

Society's gardens in the Regent's Park. The
Hudson's Bay Company supplied its place by pre-
senting a young cow, which lived there for many
years.

Atkins had a very fine collection of the feline
genus, and was famous for the production of hybrids
between the lion and the tigress. The cubs so pro-
duced united some of the external characteristics of
both parents, their colour being tawny, marked
while they were young with dark stripes, such as
may be observed in the fur of black kittens, the
progeny of a tabby cat. These markings disap-
peared, however, as they do in the cat, as the lion-
tigers attained maturity, at which time the males
had the mane entirely deficient, or very little de-
veloped. I remember seeing a male puma and a
leopardess in the same cage in this menagerie, but
am unable to state whether the union was fruitful.

Atkins's lion and tigress, with their playful cubs,
were engaged by Ducrow and West as one of the
attractions of the season of 1832, and were intro-
duced to the frequenters of Astley's by their keeper,
Winney. A zebra hunt was also exhibited in the
circle, in which four zebras appeared ; and with this
novel spectacle was combined, on the occasion of
Ducrow's benefit, a mimic representation of a
Spanish bull-fight, in which the great equestrian

8o Circus Life

enacted the part of the matador. "When a similar
exhibition was got up, many years afterwards, at
the Alhambra, during the time when it was tempor-
arily converted into a circus, a horse was trained to
wear the horns and hide of an ox, and do duty for
Toro ; and, though I have not been able to verify
the fact, this was probably the case at Astley^s.

It was during this season that Ducrow had the
honour of performing before William lY., who or-
dered a temporary amphitheatre to be erected with-
in the grounds of the Pavilion at Brighton, in order
that he might witness the performances of this cele-
brated equestrian, which included several of his most
admired feats of horsemanship.

In the following year the bull -fight was repeated,
and the zebras re-appeared in the spectacle of Alad-
din. After the Amphitheatre was closed the stud
appeared at Drury Lane, instead of going into the
provinces; and this arrangement between Elliston
and the lessees of Astley's was repeated in more
than one season. Elliston's biographer relates that
when the stud was engaged for Croly's Enchanted
Courser, the horses and their grooms were at the
stage door of Drury Lane Theatre, at the time fixed
for the first rehearsal, but there was no one to direct
the important share which they were to take in the
performance. A note was sent to Ducrow, who

I

And Circus Celebrities.

replied that Hs agreement with Elliston only related
to the horses. This was found to be correct^ though
undoubtedly an oversight on the part of Elliston,
the Drury Lane manager, who had to make a second
agreement with Ducrow for his personal services in
superintending the training of the horses, and the
general arrangement of the scenes in which they
were to be introduced.

The introduction of horses on the stage of Drury
Lane was the subject of a letter to Elliston from
Thomas Wooler, of Yellow Dwarf fame, from which
the following passages, are extracted, as bearing
upon the long subsequent production of Richard III.
at Astley's, while under the management of William
Cooke.

^What think you of mounting Shakespeare's
heroes, as the bard himself would rejoice they should
be ? Why not allow the wand of Ducrow to aid the
representation of his dramas, as well as the pencil
of Stanfield ? " Saddle White Surrey " in good
earnest, and, as from The Surrey you once banished
these animals, and have taken them up at Drury
Lane, think of doing them justice. I fancy your
giving up the circle in St George's Fields, and
bringing your stable into a Theatre Eoyal, a little
inconsistent ; but no matter, it is done, and reminds
me of a friend of mine, who swept away his poultry-

6

82 Circus Life

yard from his suitable villa at Fulham, and yet kept
cocks and hens in Fleet Street.

' Bat to return ; instead of niggardly furnishing
Richard and Richmond with armies that do not
muster the force of a serjeant^s guard, give them an
efficient force of horse and' foot. Your two-legged
actors would be in arms against this project, but
disregard their jealousy, and remember that four to
two are two to one in your favour, Richard should
march to the field in the full panoply of all your
cavalry, and not trudge like a poor pedlar, whom no
one would dream of "interrupting in his expedition."
He might impressively dismount in compliment to
the ladies ; aud when in the field he cries, " My .
kingdom for a horse ! " the audience might fairly
deem such a price only a fair offer for the recovery
of so noble an animal. The audience would wish
Hotspur to manage his roan as well as his lady, and
though amongst your spectators there might be
perhaps a grey mare, yet she would be content that
Hotspur should be the "better horse" for her
night's amusement.'

What Wallett says of the absence of a good seat
on horseback from the list of the qualifications of
clowns and acrobats is true of actors, and in a
greater degree, in the sense, I mean, that is attached
to riding by professional entertainers, of the public.

And Circus Celebrities. 83

The number of actors who can ride at all is com-
paratively small; and among those who can, and
who make a decent figure in Rotten Eow, there are
probably not two who would venture to gallop
across a stage, and much less to take part in an
equestrian combat or joust. Hence it is only in the
arena of a circus that Richmond wins his crown as
he did at Bosworth ; and, though horses were again
introduced on the stage of Drury Lane in the drama
of Rehecca, they were not ridden by the actors
whose names appeared in the bills. The horses
belonged to a circus company, and were ridden by
the practised equestrians accustomed to bestride
them — ' doubles ' of the Knight of Ivanhoe and
Sir Brian Bois-Guilbert.

When Bernard^s hippo- dramatic spectacle of St
George and the Dragon was produced at Drury Lane,
under the superintendence of Ducrow, who had
acquired great experience in the arrangement of
equestrian cavalcades, pageants, and tableaux, there
was a great deal of trouble with the supernumer-
aries, who were not accustomed to doing their
business in the manner expected from them by so
accomplished a pantomimist as the lessee of Astley's.
While the scene was being rehearsed in which the
people appear excitedly before the Egyptian king,
with the news of the devastation and dismay caused

84 Circus Life

by the dragon, the ' supers * exhausted Ducrow's not
very large stock of patience, and, after making them
go through their business two or three times, without
any improvement, his temper burst out, in his
characteristic manner.

' Look here, you damned fools ! ' he exclaimed.
*" You should rush up to the King,^ — that chap there
— and say, " Old fellow, the dragon has come, and
we are in a mess, and you must get us out of it."
The King says, ^* Go to Brougham," and you all go
off to Brougham ; and he says, " What the devil do
I know about the dragon ? Go to your gods," and
your gods is that lump of tow burning on that
block of timber.'

This strange address was accompanied by an
exhibition of the pantomimic skill of which Ducrow
possessed a greater degree than any man of his day,
and which was intended to impress the subordinate
actors and supernumeraries of the theatre with a
correct idea of the manner in which their business
should be performed.

This was Ducrow's manner on all occasions.
One morning, during the season of 1833, he was on
the stage, in his dressing-gown and slippers, to
witness the first rehearsal of a new feat by the
German rope-walker, Cline. The rope was stretched
from the stage to the gallery, and the performer

And Circus Celebrities. 85

was to ascend it, and return. Cline was a little
nervous ; perhaps the rope had been arranged more
in accordance with Ducrow's ideas than with his
own. Whatever the cause, he hesitated to ascend
the rope, when Ducrow snatched the balancing-pole
from his hands, and walked up the rope in his
slippers, his dressing-gown flapping about his legs
in the draught from the stage in a manner that
caused his ascent to be watched with no small
amount of anxiety, though he did not appear to feel
the slightest trepidation himself.

The special attractions in the circle during the
season of 1834 were the Vintner family, who pre-
sented a novel performance on two and three ropes,
with double and single ascensions, which had been
much applauded the year before at Franconi's ; and
a troupe of Arab vaulters and acrobats, who seem to
have been the first of their race who had visited
Europe in that capacit}^. On the conclusion of the
season at Astley's, the stud went again to Drury
Lane, where Pocock^s spectacle of ILing Arthur and
the Kniglits of the Round Table was produced. The
production of this piece was the occasion of an
unfortunate contention between Ducrow and Clark-
son Stanfield, who was then scene-painter to Drury
Lane. The scenic artist had painted a beautiful
view of Carlisle, which he wished to be seen by the

86 Circus Life

spectators before tlieir attention was diverted from
it by the entry of Arthur and his knights. Ducrow
crowded the stage with men and horses, and wished
the curtain to rise upon this animated spectacle —
knights caracoling, banners waving, trumpets blar-
ing, people shouting their welcome. Bunn sided
with Ducrow, and Stanfield retired from his post,
mortified and offended.

Queen Adelaide witnessed the performance of
this spectacle, as she had that of the preceding
season, and was so much gratified that she ordered
a hundred pounds to be distributed among the
company. Count D'Orsay was so pleased with it,
that he presented Ducrow with a gold and ivory-
mounted dirk, and a pair of pistols inlaid with gold,
which had been worn by Lord Byron, and presented
by him to the Count.

Henry Adams was again a prominent member of
Ducrow's company in 1835, when he appeared in the
circle as the Mexican lasso-thrower, a part which he
performed with great dexterity. In the following
year, the Yintners and the Arabs were found a source
of undiminished attraction, but were joined with
Price, called the Bounding Ball, who exhibited the
then unparalleled feat of throwing thirty somer-
saults.

John Ducrow, brother of the renowned equestrian.

And Circus Celebrities. 87

who had been the principal clown of the Amphi-
theatre during the preceding ten yearSj died in 1834;
and Andrew Ducrow's first wife, the companion of
his early triumphs, died about two years afterwards.
Widdicomb, who had been ring-master of the
establishment for many years, died the same year,
at the age of sixty-seven. Ducrow subsequently
married Miss Woolford, who had for several years
been one of the leading attractions of his establish-
ment, and various members of whose family helped
to supply the travelling circuses with equestrians
and tight-rope performers for a long period;

88

CHAPTER V.

Lious and Lion-tamers— Manchester Jack— Van Amburgh— Carter's
Feats— What is a Tiger ? — Lion-driving and Tiger-fighting — Van
Amburgh and the Duke of Wellington— Vaulting Competition
between Price and North — Burning of the Amphitheatre —
Death of Ducrow— Equestrian Performances at the Surrey
Theatre — Travelling Circuses — Wells and Miller — Thomas
Cooke — Van Amburgh— Edwin Hughes— William Batty— Pablo
Fanque.

He must have been a bold man who fii'st undertook
to tame and train a lion. It has been jocosely
remarked that he must have been a courageous man
who first ventured to eat an oyster ; but a very
different degree of courage must have been pos-
sessed by the man who first ventured upon famili-
arities with the tawny monarch of the African
forests. The distinction is attributed to Hanno,
the Carthaginian general ; but the first public
exhibition of trained lions was given in the Amphi-
theatre at Rome, where Mai-k Antony, seated in a
car, with a lady by his side, drove a pair of lions
round the arena. But we must come down to

Circus Celebrities. 89

modern times for the first exhibition of tamed and
trained lions and tigers in this country. Van'
Amburgh is generally credited with the distinction
of having been the first lion-tamer of modem times;
but I remember seeing, when a very small boy, the
keeper of the lions in WombwelFs menagerie enter
the cage of a fine old lion, Nero; and sit on the
animal's back, open his mouth, &c. As this was more
than forty years ago, the performer must have been
' Manchester Jack,' who was enacting the part of
' lion king ' in WombwelFs menagerie when Yan
Amburgh, an American of Dutch descent, arrived in
England with his trained lions, tigers, and leopards.

It has been said that arrangements were made
for a trial of skill and daring between the American
and Manchester Jack, and that it was to have taken
place at Southampton, but fell through in con-
sequence of Yan Amburgh showing the white
feather. The story seems improbable, for Yan
Amburgh's daring in his performances has never
been exceeded.

' Were you ever afraid ? ' the Duke of Wellington
once asked him.

' The first time I am afraid, your Grace,' replied
the lion-tamer, ' or that I fancy my pupils are no
longer afraid of me, I shall retire from the wild
beast line.* f

90 Circus Life

After having been killed in the newspapers half
a dozen times, his back broken twice, and his head
once bitten off by a tigei". Van did retire, undevoured,
and died quietly in his bed about five years ago.
Manchester Jack also retired from the profession,
and kept an inn at Taunton for many years after-
wards, dying in 1865.

Van Amburgh and his trained animals were
engaged by Ducrow and West during the season of
1838 at Astley's, and proved a great attraction.
Then came Carter, another lion-tamer, who appeared
with his animals, in a drama specially written for
them, as Afghar, a lion- tamer, in which part he drove
a lion in harness and maintained a mimic fight with
an animal called in the bills a tiger. I have not been
able to ascertain whether this animal was really a
tiger, a point upon which doubt arises from the fact
of Carter^s collection being announced as containing
a fine ' Brazilian tiger,' and from the application of
the name by travellers and colonists imperfectly ac-
quainted with zoology to every feline animal which is
larger than a cat, and does not possess a mane. The
beautiful striped animal properly called a tiger has a
very circumscribed range, being found only in the hot
regions of Asia, south of the Himalayan mountains
and east of the Indus. But the South African
colonists call the leopard a tiger, and many travellers

\

And Circus Celebrities. 91

in the tropical regions of America speak of the
jaguar by that name. Carter's 'Brazilian tiger'
was, of course, a jaguar ; but his collection may have
contained a veritable tiger, and it maxj have been
the latter animal that he engaged in mimic conflict
with on the stage. Tigers are not usually suflBciently
docile to be trusted in such performances ; but the
possibility of their being so trained is proved by the
fact that I saw a struggle between a man and a tiger,
about five and thirty years ago, in a small show
pitched on a piece of waste ground at Norwood. It
was a rather tame affair, however, and, coupled with
the fact that the tiger was the sole representative of
the ' group of trained animals ' announced in the
bills, caused my boyish disappointment to vent itself,
as I passed out of the show, in a remark oh the dis-
crepancy between the promise and the performance.
' What can you expect for a penny ? ' was the
rejoinder of the shabby woman who acted as money-
taker ; and, though I felt that I ought to have seen
at least another animal, I passed on, silently
wondering how a tiger and several human beings
could be fed upon the scanty receipts of a little penny
show ; for there was a drama produced, the hero of
which was an English traveller, who underwent
harrowing adventures among savages and wild
beasts in Central Africa.

92 Circus Life

The ex-lion king, whose reminiscences and ex-
periences were recorded three years ago in a London
morning journal, computes the number of lions in
this country" at about fifty ; but this seems erroneous,
as there were ten in Fairgrieve's menagerie, and
probably as many in each of the other two shows
into which WombwelPs collection was divided at his
death, five in Manders's, and five attached to Sanger's
circus, besides those in Hilton's, Day's, and other
menageries. Bell and Myers's circus, and the
Zoological Gardens of London, Bristol, and Man-
chester. The greater number of them have been bred
in cages. . These are cheaper than the imported lions,
but seldom attain so large a size as the latter.
Jamrach, of Ratcliflfe Highway, is the agent through
whom most of the imported lions are procured. He
has agents abroad, and also buys from captains and
stewards of ships, who sometimes bring home wild
animals as a commercial speculation. As I lay claim
to no practical knowledge of the business of lion-
taming and lion-training, I quote here what the
^ ex-lion king' said on the subject two years ago, in
preference to writing at random about it.

' The lion- tamer,' we are told, ' likes to get his
beasts as young as he can, because then they are
more easily brought into order, although, no doubt,
there are many instances where a full-grown forest

And Circus Celebrities. 93

lion has been trained to high perfection. The lion-
tamer begins by taking the feeding of them into his
own hands, and so gets them to know him. He
commences feeding them from the outside of the
den, then ventures inside to one at a time, always
carefully keepiflg his face to the animal, and avoid-
ing any violence, which is a mistake whenever it
can be avoided, as it rouses the dormant devil in the
beasts. Getting to handle the lion, the tamer
begins by stroking him down the back, gradually
working up to the head, which he begins to scratch,
and the lion, which, like a cat, likes friction, begins
to rub his head against the hand. When this
familiarity is well established, a board is handed in
to the trainer, which he places across the den, and
teaches the lion to jump over it, using a whip with
a thong, but not for the purpose of punishment.
Gradually this board is heightened, the lion jumping
over it at every stage ; and then come the hoops,
&c., held on the top of the board to quicken the
beast's understanding. To teach "the animal to
jump over the trainer, the latter stoops alongside
the board, so that when the lion clears one he clears
the other, and half a dozen lessons are ordinarily
about sufficient to teach this. To get a lion to lie
down, and allow the tamer to stand on him, is more
difficult. It is done by flicking the beast over the

94 Circus Life

back with a small tickling whip, and at the same
time pressing him down with one hand. By raising
his headj and taking hold of the nostril with the
right hand, and the nnder lip and lower jaw with
the left, the lion, by this pressure on the nostril and
lip, loses greatly the power of his jaws, so that a
man can pull them open, and put his head inside
the beast's mouth, the feat with which Van Am-
burgh's name was so much associated. The only
danger is, lest the animal should raise one of its
fore-paws, and stick his talons in ; and if he does,
the tamer must stand fast for 'his life till he has
shifted the paw.'

This is a fool-hardy feat, in which a considerable
amount of risk is incurred, without exhibiting any
intelligence, grace, or docility on the part of the
lion. But the concluding bit of advice is note-
worthy, as lions and tigers, like cats, sometimes
extend their claws without intending any mischief,
and many injuries from them might be prevented
by presence of mind on the part of the exhibitor.

Stickney re-appeared at Astley's during the
season of Van Amburgh and Carter, and the vault-
ing performances of Price were supplemented by
the engagement of an American vaulter named
North. Between these two famous vaulters a com-
petition took place in the circle, when the unprece-

I

And Circus Celebrities. 95

dented number of one hundred and twenty somer-
saults were turned by each man.

DucroVs stud appeared, for a short season, in the
summer of 1841, at Vauxhall Gardens, returning to
the Amphitheatre for the winter. His last produc-
tion was the Dumb Man of Manchester, and the per-
formance of the principal character in that drama
was one of the most successful efforts as a pantomim-
ist which he ever exhibited. The conflagration by
which the Amphitheatre was destroyed for the third
time gave such a shock to »his system that mental
aberration and physical paralysis resulted, and he
died on the 27th of Januaiy 1842. His remains were
interred in Kensal Green cemetery, where the monu-
ment erected to his memory is one of the most
remarkable objects which arrest the eye of the
visitor.

The performers at Astley's, biped and quadru-
ped, found a temporary refuge, after the conflagra-
tion, at the Surrey theatre, which, having been
originally an amphitheatre, admitted of ready adapt-
ation to circus requirements. The dramatic company
being retained, a melo-drama was first presented,
and then the orchestra and a portion of the benches
of the pit were removed, and a ring formed in its
place. During the performance of the scenes in the
circle the orchestra and the displaced spectators

g6 Circtis Life

occupied seats ampliitlieatrically arranged on the
stage. T" The original status was then restored and
the performances concluded with the popular hippo-
dramatic spectacle of Mazeppa.

As the taste for equestrian and acrobatic per-
formances became more widely diffused, amphi-
theatres were erected at Liverpool by Oopeland, and
at Bristol, Birmingham, and Sheffield by James
Ryan ; while the travelling circuses increased yearly
in number and repute. Samwell's was still travel-
ling, but the rapid increase of wealth and population
in the northern towns, consequent upon the develop-
ment of manufactures, had induced its proprietor to
leave the southern circuit, and pitch his show near
the great industrial hives of Yorkshire and Lanca-
shire.

New names are presented to us in Wells and
Miller, in whose circus, then located at "Wakefield,
Wallett first assumed the distinctive designation of
' the Shakspeai-ian Jester.' Tom Barry, afterwards
so well known in connection with Astley's, was then
clowning in Samwell's circus. Wells and Miller
soon dissolved their partnership, and the former
started a separate concern, opening a very fine
circus at Dewsbury.

Thomas Cooke, after a professional tour in the
United States, returned to England and opened at

And Circus Celebrities. 97

Hull, afterwards visiting the principal towns in the
northern and midland counties. Van Amburgh
also, obtaining a partner with capital, started a
circus with his performing lions, tigers, and leopards
as an adjunct of no inconsiderable attractiveness.
One of John Clarke's daughters was his principal
equestrienne, and he engaged Wallett as clown.

Edwin Hughes brought out one of the largest
establishments of the kind which, at that time, had
ever been seen; but he could not make headway
against William Batty, who now came into notice,
and to ample means joined the indomitable energy
and enterprise of Astley and Ducrow. We find
Batty in 1836 at Nottingham, with a company which
included Pablo Fanque, a negro rope-dancer, whose
real name was William Darby ; Powell and Polaski,
for principal equestrians ; Mulligan, as head vaulter ;
and Dewhurst, as chief clown, with capacities for
every branch of the profession, being an admirable
vaulter and acrobat, a,nd a good rider. The stud
was as good as the company, and included a pair of
zebras, a wild ass, and an elephant, all of which,
with a contempt of local colouring worthy of
Ducrow, Batty introduced on the stage in Mazeppa !

Batty did not limit his movements to any part
of the United Kingdom. In 1838 we find him at
Newcastle and Edinburgh, and in 1840 at Ports-

98 Circus Life

mouth and Southampton. Some changes had been
made in the company, of which James Newsome,
now proprietor of one of the best of the provincial
circuses, Lavater Lee, the vaulter, and Plege, the
French rope-dancer, were prominent members. At
the time when Astley's was burnt for the third time,
Batty's circus was in Dublin, where a good stroke
of business had been done. On hearing of the con-
flagration. Batty started for London by the next
steamer, made arrangements for the immediate
rebuilding of the Amphitheatre, and returned to
Dublin. The receipts were beginning to decline
there, and, pending the completion of the new
Amphitheatre in Westminster Road, Batty resolved
to construct a temporary circus at Oxford. To that
city he accordingly proceeded, leaving the circus
under the management of Wallett, who, after travel-
ling for several years with Cooke, and two years
with Van Am burgh, had joined Batty in Dublin.
On the termination of the season in the Irish
capital, Wallett took the company and the stud to
Liverpool, and, as the circus at Oxford was not yet
ready for opening, arranged with Copeland for
twelve nights at the Amphitheatre. This engage-
ment, being made without the knowledge and
sanction of Batty, caused a warm dispute between
the latter and Wallett, which did not, however.

And Circus Celebrities. 99

have the immediate effect of terminating the clown's
engagement.

Wallett tells a humorous story of Pablo Fanque,
with whom he became intimately acquainted, and
who used to fish in the Isis. The black was a very
successful angler, and would pull the golden chub,
the silvery roach, and the bearded barbel out of the
river by the dozen when Oxonian disciples of Walton
could not get a nibble. One intelligent under-
graduate came to the conclusion that the circus
man's success must be due to his dusky complexion,
and astonished his brothers of the rod by appearing
one morning on the bank of the stream with a face
suggestive of the surmise that he must have been
playing Othello or Zanga at some private theatricals
the preceding night, and have gone to bed, as
Thornton — well known in the annals of provincial
theatres at the beginning of the present century —
once did, without wiping the black off. The
Oxonian caught no more fish, however, than he had
done before.

While Batty's circus was still at Oxford, Pablo
Fanque terminated his engagement, and started a
circus on his own account. Wallett, always a rolling
stone, joined him, and they proceeded to the north
together, opening at Wakefield, where, for the
present, we must leave them.

100

CHAPTER VI.

Conversion of the Lambeth Baths into a Circus— Garlick and the
Wild Beasts— Batty's Company at the Surrey— "White Conduit
Gardens— Re-opening pf Astley's— Batty's Cu-cus on its Travels—
Batty and the Sussex Justices — Equestrianism at the Lyceum
—Lions and Lion-tamers at Astley's— Franconi's Circus at Cre-
mome Gardens— An Elephant on the Tight-rope— The Art of
Balancing— Franconi's Company at Drury Lane — Van Amburgh
at Astley's — The Black Tiger — Pablo Fanque — Rivalry of
Wallett and Barry — Wallett's Circus — Junction with Franconi's.

"While waiting for tlie reconstruction of Astley's^
Batty obtained possession of tlie Lambeth Baths, a
spacious building in the immediate vicinity of the
Amphitheatre, and converted them, without loss of
time, into a circus, which he was enabled to open
at the close of November, 1841. Though the pro-
cess of conversion had been hastily carried out, the
accommodation and decorations left little to be de-
sired; and, as Dewhurst, the clown, observed on the
opening night, ^it, like a punch-bowl, looked all
the better for being full.''

' The performances last night,' said a critic.

Circus Celebrities. loi

' were multifarious. First, there was the phenomenon
rider, the volant Mr T. Lee, who, while riding one
or more fiery steeds, made " extraordinary and
wonderful leaps,'' as the play-bill says, round the
arena, and whose sinewy and symmetrical form, and
untiring activity, drew forth the admiration of the
audience. Tlie clown, however, thought proper to
pass a criticism upon his leg, declaring it was like
a bad candle, having more cotton than fat. Next
came Herr Ludovic's " celebrated extravaganza of
Jim Crow and his granny," in which the old trick
of carrying two faces under one hat is ludicrously
exemplified. Mr Walker followed, with his wonder-
ful feats on the flying rope and his celebrated
tourhilUons, in which he proved himself to be any-
thing but a walker. He was speedily displaced by
M. Leonard, the great French rider, on two fleet
steeds, who was miraculously adventurous, — "hazard-
ing contusion of neck and spine." A group of
ponies was then introduced, and delighted the
spectators with a variety of amusing and sagacious
tricks ; they fought, they leaped over poles, and
through hoops, they sat down and stood up at com-
mand, they wore cocked hats and cloaks, lace caps
and mantles, and supped with the clowns on oaten
pies, sitting at the table with all proper decorum;
they fetched and carried, they played at leap-frog.

I02 Circus Life

they inarched, they danced, they walked on their
hind legs, they bowed, and tbey went down on their
knees, for here that was an accomplishment, and
not a detriment, to any nag.

^A company of vaulters next performed some
daring leaps and threw somersaults ad infinitum
backwards or forwards, in rapid succession. After
this Miss O'Donnell performed some pretty evolu-
tions on horseback. Wonderful feats of " ponderos-
ity'^ were next displayed by M. Lavater Lee, who
balanced a feather and a plank forty feet long with
equal dexterity, and by various jugglings frequently
placed his physiognomy in jeopardy. These per-
formances being over there came, *^for the first
time, a novel introduction, replete with new and
splendid dresses, properties, and state carriage drawn
by four diminutive steeds," in which the whole
juvenile company appeared, entitled The Little Glass
Slipper. The foundation of this pantomime is old ;
but it was produced with ijew faces last n.ight, and
elicited loud and universal approbation. Some of
the perfoi'mers were scarcely able to toddle, but the
acting of the whole was unique, and deserving of all
the praise it received. The dresses and arrange-
ments were superlative in their style and efiect.
A series of gymnastics and equestrian exhibitions,
with a new piece, called The Wanderers of Hohonor

And Circus Celebrities. 103

and. the. Si fans, wound up the entertainments of
the evening, which were interspersed with the
witticisms and waggeries of two very clever clowns,
one of whom is a good punster, and the other a
supple posture-master and a capital performer on —
the penny trumpet.*

Early in 1842, the programme was varied by a
romantic spectacle called The Gouncil of Clermont,
devised for the introduction of a group of trained
lions, tigers, and leopards, brought from Batty' s
menagerie, accompanied by their performer, Garlick.
The spectacle comprised a triumphal cavalcade of
Frankish warriors, raediasval sports in rejoicing
for victory, the tricks of a Greek captive^s horse,
and the adventures of the Greek among the wild
beasts to whom he is thrown to be devoured.
It had a very brief run, however, and was succeededby
the elephant, and subsequently by a tournament, to
which was given the anachronical title of The Eglin-
ton Tomrncmient, or The Lists of Ashhy ! Shakspeare,
it may be said, has given, as the locality of the scene
of an incident in one of his plays, ' a sea-port in
Bohemia ; ' but the making the Eglinton tournament
take place at Ashby-de-la-Zouch is an anachronism
as glaring as the incongruity of elephants and zebras
in a Cossack camp.

The Olympic Arena, as Batty's new circus was

104 Circus Life

called, was tlie scene of some feats too remarkable
to be omitted from this record. Walker, on one
occasion, sustained the weight of six men, and held
six cart-wheels suspended, while hanging by the feet
from slings ; but it must be remarked that he held
only two of the wheels with his hands, the others
being attached in pairs to his feet, which were
secured in the slings, so that the weight fell chiefly
upon the rope to which the slings were attached.
More remarkable feats were performed by Lavater
Lee on his benefit night, when he vaulted over four-
teen horses, threw a dozen half-hundred weights
over his head, bent backward over a chair, and in
that position lifted a bar of iron weighing a hundred
pounds, threw a back somersault on a horse going
at full speed, and turned twenty-one forward somer-
saults, without the aid of a spring-board.

Dewhurst, the clown, must be allowed to speak
for himself in the bill which he issued for his bene-
fit, and which, as regards his own perfoijnances,
was as follows : —

' This is the night to see Dewhuest's long and
Lofty Jumps, without the assistance of a spring-
board : — 1. Over a garter 14 feet high. 2, Over a
man standing on a horse lengthways. 3. Through
a hoop of fire two feet in diameter. 4. Through a
circle of pointed daggers. 5. Over 10 horses. 6.

And Circus Celebrities. 105

Through six balloons. 7. Over three horses, one
standing on the backs of the other two. And finally,
to crown his extraordinary efforts, he will leap
through a Military Drum, and over a Eeal Post-
chaise AND Pair op Horses.

* During the evening will be introduced several
New Acts of Horsemanship, during the intervals of
which Mr Dewhurst will perform many surprising
Feats ; amongst the number, he will He Ms body in
a complete knot. After which he wiU walJc on his
hands, and carry in his mouth tivo fifty-six pound
weights ; in finis, it will be a Grand banquet night ! !
More entertainments than all the Aldermen in Lon-
don can swallow. Dishes to please Old and Young,
Father and Son — Daughter and Mother, Sister and
Brother — Fat and Lean, Dirty and Clean — Short
and Small, Big and Tall — Wise and Witty, Ugly
and Pretty — Good' and Bad, Simple or Sad — All
may enjoy, and plenty to pick and choose among —
Curious Speeches, Mild Observations, Strange Ques-
tions, and TJgly Answers — Shakspeare reversed, and
Milton with a glass eye — Conundrums, Piddles, Cha-
rades, Enigmas, and Problems — With a variety of
real Nonsensical Nonsense, too innumerable to men-
tion— hem !

'Mr Dewhurst will on this night dance an
Original Mock Cachouca, in a style nothing hke

io6 Circus Life

Madame Taglioni. Mr D. will likewise dance the
Cracovienne, as originally danced by Mademoiselle
Fanny Elsler, at her Majesty's Theatre, Italian
Opera House. He will also burlesque a favourite
dance of Madame Celeste ; and conclude with a New
Comic Lancashire Hornpipe in Clogs.*

Batty removed his company and stud at Whit-
suntide to the Surrey, for a short season, Dewhurst
taking another benefit, on which occasion he issued
the following characteristic appeal : —

' On this particular occasion Mr Dewhurst's

tongue will be placed on a swivel in the centre, and

black-leaded at both ends, to bring laughing into

fashion.

' I wonder how the people can
Call me Mr Merryman I
Wom are my clothes almost out
By being whipped and knocked about ;
Tom is my face in twenty places
By stretching wide to make grimaces.
My worthy cits,
Now is it fit
That you should sit,
Gallanting it,
The whole kit,
In box and pit,
To see me hit,
Boxed, cuffed, and smit,
Sham dead as a nit,
And laugh at it,
Till your sides split ?
There you sit.
Though requisite

A7td CirciLS Celebrities. 107

To rack my wit

These rhymes to knit,

Which I have writ

To bring the folks to a honse well lit,

To fill the house before we quit,

For a great attraction all admit

Will be on Dewhurst's benefit.'

From the Surrey, Batty and his company
removed to White Conduit Gardens, where a tem-
porary circus was erected for the summer season,
and in early autumn to the theatre at Brighton.
Astley's was re-opened shortly afterwards with a
powerful company and a numerous stud of beautiful
and well-trained horses. Batty was himself a
capital rider; Newsome, his articled pupil, was
already a very promising equestrian ; and the com-
pany was now joined by the celebrated Stickney,
who was a great attraction during several seasons.
A bull-fight was one of the special features of the
programme of 1842-3, a horse being, as on other
occasions when the conflicts of the Corrida de los
Toros have been represented in the arena, trained to
play the part of the bull.

While performing at Brighton, Batty was con-
victed of having performed a pantomime in a place
unlicensed for theatrical performances, whereby he
had incurred a penalty of £50 under an Act of
the reign of George II., which has been exercised
on several occasions to the vexation and loss of the

io8 Circus Life

circus proprietors against wliom it has been enforced.
Batty appealed against the. conviction, and engaged
counsel, by whom it was elicited from the witnesses
that the dialogue did not exceed fourteen lines, and
was merely an introduction to an equestrian and
acrobatic entertainment without scenery. It was
argued for the appellant that the spectacle which
had been represented was neither a pantomime nor
a stage play ; and that if an entertainment without
a stage or scenery was a ' stage play,' the well-
known tailor's ride to Brentford was a stage play,
and, if dialogue alone made an entertainment a stage
play, the clown must not crack jokes with the ring-
mastei', nor Punch appeal to the drummer outside
his temple. Counsel reminded the bench that the
Lord Chamberlain's jurisdiction did not extend to
the Surrey side of the Thames, and that magistrates
had power to grant licenses only at a distance of
twenty miles from the metropolis ; so that Astley's,
the Surrey, the Victoria, and the Bower infringed
with impunity the Act under which Batty had been
convicted. The conviction was quashed, but ^q
result of the appeal has not prevented other circus
proprietors from being similarly molested in other
parts of the country.

During the summer of 1843, Batty's company
performed in the Victoria Gardens, at Norwich,

A7td Circus Celebrities. '109

where the feats of Masotta, 'the dare-devil rider/
from Franconi's, formed a striking feature of the
programme. He was famous for leaping on and off
the horse, from side to side, and backward and
forward, while the animal was in full career. Plege,
the rope-dancer, and Kemp, the pole performer,
were also in the company.

On the company and stud returning to Astley's
in the autumn, the stirring events of the war in
Afghanistan were embodied in one of those patriotic
and military spectacles for which the establishment
was famous. The national pulse did not beat so
ardently at beat of drum and call of trumpet as it
had done a quarter of a century before, however,
and the run of the piece was proportionately short.
It was followed by a spectacular play founded upon
incidents connected with the battle of Worcester ;
a romantic equestrian drama, illustrative of the final
struggle between the Spaniards and the Moors;
and, towards the close of the season, by the ever-
attractive Mazeppa.

Young Newsome, who displayed considerable
abiUty as an equestrian pantomimist, was a great
attraction in the circle, which now began to be
enlivened by the humour of Tom Barry, who con-
tinued to be principal clown at this establishment
for several years. Among the more remarkable of

no Circus Life

the ring performances during- tliis season, other than
equestrian, were the feats of one of the Henglers on
the corde volante, and Kemp's tricks on the * magic
pole/

Equestrian entertainments were given in 1844,
for a short season, at the Lyceum Theatre ; and, in
the absence of rivalry, attracted good houses. At
Astley's, new aspirants to fame and popular favour
appeared in Plege, the French rope-dancer, and
Germani, a clever equestrian juggler, whose per-
formance seems to have somewhat resembled that
given a few years ago at the Holborn Amphitheatre
by Agouste, with the difference that Germani per-
formed his feats on the back of a horse. He juggled
with balls, oranges, and knives alternately, and then
with a marble, which he caught in the neck of a
bottle while the horse was in full career.

Carter, the lion-tamer, was also engaged towards
the close of the season; and, his re-appearance
having shown that the exhibition of trained hons
and tigers was still attractive, another of the pro-
fession, named White, was engaged by Batty in
1845, with a group of performing lions, tigers, and
leopards. White, however, never produced the
sensation created by the performances of Van Am-
burgh and Carter. The equestrianism was a very
strong feature of the programme this season, those

And Circus Celebrities. 1 1 1

accomplislied riders, John Bridges and Alfred
Cooke, being engaged, while Batty and Newsome
were pillars of strength in themselves. Cooke's
company appeared this year at the Standard, and
was succeeded in the two following years by Tour-
naire's and Columbians, but equestrian performances
did not attract there.

In 1846, Simpson, host of the Albion Tavern,
opposite Drury Lane Theatre, opened Cremorne
Gardens, for which be engaged the company and
stud of the famous Parisian circus of Fi-anconi.

At Astley's, in this year, Newsome revived
Ducrow's feat of riding six horses at once, in an
act called the Post-boy of Antwerp ; and a German
equestrian named Hinne, with his daughter Pauline,
were engaged. Young Newsome and Mdlle Hinn6
sometimes rode together in double acts, and in this
manner an acquaintance sprang up between them
which, becoming tenderer as it progressed, eventu-
ally ripened into marriage.

It was during the season of 1846 that the extra-
ordinary spectacle was witnessed at Astley's of an
elephant on the tight-rope. It is not more difficult,
however, for an elephant, or any other beast, to
balance itself upon a stretched rope than for a man
to do so ; the real difficulty is in inducing the animal
to mount the rope. The art of balancing consists

112 Circus Life

in the maintenance of the centre of gravity, which,
it may be explained, is that point in any body,
animate or inanimate, upon or about which it
balances itself, or remains in a state of equilibrium
in any position. In any regular-shaped body,
whether round or angular, provided its density is
uniform through all its parts, the centre of gravity is
the centre of the body ; but in an irregular-shaped
body, or a combination of two or more bodies, the
centre of gravity is the point at which they balance
each other. If we place any regular-shaped body
on a table, it will remain stationary, or in a state
of rest, provided an imaginary line drawn from its
centre of gravity, and passing downward in a direc-
tion perpendicular to the table, falls within its
base. But, if the centre of gravity is in a part of
the body above any palrt of the table that is out-
side the base, the object will topple over, and assume
some position in which the centre of gravity will be
within the base. Take, for example, a five-sided
block of wood, and place it upon the table. If the
five sides are each of the same superficies, it will
stand upon either of them ; but if they are unequal,
and it is so placed that the centre of gravity is above
a part of the table that is outside the face upon
which you attempt to make it stand, it will fall down.
There is a little toy which I remember having

Ajid CirciLs Celebrities. 113

seen when a child, and which, as it illustrates the
natural law upon which the art of balancing depends,
I will here describe. It was made of elder pith,
fashioned and coloured into a rough resemblance to
the human figure, and weighted with a piece of lead,
like the half of a small buUet, which was attached to
its feet with glue. The centre of gravity was, con-
sequently, so low that, in whatever position the
figure might be placed, it immediately assumed the
perpendicular, and could be kept in any other only
by holding it. Now, if the feet of a human being
were as much heavier than the head and trunk, as
the lead in this toy was heavier than the pith, we
should never be in any danger of losing our balance ;
and an infant might be allowed to make its first
essay in walking as soon as its legs were strong
enough to support it, without being in any danger
of a fall. But the head is, in proportion to its bulk,
much heavier than the trunk; and the breadth of
the trunk considerably exceeds that of the feet,
which constitute the base. The balance is, there-
fore, easily lost; because a stumble throws the
centre of gravity beyond the base.

Though the maintenance of the centre of gravity
is rendered more difficult in proportion to the height
to which it is raised above the base, as my younger
readers may have found when constructing a house

8

114 Circus Life

of cards, this is not the case when any disturbance
of the equilibrium can be counteracted immediately,
as in the case of a stick balanced on the tip of the
finger. A stick three or four feet long is more
easily balanced on the finger than one much shorter,
because the tendency to topple over can be counter-
acted by the movement of the finger in the direction
in which it leans, so as to maintain the centre of
gravity. Those who make an experiment of this
kind for the first time will be apt to find that the
balancing of a stick or a broom upon the finger is
difiScult, owing to the smallness of the base in pro-
portion to the height of the centre of gravity,
unless the eyes are directed towards the top. The
stick is at rest at the base, and any deviation from
the perpendicular must commence at the upper
extremity. Keep your eye on the top, and you can
balance a scaffold-pole or a ladder, if you can sus-
tain the weight. Whatever difficulty there was in
the feat of balancing a ladder, to the top of which a
small donkey was attached, as exhibited in my juve-
nile days by an itinerating performer, — whence the
saying, ' Twopence more, and up goes the donkey ! '
— was due entirely to the weight of the animal ;
because, if it was properly attached to the ladder,
the centre of gravity would be in precisely the same
situation as if the ladder alone had to be balanced.

And Circus Celebrities. 115

In the animal world, the centre of gravity is in-
variably so placed as to produce an exact equilibrium
and harmony of parts. Every animal furnished with
legs is balanced upon them ; so that in man the centre
of gravity is the crown of the head. The reader
may test this by leaning forward or laterally, with
the arms by the side, and the legs straight, when a
tendency to fall will be experienced, which can be
counteracted only by extending an arm or a leg in
the opposite direction. The art of balancing the
body in extraordinary situations, as exemplified in
the feats of rope-walkers and gymnasts, depends,
therefore, on the same natural law as that which
enables us to balance a stick upon the finger. The
centre of gravity must be kept perpendicular to the
rope or bar, any tendency to sway to the right or
left being corrected by the arms, or by the balanc-
ing-pole, if preferred, by performers on the rope.

I have dwelt upon this subject a little after the
manner of a lecturer, because so many of the feats
performed in the arena of a circus depend upon the
natural law which I have endeavoured to explain,
and many of my readers, who have witnessed them,
without being able to account for them, may like to
know something of the rationale. It may be asked,
and the question is a very pertinent one, why do not
equestrians fall in performing feats of horsemanship

ii6 Circus Life

in a standing position, in whiclij as the horse careers
round the ring, they lean inward ? This phenomenon
is due to the counterpoise which^ in the case of
bodies in a state of rapid motion, the centrifugal
force presents to the weight of the body.

Centrifugal force, it must be explained, is the
tendency which bodies have to fly off in a straight
line from motion round a centre; and the power
which prevents bodies from flying off, and draws
them towards a centre, is called centripetal force.
All bodies moving in a circle are constantly acted
upon by these opposing forces, as may be seen by
attaching one end of a piece of string to a ball, and
the other to a stick driven into the ground. If the
ball is thrown horizontally, with the string in a state
of tension, it will fly round the stick ; but, if it be-
comes disengaged from the string, the centrifugal
force, or its tendency to fly off, will cause it to
proceed in a straigh.t line from th.e point at which
the separation is effected.

Let us now see how these forces operate in the
case of the riders in a circus. The equestrian leans
inward so much that, if he were to stand still in that
position, he would inevitably fall off the horse ; but
the centrifugal force, which, has a tendency to impel
him outward from the circle, or in a straight line of
motion, sustains him, and he careers onward safely

And Circus Celebrities. 117

and gracefully. The tendency of the centrifugal
force to impel him outward is counteracted by the
inward leaning, while it forms an invisible support
to the overhanging body. It will be observed also
that the horse assumes the same counteracting pos-
ture ; and a horse quickly turning a comer does the
same.

Kesuming our record of circus performances, we
find Pablo Fanque at Astley's in 1847, with a won-
derful trained horse, Plege again appearing on the
tight-rope^ and Le Fort, 'the sprite of the pole,^ in
a novel and clever gymnastic performance. The
political events of which Paris was the scene in the
following year caused the managers of Franconi's
Cirque to transfer their company and stud to Drury
Lane Theatre, so that London had two circuses
open at the same time for the first time since the
days of Astley and Hughes.

John Powell appeared during this season at
Astley's, and an additional attraction was provided
in Van Amburgh's trained animals, to which, there
was now added a black tiger, a rare variety, and
one which had never been exhibited in a state of
docility before. It was introduced in the drama of
the Wandering Jew, a story which was then creating
a great sensation all over Europe ; and Van Am-
burgh personated the beast-tamer, Morok, through

ii8 Circus Life

whose instrumentality the Jesuits endeavour to
delay the old soldier, Dagobert, on his journey to
Paris, by exposing his horse to the fangs of a
ferocious black panther.

It was in this year, it may here be remarked,
that Sir Edwin Landseer's great picture of Van
Amburgh in the midst of his beasts was exhibited
at the Royal Academy, where it attracted as much
attention as the originals had done at Astley's.

Pablo Fanque's circus had, in the mean time,
moved from Wakefield to Leeds, where a catas-
trophe occurred which has, unfortunately, had too
many parallels in the annals of travelling circuses.
On a benefit night in March, 1848, the circus was
so crowded that the gallery fell, and Pablo's wife
was killed, and Wallett's wife and several other
persons were more or less injured. Wallett then
joined Ryan's circus, which, however, was on its
last legs ; bailifis were in possession, and its declin-
ing fortunes were brought to a climax by a ' strike '
of the band. At this crisis Wallett had the good
fortune to be engaged for Astley's, where a keen
rivalry soon ensued between him and Barry, who
claimed the choice of acts in the ring, in his exercise
of which Wallett was not disposed to acquiesce.
Thompson, the manager, took the same view as the
latter of the equality of position of the two clowns ;

And Circus Celebrities. 119

and Barry, in consequence, refused to perform,
unless the choice of acts was conceded to him. A
very attractive act was in rehearsal at this time, in
which John Dale was to appear as an Arab, with a
highly-trained horse, and Barry as a rollicking
Irishman. As Wallett had attended all the rehear-
sals he was as capable of taking this part as the
other clown was, and, on Barry failing to appear, he
was requested by Thompson to take the part which
had been assigned to his rival. Wallett complied,
and enacted the part of Barney Brallaghan with
complete success. Barry thereupon retired, and for
many years afterwards kept a public-house in the
immediate vicinity of the theatre.

Thompson was succeeded in the management by
William Broadfoot, the brother-in-law of Ducrow,
whom he resembled very much in disposition and
temper. One day, during the rehearsal of a military
spectacle, a cannon ball, which was among the stage
properties, was thrown at him, which so enraged
him that he offered a reward of £2 for information
as to the person by whom it had been thrown, the
hand which had impelled the missile being unknown
at least to himself. There was a fine of ten shillings
for practical joking during rehearsals, but the
reward left a wide margin for its payment, and
tempted Wallett to acknowledge that he was the

1 20 Circus Life

offender. Broadfoot paid tlie reward, and Wallett
paid the fine, afterwards expending tlie balance of
thirty shillings in a supper, shared with Ben Crow-
ther, Tom Lee, and Harvey, the dancer.

There was another supper at Astley's which the
parties did not find quite so pleasant. Batty pro-
duced an equestrian drama called the DeviVs Horse,
in which Wallett had to play a subordinate part, one
agreeable incident of which was the eating of a plate
of soup. One night, James Harwood, the equestrian
actor, intercepted the soup in transit, and refreshed
himself with a portion of it, which so enraged Wal-
lett that he broke the plate on the offender's head.
By this assault he incurred the penalty of being
mulcted of a week's salary, the means of evading
which exercised his mind in an unusual degree.
The expedient which he hit upon was the borrowing
of ten pounds from the treasurer, George Francis,
having obtained which he went his way rejoicing.
He did not present himself at the treasury on the
following Saturday; and Batty, meeting him on
Monday morning, inquired the reason of his absence.

' I had no salary to receive,' replied Wallett. ' I
had borrowed ten pounds of Mr Francis in the
week.'

* Then your fine will be a set off against next
week's salary,' observed Batty.

A nd Circus • CelebiHties. 121

' Aren^t you aware, sir,' rejoined Wallett^ 'that the
time I was engaged for expired on Saturday night ? *

By this stratagem he escaped the payment of
the fine ; but his engagement was not renewed, and,
having saved some money, he started a circus, and
opened with it at Yarmouth. Business was very
bad there, and he proceeded to Colchester, where
part of the circus was blown down by a high wind,
and this accident created an impression of insecurity
which damaged his prospects in that town beyond
repair. At Bury St Edmunds and Leicester he was
equally unsuccessful, and determined to proceed
northward. Nottingham afibrded good houses, but
Leeds was a failure, and at Huddersfield the gallery
gave way, and the alarm created by the accident
deterred persons from venturing into the circus
afterwards. Franconi's company were doing good
business at Manchester, in the Free Trade Hall, at
this time ; and Wallett, after two more experiments,
at Burnley and Wigan, with continued ill fortune,
effected an amalgamation with the French troupe.
James Hernandez, one of the most accomplished
equestrians who have ever entered the arena, made
his dthut at Manchester while the combined com-
panies and studs were performing there, and proved
so sterling an attraction that he was engaged for
the following season at Astley's.

122 Circus Life

Crowther, wlio lias been incidentally mentioned
in connection with Wallett, married Miss Vincent,
' the acknowledged heroine of the domestic drama/
as she was styled in the Victoria bills. The union
was not a happy one, though the cause of its infeli-
city never transpired. It was whispered about,
however, that a prior attachment on Crowther^s part
to another lady had something to do with it ; and
there were many significant nods and winks, and
grave shakings of the head, at the bar of the
Victoria Tavern, and at the Rodney and the
Pheasant, over the circumstance of his strange
behaviour in the church at which he and the fair
Eliza were mariied. The talk was, that the bride^s
position and worldly possessions had tempted him
to break the word of promise he had plighted to
another, and that compunction for his faithlessness
was the cause of his strangeness of demeanour on
the wedding-day, and of the domestic infelicity
which it preluded. But nothing ever transpired to
show that these rumours had any foundation in fact.

123

CHAPTER VII.

Hengler's Circus — John and George Sanger— Managerial Anachron-
isms and Incongruities— James Hernandez — Eaton and Stone-
Horses atDrury Lane — James Newsome— Howes and Cushing's
Circus — George Sanger and the Fighting Lions — Crockett and the
Lions at Astley^s — The Lions at large — Hilton's Circus — Lion-
queens— Miss Chapman — Macomo and the Fighting Tigers.

The haze whicli envelopes the movements of travel-
ling circuses prior to the time when they began to
be recorded weekly in the Era cannot always be
penetrated, even after the most diligent research.
Circus proprietors are, as a rule, disposed to reti-
cence upon the subject ; and the bills of tenting
establishments are seldom preserved, and would
afford no information if they were, being printed
without the names of the towns and the dates of
the performances. I have been unable, therefore,
to trace Hengler^s and Sanger's circuses to their
beginnings ; but, having seen the former pitched
many years ago in the fair-field, Croydon, I know
that it was tenting long before its proprietor

12 4- Circus Life

adopted the system of locating his establishment
for some months together in a permanent building.
Both Hengler's and Sanger's must have been travel-
ling nearly a quarter of a century, and the career of
both has been prosperous.

Indeed, the most successful men in the profes-
sion have been those who have lived from their in-
fancy in the odour of the stables and the sawdust.
Such a man was Ducrow, and such also are the
Cookes, the Powells, the Newsomes, the Henglers,
the Sangers, and, I believe, almost every man of
note in the profession. They are not, as a rule,
possessed of much education, which may account
for the incongruities so frequently exhibited in the
' getting up ' of equestrian spectacles, and the per-
plexities which so often meet the eye when the pro-
prietor of a tenting circus parades in type the
quadrupedal resources of his establishment.

I remember seeing a zebra in the Cossack camp
in Mazeppa, and that, too, at Astley's ; for neither
Ducrow nor Batty cared much for correctness of
local colouring, if they could produce an effect by
disregarding it. Lewis, when reminded of the in-
congruity of the introduction of a negro in a North-
umbrian castle, in the supposed era of the Castle
Spectre, replied that he did it for effect ; and if an
effect could have been produced by making his

And Circus Celebritiss. 125

heroine blue, blue slie should have been. The
effect, however, is sometimes perplexity, rather than
excitement, so far at least as the educated portion
of the community is concerned.

I saw at Kingston, some years ago, immense
placards announcing the coming of Sanger's circus,
and informing the public that the stud included
some Brazilian zebras, and the only specimen ever
brought to Europe of the ^ vedo, or Peruvian god-
horse.' Every one who has read any work on
natural history knows that the zebra is confined to
Africa, and that the equine genus was unknown in
America until the horses were introduced there by
the Spaniards. Not having seen the animal, I am
not in a position to say what the ' vedo ' really is or
was ; but it is certain that the only beasts of burden
possessed by the Peruvians before horses were in-
troduced by their Spanish conquerors were the llama
and the alpaca, which are more nearly allied to the
sheep than to any animal of the pachydermatous
class, to which the horse belongs.

Leaving these wandering circuses for a time, we
must turn our attention for a little while to the per-
manent temples of equestrianism in the metropolis.
James Hernandez made his appearance at Astley's
during the season of 1849, in company with John
Powell, John Bridges, and Hengler, the rope-dancer.

126 Circus Life

Bridges exhibited a wonderful leaping act, and
Powell's acts were also much admired ; but the palm
was awarded by public acclamation to Hernandez,
whose backward jumps and feats on one leg elicited
2k furore of applause at every appearance. His suc-
cess, and consequent gains, enabled him, on leaving
Astley's, and in conjunction with two partners,
Eaton and Stone, to form a stud, with which they
opened on the classic boards of Drury Lane.

Among the company was an equestrian who ap-
peared as Mdlle Ella, and whose graceful acts of
equitation elicited almost as much applause as those
of Hernandez, while the young artiste's charms of
face and form were a never-ending theme of convers-
ation and meditation for the thousands of admirers
who nightly followed them round the ring with en-
raptured eyes. It was the same wherever Ella ap-
peared, and great was the surprise and mortification
of the young equestrian's admirers when it became
known, several years afterwards, that the beautiful,
the graceful, the accomplished Ella was not a woman,
but a man ! Ella is now a husband and a father.

James Newsome was also a member of the veiy
talented company which Hernandez and his partners
had brought together under the roof of Drury Lane.
After completing his engagement with Batty, and
entering into matrimonial obligations with Pauline

And Circus Celebrities. 127

Hinii^ lie liad proceeded to Paris, where he applied
himself earnestly to the art of which he soon became
a leading master, namely, the breaking of horses in
what is termed the haute ecole, then almost unknown
in this country. The fame which he acquired in
Paris procured him an engagement in Brussels,
where he taught riding to the Guides, by whose
officers he was presented, on leaving the Belgian
capital, with a service of plate. From Brussels he
proceeded to Berlin, of which city Madame Newsome
is a native. There the famous English riding master
added to his laurels by breaking a vicious horse
named Mirza, belonging to Prince Frederick
William (now heir to the imperial crown of Ger-
many), who presented him with the animal, in
recognition- of his skill. It may here be added,
that he had the honour, some years afterwards, of
exhibiting his system of horse-breaking before the
Prince of Wales and the Duke of Cambridge, by
whom it was highly commended.

On the termination of their season at Drury
Lane, Hernandez and his partners associated New-
some with themselves in the firm, and made a suc-
cessful tour of the provinces. In the following
season, however, Newsome separated from his
partners, and started a well-appointed circus of his
own. The distinctive features of his estabhshment

128 Circus Life

are, tliat he breaks his horses himself — other circus
proprietors, not having the advantage of himself.
Batty, and Ducrow, of being trained in the pro-
fession, being compelled to hire horse-breakers j
and that the performances are not given under a
tent, set up for a couple of days only, and then
removed to the next town, as in the case of most
other circuses, but in buildings erected for the
purpose in most of the large towns of the north of
England, and permanently maintained.

The great Anglo-American circus of Howes and
Gushing was added to the number of the circuses
travelling in England and Scotland about this time.
The strength of the company and stud, and the
resources of the proprietors, threatening to render
it a formidable rival to the English circuses, the
Sangers were prompted by the spirit of competition
to take a leaf from Batty's book, and introduce per-
forming lions. The lions were obtained, and the
appointment of ' lion king ^ was offered to a musician
in the band, named Crockett, chiefly on account of
his imposing appearance, he being a tall, handsome
man, with a full beard. He had had no previous
experience with wild beasts, but he was suffering
from a pulmonary disease, which performing on a
wind instrument aggravated, and the salary was
tempting. So he accepted the appointment, and

And Circus Celebrities. 129

followed the profession literally till the day of his
death. It is worthy of remark, as bearing on the
causes of accidents with lions and tigers, that
Crockett was a strictly sober man ; and so also was
the equally celebrated African lion-tamer, Macomo,
who never drank any beverage stronger than coffee.
Many anecdotes are current in circuses and menag-
eries of the rare courage and coolness of both men.
One of Sanger^ s lions was so tame that it used
to be taken from the cage to personate the British
lion, lying at the feet of Mrs George Sanger, in the
character of Britannia, in the cavalcades customary
with tenting circuses when they enter a town, and
which are professionally termed parades. One
morning, when the circus had been pitched near
Weymouth, the keepers, on going to the cage to
take out this docile specimen of the leonine tribe,
found the five lions fighting furiously with each
other, their manes up, their talons out, their eyes
flashing, and their shoulders and flanks bloody.
Crockett and the keepers were afraid to enter. But
George Sanger, taking a whip, entered the cage,
beat the lions on one side, and the lioness, who was
the object of their contention, on the other, and made
a barrier between them of the boards which were
quickly passed in to him for the purpose. This
exciting affair did not prevent the lions from being

130 Circus Life

taken into the ring on the conclusion of the eques-
trian performance, and put through their regular
feats.

If Crockett temporarily lost his nerve on this
occasion, it must be acknowledged that he exhibited
it in a wonderful degree at the time when the lions
got loose at Astley's. The beasts had arrived the
night before from Edmonton, where Sanger's circus
was at that time located. How they got loose is
unknown, but it has been whispered, as a conjecture
which was supposed not to be devoid of foundation,
that one of the grooms liberated them in resent-
ment of the fines by which he and his fellows were
mulcted by Batty, and in the malicious hope that
they would destroy the horses. Loose they were,
however, and before Crockett, to whose lodging a
messenger was sent in hot haste, could reach the
theatre, one of the grooms was killed, and the lions
were roaming about the auditorium. Crockett
went amongst them alone, with only a switch in
his hand, and in a few minutes he had safely caged
the animals, without receiving a scratch.

These lions were afterwards sold by the Sangers
to Howes and Cushing, when the latter were about
to return to America, and Crockett accompanied
them at a salary of £20 a week. He had been two
years in the United States, when one day, while the

And Cirais Celebrities. 131

circus was at Chicago, lie fell down wliile passing
from the dressing-room to the ring, and died on the
spot. The Sangers possess lions at the present day,
and one of them is so tame that, as I am informed,
it is allowed to roam at large in their house, like a
domestic tabby. This is probably the animal which,
on the occasion of the Queen's thanksgiving visit
to St PauPs, reclined at the feet of Mrs George
Sanger, on a triumphal car, in the ' parade ' with
which the day was celebrated by the Sangera and
their troupe.

While Crockett was still travelling with the
Sangers, and to counterbalance the attractiveness of
his exhibitions, it was suggested to Joseph Hilton
by James Lee, brother of the late Nelson Lee, that
the former's daughter should be * brought out ' in
his circus as a ' lion queen.' The young lady was
familiar with lions, another of the family being the
proprietor of a menagerie, and she did not shrink
from the distinction. She made her first public
appearance with the lions at the fair, since sup-
pressed, which used to be held annually on Stepney
Green. The attractiveness of the spectacle was
tempting to the proprietors of circuses and mena-
geries, and the example was 'contagious. Edmunds,
the proprietor of one of the three menageries into
which Wombwell's famous collection was divided on

132 Circus Life

the death of the original proprietor in 1850, formed
a fine group of lions, tigers, and leopards, and Miss
Chapman — now Mrs George Sanger — volunteered
to perform with them as a rival to Miss Hilton.

Miss Chapman, who had the honour of appearing
before the royal family at Windsor, had not long
been before the public when a third ' Hon-queen '
appeared at another of the three menageries just
referred to in the person of Helen Blight, the daugh-
ter of a musician in the band. The career of this
young lady was a brief one, and its termination most
shocking. She was performing with the animals at
Greenwich fair one day, when a tiger exhibited some
sullenness or waywardness, for which she very im-
prudently struck it with a riding whip which she
carried. The infuriated beast immediately sprang
upon her, with a hoarse roar, seized her by the throat
and killed her before she could be rescued. This
melancholy affair led to the prohibition of such per-
formances by women ; but the leading menagei'ies
have continued to have ' lion-kings ' attached to them
to this day.

Twenty years ago the lion-tamer of George
Hilton's menagerie was Newsome, brother of the
circus proprietor of that name ; and on this per-
former throwing up his engagement at an hour'a
notice, owing to some dispute with the proprietor.

And Circus Celebrities. 133

a man named Strand, who travelled about to fairs
with a gingerbread stall, volunteered to take his
place. His quahfications for the profession were
not equal to his own estimate of them, however,
and James Lee, who was Hilton^s manager, looked
about him for his successor. One day, when the
menagerie was at Greenwich fair, a powerful-looking
negro accosted one of the musicians, saying that he
was a sailor, just returned from a voyage, and would
like to get employment about the beasts. The
musician informed Manders, into whose hands the
menagerie had just passed, and the negro was
invited into the show. Manders liked the man's
appearance, and at once agreed to give him an op-
portunity of displaying his qualifications for the
leonine regality to which he aspired. The negro
entered the lions' cage, and displayed so much
courage and address in putting the animals through
their performances that he was engaged forthwith ;
and the ' gingerbread king,' as Strand was called by
the showmen, lost his crown, receiving a week's
notice of dismissal on the spot.

This black sailor was the performer who after-
wards became famous far and wide by the name of
Macomo. The daring displayed by him, and which
lias often caused the spectators to tremble for his
safety, was without a parallel. ' Macomo,' says the

134 Circus Life

ex-lion king, in the account before quoted, ^ was the
most daring man among lions and tigers I ever saw/
Many stories of his exploits are told by showmen.
One of the finest tigers ever imported into this
country, and said to be the identical beast that
escaped from Jamrach's possession, and killed a boy
before it was recaptured, was purchased by Manders,
and placed in a cage with another tiger. The two
beasts soon began to fight, and were engaged in a
furious conflict, when Macomo entered the cage,
armed only with a whip, and attempted to separate
them. Both the tigers immediately turned their fury
upon him, and severely lacerated him with their sharp
claws; but, covered with blood as he was, he continued
to belabour them with the whip until they cowered
before him, and knew him for their master. Then,
with the assistance of the keepers, he succeeded in
getting one of the tigers into another cage, and
proceeded to bind up his wounds. This was not the
only occasion on which Macomo received injuries, the
scars of which he bore to his grave. Every one who
witnessed his performances predicted for him a vio-
lent death. But, like Yan Amburgh, like Crockett,
he seemed to bear a charmed life ; and he died a
natural death towards the close of 1870.

^3S

CHAPTER VIII.

Pablo Panque — James Cooke — Pablo Fanque and the Celestials —
Ludicrous affair in the Glasgow PoUce-court— Batt/s transactions
with Pablo Fanque— The Liverpool Amphitheatre— John Clarke
— ^WiUiam Cooke— Astle/s—Fitzball and the Supers — Batty's
Hippodrome— Vauxhall Gardens— Gmnett's Circus— The Alham-
bra— Gymnastic Performances in Music-Hails— Gymnastic Mis-

When Wallett, the clown, returned from his
American tour, he had arranged to meet Pablo
Fanque at Liverpool, with a view to performances in
the amphitheatre there; but when the Shakspearian
humourist arrived in the Mersey, his dusky friend
was giving circus performances in the theatre at
Glasgow, with James Cooke's large circus on the
Green, in opposition to him. London was not, at
that time, thought capable of supporting more than
one circus, and it was not to be expected that Glas-
gow could support two, even for a limited period.
Pablo Fanque retired from the contest, therefore,
and removed his company and stud to Paisley.

v>

6 Circus Life

Doing a good business in that town, he returned to
Glasgow with a larger circus, a stronger company,
and a more numerous stud, and Cooke retired in his
turn.

Wallett, who had been clowning in Franconi's
circus, then located in Dublin, joined Pablo Fanque
in Glasgow, and between them they devised an
entertainment which was found attractive, but
which produced most ludicrous consequences.
There was a posturer in the company, whose Hiber-
nian origin was concealed under the nom, dt,^ arena of
Yilderini; and it was proposed that this man should
be transformed, in semblance at least, into a Chinese.
The Irishman did not object, though the process
involved the shaving of his head, and the staining
of his skin with a wash to the dusky yellow tint
characteristic of the veritable compatriots of Con-
fucius. The metamorphosis was completed by ar-
raying him in a Chinese costume, and conferring
upon him the name of Ki-hi-chin-fan-foo, which
appeared upon the bills in Chinese characters, as
well as in the English equivalents. Whether his
sponsors had recourse to a professor of the peculiar
language of the Flowery Land, or took the characters
from the more convenient source presented by a
tea-chest or a cake of Indian ink, I am unable to
say; but the strange scrawl served its purpose.

And Circus Celebrities. 137

which, was to attract attention and excite curiosity,
and the few Celestials in Glasgow were either more
unsophisticated than the ^ heathen Chinee ' immor-
talized by Bret Harte, and suspected no deception,
or they were too illiterate to detect it.

It happened that an enterprising tea-dealer in
the city had, some time previously, conceived the
idea of engaging a native of China to stand at the
shop-door, in Chinese costume, and give handbills
to the Glasgowegians as they passed. A Chinese
was soon obtained, and posted at the door, where,
in a few weeks, he found himself confronted with a
fellow-countryman, who was similarly engaged at a
rival tea-shop on the other side of the street. The
two Chineses — Milton is ray authority for that word
— could not behold the circus bills, with their
graphic design of a Chinese festival and the large
characters forming the name of the great posturer
who had performed before the brother of the sun
and the moon, without being moved. They went
to the circus, and, in a posturing act, to which a
Chinese character was imparted by a profuse dis-
play of Chinese lanterns and a discordant beating
of gongs, thumping of tom-toms, and clashing of
cymbals, by supernumeraries in Chinese costumes,
they beheld the great Ki-hi-chin-fan-foo.

On the conclusion of the performance, they went

138 Circus Life

round to what in a theatre would be termed the
stage-door, asked for their countryman, and evinced
undisguised disappointment on being informed that
he could not be seen. They repeated their applica-
tion several times, but always with the same result ;
and, the idea growing up in their minds that their
countryman was held in durance, and only liberated
to appear in the ring, they went to the police-court,
and made an affidavit that such was their belief.
Pablo Fanque was, in consequence, called upon for
an explanation, and found himself obliged to pro-
duce the posturer in court, and put him in the
witness box to depose that he was not a country-
man of the troublesome Chineses, but a native of
the Emerald Isle, who could not speak a word of
Chinese, and had never been in China in his
hfe.

Pablo Fanque moved southward on leaving
Glasgow, but he fell into difficulties, and borrowed
money of Batty, giving him a bill of sale upon the
circus and stud. Going into the midland districts,
and finding Newsome's circus at Birmingham, he
went on to Kidderminster, where, failing to carry
out his engagements with Batty, the latter took
possession of the concern, and announced it for
sale. Becoming the purchaser himself, he consti-
tuted Fanque manager, thus displacing Wallett,

And Circtis Celebrities. 139

who had been acting in that capacity for the late
proprietor.

Wallett endeavoured to make an arrangement
for the company and stud to appear in the amphi-
theatre at Liverpool, but could not obtain Batty's
acquiescence. Having engaged with Copeland to
provide a circus company and horses, Batty's refusal
to allow the Fanque troupe to go to Liverpool put
him to his shifts. Having to form a company in
some way, he engaged two equestrians, Hemming
and Dale, who happened to be in Liverpool without
engagements ; and hearing' that John Clarke, then
a very old man, was in the neighbourhood, with
three horses and as many clever lads, he arranged
with him for the whole. He then started for
London by the night train, roused William Cooke
early in the morning, and hired of him eight ring
horses and a menage horse, at the same time en-
gaging Thomas Cooke for ring-master, with his
pony, Prince, and his son, James Cooke, the younger,
as an equestrian. These were got down to Liver-
pool with as little delay as possible, and the amphi-
theatre was opened for a season that proved highly
prosperous.

In 1851, the expectation of great gains from the
concourse of foreigners and provincials to the Great
International Exhibition in Hyde Park induced

140 Circus Life

Batty to erect a spacious wooden structure, capable
of accommodating fourteen thousand persons, upon
a piece of ground at Kensington, opposite the gates
terminating the broad walk of the Gardens. It
was opened in May as the Hippodrome, with amuse-
ments similar to those presented in the Parisian
establishment of the same name, from which the
company and stud were brought, under the direction
of M. Soullier. Besides slack-rope feats and the
clever globe performance of Debach, there was a
race in which monkeys represented the jockeys,
a steeple chase by ladies, an ostrich race, a chariot
race, with horses four abreast, after the manner of
the ancients, and the feat of riding two horses, and
driving two others at the same time, the perform-
ances concluding with one of those grand equestrian
pageants, the production of which subsequently
made the name of the Sangers famous, in connection
with the Agricultural Hall.

Fitzball wrote some half-dozen spectacular
dramas for Batty during the latter's management of
Astley's, one of the earliest of which was The
WJiite Maiden of California, in which an effect was
introduced which elicited immense applause at every
representation. The hero falls asleep in a mountain
cavern, and dreams that the spirits of the Indians
who have been buried there rise up from their

And Circus Celebrities. 141

graves around him. The departed braves, each
bestriding a cream-coloured horse, rose slowly
through traps, to appropriate music; and the
sensation produced among the audience by their
unexpected appearance was enhanced by the statue-
like bearing of the men and horses, the latter being
so well trained that they stood, while rising to the
stage, and afterwards, as motionless as if they had
been sculptured in marble.

Fitzball adapted to the hippo-dramatic stage the
spectacle of Azael, produced in 1851 at Drury Lane.
At the first rehearsal, there was as much diflSculty
in drilling the gentlemen of the chorus into unison,
to say nothing of decorum, as Ducrow had experi-
enced at Drury Lane in instructing the small fry of
the profession in the graces of elocution. There
was an invocation to be chanted to the sacred bull
by the priests of Isis, and the choristers, who seem
to have been drawn from the stables, entered in an
abrupt and disorderly manner, some booted and
spurred, and carrying whips, others holding a curry-
comb or a wisp of hay or straw. Kneeling before
the shrine, they shouted the invocation in stentorian
tones, and with a total disregard of unison ; and
during a pause they disgusted the author still more
by indulging in horse-play and vulgar ' chaff.'

Fitzball made them repeat the chorus, but with-

142 Circus Life

out obtaining any improvement. They would play,
and they would not sing in unison. Fitzball glanced
at his watch ; it indicated ten minutes to the dinner
hour of the fellows. He thereupon desired the
call-boy to give his compliments to Mr Batty, and
request that the dinner-bell might not be rung until
he gave the word for the tintinnabulic summons.
The choristers heard the message, and, as they
wanted their dinners, and knew that Batty was a
strict disciplinarian, it had the desired effect. There
was no more ' chaffing,' no more practical jokes ;
they repeated the invocation in a chastened and
subdued manner, and before the ten minutes had
expired their practice was as good as that of the
chorus at Covent Garden.

Mazeppa was revived at Astley's during the sea-
son of 1851-2, and the acts in the arena comprised
the fox-hunting scene of Anthony Bridges with a
real fox ; the great leaping act of John Bridges ; the
cachiica and the Gracovienne on the back of a horse,
danced by Amelia Bridges ; the graceful eques-
trian exercises of Mademoiselles Soullier and Ma-
sotta ; the gymnastic feats of the Italian Brothers ;
and the humours and witticisms of Barry and Wheal,
the clowns.

The Hippodrome re-opened in the summer of
1852, under the management of Henri Franconi, -the

A7td Circus Celebrities. 143

most striking features of tlie entertainment being
Mr Barr's exhibition of the sport of hawking, with
living hawks and falcons ; the acrobatic and rope-
dancing feats of the clever Brothers Elliot ; and
Mademoiselle Elsler^s ascent of a rope over the roof
of the circus.

Batty, who was reputed to have died worth half
a million sterling, was succeeded in the lesseeship
of Astley^s by William Cooke, who, with his talented
family, for several years well maintained the tra-
ditional renown of that popular place of amusement.
Like the Ducrows, the Henglers, the Powells, and
others, the Cookes are a family of equestrians ; and
not the least elements of the success achieved by
the new lessee of Astley's were the wonderful feats
of equestrianism performed by John Henry Cooke,
Henry Welby Cooke, and Emily Cooke (now Mrs
George Belmore). Welby Cooke's juggling acts on
horseback were greatly admired, and John H.
Cooke's feat of springing from the back of a horse
at full speed to a platform, under which the horse
passed, and alighting on its back again, was quite
unique.

Vauxhall Gardens re-opened in 1854 with the
additional attraction of a circus, in rivalry with
Cremome, now become one of the most popular
places of amusement in the metropolis. The sensa-

144 Circus Life

tion of the season was the gymnastic performance
of a couple of youths known as the Italian Brothers
on a trapeze suspended beneath the car of a balloon,
while the aerial machine was ascending. The peril-
ous nature of the performance caused it to be pro-
hibited by the Commissioners of Police, by direction
of the Home Secretary; a course which was also
adopted in the case of Madame Poitevin's similar
ascent from Cremorne, seated on the back of a bull,
in the character of Europa, though in that instance
on the ground of the cruelty of slinging the bovine
representative of Jupiter beneath the car.

Some years afterwards, the gymnasts who bore
the professional designation of the Brothers Francisco
advertised their willingness to engage for a trapeze
performance beneath the car of a balloon ; but they
received no response, probably owing to the official
prohibition in the case of the Italian Brothers.

^ Would not such a performance be rather
hazardous ? ' I said to one of them.

' Oh, we should only do a few easy tricks/ he
replied. ' We should soon be too high for anybody
to see what we were doing, and need only make
believe. Once out of sight, we should pull up into
the car.'

^ Of course,' I observed, ' the risk of falling would
be no greater than if you were only thirty or forty

And Circus Celebrities. 145

feet from the ground; but, if you did fall, there
would be a difference, you would come down like poor
Cocking/

' Squash ! ' said the gymnast. ' As the nigger
said, it wouldn't be the falling, but the stopping, that
would hurt us. But the risk would have to be con-
sidered in the screw ; and then there is something
in the offer to do the thing that ought to induce
managers to offer us an engagement/

In 1858, Astley's had a rival in the Alhambra,
which, having failed to realize the anticipations of
its founders as a Leicester Square Polytechnic,
.under the name of the Panopticon, was converted by
Mr E. T. Smith into an amphitheatre. Charles Keith,
known all over Europe as ' the roving English
clown,' and Harry Croueste were the clowns ;
and Wallett was also engaged in the same capacit}''
during a portion of the season. One of the special
attractions of the Alhambra circle was the vaulting
and tumbling of an Arab troupe from Algeria.
Vaulting is usually performed by European artistes
with the aid of a spring-board, and over the backs
of the horses, placed side by side. The head vaulter
leads, and the rest of the company^-clowns, riders,
acrobats, and gymnasts — follow, repeating the bound
until the difficulty of the feat, increasing as one
horse after another is added to the group, causes

10

146 Circus Life

the less skilful performers to drop, one by one, out
of the line. The Arab vaulters at the Alhambra
dispensed with the spring-board, and threw somer-
saults over bayonets fixed on the shouldered muskets
of a line of soldiers. This feat has since been per-
formed by an Arab named Hassan, who, with his
wife, a French rope-dancer, has performed in several
circuses in this country.

Vauxhall Gardens, which had been closed for
several years, opened on the 25th of July, in this
year, for a farewell performance, in which a circus
troupe played an important part, with Harry
Croueste as clown. Then the once famous Gardens
were given over to darkness and decay, until the
fences were levelled, the trees grubbed up, and the
site covered with streets, some of which, as Gye
Street and Italian Street, still recall the former
glories of Vauxhall by their names.

Some reminiscences of the provincial circus en-
tertainments of this period have been furnished by
Mr C. W. Montague, formerly with Sanger's, Bell's,
F. Ginnett's, Myers's, and William and George
Ginnett's circuses, and now manager of Newsome's
establishment. 'Early in the spring of 1859,' says
this gentleman, 'some business took me into the
neighbourhood of Wliitechapel, and while passing
the London Apprentice public-house, I heard my

And Circus Celebrities. 147

name shouted, and looking round espied Harry-
Graham, whom I had known in the elder Ginnett's
circus. He was doing a conjuring trick outside a
miserable booth, at the same time inviting the public
to walk in, the charge being only one halfpenny.
On the completion of the trick, he jumped off the
platform, and insisted on our adjourning to the
public-house, where he explained the difficulty he
was in, having been laid up all the winter with
rheumatic gout. On his partial recovery, he was
compelled to accept the first thing that offered,
which was an engagement with the owner of the
booth, a man known in the profession as the Dudley
Devil.

' Poor Harry begged me to give him a start ; so
I came to an arrangement to take him through the
provinces as M. Phillipi, the Wizard. This was on
a Friday ; on the following Wednesday he appeared
at Ramsgate to an eighteen pound morning per-
formance and a fourteen pound one at night, our
prices being three shillings, two shillings, and one
shilling, although in Whitechapel he would not
have earned five shillings per day. Among other
places I visited was Dartford, where I took the
Bull Hotel assembly-room, which had been recently
rebuilt, but not yet opened. Mrs Satherwaite,
a lady of considerable distinction, kindly gave me

148 Circus Life

her patronage, and I arranged for a band at
Gravesend. On the day of the performance, to-
wards the afternoon, the band not having arrived,
I sent my assistant to Gravesend, with instructions
to bring a band with him. Half-past seven arrived,
the time announced for opening the doors, when a
large crowd had assembled, as much out of curiosity
to see the new room as the conjurer, and in a short
time every seat was occupied.

' Just before the clock struck eight, the time for
commencement, in came my assistant, saying the
band had gone to Dover, to a permanent engage-
ment. I ran round to the stage-door, and told
Graham. He said it was impossible to give the
entertainment without music. In my despair, I
rushed into the street, with the intention of . asking
Reeves, the music-seller, if he could let me have a
pianoforte. I had not got many yards when I heard
a squeaking noise, and found it proceeded from
ihree very dirty German boys, one playing a corno-
pean, another a trombone, and the third a flageolet.
On accosting them, I found they could not speak a
word of English ; so I took two of them by the
collar, and the other followed. On reaching the
stage- door, I could hear the impatient audience
making a noise for a commencement.

' Harry Graham, on seeing my musicians, said

And Circus Celebrities. 14.9

it would queer everything to let them be seen by
the audience. "I can manage that/' I said; '^we
will just put them under the stage, and I will
motion them when to go on and when to leave off/'
In another moment M. Phillipi was on the stage,
and received with shouts of applause from the im-
patient audience. On the conclusion of the per-
formance, I went to the front, and thanked Mrs
Satherwaite for her kindness, when she said, " He
is very clever ; but, oh ! that horrid unearthly
music ! ^^'

' On finishing the watering towns, I took the
Cabinet Theatre, King's Cross, where M. Phillipi
appeared with success. One evening, to vary the
performance, we arranged to do the bottle trick,
and specially engaged a confederate, who was to
change the bottles from the top of the ladder,
through one of the stage-traps. By some error,
the man took his position directly the bell rang for
the curtain to go up, instead of doing so, as he
should have done, at the commencement of the
second part of the entertainment. M. Phillipi com-
menced his usual address, explaining to the audi-
ence that he did not use machinery or employ con-
federates, as other conjurers are wont to do ; and to
convince them, he pulled up the cloth of the table,
at the same time saying, " you see there is nothing

150 Circus Life

here but a common deal table." To his surprise,
the audience exclaimed, '' There's a man there ! "
But he was equal to the occasion, and went on with
his address, taking the first opportunity to give
the confederate a kick, when down the ladder he
went.

' At this establishment, while under my manage-
ment, the earthly career of poor Harry Graham was
brought to a close. For many years it had been his
boast that his Richard III. was second only to Edmund
Kean's, and that he only lacked the opportunity to
astound all London with his impersonation of the
character. Now the opportunity had arrived, and
he determined to play it for his benefit ; but, unfor-
tunately, the excitement of this dream of years was
too much for him, and he died a few days afterwards.
Those who are curious about the last resting-place
of this world-renowned showman may find his grave
in the Tower Hamlets cemetery.

' In the following winter, I joined Ginnett's
circus at Greenwich, and found the business in a
wretched condition. The principal reason for this
state of things was, that the circus had only a tin roof
and wooden boarding around, and the weather being
very severe, the place Could not be kept warm. I
was at my wita' ends to improve the receipts when,
being one day in a barber's shop, getting shaved.

And Circus Celebrities. 151

the barber remarked, " There goes poor Townsend."
On inquiring I found that the gentleman referred to
had been M, P. for Greenwich, but in consequence
of great pecuniary difficulties had had to resign.
My informant told me that he was a most excellent
actor, he having seen him, on more than one occa-
sion, perform Richard III. with great success;
and what was more, he was an immense favourite in
Greenwich and Deptford, he having been the means,
when in the House of Commons, of getting the
dockyard labourers' wages considerably advanced.

' It immediately struck me that, if I could get
the ex-M. P. to perform in our circus, it would be a
great draw. With this object in my mind, I waited
on Mr Townsend the next morning, and explained
to him my views. "Heaven knows," he said in
reply, " I want money bad enough ; but to do this in
Greenwich would be impossible." I did not give it
up, however, but pressed him on several occasions,
until at last he consented to appear as Richard III.
for a fortnight, on sharing terms. The next diffi-
culty was as to who should sustain the other charac-
ters in the play, there being no one in the company,
except Mr Ginnett and myself, capable of taking a
part. We got over the difficulty by cutting the piece
down, and Mr Ginnett and myself doubling for Rich-
mond, Catesby, Norfolk, Ratcliflfe, Stanley, and the

152 Circus Life

Ghosts. The business, notwithstanding these draw-
backs, turned out a great success ; so much so, that
!Mr Townsend insisted on treating the whole of the
company to a supper. Shortly afterwards, he went
to America.

'In the following year, while at Cardiff, we got
up an equestrian spectacle entitled The Tourna-
ment; or, Kenihcortk Gastle in tJie Days of Good
Queen Bess, for which we required many supernu-
meraries to take part in the procession, the most im-
portant being a handsome-looking female to imper-
sonate the maiden Queen. Walking down Bute Street
one day, I espied, serving in a fruiterer^s shop, a
female whom I thought would answer our purpose
admirably. So I walked in, and made a small pur-
chase, which led to conversation ; and by dint of a
little persuasion, and explaining the magnificent
costume to be worn, the lady consented to attend a
rehearsal on the following day. She came to the
circus, received the necessary instructions, and
seemed highly gratified when seated on the throne,
surrounded by her attendants.

' On the first night of the piece, everything went
off well until its close, when Mr Ginnett rushed
into my dressing-room, in great excitement, ex-
claiming, " There is that infernal woman sitting on
her throne ! '^ I immediately proceeded to the

And Circus Celebrities. 153

ring-doors, and there, to my dismay, saw the Queen
on the throne by herself, and the boys in the gallery
pelting her with orange peel. I beckoned to her,
but she seemed to have lost all presence of mind.
I sent one of the grooms to fetch her off, and amidst
roars of laughter her royal highness gathered up her
robes, and made a bolt. It appeared that the Earl
of Leicester, who should have led her off, had, for a
joke, told her to stay until she was sent for.^

Gymnastics continued in the ascendant at the
Alhambra long after its conversion into a music-
hall, and crowds flocked there nightly to witness
the wondrous, and then novel, feats of Leotard,
Victor Julien, Verrecke, and Bonnaire on the flying
trapeze. Somersaults over horses in the ring,
being performed by the aid of a spring-board, are
far surpassed by the similar feats of gymnasts be-
tween the bars of the flying trapeze. The single
somersaults of Leotard and Victor Julien were
regarded with wonder, but they have been excelled
by the double somersault executed by Niblo, which,
in its turn, has been surpassed by the ti;iple turn
achieved by the young lady known to fame as
' Lulu.' I am not aware that a quadruple somer-
sault has ever been accomplished, if indeed it has
ever been attempted. It was stated, about three
years ago, that a gymnast who had attempted the

154 Circus Life

feat in Dublin paid the penalty of his hardihood in
loss of life ; but experience has rendered me some-
what incredulous as to the rumours of fatal accidents
to gymnasts and acrobats which are not confirmed
by the report of a coroner's inquest.

Besznak, the cornet-player of the London Pa-
vilion orchestra, said to me one evening, several
years ago, ' You know Wilho, the bender ? Welh
he is dead ; went into the country to perform at a
gala, and caught a cold, poor fellow ! ' Willio is,
however, still living. I will give another instance.
About two years ago, one of the Brothers Ridgway
met with an accident at the Canterbury Hall, while
practising. Some weeks afterwards, it was currently
reported that his injuries had proved fatal. Sub-
sequently, however, a gentleman engaged in the
ballet at the Alhambra, and who, at the time of the
accident, had been similarly engaged at the Canter-
bury, was accosted one evening, while returning
home, in the well-known voice of the young gymnast
who had been reported dead. Turning round in
surprise, .he saw that it was indeed Ridgway who
had spoken, looking somewhat paler than he did
before the accident, but far more lively than a
corpse.

Great as the risks attending gymnastic feats
really are, they are not greater than those which are

And Circus Celebrities. 155

braved every day by sailors, miners, and many other
classes, as well as in hunting, shooting, rowing, and
other sports, not excluding even cricket. While
there are few gymnasts who have not met with casu-
alties in the course of their career, the proportion
of fatal accidents to the number of professional gym-
nasts performing is certainly not greater than among
the classes just mentioned, and I believe it to be even
less. During the period between the advent of Leo-
tard at the Alhambra and the present time, only two
gymnasts, so far as I have been able to ascertain,
have been killed while performing; and the pro-
phecy attributed to that renowned gymnast, that all
his emulators would break their necks, has, happily,
not been fulfilled.

156

CHAPTER IX.

Cremome Gardens — The Female Blondin — Fatal Accident at
Aston Park— Reproduction of the Egliuton Tournament— New-
some and Wallett— Pablo Fanque's Circus — Equestrianism at
Drury Lane— Spence Stokes — Talliott's Circus— The Gymnasts
of the Music-halls— Fatal Accident at the Canterbury — Gym-
nastic Brotherhoods— Sensational Feats— Sergeant Bates and
the Berringtons — The Rope-trick — How to do it.

Though the history of circus performances would
be scarcely complete without an occasional passing
glance at the music-halls, it would be impracti-
cable to give a consecutive record of the per-
formances at places now so numerous without pro-
ducing a work that would rival in voluminousness,
and, I may add, in tedium, the dramatic history of
Geneste. I shall, therefore, give only a general
view of them, including in the survey places which,
during the summer, divide with them the patronage
of the pleasure- seeking public.

While the graceful performance of Leotard was
attracting nightly crowds to the Alhambra, the

And Circus Celebrities. 157

public were invited by the lessee of Cremome
Gardens to witness the crossing of the Thames on a
rope by a lady who assumed the name of the Female
Blondin, and whose performance was probably sug-
gested by the more adventurous feat of her masculine
prototype over the cataract of Niagara. The per-
formance was decidedly sensational, and attracted a
great crowd ; besides having the advantage of being
attended with much less risk to the performer than
any exhibition ever given by the cool-headed and
intrepid Frenchman whose name she borrowed.
Had Blondin fell at Niagara, he would have been
carried over the cataract, and been dashed to pieces ;
if he should fall from his lofty elevation at the
Crystal Palace, he would be killed instantaneously.

Miss Young incurred no such risk ; if she had
fallen into the river, she would have found it soft,
and so many boats were on its surface that the risk
of drowning could not enter into the calculation.
Leotard practised his aerial somersault over water
before he performed in public ; and it would have
been well for Miss Young if she had confined her
rope-walking feats to localities . in which she had
the water beneath her. The experiment at Cromorne
served its purpose in recommending her to the
attention of managers as a rival of Blondin on the
high rope ; but it was not long before she met with

158 Circus Life

an accident which rendered her a cripple for life,
while another young woman, whom her success led
to emulate her lofty feats, fell from a rope at Aston
Park, in the environs of Birmingham, and was
killed on the spot.

The great attraction of the Cremome season of
1863 was a tournament, got up on the model of the
one which attracted so large a proportion of the
upper ten thousand to Eglinton Castle in the sum-
mer of 1844. There was a grand procession to the
lists, and an imposing display of banners, and all
the pomp and pageantry of bygone times ; and then
the encounters of the armoured knights, for which
the lists at Cremome afforded much more scope than
the stage at Astley's, or even at Drury Lane.
Doubtless there were some dummies, as I have seen
in the tournament scene in Mazeppa ; but the living
knights acquitted themselves very creditably, and the
spectacle proved a powerful source of attraction.

The Queen of Beauty was a lady whose ordinary
business was to ride in entrees, and who was known
professionally as Madame Caroline. If she did not,
like Thackeray's Miss Montmorency, live in the
New Cut, she had her abode in the vicinage of that
thoroughfare, in the somewhat more westerly region
which receives, after midnight, so large a proportion
of those who, in various ways, contribute to the

And Circus Celebrities. 159

amusement of the public. Yet there may have been
some of the critical spectators of the Cremorne
tournament who, looking upon Madame Caroline,
may have felt the force of the remark made by
Willis as to the comparative suitabiHty of Lady Sey-
mour and Fanny Kemble to have occupied the
throne of the Queen of Beauty at Eglinton Castle.

'The eyes/ said Willis, 'to flash over a crowd
at a tournament, to be admired from a distance, to
beam down upon a knight kneeling for a public
award of honour, should be full of command ; dark,
lustrous, and fiery. Hers are of the sweetest and
most tranquil blue that ever reflected the serene
heaven of a happy hearth — eyes to love, not wonder
at — to adore and rely upon, not admire and tremble
for. At the distance at which most of the spectators
of the tournament saw Lady Seymour, Fanny
Kemble's stormy orbs would have shown much
finer ; and the forced and imperative action of a
stage-taught head and figure would have been more
applauded than the quiet, nameless, and indescrib-
able grace, lost to all but those immediately around
her.^

Wallett, the clown, on his return from his second
American tour, having acquired some money, was
taken into partnership by Newsome, whose circus
WAS, in the words of the former, ' one of the most

i6o Circus Life

complete concerns ever seen/ They opened at
Birmingham, where good business was done for a
few months, after which they started on a tenting
tour, with a stud of forty horses. They returned to
Birmingham for the winter, and showed their
thousands of patrons one of the finest amphitheatres
ever opened in this country. The ring, instead of
having saw-dust or tan laid down, was covered with
pile matting of cocoa-nut fibre for the horses to run
on, while the central portion, where the ring-master
cracks his whip and the clown his ' wheeze,' boasted
a circular carpet. The decorations of the interior
were rich and tasteful, and it was illuminated by a
chandelier by Defries, which had cost a thousand
guineas.

The association of Wallett with Newsome con-
tinued for two years, after which the circus was
conducted by the latter single-handed, and. the
former joined Pablo Fanque^s circus as clown. He
is next found engaging the talented Delavanti family
for a tour, and afterwards coming with them to
London, where they were all engaged at Drury Lane
Theatre, then temporarily open for circus perform-
ances, under the management of Spence Stokes, an
American.

In 1865, Hengler's company and stud came to
London, and gave a series of performances at the

And Circles Celebrities. i6i

Stereorama, temporarily converted into a circus for
the purpose.

On the termination of these performances, and
of William Cooke's lesseeship of Astley's, London
was without an amphitheatre for several years, with
the exception of a few months, when a small tem-
porary circus was opened in the back-slums of
•Lambeth Walk, by James Talliott, formerly well
known as a trapeze performer. The company and
stud, which were on a very limited scale, were sup-
plied from Fossett's circus, which tented at fairs
during the summer, and Talliott erected a tem-
porary circus for them on the yards at the back of
a row of houses belonging to him.

During the time that Astley's ceased to exist as
a circus, the music-halls of the metropolis, which
were now springing up in every quarter, supplied
the seekers after amusement with a constant suc-
cession of performers of those portions of a circus
entertainment which can be exhibited upon a plat-
form. The fatal accident which befell a gymnast
named Majilton at the Canterbury caused the pro-
prietors of those places of amusement to discount-
enance the flying trapeze for a time, and the rising
school of yaung gymnasts who intended to tran-
scend the feats of Leotard began to practise on the
fixed trapeze, single or double, the horizontal bar,

11

1 62 Circus Life

and the flying rings. The gymnast known pro-
fessionally as Airec made balancing the distinctive
feature of his performances, and exhibited it on the
trapeze in every position. Others gave to their
feats on the trapeze the sensational character which
was so striking an element in the performances ot
Leotard and Victor Julien by exhibiting what is
called ' the drop/ in which one of the performers
falls headlong from the bar, as if by accident, and
is caught by the foot by his companion, who him-
self hangs from the bar by his feet, which are
locked in the angles formed by the bar and its
supporting ropes.

The gymnasts known as the Brothers Ellis, and
sometimes as the Brothers Ellistria, were two of the
best performers on the horizontal bar that I ever
witnessed. The slow pull-up of James Ellis was
inimitable ; but in feats in which ease and grace
were displayed more than strength he was excelled,
I think, by his partner, who, after their separation,
assumed the name of Castelli. I must here remark
that gymnastic and acrobatic ' brothers ' seldom bear
the relationship to each other which the designation
conveys. Though it exists in some instances, as in
the case of the Brothers Ridley (both, I believe,
now dead), they are the exceptions ; the Brothers
Francisco, who performed in numerous circuses and

And Circus Celebrities. 163

provincial music-halls several years ago, but have
since retired from the profession, were cousins.
The Brothers Ellis, the Brothers Price, and many
other professional fraternities that could be named
were not even partners, one of them making engage-
ments and receiving the salary, taking the lion's
share for himself, and paying a stipulated sum to
his companion, in or out of an engagement.

The partnership of the Brothers Price, who per-
formed on the double trapeze, was of brief duration.
Price, for only one of them bore that patronymic in
private life, had the good fortune to receive a legacy
of considerable amount, and thereupon retired from
the profession ; and his partner, whose real name
was Welsh, assumed the name of Jean Price, and,
knowing that single trapeze performances did not
' go * like the double, he began to practise the ' long
flight,' and made it his specialty. Suspending his
trapeze above the platform, as usual, he erected a
perch, as for the flying trapeze, at the opposite end
of the hall, and at the same altitude as the trapeze.
Midway between the perch and the trapeze a pair
of ropes were suspended from the ceiling, and pro-
vided with rings or stirrups, as for the flying rings
performance, but long enough to reach the perch.
Taking his stand on the perch, and grasping the
rings firmly with his hands, the gymnast sprang off

164 Circus Life

into the air, and swung to the trapeze, wliich he
caught with his legs, at the same moment loosing
his hold of the rings. He then performed some
ordinary feats on the trapeze, and catching the
climbing rope swung to him by an attendant, de-
scended by it to the platform, from which he bowed
his acknowledgments of the warm applause with
which such sensational feats as the long flight are
invariably received.

Remarks are often made by gymnasts as to the
ease with which they perform on the trapeze and
the horizontal bar many of the feats which elicit the
most applause, as compared with those which often
excite no demonstration whatever. Every one who
has witnessed the tight-rope performances of the
inimitable Blondin must have observed how much
more he is applauded when he appears on a rope
stretched at a great elevation than when he performs
his feats on a low rope. There is, however, no more
difficulty, and no greater risk of falling, whether the
rope is stretched at an elevation of four feet only, or
of forty feet, while the feats performed are the same.
But the greater elevation conveys to most minds the
idea of a greater amount of skill and courage being
required for their performance, and hence the louder
and more general applause which they elicit when they
are performed on the high rope. People admire dar-

A7td Circus Celebrities. 165

ing, and the more sensational a gymnastic perform-
ance of any kind is the more it is sure to be applauded.
Antipodean balancing feats have been exhibited
by several music-hall artistes, in various modes, and
with a considerable variety of accessories. James
King, known as the bottle equilibrist, places a stool
on a table, four wine glasses on the stool, a tray
upon the glasses, and a decanter upon the tray ;
and then, grasping the upper part of the decanter
with both hands, raises himself to a head-balance.
Another artiste of this class, Jean Bond, balances
himself upon his head upon the summit of one of the
uprights of a ladder, which is surmounted by a
revolving cap, and by turning the cap with his hands,
he spins round in that position. A more interesting
performance, to my mind, than either of these was
shown three or four years ago by an acrobat named
Carl, who walked upon his hands along a wire
stretched from the gallery to a temporary platform
on the stage. In performing this feat, the whole
weight of the body rests on the right and leift hands
alternately, and the equilibrium is maintained by
following each movement of the hands along the
wire with a corresponding motion of the body, so
that, whether the weight is resting on the right
hand or the left, the centre of gravity is directly
above the wire.

1 66 Circus Life

The flying rings^ being a less sensational per-
formance tlian the trapeze, has not been much
favoured by gymnasts, though they frequently
practise with the rings while training, as a prepara-
tion for the flying trapeze. Some very good tricks
can be shown with them, however, and several years
ago the performance was made a specialty by a brace
of gymnasts known as Parelli and Costello. Parelli
is not an Italian, as his professional name would lead
the incognoscenti in such matters to infer, but a native
of Westminster, and his real name is Francis Ber-
rington. Having practised gymnastics with a view
to a public appearance, he found a partner in a young
acrobat named Costello, also a native of Westminster,
whose performances had hitherto been exhibited in
quiet streets, and been followed by a ' nob.' He is
not, however, the only performer whom the multi-
plication of music-halls, and the consequent demand
for gymnasts and acrobats in such establishments,
has elevated from the streets to the platform ; and
it is certain that the change, while it has raised the
status of the vocation, has produced a great improve-
ment in the quality of the performance, by furnishing
the performer with a constant incentive thereto. It
is a curious illustration of the system of adopting
professional names differing from their real patrony-
mics, and which obtains equally among all classes

And Circus Celebrities. 167

that contribute to the amusement of the public in
theatres, circuses, and music-halls, that ParelH is
the brother of Luke Berrington, who performs
under the name of Majilton. Luke Berrington is a
very creditable artist in water-colours, and his views
of the various portions of the exterior and interior of
Westminster Abbey have been greatly admired by
competent judges for their artistic finish and the
fidelity with which every portion of the venerable
edifice has been reproduced. To the general public,
however, he is better known as a clever performer
of the tricks with a hat of soft felt which were first
exhibited in this country by the French clowns,
Arthur and Bertrand.

Mr Ben'ington, senior, the father of Luke and
Frank, is not a little proud of his clever sons and
daughter. When Serjeant Bates, to win a wager
and make a book, carried the flag of the American
Union from Glasgow to London, the elder Berring-
ton welcomed him to the metropolis in an epistle
signed * Majilton,' without the prefix of his bap-
tismal name, as if the writer was a peer of the
realm, and used his title. He refers, with pardon-
able parental pride, to his olive-branches, then
making a professional tour in the United States,
Luke and Frank being accompanied by their sister
and Costello ; and the serjeant, who had probably

1 68 Circtts Life

never heard of them before, speaks of them as a
talented family of actors ! Their entertainment was
really a ballet of diablerie, like those of Fred Evans
and the Lauri family, with a good deal of tumbling
and hat- spinning.

Seven or eight years ago, the great ' sensation *
of the London music-halls was a balancing feat of a
novel character, which was exhibited by an acrobat
named professionally Sextillian, but whose real
name is James Lee. He arranged about a score of
glass tumblers in the form of an inverted pyramid,
and balanced the fragile structure on his forehead,
the base being formed by a single tumbler. But
this was not all. He changed his position several
times, constantly assuming attitudes which would
have won the admiration of the world, if they could
have been perpetuated in marble, and even passed
in various positions through a hoop, all the time
maintaining the equilibrium of the glittering pile
that rested upon such a narrow base upon his fore-
head. If any of my readers should be disposed to
attempt the performance of this feat as a private
drawing-room entertainment, they must be prepared
with a good supply of tumblers, for I am able to
assure them, on the excellent authority of Sextillian
himself, that the wondrous dexterity with which he

And Circus Celebrities. 169

performs it was not attained without an extensive
destruction of glass.

Another performance which excited a large
amount of public attention, partly through the
mystery in which the modus operandi was enveloped,
and partly by reason of the excitement previously
produced by the Brothers Davenport's exhibition of
alleged spirit-manifestations, was the ' rope-trick,'
shown first by an expert performer named Redmond
at Astley's, and afterwards at most of the music-
halls. The performer was enclosed in a cabinet
about three feet square, and five or six feet high,
with a, door facing the spectators, and provided with
a small aperture near the top. In a few minutes an
attendant opened the door, when Redmond was seen
within, securely bound in a chair. The spectators
were allowed to satisfy themselves that he was
bound as securely as if a second person had bound
him, and then the door was closed. In a few
moments he rang a bell, then he showed one hand
at the aperture ; in a few seconds more he began to
beat a tambourine, and in a minute and a half from
the time he was shut in the door was opened again,
and he walked out, with the rope in his hands. This
performance proved so attractive that it soon had
many imitators, but none of them did it in so

170 Circus Life

genuine and puzzling a manner, or displayed equal
dexterity in its exhibition.

The trick was not original, but it was new to
the public, or at least to the present generation. I
have heard it called both the American rope-trick
and the Indian rope-trick, but the former name may
have been derived from the similar performance of
the Brothers Davenport, who pretended to be pas-
sive agents in the business, and to be tied and un-
tied by spirits. Long before the pretended spiritual
phenomena were ever heard of, the rope-trick was
in the repertoire of the famqus Hindoo juggler,
E,amo Samee, who performed at the Adelphi and
the Victoria some forty years ago. The manner of
its performance is said to have been communicated
by him to one of the Brothers Nemo, who thought
so little of it that he never exhibited it until the
public mind had become excited by the tricks of
the Davenports and the antagonistic performance of
E-edmond. Next to the latter. Nemo was the best
exhibitor of the trick that I ever saw ; but that is
not saying much, for most of them were so incom-
petent to perform it that the effect produced by its
exhibition by them was simply ludicrous. I remem-
ber one of them — I will not mention his name —
complaining, when he found that he could not
release himself, that he had not been treated as a

And Circus Celebrities. 171

gentleman by the person — one of tJie spectators — »
by whom he had been bound ; and another, that he
had been tied so tightly that the rope hurt his wrists,
and stipulating, on another occasion^ that h^ should
not be tied tight !

The peculiarity which distinguished Eedmond's
feats in a remarkable manner from those of his imi-
tators was, that he not only released himself from
the rope in less time than was occupied in binding
him, whoever the operator might be, but bound
himself in a manner that baffled the skill and ex-
hausted the patience of every one who attempted to
unbind him. I was present one evening at the de-
cision of a wager which had been made by a West-
end butcher, that he would unbind Kedmond in a
given time, the tying up being done by Redmond
himself. The performer entered the cabinet, carry-
ing the rope, and was shut in; in less than two
minutes the door was opened, and he was seen
bound, hand and foot, to the chair on which he was
sitting. The butcher immediately set to work,
several gentlemen standing around, with their
watches in their hands, surveying the operation with
the keenest interest. It was very soon seen that
the butcher was at fault ; he could not find either
end of the rope. He sought in Redmond's boots,
up his sleeves, inside his vest, but the rope seemed

172 Circus Life

endless. He fumed, lie perspired, as tlie seconds
grew into minutes, and tlie minutes swiftly chased
each other down the stream of time ; but no end
could he discover. Time was called, and the
butcher's wager was lost. Redmond was then en-
closed in the cabinet again, and in less than two
minutes he was free.

The secret of this trick is unknown to me, but I
was not long in discovering that the mere untying
by a person of a rope which has been bound about
him by another is, however securely the rope may
be tied, a very simple matter. It does not follow,
however, that the feat can be performed by every
one. The operator must possess good muscles,
sound lungs, small hands, and strong fingers. It
he clenches his hands, raises the muscles of his
arms, and keeps his chest inflated during the opera-
tion of tying, he will find that his work is half done
by the simple process of opening his hands, relaxing
the muscles of the arms, and restoring the natural
respiration. If the wrists are bound together with-
out being separately secured, the releasing of one
hand frees the other by the slackening of the rope ;
but the operator is thought to be more securely tied
when the rope is tied with a knot about the right
wrist, and then passed round the other, both drawn
close together, and a second knot tied. In this

And Cirai'S Celebrities. 173

case, the riglit hand must be drawn through the
hempen bracelet by arching it lengthwise, and
bringing the thumb within the palm, so that the
breadth of the hand shall very little exceed that of
the wrist ; and this operation is greatly facilitated
by a smooth, hard skin. With the right hand at
liberty, there is little more to be done ; for a skilful
and experienced manipulator finds it easier to slip
out of his bonds than to untie the knots which are
supposed to increase his diflBculty. Any man pos-
sessing the physical qualifications which I have
mentioned ought to be able to liberate himself, how-
ever securely he is tied, in a minute and a half.

I have performed this feat on several occasions
for the satisfaction of friends, and have always re-
leased myself in Redmond's time, except on one
occasion, when I failed entirely, and had to be re-
leased by the gentleman who had bound me. He had,
unknown to me, made a noose at one end of the
rope, and this he passed over my head, after binding
my arms and knotting the rope behind me in such a
manner that I could not move either hand without
producing a lively sense of strangulation.

' I learned that trick in Australia,' observed the
author of my discomjiture. ' I tied up a black
fellow like that in the bush ; and he is there now.'

'74

CHAPTER X.

Opening of the Holbom Amphitheatre — Friend's season at Astley's
— Adah Isaacs Menken — Sanger's Company at the Agricultural
Hall — The Carr6 troupe at the Holbom Amphitheatre— Wander-
ing Stars of the Arena — Albert Smith and the Clown — Guillaume's
Circus — TheCirco Price — Hengler's Company at the Palais Royal
— Re-opening of Astley's by the Sangers — Franconi's Circus—
Newsome's Circus — Miss Newsome and the Cheshire Hunt —
Rivalry between the Sangers and Hovres and Cushing.

After the lapse of several years, during wliicli no
equestrian performances were given in the metropo-
lis, though gymnastic and acrobatic feats were exhi-
bited nightly at a score of music-halls, a new amphi-
theatre was, in 1868, erected on the north side of
Holbom. There, under the excellent management
of Messrs Charman and MaccoUum, have been exhi-
bited some of the finest acts of horsemanship, and
the most striking gymnastic feats, ever witnessed by
this or any other generation. Alfred Bradbury's
wonderful jockey act ; James Robinson's great feat

And Circus Celebrities. 175

of hurdle-leaping on tlie bare back of a horse with a
boy standing upon his shoulders; the marvellous
leap through a series of hoops of George Delavanti ;
the astounding gymnastic performances of the
Hanlons and the Rizarelis ; the extraordinary somer-
saulting and rocket-like bound of the young lady
known as Lulu ; and the graceful riding of Beatrice
Chiarini, without saddle or bridle, will not soon be
forgotten by those who had the gratification of
witnessing them.

In the same year that the Holborn Amphitheatre
was opened, Astley's was re-opened as a circus by
Mr Friend. The chief attraction upon which Mr
Friend relied was the impersonation of Mazeppa by
Adah Isaacs Menken, a young lady of Jewish ex-
traction, who came from America with the reputa-
tion of a female Crichton of the nineteenth century.
According to a biographical sketch prefixed to a
Paris version of the drama, Tlie Pirate of the
8(wannah, in which she appeared in that city, she
had written verses and essays at an age at which
other girls are occupied with dolls, and translated
the Iliad in her thirteenth year. In Latin and
Hebi-ew, Spanish and German, she was as proficient
as in Greek ; French, her enthusiastic Gallic biogra-
pher does not seem to consider it necessary to
mention. Her mother being left in reduced circum-

176 Circus Life

stances at her second widowliood, Adah resolved to
devote her natural talents and acquired accomplish-
ments to the stage, and made her appearance as a
dancer at the opera-house at New Orleans, of which
city she was a native.

After achieving the greatest artistic triumphs
there and at Havanna, she abandoned the boards
for the literary profession, publishing a volume of
poems, and contributing for some time to two New
Orleans journals. In 1858, being then seventeen
years of age, she made her debut as aiv actress in
her native city, and subsequently performed in the
chief towns of the West. In 1863 she went to San
Francisco, and afterwards made a professional tour
of the Eastern States, raising her reputation, ac-
cording to her biographer, to the highest pitch.

Unfortunately for the maintenance of the exalted
fame which she brought from the United States,
this versatile lady appeared, not at the Italian Opera
as a dancer, nor at Drury Lane or Covent Garden
as an actress, which such fame should have entitled
her to do, but at Astley's in the character of
Mazeppa ; and it was still more unfortunate that the
management pinned their faith in her powers of
attraction, not upon her talent as an actress, but
upon her beauty and grace, and her ability to play
the part without recourse to a double for the fencing

And Circus Celebrities. 177

and riding. Eaormous posters every wliere met the
eye, representing the lady, apparently in a nude
state, stretched on the back of a wild horse, and
inviting the public to go to Astley^s, and see ' the
beautiful Menken/ Young men thronged the
theatre to witness this combination of looses plas-
tiques with dramatic spectacle, and ' girls of the
period ' dressed their hair a la Menlcen, that is, like
the fx'izzled crop of a negress ; but the theatrical
critics looked coldly and sadly upon the perform-
ance, and accused the management of ministering
to a vitiated taste.

Adah Menken was at this time in her twenty-
seventh year, and had a few years previously become
the wife of Heenan, the pugilist, whose fine figure
had won her regards when the wealthiest men in
California were competing for her favours. The
union was not a happy one, for which result both
the parties have been blamed; and the cause of
difference was probably one in respect of which
neither could reproach the other without provoking
recrimination. Heenan, who was then in London,
might often have been seen at Astley's during his
wife's engagement, and it was said that both desired
a reconciliation, and that Adah had come to England
with that view ; but nothing came of it. ' The

beautiful Menken ' went to Paris, and was said to be

12

178 Ciracs Life

on terms of tender intimacy with tlie elder Dumas.
She died in Paris shortly afterwards, and her re-
mains rest in the cemetery of Pere La Chaise.

Adah Isaacs Menken was undoubtedly a woman
of rare natural talents and great accomplishments.
While in London, she published a volume of poems,
with the general title of Infelicia, which correctly
describes their tone and character. Some of them
are as wild as anything which has emanated from
Walt Whitman, and more are replete with the weird
fancies and wayward genius of Poe ; but all are
pervaded by a deep and touching melancholy, which
seems to shadow forth the spectre that haunted the
author's gay and brilliant life, like the garlanded
skeleton at the festive board of the ancient Egyp-
tians. From the suggestive title to the last of the
little head-and-tail pieces, designed probably by
Adah herself, everything in the book impresses a
lesson which may be read in Ecclesiastes. In the
first of these tiny engravings we seem to read the
moral of the author's life- story. It represents a
woman stretched on the shore of a stormy sea, with
her face to the earth, and her dark hair flowing over
her recumbent form, which is faintly illuminated by
the fitful light of a moon half-obscured by drifting
masses of black clouds. The book was dedicated to
Dickens, and contains a photographic reproduction

And Circus Celebrities. 179

of a letter from the great novelist, thanking ^ Dear
Miss Menken ' for her portrait, and giving the desired
permission to the dedication.

On the legal principle, it would seem, that two
lawyers will live where one would starve, the S angers
brought their company and stud to the Agricultural
Hall, where, for several successive winters, their
performances attracted thousands of spectators.
This establishment continues to travel during the
summer, however, only resorting to a permanent
building in the metropolis when the approach of
winter renders ' tenting ' as unpleasant as it is un-
profitable. The Agricultural Hall, not having been
constructed for equestrian entertainments, is not so
well adapted for them as for the purpose for which
it was especially designed, and the locality is far
inferior, as a site for a circus, to that of the Holborn
Amphitheatre, of the circus subsequently erected by
Charles Hengler, or even Astley's.

It was at the Holborn Amphitheatre that the first
female trapezist appeared, in the person of a beauti-
ful young woman rejoicing in the nom d^ arena of
Azella, the attractiveness of whose performances, as
in the case of female lion-tamers, soon produced
many imitators. Azella was announced to appear on
the flying trapeze, and to turn a somersault ; but this
feat, which created such a sensation when performed

I So Circus Life

by Leotai'd and Victor Julien, was exhibited by the
fair aspirant to the highest gymnastic honours in a
manner which caused some disappointment to those
who had witnessed the performances of those
renowned gymnasts at the Alhambra. Instead of
throwing ofif from one bar, turning the somersault,
and catching the next bar, Azella threw ofif, and
somersaulted in her descent from the bar to the bed
placed for her to alight upon. The grace with which
all her evolutions were performed combined, how-
ever, with the beauty of her person and the novelty
of seeing such feats performed by a woman, to secure
her an enthusiastic reception whenever she appeared.
Azella was succeeded at the Amphitheatre by
Mdlle Pereira, who performed similar feats, which
she had exhibited in 1868 at Cremome. Imitators
soon appeared at all the music-halls in the metropolis.
At some of these the long flight of Jean Price was
emulated by a lady named Haynes, who transformed
herself, for professional purposes, into Madame
Senyah by the device of spelling her real name back-
ward. A variation from Price^s mode of performing
the feat was presented by this lady, whose husband
appeared with her in a double trapeze act, and hang-
ing from the bar by his feet, caught her with his
arms as she swung towards him on loosing her hold
of the stirrups.

Ajid Circus Celebrities. i8i

The company witli which the Amphitheatre was
opened was succeeded, after a long and successful
career, by the Carre troupe, which introduced to the
metropolis Alfred Burgess, who unites the qualifi-
cations of a clown with those of an accomplished
equestrian and clever revolving globe performer.
Clowns would seem to be precluded, by the nature
of their business, from the cosmopolitan wanderings
of other circus performers ; but the name of Burgess
is almost as famous on the continent as that of
Charles Keith, who has performed in nearly every
European capital, though Albert Smith has given a
picture of clowning under diflSculties which might
well deter those who cannot crack a ' wheeze ' in
half a dozen languages from venturing into lands
where English is not spoken.

* One evening,' sayS' the humourist, ' I went to
the Grand Circo Olympico — an equestrian entertain-
ment in a vast circular tent, on a piece of open
ground up in Pera ; and it was as curious a sight as
one could well witness. The play-bill was in three
languages — Turkish, Armenian, and Italian ; and
the audience was composed almost entirely of Le-
vantines, nothing but fezzes being seen round the
benches. There were few females present, and of
Turkish women none ; but the house was well filled,
both with spectators and the smoke from the pipes

J 82 Circus Life

wliich nearly all of tlieni carried. There was no
buzz of talk, no distant bailings, no whistlings, no
sounds of impatience. Tbey all sat as grave as
judges, and would, I believe, have done so for any
period of time, whether the performance had been
given or not.

' I have said the sight was a curious one, but my
surprise was excited beyond bounds when a real
clown — a perfect Mr Merriman of the arena — jumped
into the ring, and cried out, in perfect English :
" Here we are again — all of a lump ! How are
you ? " There was no response to his salutation,
for it was evidently incomprehensible; and so it
fell flat, and the poor clown looked as if he would
have given his salary for a boy to have called out
" Hot codlins ! " I looked at the bill, and found him
described as the '* Grottesco Inglese,^' Whittayne.
I did not recognize the name in connection with
the annals of Astley's, but he was a clever fellow,
notwithstanding; and, when he addressed the
master of the ring, and observed, " If you please,
Mr Guillaume, he says, that you said, that I said,
that they said, that nobody had said, nothing to
anybody," it was with a drollery of manner that at
last agitated the fezzes, like poppies in the wind,
although the meaning of the speech was still like a
sealed book to them.

And Cwcus Celebrities. 183

* I don't know whether great writers of Eastern
travel would have gone to this circus ; but yet it
was a strange sight. For aught that one could tell
we were about to see all the mishaps of Billy
Button's journey to Brentford represented in their
vivid discomfort upon the shores of the Bosphorus,
and within range of the sunset shadows from the
minarets of St Sophia ! The company was a very
fair one, and they went through the usual programme
of the amphitheatre. One clever fellow thr^ a
bullet in the air, and caught it in a bottle during a
'^ rapid act ; " and another twisted himself amongst
the roixnds and legs of a chair, keeping a glass full
of wine in his mouth. They leaped over lengths of
stair-carpet, and through hoops, and did painful
things as Olympic youths and Lion Vaulters of
Arabia.

' The attraction of the evening, however, was a
very handsome girl — Maddalena Guillaume — with
a fine Gitana face and exquisite figure. Her per-
formance consisted in clinging to a horse, with
merely a strap hung to its side. In this she put
one foot, and flew round the ring in the most reck-
less manner, leaping with the horse over poles and
gates, and hanging on, apparently, by nothing, until
the fezzes were in a quiver of delight, for her
costume was not precisely that of the Stamboul

184 Circus Life

ladies — in fact^ very little was left to the imagina-
tion/

I quote this passage for the purpose of showing
that the wanderings of the men and women whose
vocation it is to entertain the public as equestrians,
clowns, acrobats, and jugglers are not confined to
the limits within which actors and singers obtain
foreign engagements. There are very few men or
women of eminence in the profession who have not
visited nearly every European capital, and many of
them have made the tour of the world. Price's
circus was for many years one of the most popular
institutions of Madrid, and the Circo Price was to
English circus artistes what Cape Horn is to
American seamen. Tell an equestrian or an acro-
bat that you think you have seen him before, and he
will ask, ' Was it at the Circo Price ? ' just as a
Yankee sailor will snuffle, ' I guess it was round the
Horn.* To have appeared at the Hippodrome or
the Cirque Imperiale is a very small distinction
indeed, when so many have performed in Madrid
and Naples, Berlin and St Petersburg, and not a
few have traversed the United States from New
York to San Francisco, and then crossed the ocean,
and performed in Sydney and Melbourne, or Yoko-
hama, Hong Kong, and Calcutta.

Circus performers wander about the world more

And Circus Celebrities. 185

generally, and to a greater extent, tlian the acrobats
and jugglers who perforin in music-halls, from whom
they are separated into a distinct class by the re-
quirements of circus engagements. All aspirants
to saw-dust honours being engaged for ' general
utility/ it is necessary for them to understand the
whole routine of circus business, whether their
specialty is riding, vaulting, clowning, or any other
branch. They are required to take part in vaulting
acts, to hold hoops, balloons, banners, &c., which
requires some practice before it can be done properly,
and to line the entrance to the ring when a lady of
the company flutters into it, or bows herself out of it.
For this last duty, the proprietors of the best ap-
pointed circuses provide uniform dresses, which are
worn by all the male members of the company, when
not engaged in their performances, from the time
the circus opens until they retire to the dressing-
room for the last time. I am speaking, of course,
of those who form the permanent company of a
circus, and not of those engaged, as ' stars,^ for six
or twelve nights.

The ' bright particular star ' of the Amphi-
theatre, during the season of 1870, was the young
lady known as Lulu, and who was recognized by
frequenters of that popular place of entertainment as
the agile and graceful child who had appeared, a

i86 Circus Life

few years previously, with her father, at the
Alhambra and Cremorne, as ' the flying Farinis,' in
a performance somewhat resembling that of the
Brothers Hanlon and the child called ' Little Bob/
She was then supposed to be a boy, and much
amusement was created after her appearance at the
Amphitheatre as an avowed woman, by the recol-
lection of her having, after descending from the lofty
arrangement of trapezes and ladders on which she
performed at the Alhambra, advanced to the foot-
lights, and sang a song, each verse of which ended
with the words, ' Wait till I'm a man/ The secret
of her sex was at that time unknown even to the
performers at the Alhambra, at least to the mascu-
line portion, among whom the circumstance of her
being accompanied by her mother, and performing
the operations of the, toilet in the ladies' dressing-
room, was a frequent subject of wonder and specula-
tion.

There was a doubt also about the sex of the
child who for a long time did a gymnastic perform-
ance at the London Pavilion, very similar to that
given by Olmar at the Alhambra. The child was
announced as ' Little Corelli,' and was generally
supposed to be a boy ; but I have since heard that
it was a girl.

The performances of Azella and Pereira had not

And Ch'cus Celebrities. 187

satiated the public appetite for tlie feats of female
gymnasts, and the manager of the Amphitheati*e
secured in Lulu a star of the first magnitude. Her
triple somersault is a feat in which she is still un-
rivalled ; and though George Conquest has since
achieved her wonderful vertical spring of twenty-
five feet from the ring-fence, the means by which it
is accomplished is still a mystery. Lulu was suc-
ceeded by the Brothers Rizar, as they now chose to
be called, though they had gained immense applause
a few years previously at the Alhambra as the
Brothers Rizareli. The double trapeze of these
clever gymnasts is perfectly unique, and must be
seen to be believed.

The Amphitheatre did not continue without a
competitor for the patronage of that portion of the
public which delights in witnessing feats of eques-
trianism and gymnastics. Hengler's circus, after
being located for some time in Bristol, and after-
wards in Dubhn, settled down at the Palais Royal,
in Argyle Street, and introduced to the metropolis
all the Henglers and Powells, male and female,
whose praises had been sounded by the provincial
press all over the kingdom. The most noteworthy
members of the company were Louise Hengler, an
admirable horse-woman, who, like Adele Newsome,
rides and leaps in a ' cross country ^ fashion, over

i88 Circus Life

hurdles and six-barred gates ; James Lloyd, most
experienced in his art, and one of the neatest, as
well as of the boldest, of riders; John Milton
Hengler, who danced on a tight-rope with a grace
and skill which fully justified the warmth of the
applause with which the performance was received ;
and Franks, the clown, who, before joining the
Hengler troupe, had been the chief exponent of fun
and humour attached to Newsome's circus.

The circumstance of John M. Hengler dispensing
with the balai^cing-pole in his performance was
mentioned by some of the newspaper critics as if it
was unique ; but every frequenter of the Loudon
music-halls must have observed the same feature in
the similar performance of a member of the clever
Elliott family.

Scarcely had the lovers of circus entertainments
had time to solve the problem of the possibilities of
success for two amphitheatres in London when
Astley's was re-opened as a circus by the Sangers.
Circus performances are necessarily so much alike
that it is only by the production of a constant suc-
cession of novelties, as was done at the Holboi'n
establishment, or by combining hippo-dramatic
spectacles with the ring performances, as Ducrow
and Batty did, that any distinctive character can be
established. The Sangers followed the example of

And Circus Celebrities. 189

their predecessors, and preceded the acts in the
arena by an equestrian drama of the kind which had
been found attractive in the palmy days of Astley's.
The ring performances were good, but presented no
novelty. Lavinia Sanger deserved her tribute of
applause as a skilful rider, who gracefully leaped
over banners and boldly dashed through ' balloons ; '
and her brother's, or cousin's, feat of riding, or rather
driving, a number of horses at once, in emulation of
Ducrow, was very creditably performed, but who
has not ^eeu similar feats as well performed in every
circus he has entered ? We should be sorry to miss
them ; but they should be the ' padding ' of the
programme, and not its staple.

I have often heard the questioH asked, 'What
can be done upon a horse which has not been done
before?' The question has been answered again
and again by the equestrian feats of such masters ox
the art of equitation as Andrew Ducrow, Henry
Adams, John Henry Cooke, Henry Welby Cooke,
George Delavanti, James Robinson, and Alfred Brad-
bury. It is only by doing something which has
never been done before, or by performing some feat
in a very superior style to that of previous exhibit-
ors, that a circus artiste can emerge from the ruck,
whether he is a rider, a tumbler, a juggler, or a
gymnast.

190 Circus Life

' If you want to get your name up/ I said^
several years ago^ to a young gymnast, ^you must
do something that has not been done before, and
not be content with performing such feats as may
be seen every night, in every music-hall in London.'

' What can we do ? ' he inquired.

* Ay, " there's the rub ! " Only a gymnastic
genius can answer the question. You may be sure
that question was asked of themselves by Leotard,
and Olmar, and Farini, and all the other fellows who
have made their names famous, as the first perform-
ers of a skilful and daring feat. You know how
they answered it, and what salaries they got. As in
the story of Columbus and the Qgg, when a trick
has once been done, there are many who can repeat
it, but it is the first performer that gets the great-
est fame and the highest salary.'

I must conclude this chapter with a brief notice
of the changes and movements of the principal
travelling circuses during the last ten years. In
1864, Franconi^s was at Nottingham for a time, with
Charlie Keith as clown and the Madlles Monfroid
holding a conspicuous place among the equestrian
members of the company. Newsome's circus was,
later in the year, at Chester, as I find by the follow-
ing passage in a local journal descriptive of a fox-
hunt : — ' The pace was terrific, and the country the

And Circus Celebrities. 191

stiffest in Chestire. This description would be in-
complete if I omitted to mention Miss Newsome, of
the Chester Circus. This young lady astonished
the whole field by the plucky way in which she rode.
She unquestionably led the whole way, and never
came to grief once. Straight was her motto, and
straight she went; brook, hedge, and cop were
cleared by her in a style never seen in Cheshire be-
fore, and when Reynard was deprived of his brush,
it was most deservedly presented to her amidst the
cheers of all present.'

The movements of this circus during the follow-
ing year are related, in another chapter, by a
gentleman who was at that time a member of the
company. In the spring of 1870, Messrs Sanger,
who^ circus is the largest and most complete tent-
ing establishment travelling in this country, were
threatened with a formidable rivalry by the appear-
ance in the field of the great American circus of
Howes and Gushing. How they met it is thus told
by Mr Montague, who was then their agent in ad-
vance : —

' It is well known that two large tenting concerns
will not pay in England. Under these circum-
stances, Messrs Sanger determined to drive the
Yankees off the road, which we ultimately succeeded
in doing. Our mode of fi-ghting them was to bill all

192 Circus Life

the towns taken by them as though we were coming
the following day, it being known to us that English
people will always wait for the last circus, when two
or more companies are advertised at the same time.
Our next move was to take all the best towns in the
North first. We succeeded so well with this mode
of operation that we ultimately performed in the
same town with them, namely, Preston, in Lanca-
shire. On this memorable occasion, showmen came
from all parts of England, two such concerns never
having been seen in one town on the same day.
Messrs Howes and Gushing acknowledged them-
selves beaten, and shortly afterwards returned to
America.^

William Darby, better known as Pablo Fan que,
died in the following year, at the ripe age of seventy-
five. Charles Hengler had adopted the plan so
successfully followed by Newsome, of locating his
circus in permanent buildings, maintaining several
for the purpose, and remaining several months at
each place. The principal members of his company
in 1873, were Miss Jenny Louise Hengler, Miss
Cottrell, John Henry Cooke, Hubert Cooke, William
Powell, Herr Oscar, the Hogini family, the Brothers
Alexander, and the clowns, Bibb and ' Little Sandy.'
Newsome' s company comprised, at the same time,
in addition to the clever ladies of his family, Charles

And Circus Celebrities. 193

and Andrew Ducrow (descendants of the great
equestrian of that name), Hubert Mears, Fredericks,
and the gymnast known as Avolo.

Sanger's is the only great circus which follows
the tenting system, which can be successfully pur-
sued only by those who possess a numerous stud of
showy horses. A less powerful company than
Hengler or Newsome finds necessary will do, be-
cause, the performances being given only two nights
in a town, the programme does not require to be
changed so frequently as when the company perform
every night for a period of three months in the same
place ; and the horses may be ridden in parades by
the grooms and their wives or daughters. But the
public do not believe in a tenting circus, unless its
resources are put forth in a parade, for which pur-
pose a large number of horses are required, with a
handsome band-carriage, an elephant, and a couple
of camels. The cost of maintaining such an estab-
lishment is so great that the system cannot be suc-
cessfully pursued without a large capital, and the
most complete and efficient organization. Without
both these requisites a bad season will ruin the
proprietor, as many have found by sad experience.

13

194.

CHAPTER XI.

Reminiscences oi the Henglers — The Rope-dancing Henglers at
Astle/s — Circus of Price and Powell — Its Acquisition by the
Henglers — Clerical Presentation to Frowde, the Clown — Circus
Difficulties at Liverpool — Retirement of Edward Hengler —
Rivalry of Howes and Cushing — Discontinuance of the Tenting
System — Miss Jeimy Louise Hengler — Conversion of the Palais
Royal iato an Amphitheatre — Felix Rivolti, the Ring-master.

Conscious as I am of the imperfections of the fore-
going record of circus performances in this country,
it is a reUef to my mind to be enabled to supple-
ment the history with some further particulars con-
cerning the establishments so long, and with such
well-deserved success, conducted by the gentlemen
who bear the renowned names of Hengler and
Sanger. I am indebted for the following memoir
of the Henglers to a gentleman well known in the
equestrian profession, and who has for many years
held the important position of acting-manager in
one of the best-appointed and most admirably-con-
ducted circuses in this country.

Circus Celebrities. 195

Mr diaries Hengler, the proprietor of the
cirque in Argyle Street, may be said to have been
bom to the equestrian profession, his father having
been a celebrated tight-rope dancer with Ducrow,
in whose service he remained for several years ; and
thus had an opportunity of teaching his sons his
own profession.

Edward Henry Hengler, the eldest, became
famous in England and on the Continent under the
title of Herr Hengler, and was the most celebrated
professor of that art in his day. He died a few
years since. John Milton Hengler, a younger son,
inherited the family talent, and also became famous
in America, and on the Continent. He came to
England on the retirement of his elder brother, and
was considered a worthy successor. A few years
ago he retired from active service, and opened a
riding school in Liverpool, where he is still residing,
highly respected and esteemed by all who know
him. Charles Hengler was, fortunately for him, too
tall to follow in the footsteps of his brothers, so
his father determined to make him the business
man of the family, and his present position is ample
proof of his father^ s success in so doing.

After leaving Ducrow, Hengler, with his sons,
joined the circus of Price and Powell — Powell having
married one of his daughters. Here they remained

196 . Circus Life

some time, Charles attending to the business de-
partment, and his father and brothers performing
in the ring. As the showman's life is, at the best,
a very precarious one. Price and Powell got into
difficulties while performing at Greenwich, and
were consequently obliged to dispose of their con-
cern, which was purchased by Charles and Edward
Hengler. Price went abroad, and Powell, who was
an excellent equestrian, accepted an engagement
with the new proprietors, who carried on the busi-
ness for several years with varied success, sometimes
making money, and as frequently losing what they
had worked so hard to obtain. It must be remai'ked
that in those days^ equestrianism was not so popular
as it has since become, and there were two men in
the business who carried all before them, namely,
Ducrow and Batty ; so young and struggling be-
ginners had a hard battle to fight, the best towns
in England being in the possession of the former.
But, as usual in all such cases, courage and per-
severance, combined with honesty of purpose and
strict attention to business, ultimately met its
reward; for Henglers' circus at last made a name
for itself, being the most respectably conducted
establishment of that class travelling the provinces.
During the summer months they 'tented,'
and in the winter erected temporary wooden build-

And Circus Celebrities. 197

ings in populous towns, in which the second visit
was invariably more remunerative than the previous
one — a sufficient proof of the high estimation in
which the company were held. This is not to be
wondered at, when it is stated that several per-
formers, who were then with Mr Hengler, are yet
on his establishment; notably, Mr James Franks,
one of the best clowns in his line of business of
this or any other day. Also Mr Bridges, Mr Powell,
and a few others. Of course, with the exception
of Mr Powell, they were very young men when
they first joined him. There was also another very
clever clown on the establishment, of whom I must
say a few words. This was James Frowde, a
nephew of the proprietors. This gentleman, who
several years since retired from the equestrian pro-
fession, was an immense favourite with all classes.
His appearance in the ring was invariably greeted
with acclamations, and in private life his company
was sought by many of the most respectable mem-
bers of the community. To give some idea of the
popularity of this gentleman, I may state that while
the company were located in Chester in 1856,
several clergymen presented him with a very
valuable Bible. This was made the subject of an
eulogistic paragraph in Punch, in which the recipi-
ent and the donors were equally complimented —

198 Circus Life

the one for deserving such a testimonial, the others
for their liberal appreciation of his conduct as clown.
Christian, and gentleman. It would be well if more
of our divines followed so excellent an example ;
not necessarily by presenting Bibles, for the poor
player not only possesses the book, but in most
instances acts up to its teachings.

It was while residing in Chester that Mr
Hengler obtained the patronage of the Marquis of
Westminster ; of course on previous occasions he
had been patronized by many distinguished per-
sonages, and this particular instance is mentioned
only because it was the source of Mr Hengler's
gaining a footing in Liverpool. I may here be
allowed to quote a short paragraph which appeared
in the CJhesfer Observer : —

' Hengler's Cieque. — The patronage and pre-
sence of the Mayor at this admirably-conducted
place of entertainment on Tuesday last filled the
building to overflowing. . . Last night the per-
formances were under the patronage of Earl Gros-
venor, M. P. In the morning the Marquis of
Westminster honoured the establishment with his
patronage and presence, the noble lord kindly and
duly appreciating the just claim that Mr Hengler
has on the public as regards talent, attraction, and
propriety, and so, with his usual discretion and

And Circus Celebrities. 199

sound judgment, took this opportunity to signify
to Mr Henry, the manager, his conscientious ap-
proval of Mr Hengler's admirabfy-conducted estab-
lishment/ Mr Hengler also received a letter from
the Marquis conveying a similar opinion.

For several years it had been the desire of Mr
Hengler and other equestrian managers to obtain
permission from the authorities of Liverpool to erect
a temporary circus in that town. Applications were
frequently made, and as frequently refused. The
invariable answer was, * If you wish to perform in
this town, you must make an arrangement with Mr
Copeland; he has the Amphitheatre, and we cannot
allow any one to oppose him.' Now although the
Amphitheatre, as its name imports, had been origin-
ally built for equestrian performances, they had with
one or two exceptions, and these in its earliest days,
proved failures. Of course no manager possessing
the knowledge of Mr Hengler would risk going
there, especially as the best arrangement it was
possible to make with the then proprietor was some-
thing like * Heads I win, tails you lose.' I think I am
not far wrong in stating that Mr Hengler had made
seven or eight applications ; and invariably received
a similar reply, ' You can't be allowed to build here.
The Amphitheatre is open to you ; go there, or go
away.' Armed with the Marquis of "Westminster's

200 Circus Life

letter, and several other valuable testimonials, Mr
Hengler determined to make one more trial j with
what success I shall presently show.

A piece of ground, the property of the corporation,
was vacant in Dale Street, and was a capital site for
the erection of a temporary circus.

Mr Hengler, and his architect, Mr O'Hara, went
to Liverpool, and obtained an interview with the
then Mayor, a celebrated builder and a liberal-mind-
ed gentleman.

The testimonials were shown and a promise was
made, that, at the next meeting of the Council, Mr
Hengler's request should be brought forward, and
that the Mayor would assist him by using his influ-
ence. With this Mr Hengler was compelled to be
satisfied.

From Chester, Mr Hengler went to Bradford,
on which occasion the following paragraph appear-
ed in the lieeds Mercm'y, of January 10, 1857 —

'Mr Hengler's Establishment receives, as it
deserves, the patronage of immense audiences. The
performances are so unique and varied, that they
cannot fail to please ; while it is gratifying to per-
ceive the strict care that is taken to prevent anything
that could offend the most fastidious. The generality
of such entertainments are more or less loose in
their morality ; but the able and correct manner in

And Circus Celebrities. 201

■which, these pei-formances are conducted is testified
by the fact^ that they have met with the approbation
of the local clergy. The Rev. Vicar patronizes the
performance on Monday next. And on that occa-
sion Mr Hengler affords free admission to the day-
schools connected with the Church of England.*
This, of course, was of great value to Mr Hengler ;
and the authorities at Liverpool were duly apprised
of it ; and, in a few days, the welcome intelligence
was conveyed to Mr Hengler that his request had
been complied with, and Mr O'Hara was started off
to make arrangements for the erection of the circus.
This he soon succeeded in doing, Messrs Holmes
and Nicol, the eminent builders, undertaking its
erection.

This circus was opened by Mr Hengler on
March the 15th, 1857. To give some idea of its
style and appointments, I cannot do better than
quote the following description from the Liverpool
Daily Mail of March 20th, 1857.

' Hengler's Cirque Varieties. — During the
present week Mr Charles Hengler has opened, in
Dale Street, a handsome, commodious, and spacious
theatre, devoted to equestrian performances, which
has been constructed by Messrs Holmes and Nicol of
this town, on the model of Franconi's famous Cirque,
in the Champs Elysees, Paris. The building, though

2C2 Circus Life

of a temporary character, is most admirably suited for
the purpose for which it is designed ; and while ac-
commodating an immense number of spectators, who
can all easily witness the performances, the ventila-
tion is perfect, and with an entire absence of draughts.
There is nothing to offend the senses of smell or
sight. The audience is placed in compartments
round the circle ; the frequenters of the boxes being
seated on cushioned chairs, with a carpeted flooring
under their feet. The compartments entitled pit
and gallery are also very comfortable, while round
the whole building runs a spacious promenade. The
ceiling is covered with coloured folds of chintz,
which give a brilliant and cleanly appearance ; and
the pillars supporting the roof are neatly papered,
and ornamented with flags and shields. The whole
aspect is, in fact, what has long been a desideratum
in this country, and we regret it will have to be
pulled down again in a few months.

' With respect to the performances, we can only
speak most highly ; they are decidedly the best we
have witnessed here since the appearance of the
French Company.

' The horses are beautiful and well trained, the
grooms smart and natty, and the dresses of all con-
nected with the establishment new and tasteful.
We have not space to mention a tithe of the perform-

And Circus Celebrihes, 203

ances, which present many novelties, and display
the varied talent of the company to great advantage ;
the gentlemen being all daring and skilful, and the
ladies, equally clever, yet modest and charming.
In fact, we can strongly recommend our readers to
pay a visit to Mr Hengler's circus ; for, as we were
surprised and delighted ourselves, we feel assured
that no one can regret patronizing an entertainment
so harmless, pleasing, and exciting.'

In one respect, the writer of the above para-
graph made a mistake, for, although the circus was
originally intended to be a temporary building, the
success was so great that it remained standing for
five years, Mr Hengler visiting Liverpool for four
months each winter. At this time the company
comprised William Powell, Anthony and John
Bridges, the Brothers Francisco, the clowns Frowde,
Hogini, and Bibb, Ferdinand and Eugene, Madame
Bridges, Miss Adrian, etc. The performing horses
were introduced by Mr Hengler. Previous to Mr
Hengler visiting Liverpool, the partnership termi-
nated between him and his brother Edward, the
latter having realized Sufl&cient to retire from the
profession.

The ground in Dale Street being wanted by the
corporation for building purposes, Mr Hengler
obtained a site for the erection of a building in

204 Circus Life

Newington, and a lease of the ground for seven
years. He here built a very fine and capacious
cirque, the builders who erected the one in Dale
Street undertaking the contract. It was to be a
brick building ; and they were under heavy penalties
to get it completed by a certain time. Unfortu-
nately for them, they had no sooner commenced,
than a strike took place amongst the brick-makers ;
and the builders had to appeal to Mr Hengler, who
allowed them to erect a wooden structure, they
agreeing to erect, at the expiration of the strike,
brick walls around it, which was done.

Here Mr Hengler remained for seven years, the
term of his lease. The ground was then required
for a new railway, and he had to leave Liverpool,
not being able to find a site adapted to his pur-
pose. While Mr Hengler remained here, several
other circuses attempted to oppose him, the author-
ities, who had remained inflexible for so many years,
granting indiscriminatepermission to whoever applied
to them. All of them failed, and soon left the town.
A notable example occurred in one especial case.

Howes and Gushing, the American equestrian
managers, chartered a vessel, and landed at Liver-
pool with the largest company and stud that had
ever visited these shores. They obtained the best
position in Liverpool for the erection of their tent :

And Circus Celebrities. 205

and this, only after Mr Hengler liad been open in
Dale Street about one month. They inundated the
town with their large pictorial posters, paid fabulous
sums for fronts and sides of houses on which to
have them affixed. Liverpool really went Howes
and Gushing mad. The American colours were
flying from every house in which any of the company
lodged. Columns of advertisements were in all the
Liverpool newspapers ; and the day upon which they
advertised to parade the town every house in the
line of procession was closed. The streets were
crowded ; all Liverpool seemed to have congregated
on the line of route. Special trains came from the
surrounding districts.

The procession was certainly a noble one. A
huge car, in which the band was seated, was drawn
by forty horses, driven in hand. The whole of the
company, a very extensive one, was placed in the
other cars, which were elaborately carved and gilt.
The pageant terminated with a procession of Indians,
and a huge musical instrument which was played by
steam power. And what was the result ? The
morning after their first performance the papers
were unanimous in saying Mr Hengler's entertain-
ment was far superior. One of them stated that
* the greatest circus in America has met more than
its match in Liverpool.' They remained but two

2o6 Circus Life

weeks ; tlie business falling off very considerably^
while Mr Hengler's increased niglitly.

After a few very successful seasons in Liverpool
Mr Hengler discontinued the tenting business in the
summer months, — never to him a very congenial
occupation, and erected large buildings in several
important towns, notably, Edinburgh, Glasgow,
Dublin, and Hull. Those in Glasgow and Hull are
still in existence ; and, when not occupied by the
proprietor, are let for concerts, and entertainments
of a similar character.

In 1865 Mr Hengler was offered an engagement
at Cremome Gardens, where there was a very fine
building, originally erected for equestrian purposes,
but used latterly for exhibiting a Stereorama, which
proved a great failure, although the paintings were
by those eminent artists. Grieve and Telbin. For
several years Mr Hengler had been desirous of per-
forming before a London audience, and thought this
a good opportunity of feeling the pulse of the
metropolitan public. He therefore came to terms
with the then proprietor, Mr E. T. Smith ; but, even
in those days, Cremorne was in its decadence, and
the engagement was neither pleasant to Mr Hengler
nor his company. With the exception of one or two
miserable attempts, circus performers bade a final
adieu to a place which has lately gained such unen-

And Circus Celebrities. 207

viable notoriety. After leaving Cremome Mr Heng-
ler went to Hull, where lie had a most successful
season.

It may be a matter of surprise to many people
that Mr Hengler never brought any of his family (a
very numerous one) up to the equestrian business,
with the exception of his daughter, Miss Jenny
Louise. He was always desirous that they should
receive a good education. Now it would be almost
an impossibility to combine the two things, for, at
the very time children should be studying their
lessons in school, they would be compelled to be
practising in the ring, and performing at night, as
Infant Prodigies, Lightning Lilliputians, or Bound-
ing Brothers. Then how about Miss Jenny Louise ?
it may be asked. That young lady did not commence
riding before the public until she was eighteen years
of age ; but she had such an intense desire to become
an "equestrienne^ that she learned, under her father^s
tuition, more in one year, than many others would
have learned in a lifetime. She was naturally grace-
ful, very feminine, and she possessed the necessary
nerve and firmness. She was always most deservedly
an immense favourite with the public, her skilful
horsemanship and charmingly graceful appearance
never failing to secure her hosts of admirers of both
sexes.

2o8 Circus Life

I now come to Mr Hengler's second appearance
in London, wliicli had such a different result to the
previous one, as will be shown in the sequel. In 1871,
a gutta percha merchant, who had made several
ventures in the equestrian business^ obtained pos-
session of the Palais Royal in Argyle Street, the
site of the present cirque, and wished Mr Hengler
to join him. Mr Hengler took time to consider the
proposal, which after due consideration he declined,
the previous experiments of the gutta percha mer-
chant in the equestrian business having invariably
proved so unsuccessful that his shows became known
amongst equestrians as the Gutta Percha Circus, an
appropriate title, they having in most instances so
suddenly collapsed.

After some difficulty, Mr Hengler succeeded in
obtaining possession of the Palais Royal, as it was
then called, and speedily converted it into the ele-
gant theatre, so admirably adapted for its present
purposes, which was opened in the autumn of 1871.
His first season was not a profitable one, in a pecu-
niary sense ; and this, in a great measure, is to be
accounted for by the fact, that circus entertainments
in London had become very unpopular. In the first
place, the circus in Holborn had been badly managed,
the proprietors not understanding the business. In
this year it was again opened by one of the former

And Circus Celebrities. 209

proprietors, and the season not having proved
profitable, the place was soon closed.

In 1872 it was opened under the auspices of the
gutta percha merchant, though his name did not
appear pubhcly in the matter. Astley^s also opened
under the management of the Brothers Sanger,
gentlemen of great experience in the profession,
and who, as a matter of course, were formidable
rivals. There were now ' three Richmonds in the
field,^ and, as Mr Hengler, although popular in the
provinces, was not known to any great extent in
London, he had to bide his time, until the superiority
of his entertainments became known and appreciated.
At any rate he had sown the seed ; the harvest was
to be gathered hereafter. All who visited the place
were delighted with the high character of the enter-
tainments. Everything was neat and elegant ; the
horses were considered, by good judges, to be far
superior to those usually exhibited in places of this
description. Miss Jenny Louise Hengler had al-
ready become a great favourite with lovers of high-
class riding.

At Christmas, Cinderella, with a host of ju-
veniles, was for the first time produced in a London
Cirque. Everybody who witnessed it left the place
delighted ; and it became the talk of London. The
mid-day performances were invariably well attended,

14

210 Circus Life

and by the best families in London and its suburbs ;
but Mr Hengler*s expenses were very great, and
the receipts, though good, were not commensurate
with his outlay and risk. He remained in London
until the beginning of May, and then went into the
provinces, where he met with his usual success.

In November, 1872, he again opened the "Cirque
in Argyle Street, to which he brought a very clever
company, the principal features being Miss Jenny
Louise Hengler, * Little Sandy,' who made his first
appearance in London, and the performing horses.
This season, the Prince and Princess of Wales and
family honoured the Cirque with a visit, and express-
ed themselves highly delighted with the entertain-
ment. Mr Joe Bibb, another very clever grotesque
and clown, appeared during this season, and soon
became popular. Mr H. B. Williams, a lyrical
jester, was also a favourite. Mr Charles Fish, an
American rider, made his first appearance in
England, and created a sensation.

At Christmas, Jack tJw Giant Killer was pro-
duced, with an army of forty juveniles, whose evolu-
tions were highly commended. This season was a
very profitable one, although the circus in Hol-
born and Astley's were open at the same time. Mr
Hengler remained until the beginning of March,
when he left for Dublin.

And Circus Celebrities. 211

After visiting several towns, he returned to
London in November, 1873. This was a very suc-
cessful season — several new engagements having
been effected, notably Mr William Bell, one of the
best, if not the very best, equestrians in the profes-
sion, and Mr Lloyd, another extraordinary rider.
Little Sandy now became, if possible, more popular
than before ; and the portrait of Miss Jenny Louise
Hengler was in all the photographers' windows, and
in everybody's album.

Mr Felix Rivolti, the genial ring-master who had
been with Mr Hengler, with the exception of a few
months, about eighteen years, was still in great force.
This gentleman had the happy knack of pleasing all
audiences, as one half invariably laughed with him,
the other half as certainly laughed at him. Very
good judges considered him the best ring-master
since the celebrated Widdicomb delighted his au-
diences at Astley's.

Observe with what a self-sufficient smirk Rivolti
enters the arena, gracefully handing in the young
lady ; see how he places her on her horse, and then
looks round the house, as much as to say, ' In one
minute you will be delighted to see what I can make
her do.' He cracks his whip, the horse starts into
a canter, the young lady leaps from his back, over
garlands, through hoops, etc., etc., when the horse

212 Circus Life

stops, and while the audience are applauding, how
happy Eivolti appears ! He looks around as much
as to say to the audience, ' I told you I could do it.
But wait a minute. You see this clown ; now I am
going to make him do all manner of funny things.'
Then ' Little Sandy ' performs some of his quaint
tricks as only 'Little Sandy' can, and while the
audience are laughing and applauding, with what
complacency Eivolti looks at them, every feature
in his face beaming with gratification. His many
admirers will be sorry to hear that he has for the
present left the profession, to which, however, he
will probably soon return.

Mr John Henry Cooke returned from America
this year, and again joined Mr Hengler's Company.
Cinderella was reproduced for the Christmas holi-
days, and with greater splendour than on the previous
occasion. Large audiences visited the circus, and
the season proved a very profitable one. The Prince
and Princess of Wales and family again visited the
cirque. From London Mr Hengler and his com-
pany went to Dublin, and from thence to Hull and
Glasgow, returning to London to open for the fourth
season in December 1874. The company was of
the usual excellence, including a new importation
from America, Mr Wooda Cook, a very clever
equestrian ; ' Little Sandy,' and Mr Barry, a very

And Circus Celebrities. 213

pleasing lyrical jester, a great favourite in America,
where lie has been located several years. The other
performers are all excellent. The great feature for
the Christmas holidays was a new pantomime, en-
titled liittle Red Biding Hood, performed (with
the exception of ' Little Sandy,' who enacts the
Wicked Wolf) entirely by children, original music
being composed by Messieurs Kiviere and Stanis-
laus. The idea of this piece is entirely original,
nothing of a similar description having been pro-
duced in the arena. The cirque is crowded at
every representation, and the present promises to
be a greater success than either of Mr Hengler's
previous seasons in Argyle Street.

214

CHAPTER XII.

The Brothers Sanger — First Appearance in London— Vicissitudes of
Astle/s— Batty and Cooke— Purchase of the Theatre by the
Brothers Sanger— Their Travelling Circus— The Tenting System
— Bamum and the Sangers.

An impenetrable mist hangs over the early history
of the industrious and enterprising gentlemen who
now own the 'home of the equestrian drama' in
the Westminster Road. The names of Hengler,
and Cooke, and Adams have been, to our fathers
and grandfathers, as well as to the present genera-
tion, ' familiar in their mouths as household words ; '
but circus records, and even circus traditions, are
silent concerning the progenitors of John and
George Sanger. There is a whisper floating about
circus dressing-rooms that the latter gentleman
might have been seen, many years ago, doing a
conjuring trick on the narrow 'parade' of a little
show at fairs; but the Brothers Sanger are most
reticent concerniug their antecedents, and all that

Circus Celebrities. 21^

can be said of them with certainty is that they were
travelling with a weU-appointed circus, and a
numerous company and stud, many years before
they became known as public entertainers in the
metropolis.

They first became known to a London audience
by their successful series of performances at the
Agricultural Hall, which place of amusement they
occupied for several seasons.

During their tenancy they produced several
equestrian spectacles, all mounted in a costly and
elaborate manner. The first was entitled 'The
Congress of Monarchs,* and, nothing of a similar
character having been previously produced in
London, it attracted an immense concourse of per-
sons to the Hall. To give some idea of the vast
number who attended, I am enabled to state, on
authority, that on several occasions upwards of
37,000 persons witnessed the performances in one
day.

Their last season in this place was in 1872, in
which year they also acquired possession of Astley's,
which had, since the earlier days of Batty, gradually
sunk to the lowest grade in the estimation of the
pleasure-seeking portion of the public, all Batty^s
successors, with the exception of Wilham Cooke,
having signally failed. Upon the termination of

2i6 Circus Life

Cookers lease, Batty wished to raise the rental, or
sell the property, and as Cooke declined paying
more than he had hitherto done, he retired from
Astley's and the profession, and Batty, not finding
a purchaser or a suitable tenant, after keeping the
place closed for some time, opened it himself, having
Hughes, a once celebrated equestrian proprietor, as
acting manager, and William West as stage director.
The military spectacle with which the theatre was
re-opened, entitled Tl^e Story of a Flag, was a
failure; and after lingering for a few months the
theatre was closed.

Mr ]fi. T. Smith then obtained possession on very
advantageous terms, and in a short time was fortun-
ate enough to find a tenant in Mr Nation, who paid
£5000 for the unexpired term of the lease. This
not proving a profitable investment, the theatre was
again in the market, when Mr Boucicault, with the
same view of 'regenerating the National Drama,'
which he subsequently essayed at Covent Garden
with Babil and Bijou, obtained a lease, made great
alterations, and renamed the building the Royal
Westminster Theatre, advertising it as 'the nearest
theatre to the West End, through the parks, which
extend to the foot of Westminster Bridge, close to
which the theatre is situate.' The inhabitants of
Lambeth laughed, and the dwellers in Belgravia

And Circus Celebrities. iiy

wondered; but tlie Royal Westminster was not
frequented by the play-goers of either quarter, and
after an unsuccessful season the theatre was again
closed.

Mr Batty again trying to dispose of the property,
but without effect, it remained closed for a consider-
able period, until the present proprietors obtained
possession of it, and opened it for the Christmas
holidays. The experiment of keeping both Astley's
and the Agricultural Hall open at the same time
did not, however, answer their expectations, and
they ultimately concentrated their forces at Astley^s,
having purchased the property upon extremely
advantageous terms.

They expended a large sum of money in having
the interior almost entirely remodelled, the well-
known theatrical architect, Mr Robinson, being
employed for the purpose. Under the present
arrangement the building is adapted for the ac-
commodation of nearly 4000 persons. During the
winter season the Brothers Sanger remain in London;
the other portion of the year is passed in visiting
the principal provincial towns, where the extent and
splendour of their parade invariably attracts large
audiences. The performances are given, sometimes
in a huge tent, and sometimes in the open air, in a
large field near the town. Their stay in one place

2i8 Circus Life

is usually from one to four days, according to the
population. Their expenses are necessarily very
heavy, and their takings, as a rule, enormous.

It may be interesting to some persons to know
how an affair of this description is managed. The
proprietors themselves are most industrious and
indefatigable, and they have in their service, as act-
ing manager, a very clever and experienced gentle-
man named Twigg, late lieutenant in one of Her
Majesty's regiments. Mr Twigg engages several
persons, whose duty it is to make arrangements in
advance for the numerous company and stud. They
hire ground suitable for the purpose, and engage
bill-posters, who placard the town with large and
brilliantly- coloured pictorial representations of the
performances, and distribute printed bills, contain-
ing the names of the performers, also giving a
description of the procession, and the route it will
take in parading the town. These are distributed
in all the villages within a radius of fifteen miles.
Lengthened advertisements are also inserted in all
the local newspapers, and thus the public curiosity
is excited, and it is no uncommon thing for a general
holiday to be held upon the day of their grand pro-
cession through the town.

Previous to the company arriving, the tent-men,

And Circus Celebrities. 219

with the baggage-waggons, proceed to the field,
erect the tent, make the ring, and prepare for the
various performances, — fixing the hurdles, gates, etc.
When the company arrives everything is prepared.
The horses are stabled, groomed, and fed; the
^Tableaux Carriages* (as they are termed) are
washed, and everything made ready for the grand
parade, which usually starts from the tent about an
hour and a half previous to the first performance.
After the parade the show commences — the first one
occupying about two hours. After this is over the
performers dine and rest until the evening — the
second performance commencing about seven, and
terminating about ten o'clock.

Immediately after the last act, the whole of the
company are advised at what hour they will be
required to start in the morning for the next place ;
this, of course, depends in a great measure upon the
length of the journey and the state of the roads;
the usual time for starting is about five o'clock, and
they travel at the rate of five or six miles an hour.
The tent and baggage men leave earlier. Many of
the principal members of the company have their
own 'living carriages,' which are fitted up with
every convenience, and a very jolly and healthy life
the occupants lead. Two performances are invari-

2 20 Circus Life

ably given each day, consisting of the usual eques-
trian and gymnastic feats, horse and pony racing,
hurdle-leaping, and Roman chariot races.

The stud of the Brothers Sangei* comprises up-
wards of 200 horses, the greater number of which
are used for drawing their show-cars, conveying the
performers and paraphernalia, etc. The trained
animals used in their entertainments are very numer-
ous, however, and they have also no fewer than 11
elephants. The company is, necessarily, a very
numerous one, consisting of male and female per-
formers, band, grooms, stable-helpers, tent-men,
etc. ; seldom less than 200 persons altogether. It
would surprise most people to see how easily all the
arrangements are carried out; when once started
on its tour the whole affair moves on like clock-work.
The advent of the circus in each town at the time
announced may be regarded as an absolute certainty,
so complete is the organization in every respect.

This immense establishment has grown to its
present gigantic dimensions from very small begin-
nings, the Brothers Sanger being proud to acknow-
ledge that they commenced their career at the
lowest rung of the ladder.

In addition to his share in Astley*s Amphitheatre,
Mr John Sanger is also proprietor of the ^ Hall by
the Sea ' at Margate, which is managed by his son-

And Circus Celebrities, 221

in-law, Mr Reeves, and is highly popular as a place
of recreation with the thousands of persons who
visit that salubrious watering-place during the sum-
mer.

The fame of the Brothers Sanger having reached
the United States, Mr P. T. Barnum, the world-
renowned American showman, came to England in
1873 expressly to purchase from them the whole of
the dresses and material used in the grand spectacle
of ' The Congress of Monarchs ' (produced by them,
as before stated, at the Agricultural Hall), at a cost
(as advertised) of £30,000. This has been an
immense attraction in New York, and has added
considerably to the fortunes of the ' prince of show-
men,* as Barnum calls himself.

The Christmas entertainment of the present
season has been, as everybody knows, a pantomime
entitled — Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp, and
the Forty Thieves, and the Flying Horses of Lambeth
— a strange and rather peculiar conglomeration of
titles. It has been produced and placed on the
stage regardless of cost, the scenic effects being
very beautiful, the costumes magnificent and elabor-
ate, and one scene, in which all the company appear,
forming a brilliant combination of colour, certainly
deserving of the highest praise, and reflecting the
greatest credit upon all concerned.

222 Circus Life.

The eleven elepliants are here introduced, the
'white* one especially attracting much attention,
and Mr George Sanger's address previous to its
introduction being not the least amusing part of the
performance. These elephants play a very conspicu-
ous part in the tableaux, and the general effect far
surpasses anything of a similar description ever
produced by the Brothers Sanger, who certainly
deserve the fame and fortune which their industry
and enterprise have acquired for them.

Until within the last few years it was supposed
that the circus-loving portion of the metropolitan
population was not numerous enough to support
more than one equestrian establishment; but the
contrary may now be regarded as proven, and,
though it may still be doubted whether London
would support as many circuses as the much less
populous city of Paris, we trust to see the company
and stud of Mr Hengler at his most comfortable
cirque in Argyle Street, and those of the Brothers
Sanger at Astley's, for many years to come, and to
be assured that with each recurring season the pro-
prietors of both establishments are augmenting the
fame and fortune which they have so deservedly won.

223

CHAPTER XIII.

American Circuses— American Performers in England, and English
Performers in the United States — The Cookes in America —
Bamum's great Show — Yankee Parades — Van Ambm-gh's Circus
and Menagerie— Robinson's combined Shows — Stone and Mur-
ray's Circus — The Forepaughs— Joel Warner — Side Shows —
Amphitheatres of New York and New Orleans.

The circus in America is a tiglily popular entertain-
ment, and is organized upon a very extensive
scale, as everything is there, like the country itself,
with its illimitable prairies, rivers thousands of
miles long, and lakes like inland seas. Americans
have a boundless admiration of everything big ; they
seem to revel even in ' big ' bankruptcies and ^ big '
fires, such as that which desolated Chicago a few
years ago. Circus proprietors bring their establish-
ments before the public, not by vaunting the talent
of the company, or the beauty and sagacity of the
horses, but by announcing the thousands of square
feet which the circus covers, the thousands of dollars

2 24 Circus Life

to which their daily or weekly expenses amount, and
the number of miles to which their parades extend.
' This is a big concern,' say those who read the an-
nouncement, and their patronage is proportionate
to its extent and cost.

The American circuses are all conducted on the
tenting system, and, as there are few towns in the
Union which could support one only of the many
colossal establishments which travel during the
summer, most of them are idle during the winter;
many of them are combined with a menagerie, in
which cases one charge admits to both. Except
in the matter of size, they do not differ materially
from tenting circuses in this country ; but the tents
are larger, the parades longer, and the rifle-targets,
the Aunt Sallies, and the acrobats in dirty tights
who follow Sanger, and the Ginnetts, and Quaglieni,
and other tenting circuses in England, are replaced
by small shows, such as attend fairs in this country,
and in which giants, dwarfs, albinoes, and monstro-
sities of various kinds are exhibited.

The interchange of circus performers between
England and the United States, which has existed
almost as long as circuses, has made us better ac-
quainted in this country with the kind and quality
of the performances to be witnessed in American
circuses than with the manner in which they are

And Circus Celebrities. 225

conducted. Stickney and North were known and
appreciated at Astley's by the last generation, and
the present has seen and admired, at the Holborn
Amphitheatre, those inimitable gymnasts, the
Brothers Hanlon, the incomparable vaulter, Kelly,
and some others. Wallett, the Cookes, and many
others, besides French, German, and Italian per-
formers who have appeared in English circuses and
music-halls, have found their way to America, and
proved as attractive there as here. Four years ago,
the Cooke family was represented in the United
States by Emily Henrietta Cooke, John Henry
Cooke, and George Cooke, prominent members of
Stone and Murray's company, and James E. Cooke
with French's circus.

The largest circus now travelling is Bamum's,
forming a portion of the great combination adver-
tised as the ' Great Travelling "World's Fair.' Bamum
has long been famous in both hemispheres as the
greatest showman in the world. He is certainly a
man of remarkable enterprise and energy. He is
quick in an'iving at conclusions, and when he has
resolved upon any undertaking, he exercises all hi8
energy, and brings into force aU the results of his
long and varied experience, in carrying it into exe-
cution.

Coup, a gentleman well known among public en-
15

2 26 Circus Life

tertainers across the Atlantic, said to Bamum one
day, ' What do you say to putting a big show on the
road ? '

' How much will it cost ? ' inquired Bamum, after
a moment's reflection.

^Two hundred thousand dollars,' was the re-

' m let you know to-morrow,' said Bamum.

On the following day, he told Coup that ' Bar-
num's great show ' was a fact, and that he (Coup)
was to be its manager, as he is to this day. The
establishment then formed was, however, far from
being the mammoth concern with which the great
showman took the field in 1873. Notwithstanding
the great loss which he sustained by the burning of
the museum which so long attracted attention in
the Broadway, New York, at the close of the pre-
ceding year, he came before the public a few
months afterwards with a circus, a menagerie, a
museum, a gallery of pictures and statuary, and a
show of mechanical wonders and curiosities, all
combined in one, and to which the public were
admitted for a single payment of half- a- dollar.

The address to the public with which this colossal
combination of entertainments was inaugurated is
so unique and characteristic that I need make no
apology for inserting it entire.

And Circtis Celebritiss. 227

' Ladies, Gentlemen, Families, Children, Friends :
' My career for forty years as a public Manager
of amusements, blended with instruction, is well
known. You have all heard of my three New York
Museums; my great triumphal tour with Jenny
Lind, the Swedish Nightingale, and my immense
travelling exhibitions. Everybody concedes that I
give ten times the money's worth, and always de-
light my patrons. I now come before you with the
last grand ckowning triumph op my managerial
life.

'Notwithstanding the burning of my last Mu-
seum, in December (which, however, did not destroy
any of my great travelling chariots, vans, cages, or
horses, nor duplicates of most of my living wild
animals, which were then on exhibition in New Or-
leans), I have been enabled, through the aid of cable
dispatches, electricity and steam, and the expendi-
ture of nearly a million of dollars, to place upon the
road by far the largest and most interesting combin-
ation of Museum, Menagerie, and Hippodrome ever
known before — a veritable World's Fair.

' No description will convey an adequate idea of
its vastness, its beauty, and its marvellous collection
of wonders. It travels by rail, and requires more
than one hundred cars, besides fifty op my own,
made expressly for this purpose, and five or six

228 Circus Life

locomotives to transport it. My daily expenses ex-
ceed $5,000. We can only stop in large towns, and
leave it to those residing elsewhere to reach us by
cheap excursion trains, which they can easily get
up.

' Among some of my novelties is a fees full
MENAGEEiE OF WILD ANIMALS, including all, and more
than are usually seen in a travelling menagerie,
which I now open to be seen by everybody, without
ANY CHARGE WHATEVEE. Although I have consolid-
ated more than twenty shows in one, containing
nearly one hundred gorgeously magnificent gold
and enamelled cages, dens and vans, requiring the
services of nearly 1,000 men and over 500 horses,
the price of admission to the entire combination
of exhibition is only the same as is charged to
a common show, viz. 50 cents; children half
price. My great Hippodrome Tent comfortably
seats 14,000 persons at one time, while my numer-
ous other tents cover several acres of ground.

' The Museum Department contains 100,000
curiosities, including Professor Faber^s wonderful
Talking Machine, costing me $20,000 for its use six
months. Also, a National Portrait Gallery of 100
life-size Oil Paintings, including all the Presidents
of the United States, our Statesmen and Military
Heroes, as well as foreign Potentates and Celebrities,

And Circus Celebrities. 229

and the entire Collection of the celebrated John
Rogers* groups of Historical and Classic Statuary.
Also, an almost endless variety of Curiosities, in-
cluding numberless Automaton Musicians and Me-
chanicians, and Moving Scenes, Transformation
Landscapes, Sailing Ships, Eunning Water-mills,
Railroad Trains, etc., made in Paris and Geneva,
more beautiful and marvellous than can be imagined,
and all kept in motion by a Steam Engine. Here,
also, are Giants, Dwarfs, Fiji Cannibals, Modoc and
Digger Indians, Circassian Girls, the No-armed
Boy, etc.

' Among the rare wild animals are Monster Sea
Lions, transported in great water-tanks ; the larg-
est Rhinoceros ever captured alive, and 1,500
Wild Beasts and Rare Birds, Lions, Elephants,
Elands, Gnus, Tigers, Polar Bears, Ostriches, and
every description of wild animal hitherto exhibited,
besides many never before seen on this Continent.

* In the Hippodrome Department are theeb
DISTINCT EiNGS, wherein three sets of rival perform-
ances are taking place at the same time, in full view
of all the audience. Here will be seen Performing
Elephants, Horse-riding Goats, Educated Horses,
Elk and Deer in Harness, Ponies, Trick Mules, and
Bears, and three distinct Equestrian Companies
(with six clowns), including by far the best Male

230 Circus Life

and Female Bare-back Riders in the World, with
numerous Athletes and Gymnasts who have no
equal. Everything is perfectly chaste and unobjec-
tionable. Its like will never be known.

* The great steeet-procession, three miles long,
takes place every morning at half-past eight o^ clock.
It is worth going 100 miles to see. It consists of
trains of Elephants, Camels, Dromedaries, Zebras,
and Elks in harness; nearly 100 Gold Enamelled
and Cerulean Chariots, Vans, Dens, and Cages;
Arabian Horses, Trick Ponies, three Bands of
Music, and a most marvellous display of Gymnastic,
Automatic, and Musical performances in the public
streets.

^ Three pull exhibitions will be given each day
at ten, one, and seven o'clock. No one should miss
the early Procession.

* The Public's Obedient Servant,

' P. T. Baenum.'

The circus department of this unrivalled com-
bination show is managed by Dan Castello, who is
described in the bills as ' a gentleman of rare accom-
plishments as a jester and conversationalist, whose
varied and ripe experience in Continental Europe,
and North and South America, render his services
of great value.' The company comprised Celeste

And CirciLS Celebrities. 231

Pauliere, the dashing bai'e-back rider of the Cirque
Fi'an9ai8 ; D'Atalie, ' the man with the iron jaw,'
who appeared a year or two ago at some of the
London music-halls; the Sisters Marion, who then
appeared in America for the first time; Frank
Barry, Vinnie Cook, Montenard and Aymar, Ma-
dame Aymar, Marie Girardeau, and Carlotta Davi-
oli : and among performers less known on this side
of the Atlantic, Lucille Watson, Angela (' the female
Samson'), Sebastian and Romeo, the Mathews
family, Lazelle and Millison, the Bliss family, Bush-
nell, Nathan, Nichols, Lee, and Hopper.

The grand parade is a thing to be seen once in a
life, and talked of ever afterwards. Here I must
let the Prince of Showmen, as Barnum has been
called, speak for himself; no other's pen could do
justice to the theme. ' The grand street pageant,'
says one of his bills, ' which heralds the advent into
each town of the longest and grandest spectacular
demonstration ever witnessed, is nearly three miles
in length. Prominent among the grand and attract-
ive features of the innumerable caravan, are the
twelve golden chariots, eight statuary and four
tableau, including the gorgeous moving Temple of
Juno, 30 feet high, built in London at a cost of
$20,000, the musical Chariot of Mnemosyne, the
revolving Temple of the Muses, the great steam

232 Circus Life

Calliope, three bands of music, and one hundred
resplendent cages and vans.

^ These magnificently gilded Palaces and Dens,
plated and elaborated by the most cunning artisans,
after vivid designs and gorgeous impersonations
from the Dreams of Hesiod, are drawn in the Great
Procession by trained Elephants, Camels, Drome-
daries, Arabian Thoroughbreds, Liliputian Ponies,
herds of Elk and Reindeer in harness, and a gor-
geously caparisoned retinue of dapple Steeds and
Shetland Palfreys. They are of such rich and varied
attractions as to excite the envy of a Crcesus or
Bellerophontes.

' The Great Procession wiU be interspersed with
grotesque figures, such as automaton gymnasts,
mechanical trapezists, globe and ball jugglers,
comic clowns, and athletic sports, performing on
the tops of the cages and chariots, in open streets,
all the diflBcult feats of the celebrated living gym-
nasts. The diSerent brass bands, musical chariots,
Polyhymnian organs, steam pianos, and Calliopes,
&c., are equivalent to one hundred skilful musicians.
Persons anxious to see the procession should come
early, as three performances a day are given to
accommodate the multitudes, viz., at 10 a.m., also
at one and seven o'clock in the afternoon and even-
ing. Prof. Fritz Hartman's silver comet band, Herr

And Circus Celebrities. 233

Hessler's celebrated brass and string bands, Mons.
Joseph Mesmer^s French comet band, and the
great orchestra Polyhymnia, will enliven the com-
munity with their choicest rhapsodies, in alternate
succession, while passing through the streets.'

The bill concludes with the follo-sving announce-
ment, eminently characteristic of the people, and of
Barnum in particular : — ' Tickets will be carefully
but rapidly dispensed, not only by BEN LUSBIE,
Esq., the "Lightning Ticket Seller," whose
achievement of disposing of tickets at the rate of
6,000 per hour is one of the sensational features of
the great free show, but from several ticket waggons,
and also from the elegant carriage of Mr Bamum'a
Book Agent, who furnishes Tickets FEEE to all
buyers of the Life of P. T. Barnum, written by him-
self, reduced from $3,50 to SI. 50/

Circuses on such a scale as this, and many simi-
lar concerns now travelling in the United States,
can only be conducted successfully by those who
combine a large amount of reserve capital with the
requisite judgment, experience, and energy for
undertakings so great and onerous. There are in
that country, though its population is much less and
scattered over an area far more extensive than that
of Great Britain, many more circuses than exist in
this country, and most of them organized on a scale

234 Circus Life

■which can be matched in England only by Sanger's.
Conducted as such enterprises are in America, under
conditions unknown in this country, a bad season is
ruin to circus proprietors whose reserve capital is
insufficient to enable them to hold their own against
a year's losses, maintain their stud during the winter
in idleness, and take the field with undiminished
strength and untarnished splendour in the following
spring.

American circus proprietors, managers, perform-
ers, and all connected with them, will not soon for-
get the season of 1869, which ruined several con-
cerns, sapped the strength of more, and disappointed
all. 'During the winter of 1868-9,' writes an
American gentleman, fully acquainted with the
subject, ' the most extensive preparations were made
by them. New canvases were bought, new wagons
built, the entire paraphernalia refitted, and consider-
able expense gone to for what they all anticipated
would be a prosperous season. The rainy term
struck a good many of the shows in the western
country as soon as they got fairly on the road, and
some of them did not see the sun any day for three
weeks. This proved disastrous, as it put them back
several weeks. The rainy weather made the roads
in a horrible condition and almost impassable, while
in some parts of the far west one concern came to a

And Circus Celebrities. 235

dead stand for a week, not being able to get along
with tlie heavy wagons through a country that had
to be forded. In this manner several concerns lost
many of their stands. Then, when they did strike
a clear country, business did not come up to ex-
pectations. It is very doubtful if, out of the
twenty-eight circuses and menageries that started
out in April and May, more than six concerns came
home with the right side of a balance-sheet. Of
this number were the European, Bailey's, Stone and
Murray's, and two or three of the menageries. Some
of the other shows managed by close figuring to
worry through the season and come home with their
horses pretty well jaded out, their wagons worn, and
their canvas in a dilapidated condition. There were
other shows that collapsed before the season was
half over.

' Profiting by experience, and having not much
better hopes for next season, scarcely a manager
went heavily into preparations during the winter
for the summer's campaign. The general impression
with all the old and experienced managers was that
it was going to be another hard one for them to pull
through, and could they have made any satisfactory
disposal of their live stock, they would willingly
have done so sooner than go through such another
summer as the last one. Some of the old managers

236 Circus Life

believe in " Never say die," and launched out a little
more boldly than the rest, believing that " Nothing
venture, nothing win." The big concerns that have
wealthy managers, who can stand a few weeks of
bad luck, hold out ; but there are several new man-
agers getting into the business — as well as several
old ones — ^who have just money enough to get their
shows on the road. These are the concerns that go
by the board first, should times be bad, for, having
no money to fall back on, the *^ jig^s up." There
are many shows that go on the road without a dollar
in the treasury, comparatively speaking. They
manage to crawl along by paying no salaries, their
daily receipts just about meeting their hotel bill for
keep of men and horses. Finally, they reach a town,
the weather is very stormy, and the receipts do not
come up to the daily expense. The consequence is
the landlord of the hotel has to accompany the show
to the next stand to get his money, and in some in-
stances keep along for two or three days.

' I know of a circus that once travelled through
Vermont and did a good business, but on their
return home through New York State met with five
weeks of horrible business, the weather being rainy
nearly every day. There were from two to three
landlords accompanying the show all the time to
collect back biUs, and as fast as one was dropped

And Circus Celebrities. 237

another would be taken on. In one town one land-
lord, who had been along for nearly a week, grew
out of patience, and, becoming desperate, had the
canvas attached, and as soon as the company got
ready to start for the next town it was hauled down
to a stable under charge of the sheriff. Of course
there was no use of the show going to the next town
without a canvas, so at last the sheriff kindly con-
sented to take two of the baggage horses for the
debt, and they were left behind. This caused a
delay, and the canvas did not arrive in the next
town until it was too late to give the afternoon show.
This is only one of the hundreds of little events that
transpire during the tenting season.

' But the greatest trouble experienced by circus
managers is the attempt on the part of crowds of
roughs to gain free admittance to the circus. In a
body they go to the door and attempt to pass ; upon
being stopped, they show fight. If they are worsted,
they soon re-appear on the scene, considerably
strengthened in numbers, and they either cut the
guy ropes and let down the canvas, or they get into
a fight with the circus boys. Generally speaking,
serious results follow, and if one of the citizens of
the town is hurt the concern is followed to the next
town and hunted like dogs, and probably the same
scenes occur there. There are several towns where

238 Circus Life

trouble is generally looked for. West Troy, K. Y.,
is one of these, and we could mention lialf a dozen
others. In scarcely one of these towns are the
police strong enough to break up these regular
circus riots. A circus manager is compelled to pay
to the corporation a heavy license fee for the privi-
lege of showing in the town, a goodly tax for ground
rent for pitching his canvas, he is charged exorbi-
tantly for everything he wants during his stay there,
and he has a United States licence also to pay, and
it is but justice that the corporation should be pre-
pared beforehand, and see that said manager's pro-
perty is protected.'

Next to Bamum's, the best organized and
appointed circuses now travelling are Van Am-
burgh's, Robinson's, and Stone and Murray's. Van
Amburgh and Co. own two menageries, one of which
accompanies the circus. It will surprise persons
acquainted only with English circuses to leam that
the staff of the combined shows comprises a manager
and an assistant manager, advertiser, treasurer,
equestrian director, riding-master, band leader, lion
performer, elephant man, doorkeeper, and head
ostler, besides grooms, tent-men, &c., to the
number, all told, of nearly a hundred. The number
of horses, including those used for draught, is about
a hundred and forty.

And Circus Celebrities.

In 1870, the management adopted the plan of
camping the horses and providing lodgings and
board for the entire company, so as to be independ-
ent of hotel and stable keepers, whose demands
upon circus companies are said to have often been
extortionate. To this end, they had constructed
a canvas stable, and two large carriages, eighteen
feet long, to be set eighteen feet apart, with swing-
ing sides, was to form a house eighteen feet by
thirty. This is their hotel, and the cooking is done
in a portable kitchen, drawn by four horses. Fifty
men are lodged and boarded in this construction,
which is called, after the manager, Hyatt Frost, the
Hotel Frost. Among the cooking utensils pro-
vided for the travelling kitchen is a frying-pan
thirty inches in diameter, which will cook a gross
of eggs at once.

Robinson, the manager of the concern known as
the Yankee Robinson Consolidated Shows, combines
a menagerie and a ballet troupe with a circus, the
former containing a group of performing bears.
The parades of this circus are organized on a great
scale, and usually present some feature of novelty,
or more than ordinary splendour. A new Poly-
hymnia, used as an advertising car, and which pro-
duces a volume of sound equal to that of a brass
band, was added to its attractions in 1870. The

240 Circus Life

Hayneses or Senyahs, who performed at several of
the London music-halls a few years ago^ and whose
performance has been described in a previous
chapter, were at that time in the company, and had
been during the previous winter at the Olympic
Theatre, Brooklyn. There also another female
gymnast known to the frequenters of metropolitan
music-halls, namely, Madlle Geraldine, appeared
that season. Robinson is said to be the only man
that so far has been successful as a circus manager,
performer, and Yankee comedian, having appeared
with considerable success as a representative of
Yankee characters at Wood's Museum and the
Olympic Theatre, New York, as well as in other
cities.

Stone and Murray^s circus enjoyed, until Barnum
took the field, a reputation second to none in the
Union. ' Wherever they have been,' says the
writer already quoted, ' they have left a good name
behind them, and they give a really good circus
entertainment. Everything about the show presents
a neat appearance, and the company are noted for
behaving themselves wherever they appear.* This
is the circus in which two or three of the numerous
and talented Cooke family performed during the
season of 1870, together with Jeannette Elsler, who
in 1852 performed at Batty 's Hippodrome, being

And Circus Celebrities. 241

then a member of Franconi^s company. Charles
Bliss, now in Barnum's company, and William
Ducrow, were also members of Stone and Murray^a
company four years ago. For the parade, this
circus has a band chariot, drawn by forty horses ;
and in 1870, as an additional outside attraction,
Madlle Elsler made an ascent on a wire from the
ground to the top of the pavilion, a feat which
she had performed eighteen years previously at
Batty's Hippodrome.

Forepaugh^s ' zoological and equestrian aggrega-
tion,' as the show is called, combines a circus with
a menagerie, and possesses no fewer than three
elephants and as many camels. Adam Forepaugh
is the proprietor of this show, which must not be
confounded with Gardner and Forepaugh' s circus
and menagerie, which was organized in 1870 by the
amalgamation of Gardner and Kenyon's menagerie
with James Eobinson's circus. Kenyon retired from
the former in 1869, and John Forepaugh, brother
of Adam, took his place. The two elephants and
other animals forming the zoological collection
belong, however, to Adam Forepaugh, from whom
they are hired on a per centage arrangement,
Madlle Virginie, who appeared at the Holborn
Amphitheatre a few years ago, has since been
travelling with Adam Forepaugh ; while Gardner

16

242 Circus Life

and Forepaugli's circus has included in its company
J. M. Kelly, brother of George Kelly, the champion
vaulter, whose double somersaults over a dozen
horses will long linger in the memory of those who
witnessed the feat in the same arena.

Joel Warner, who was formerly Adam Fore-
paugh's advertiser, started a circus and menagerie
on his own account in 1871. * He said,' writes the
gentlemaji who relates the story of the origin of
Bamum's show, ' that he was " bound to have some
money, or die ; '* and he added that he would " fifty
per cent, rather have the money than die." Well,
he started out, and met with but poor encourage-
ment ; still his indomitable energy kept him above-
water until he got into Indiana, when he found, to
his utter consternation, that he was to meet with
strong opposition. " Well," he said, " there's just
one way to get out of this," and Warner quietly
disappeared. Two or three days after a travel- worn
stranger stepped into the counting-room of Eussell,
Morgan, & Co.'s great printing house, in Cincinnati,
and, sitting himself down in a chair, exclaimed : —
"Well, here I am, and here Til stay." It was
Warner, and the way that man disturbed the placid
bosom of quart-bottles of ink was a warning to
writists. For two weeks he sat at a desk running
oflf '^ proof " from his pen, while the printers ran it

And Circus Celebrities. 243

off from the press, and when he got through, J, E.
Warner & Co.'s Menagerie and Circus was among
the best advertised shows in America. He courted
the muses too, and fair poetry shed her light upon
Warner's wearied brain, while she tipped his fingers
with: —

" One summer's eve, amid the bowers

Of Grand river's peaceful stream,
Sleeping 'mong the breathing flowers,

Joel Warner had a dream :
Argosies came richly freighted.

Birds and beasts, from every land,
At his caUing came and waited,

Till he raised his magic hand."

The " magic hand," was raised, and Hoosiers and
Michiganders filled it with " rocks." I met him in
the summer at Fort Wayne. " Well, Warner, what
success ? " I asked. " Red hot ! " was the answer,
and off he started to hire every bill-board and bill-
poster and newspaper in the town. As an adver-
tiser he stands *' ever so high," and as a gentleman
he is, as Captain Cuttle remarked of his watch,
" equalled by few and excelled by none."

' One day Charley Castle — of course, everybody
knows Charley Castle, and has heard him mention
Syracuse — one day Charley Castle lost a beautiful
topaz from a ring, and after a thorough search he
gave it up as gone ; " still," said he, " I'll give two
dollars to the finder if he returns it." Warner

244 Circus Life

quietly walked across the street to the dollar-store
and bought a glass stone which bore a remarkable
resemblance to the one lost. Laying it in a corner,
he sat down, and in a, few moments delighted Castle
by pointing out his lost gem. It fitted the setting
exactly, and Charley was happy. " Well," said
Warner, "I wonH ask you for the two dollars,
, Charley, but you must set 'em up." " All right."
They were set up accordingly, and it cost three
dollars exactly. A short time after. Castle made a
startling discovery — ^his beautiful topaz was beautiful
glass. There was war in that camp, and in order to
move Charley Castle it is only necessary to go and
whisper " topaz ^^ in his ear.

' But Castle is full of tricks too. Out in Ohio,
when he was agent of O'Brien's big show — " Great
Monster Menagerie, National Natural Kingdom and
Aviary of Exotic Birds " — that's what he calls it —
a landlord gave him a cross word. " Hitch up them
horses," he shouted to his groom, and leaving the
landlord a left-handed blessing, he drove three miles
away, and showed in an open farm, to a crowded
house. Landlords and showmen often have little
passages, and generally the showmen come out
winners. I remember a landlord in a southern
town, who once contracted to keep fifty men, and
when the show arrived he had just ten beds in the

And Circus Celebrities. 245

house. This was rough on the showmen, but the
way the landlord suffered was enough to " point a
moral and adorn a tale/^ '

Bailey's circus also combines a menagerie with
the attractions of the arena, and the former, which
includes two large elephants and no fewer than ten
camels, is exhibited during the winter at Wood's
Museum, New York. Though called Bailey's,
George Bailey is only the junior partner and general
director, the senior partners being Avery Smith and
John Nathans, who are also the proprietors, in
partnership with George Burnell, of the European
Circus. Sebastian and Romeo, now travelling with
Barnum's show, were performing in this circus a few
years ago, together with George Derious, a gym-
nast who, in 1869, performed some sensational feats
at the Bowery theatre. New York.

The European circus of Smith, Nathans, and
Burnell travels with a company of a hundred and
twenty-five persons, and a stud of a hundred and
thirty-four horses. The famous Frank Pastor was
lately the principal equestrian, and the Conrads were
among the gymnastic artistes.

French's circus was the first in America in which
the system of lodging and boarding the company
and stabling the horses, indepepdently of hotels, was
introduced. The cooking and dining carriage is

246 Circus Life

eighteen feet long, eigkt feet wide, and ten feet
high ; and there are several large carriages for
sleeping purposes. French employs a hundred and
twenty persons, aU told, and his stud numbers as
many horses, besides two elephants, fifteen camels,
and two cages of performing lions.

Campbell's show, which comprises a circus and
a menagerie, is a good one of the second, or rather
third, class. The circus company lately included
Madame Brown (better known as Marie Toumaire),
Madlle Josephine, and Sam Stickney — a name still
famous in the arena. The zoological collection in-
cludes an elephant and a group of performing lions,
tigers, and leopards, who are exercised by Signor
Balize.

There remains to be noticed several tenting
circuses of piinor extent and repute, but which
make a figure that would be more highly esteemed
in this country. Wheeler and Gushing have a band
of silvef comet players, and their company lately
included Madame Toumaire, Annie Warner, and
Pardon Dean, the oldest English equestrian in
America. Wilson's circus included the world-famed
Brothers Risareli in the company just before their
appearance at the Holboru Amphitheatre. John-
son's circus was strengthened a few years ago by
amalgamation with Levi North's show, which in-

And CirciLS Celebrities. 247

eluded a group of pei-forming animals, and is now-
able to give a parade extending to the length of a
mile. Older's circus and menagerie is a fourth-rate
concern, but yet possesses two camels.

Thayer's circus was broken up by the had
business of 1869, and the stud and effects sold by
auction. A new concern was organized in the same
name in the following year by James Anderson,
with fifty people and as many horses, Thayer being
manager, Samuel Stickney equestrian director, and
Charlie Abbott — the vanishing clown of a few years
ago at the Holborn Amphitheatre — as clown. Ward's
circus started in 1869, and broke up the same year,
when Bunnell and Jones bought the stud and effects
at auction for little more than one-seventh of the
money they had cost, and started it again in Ward's
name, in 1870. Lake's circus was sold by auction
about the same time, when the ring horses were
bought by Van Amburgh, and the draught stock by
Noyes. There are three other circuses — ^Watson's,
De Haven's, and Alexander E-obinson's — ^ which
though they bear the high-sounding names of the
Metropolitan, the Sensation, and the International
Hippo-comique and World Circus, are of compara-
tive small importance.

Besides these, there are some circuses which
travel the Southern States, where the climate enables

248 Circus Life

tliem to tent all the year round. Foremost among
these is Noyes' circus, a great feature in the parade
of which is the globe band chariot, drawn by eight
cream-coloured horses. Hemmings, Cooper, and
Whitby^s show combines with the circus a small
menagerie, and includes an elephant and a cage of
performing lions. Grady's circus lately numbered
in its company Madame Macarte, who formerly
travelled with Batty, and whose real name is, I
believe, Macarthy. John Robinson's circus and
menagerie also possesses an elephant, and the
zoological collection has been greatly enlarged of
late years. Stowe's circus appears to be a very
small concern.

Most of the American circuses, including all the
most considerable, are accompanied, as before stated,
by what are termed ' side shows,^ of which the fol-
lowing account is given by the gentleman to whom
I am indebted for the statement of the troubles of
American circuses in the beginning of this chapter.
' The side show,' he says, * is an institution of itself
—one in which considerable money is invested with
some concerns, while with others not so much capital
is required. What is known as a side show is an
entertainment given in a small canvas in close prox-
imity to the big show. To secure the sole privilege
of conducting this entertainment on the same ground

And Circus Celebrities. 249

as used by the big concern, and for being permitted
to accompany it on its summer tour, a considerable
bonus has to be paid. There is a great rivalry
among side showmen to secure the privilege with
the larger concerns, as a great deal of money is
made during a tenting season. Some of these en-
tertainments consist of a regular minstrel perform-
ance or the exhibition of some monstrosity, such as
a five-legged cow, a double-headed calf, collection
of anacondas, sword- swallowers, stone-eaters, dwarf,
giant, fat woman, and anything else, no matter
what, so long as it is a curiosity.

' The modus operandi of running a side show is as
follows : — The manager has a two-horse waggon,
into which he packs his canvas and traps. He starts
off early ip the morning, so as to reach the town in
which the circus is to exhibit about an hour before
the procession is made. He drives to the lot, and
in less than an hour every preparation has been
completed and the side show commences, with the
" blower " taking his position at the door of the
entrance, and in a stentorian voice expatiating at
large upon what is to be seen within for the small
sum of ten cents ; sometimes the admission is twenty-
five cents. The term " blower " is given to this in-
dividual because he talks so much and tells a great
deal more than what proves to be true. A CBowd

250 Circus Life

always gathers about a circus lot early in tlie morn-
ing, and many a nimble tenpence is picked up before
the procession is made in town. When that is over
and has reached the lot, an immense crowd gathers
around to see the pitching of the big canvas, and
from them many drop in to see the side show. As
soon as the big show opens for the afternoon per-
formance the " kid " show, as the side show is called,
shuts up and does not open again until about five
minutes before the big show is out. Then the
" blower " mounts a box or anything that is handy,
and goes at it with a will, " blowing " and taking
in the stamps at the same time. This is kept up for
about half an hour, by which time all have gone in
that can, while the rest have departed. The side
show entertainment lasts about half an hour, when
the doors are closed and remain so until the evening
performance of the big show is over. And then,
with a huge torch-ball blazing each side of him, the
'^blower" commences. This torch ball consists of
balls of cotton wicking, such as was used in olden
times for oil lamps ; having been soaked well in
alcohol and lighted, it is fixed upon an iron rod,
about six feet long, which is placed upright in the
ground and the ball will burn for half an hour or
more ; two balls will make the whole neighbourhood
nearly as light as day.

Aftd Circus Celebrities, 251

* The receipts from some side shows reach over
S150 a day, and with the larger concerns a still
greater amount than this is taken. I know of a
side show that travelled with a circus company-
through Vermont and the Canadas, about ten years
ago, that actually came home in the fall with more
money than the circus had ; not that it took more
money, but it did a big business, and had little or
no expense. The side show belonged to the man-
ager of the big show, and consisted of a couple of
snakes, a cage of monkeys, and a deformed negro
wench, who was represented as a wild woman,
caught by a party of slaves in the swamps of Florida.
While the big show did a poor business the " kid "
show made money. Some of the circus managers
do not dispose of the side show privilege, but run it
themselves. Then, again, the manager of the big
show rents out what is called the "concert pri-
vilege ; " that is, the right of giving a minstrel
entertainment within the canvas of the big show as
soon as the regular afternoon and evening perform-
ances are over. This consists of a regular first part
and variety minstrel entertainment, given by the
circus performers, who can either play some musical
instrument or dance j occasionally some of the ladies
of the company dance. The show lasts about three
quarters of an hour, and the charge is twenty-five

252 Circus Life

cents. The clown announces to the audience, just
before the big. show is over, that the entertainment
will be given immediately after, and those who wish
to witness it can keep their seats. Several parties
then skirmish among the assembled multitude and
cry " tickets for the concert, twenty-five cents," and
just before the entertainment commences the tickets
are collected.*

New York and New Orleans are provided with
permanent buildings in which circus performances
are given during the winter by companies which
travel in the tenting season. At the New York Am-
phitheatre the company comprises some of the best
equestrians and gymnasts, American and European,
whose services can be secured, such as Eobert Stick-
ney, William Conrad (who, with liis brother, will be
remembered by many as gymnasts at the Alhambra),
and Joe Pentland, one of the oldest and best clowns
in the Union. The stud comprises between forty
and fifty horses, all used in turn in the ring, as the
summer campaign is made by rail, and only the prin-
cipal towns are visited. Mr Lent is lessee and man-
ager in New York.

The New Orleans Amphitheatre combines
a menagerie with its circus attractions, and is
owned by C. T. Ames. There are twelve camels
attached to it, and a ' mioj' whatever that may be.

And Circus Celebrities. 2^^

the animal being as unknown to naturalists, by
that name at least, as the ' vedo ' of Sanger^s
circus. Lucille Watson, now with Bamum's com-
pany, was previously a member of the New Orleans
troupe.

254

CHAPTER Xiy.

Reminiscences of a Gymnast— Training and Practising — A Profes-
sional Rendezvous — Circus Agencies — The First Engagement —
Spriugthorp's Music-hall — Newsome's Circus— Reception in the
Dressing-room — The Company and the Stud— The Newsome
Family— Miss Newsome's Wonderful Leap across a green lane —
The Handkercliief Trick— An Equine Veteran from the Ciimea
— Engagement to travel.

The picture of circus life and maimers which I
have endeavoured to portray would not be com-
plete without a narrative of the professional ex-
periences of the performers engaged in circuses.
I shall next, therefore, present the reminiscences
of a gymnast, as I heard them related a few years
ago by one who has since retired from the avoca-
tion ; and I shall endeavour to do so, as nearly
as may be possible, in his own words.

'I was not born and bred a circus man, as most
of them are — Alf Burgess, for instance, who was
bom, as I may say, in the saw-dust, and brought
up on the back of a horse. Neither was my partner.

Circus Celebrities. 255

He was a clerk in the advertising department of a
London evening newspaper, and I was an apprentice
in a London printing-office, and not quite out of
my time, when we went in for gymnastics at the
Alhambra gymnasium. My partner was practising
the flying trapeze, and was just beginning to do his
flights with confidence, when that poor fellow fell,
and broke his back, at the Canterbury, and the
proprietors of the London music-halls set their faces
against the flying trapeze, and would not engage
gymnasts for it. In consequence of that, he had to
drop the flying trapeze, and practise for the fixed
trapeze; and, as the single trapeze doesn't draw^
he began to look out for a partner, to do it double.
Price was looking out for a partner at the same
time, but, as he was more advanced in his training
than Fred was, and was not disposed to wait till he
was proficient, he took Joe Welsh, — Alhambra Joe,
as he used to be called, — and Fred had to look out
for somebody else.

' The partnership of the Brothers Price, as they
called themselves, did not last long; for Price
dropped in for a slice of luck, in the shape of a
thumping legacy, — ^twenty thousand pounds, I have
heard, — and then he turned up the profession, and
Joe Welsh went in for the long flight. In the
mean time, I had made up my mind to follow Fred's

2,^6 Circus Life

example, and to be his partner ; and, besides fixing
up the ropes for the flying rings in my grand-
mother's orchard at Norwood, for practice on
Sundays, we took our fakements nearly every
evening to the ''ruins," as they were called, in
Victoria Street. Do you know where I mean ? '

I did know the place, and remembered that it
conveyed the idea that a Metropolitan Improvement
Commission's notions of street improvements con-
sisted in demolishing some three or four hundred
houses, and creating a wilderness of unfinished
houses, yawning chasms, and heaps of rubbish.
The place remained in that condition for several
years, and was the rendezvous and free gymnasium
of most of the gymnasts, acrobats, rope-dancers,
and other professors of muscular sensationalism in
the metropolis.

' Well, we fixed our fakements up in the " ruins,"
and when the evenings began to get dark we had
candles. A lot of us used to be there — Frank
Berrington, and Costello, and Jemmy Lee, and Joe
Welsh, and Bill George, and ever so many more.
There used to be all kinds of gymnastic exercises
going on there ; and there my partner and I went,
night after night, until we could do a tidy slang on
the trapeze, the rings, or the bar. Then we went
to Roberts ; he used to live in Compton Street then.

And Circus Celebrities. 257

and lie and Maynard, in York Road, Lambeth, were

agents for all the circuses and music-halls in the

three kingdoms, and often had commissions from

foreign establishments to engage artistes for them.

They get engagements for you, and you pay them a

commission of fifteen per cent, on the salary they

get for you ; so it is their interest to get you as

good a screw as they can, and it is your interest to

keep the commission paid regularly, because if you

don^t, you will have to look out for yourselves when

you want another engagement. If you don't act

honourable, and you try to get another engagement

without the intervention of an agent, the circus or

music-hall proprietor or manager says, " I engage

my people through Roberts, '^ or Maynard, as the case

may be ; and there you are — flummoxed !

' Well, we went to Roberts, and had to wait our

turn, while he did business with other fellows who

were before us. We looked at the framed collections

of photographs of gymnasts, acrobats, clowns,

riders, jugglers, singers, and dancers which hung

against the wall, and then we looked about us.

There was Hassan, the Arab, a wiry-looking tawny

man, black bearded and moustached, and wearing a

scarlet fez, a blue zouave jacket, and baggy crimson

breeches ; and old Zamezou, with a broad-brimmed

felt hat overshadowing his face, and his portly figure

17

258 Circus Life

enveloped in the folds of a large blue cloak; and
George ChristoflT, tlie rope-dancer, buttoned up in
Ms over-coat, and looking rather blue, as if he had
just stepped up from the chilly fog in the street ;
and Luke Berrington, looking quite the swell, as he
always does ; and one or two more that I didn't
know, or can't remember. One by one, they
dropped out, and others came in, till at last our turn
came.

' " Well," says Roberts, who is a nice sort of
fellow — a smart dark-complexioned man, with gold
rings in his ears, " I want a couple of good gym-
nasts for Springthorp's, at Hull; but, you see, I
don't know you : where have you been ? "

* That was a floorer ; but, before my partner
could answer, a young fellow who had just come in,
and who had seen us practising at the " ruins,'' and
knew what we could do, says, '^ I know them ; they
have just come from the Cirque Imperiale."

' " Oh ! " says Roberts, " if you have been at the
Cirque Imperiale, you will do for Springthorp's.
The engagement will be for six nights, commencing
on Saturday next ; and you will have five pounds."

' That was gorgeous, we thought. There was I,
getting, as an apprentice, a pound a week, with
three-and-thirty shillings, or six-and-thirty at the
most, in perspective ; and my partner, out of collar

And Circus Celebrities. 259

for months, and receiving the munificent salary of
twelve bob a week when in : and we had jumped
into fifty shillings a week each, for a nightly per-
formance of ten minutes or a quarter of an hour !
It is no wonder that we fell to work, building castles
in the air, as soon as we got into the street. We
should go to the Cirque Imperiale some day, though
we had not been there yet, and then to Madrid or
St Petersburg, and come back to England, and be
engaged for the Alhambra at fifty pounds a week.
From the lofty height to which we had soared before
we reached the Haymarket we were brought to the
ground by considerations of finance. We were both
at low-water mark, and the denarlies had to be
found for our tights and trunks, and our expenses
down to Hull. We got over that little dijBficulty,
however, and started for HuU with hearts as light
as our purses.

'Do you know Springthorp's ? You were never
in Hull, perhaps ; but, if you should ever happen to
be there, and should lose yourself, as you are very
likely to do, in the neighbourhood of the docks, and
should wander into the dullest part of the town,
towards Sculcoates, you will come upon a dreary-
looking building, which was once a chapel, and
afterwards a wax-work exhibition. That is Spring-
thorp's; and there, in the dreariest, dingiest hall

26o Circus Llfj

that was ever mocked with the name of a place of
amusement, we gave our first performance. The
Vokes family were performing there at the same
time, and very agreeable people we found them.
The six nights came to an end too soon, — before we
had got used to seeing our name in the bills, in the
largest type and the reddest ink. Then we came
back to London, and presented ourselves again
before our agent. We had given entire satisfaction
at Springthorp's, he told us; but he couldn't ofier
us another engagement just then. He should put
our name on his list, and, if anything should turn
up, he would let us know.

' The first ofier came from a music-hall at Ply-
mouth, but the screw was too low for the distance,
unless we had had other engagements in the western
towns to follow, and we didn't take it. The next
chance was at the Hippodrome, in Paris, and we
should have gone there, but another brace of gym-
nasts, whose terms were lower than ours, cut us out
of it. As if to confirm the vulgar superstition about
times, the third time was lucky. Newsome wanted
a couple of good gymnasts for his circus, and oSered
the same terms we had had at Springthorp's, and
for twelve nights. The distance was a drawback,
for the circus was then at Greenock ; but we both
desired a circus engagement, and hoped that New-

. And Circus Celebrities. 16 1

some miglit be disposed to engage us to travel with
him. So we accepted the offer^ and, reaching Edin-
burgh by steamer to Granton, went on by rail to
Greenock.

' We had never seen any other circus than Heng-
ler^s, except Astley's, and, as we did not expect to
see a theatre, we expected to find a tent. To our
surprise, we found a large wooden building, well and
substantially built, though without any pretensions
to elegance or beauty of architecture ; and we were
still more surprised when we went into the ring to
fix up our trapeze. The boxes and balcony were as
prettily painted and gilded as in any theatre, and the
ring-fence was covered with red cloth, and a hand-
some chandelier hung from a canopy such as Char-
man had at the Amphi. in Holborn.

"'This is better than Hengler^s by a lump,"
says my partner, as we looked about us. "Why, it
must look like Astley's, when the chandelier and
those gas jets all round the balcony are lighted."

' We did not see many of the company till we
presented ourselves in the dressing-room on the
first night of our engagement. As we walked in
an old clown was applying the last touch of ver-
milion to his whitened face, and a younger one was
balancing a feather on the tip of his nose. There
were seven or eight fellows in tights and trunks.

262 Ci7'cus Life

ready for the vaulting act, and two or three in the
gilt-buttoned blue tunic and gold- striped trousers
which constituted the uniform in which the male
members of the company stood at the ring-doors
when not engaged in their several performances in
the ring. They all stared at us as we went in, and
I heard one of them say, " Here are the star gym-
nasts from London ! " One or two said " good
evening," and one gave us a glance of inquiry as he
pronounced our professional name.

* " That's us," returned my partner.

' " Haven't I seen your face before ? " said
another, looking hard at him.

'"Very likely," said Fred. "Were you ever
at the Circo Price, in Madrid ? "

' " No," answered the other fellow, still looking
hard at him.

* " Then it couldn't have been there," said my
partner, without a muscle of his face moving,
though I had to bite my lips to keep from laughing.

' We found all of them very good fellows to pal
with when we knew them. There was Webster
Vernon, the ring-master; Alf Burgess, the head
vaulter and revolving globe performer, who had
been all over the continent, and was supposed to
have accumulated some coin; Coleman, the bare-
back rider, a brother, I believe, of the theatrical

And Circus Celebrities. 263

manager of that name, well known in the north;
Charlie Ducrow, a direct descendant of the great
successor of Astley, and emulating him in his rapid
act on six horses ; old Zamezou and his boys ; the
Brothers Ridley^ also acrobats, and very good in
their chair act and at hand-balancing — Joe Eidley^s
one-arm balance was the best I ever saw; Franks,
the first clown, with a fund of dry, quiet humour
that earned his salary, which was higher than any
other man^s in the company, except Burgess's ; Joe
Hogini, singing clown, and better at comic singing
than at clowning, though he could do some clever
balancing tricks; and old Adams, clown and pro-
perty-man, whose wife was money-taker at the
gallery entrance, and whose daughter took small
parts in the ballets when required.

' If I mention the gentlemen before the ladies,
which isn't manners, it is because I saw them first,
and saw them oftenest. The ladies, as is often the
case in a circus, were all members of the proprietor's
family. Madame Newsome only appeared in the
ring when her clever manege horse. Brunette, was
introduced. Miss Adele was great in leaping acts,
and has been repeatedly acknowledged by the lead-
ing gentlemen of the north country hunts to be the
finest horsewoman across country in England. One
of the wonderful stories related of her is, that a

264 Circus Life

splendid black hunter which she was riding leaped,
in the excitement of the chase, over two hedges,
with a narrow lane between them, landing safely in
the field beyond. Miss Emma did double acts with
Burgess, who is as good a rider as he is a vaulter
and a juggler on the globe. Miss Marie only ap-
peared in ballets at that time, but she is famous now
for her daring acts of horsemanship, without saddle
or bridle, like Beatrice Chiarini, whom you may have
seen at the Amphitheatre. But there was Lizzie
Keys, a bold and graceful rider, who used to take
her hoops and balloons beautifully ; they called her
the Little Wonder, and she was said to be only
fourteen years of age, but she looked more hke a
diminutive girl of eighteen.

* There was a capital stud. Newsome selected
his horses as they say Astley did, without caring
much for the colour of them ; they were not chosen
for show, like the cream-coloured, and spotted, and
piebald horses you see in circuses that do a parade,
but every horse was a good one in the ring, and had
been selected for docility and intelligence. There
was Emperor, the handsome black horse which the
governor, and sometimes Miss Adele, used to ride ;
he was worth a hundred guineas, at the very least,
as a hunter, and was a clever trick horse besides.
It was a treat to see that horse find, with his eyes

And Circus Celebrities. 26^

bandaged, a handkerchief which was buried in the
saw- dust ; you might bury it as deep as you could, and
be as careful as you liked to make the saw-dust
look as if it had not been disturbed, but he would
be sure to find it. He would step slowly round the
ring till he came to the place, and then he would
scrape the saw-dust away with his hoof, pick up the
handkerchief with his teeth, and carry it to New-
some. One night Franks took the handkerchief out
of the saw-dust, ran over to the other side of the
ring, and buried it in another place, chuckling and
gesticulating in assumed anticipation of the horse's
discomfiture. The horse found it as easily as usual.
In fact, I never knew him miss it but once ; he then
passed the place, but Newsome said, " En arriere,"
— circus horses are always spoken to in the ring in
French, — and he stepped back directly, and found
it. Then there was Brunette, a brown mare, the
most docile and intelligent creature that ever went
on hoofs ; and Balaklava, a scar-covered veteran that
had served in the Scots Greys, and had received his
name from having been wounded in the charge of
the heavy cavalry at the battle of Balaklava. Lizzie
Keys used to ride him.

' From the company and the stud, I must return
to ourselves. The twelve nights we were engaged
for, like the six at Hull, came to an end too soon ;

266 Circus Life

and my partner spoke to Henry, the manager, about
our travelling with the circus, as we had set our
minds upon doing. Henry, who was a very gentle-
manly fellow, said he would mention it to the
governor ; and Newsome called us to him.

' " I am afraid," said he, " you wouldn't be of
much use to me. You have not been used to circus
business, and you know-'nothing about it. The
general routine of a circus is very different to a
starring engagement, or a turn at a music-hall.
You can't vault, or hold a banner or a balloon."

* " We should soon learn," said Fred.

' " Well, look here," said the governor, " it's as
I said just now, you are not of much use to me at
present ; but you are good on the trapeze, and, on
the understanding that you are to make yourselves
useful in the general business as soon as you can, I
will put you on the establishment, the engagement
to be terminable at any time by a week's notice on
either side."

' " I should like travelling with a circus, of all
things," said Fred.

' '^ Of course, I couldn't give you the salary you
have been having as stars," said the governor.
'^ The best man in the company doesn't get much
more than I have been giving each of you. But if
two pounds a week for you and your partner

And Circus Celebrities. 16 'j

will satisfy you, you may consider yourself en-
gaged."

' Of course, we thanked him, and we accepted
the ofiFer, thinking that we should be worth more
some day, and that it would be better to have two
pounds a week regular than to have five pounds for
a week or a fortnight only, and then be for several
weeks without an engagement/

268

CHAPTER XV.

Continuation of the Gymnast's Reminiscences— A Circus on the
move — Three Months at CarUsle— Performance for the Benefit
of local Charities— Removal to Middlesborough — A Stockton
Man's Adventure— Journey toYork— Circus Ballets— The Paynes
in the Arena — Accidents in the Ring — A Circus Benefit — Removal
to Scarborough — A Gynmastic Adventure — Twelve Nights at the
Pantheon— On the Tramp — Return to London.

* The circus was near the end of its stay at Green-
ock when we engaged for " general utihty/' and
we were not sorry to leave the banks of the Clyde
for a more genial climate. It rained more or less,
generally more, all the time we were there, and I
can quite believe the boy who assured an English
tourist that it didn't always rain in Scotland, adding,
'' whiles it snaws." There was a frigate lying in
the Clyde at the time, and whenever the crew prac-
tised gunnery down came the rain in torrents. I
don't know how that phenomenon is to be accounted
for ; but it is a fact that there was a change from a
drizzle to a down-pour whenever the big guns were

Circles Celebrities. 269

fired. And then the Sundays — not a drop of beer !
But what do you think the thirsty folks do ? There
are a great many people thirsty on Sundays in
Scotland, and especially in Greenock and Glasgow ;
for they try to drink enough on Saturday night to
last them till Monday, and that plan doesn^t work
satisfactorily. They go to a place called Gourock,
where they can get as much ale or whiskey as they
can pay for. That is how something like the Per-
missive Bill works in Scotland.

' On the last night of our stay in Greenock, as
soon as we had doffed the circus uniform, and the
audience had departed, we took down our trapeze,
and proceeded to the railway station. A special
train had been engaged for the removal to Carlisle
of all the company, the band, the stud, and the
properties, Newsome paying for all. Having to
make the journey by night, we did not see much of
the scenery we passed through ; but we had a good
time, as the Yankees say, talking, joking, laughing,
and singing all the way. We found at Carlisle as
good a building as we had left at Greenock, and,
having fixed up our trapeze, and taken a lodging,
we walked round the city to see the lions, which are
rather tame ones.

' While we were at Carlisle, Hubert Mears was
starring with us for a short time, doing the flying

270 CirciLs Life

trapeze, and doing it, too, as well as ever I have
seen it done. After him, we had Sadi Jalma, " the
serpent of the desert," for a time, and very sei-pent-
like his contortions are ; he can wriggle in and out
the rounds of a ladder or a chair like an eel. He is
like the acrobats that I once heard a couple of small
boys holding a discussion about, one maintaining
that they had no bones, and the other that their
bones were made of gutta percha. He calls himself a
Persian prince, but I don't believe he is any relation
to the Shah. He may be a Persian, for there are
Arab, Hindoo, Chinese, and Japanese acrobats
and jugglers knocking about over England, as well
as Frenchmen, Germans, and Italians ; but nation-
alities are as often assumed as names, and he may
be no more a Persian than I am a Spaniard.

^ It is a praiseworthy custom of Newsome, to
devote one night's receipts to the charities of every
town which he visits. It would require more time
than he has to spare to make the inquiries and cal-
culations that would be necessary before a stranger
could distribute the money among the several insti-
tutions, so as to effect the greatest amount of good ;
and it is placed for that purpose at the disposal of
the Mayor. The amount of money which he has
thus given for the relief of the sick, the infirm, and
the indigent during the time his circus has been

And Circus Celebrities. 271

travelling would have been a fortune in itself, if he
had put it into his own pocket. He divides the year
between four towns, and in one year he gave two
hundred pounds to the charities of Preston, and
forty pounds to the Seamen's Orphans' Asylum at
Liverpool, besides what he gave to the similar insti-
tutions of the other towns which he visited that
year.

' Our next move was to Middlesborough, where
a very laughable incident occm-red. A party of us
ferried over to Stockton one day, and went into a
public-house there for refreshment. Circus men are
always courted and sought after, as soldiers are in a
place where they are only occasionally seen; and,
as soon as we were recognised by the Stockton men
in the room as belonging to the circus, there was a
great disposition shown to treat us, and to get into
conversation with us. Well, a short time afterwards,
one of those men came over to Middlesborough, to
see the circus again, and, after the performance, he
went into a public-house where he recognized Sam
Sault, a gymnast from Manchester, who had lately
joined us, and insisted upon treating him. Sam
had no objection to be treated, and the Stockton
man was elated with the opportunity of showing
that he was acquainted with a circus man. So one
glass followed another until the Stockton man be-

2,72 Circus Life

came, all at oncGj helplessly drunk. Sam, who
retained the use of his limbs, and some glimmering
of reason, good-naturedly took his drunken friend
to his lodging to save him from heing turned out of
the public-house, and then locked up by the police.
He had no sooner reached his lodgings, and helped
the drunken man up the stairs, however, than he
felt a doubt as to the safety of his purse ; and, on
immediately thrusting his hand into his pocket, he
found that it was gone. He reflected as well as he
was able, and came to the conclusion that he must
have left it on the parlour table at the public-house.
Depositing his helpless companion upon the sofa, he
ran down-stairs, and rushed off to the tavern, where,
by great good fortune, he found his purse on the
chair on which he had been sitting, where he had
placed it, it seems, when he thought he had returned
it to his pocket.

^ While he was at the public-house Joe Ridley
and I, and my partner, who lodged in the same
house with Sam Sault, returned to our lodging, and
found the drunken man asleep on the sofa, smelling
horribly of gin and tobacco smoke, and snoring
like a fat hog. We looked at the fellow in surprise,
wondering who he was, and how he came to be
there. Neither of us recognized him as any one we
had seen before. Then the question was raised, —

And Circus Celebrities, 273

What should we do with him. " Throw him out of
the window," says Joe Ridley. "Take him down
into the yard and pump on him/' says Fred. " No,
let us paint his face/' says I. So I got some
carmine, and Fred got some burnt cork, and we
each painted him to our own fancy till he looked
like an Ojibbeway in his war-paint. By that time
Sam Sault got back from the public-house, and
found us laughing heartily at the queer figure cut
by the recumbent Stocktonian.

' " Oh, if he is a friend of yours, we'll wipe it
off,*' says I, when Sam had explained how the man
came to be there.

* " Oh, let it be," says Sam, " and let him be
where he is ; we'll turn him out in the morning,
without his knowing what a beauty you have made
him, and that will serve him right for giving me so
much trouble."

^ So the fellow was left snoring on the sofa till
morning, when, it appears, he woke before we were
about, and, finding himself in a strange place,
walked down-stairs, and quitted the house. We
never saw him again, but we often laughed as we
thought of the figure the man must have cut as he
stalked into Stockton, and how he must have been
laughed at by his mates and the people he met on
his way.

18

2 74 Circus Life

' From Middlesborougli we went to York, where
tlie circus stood on St George's Field, an open space
between the castle and the Ouse. About that time,
Webster Vernon left the company, and was suc-
ceeded as ring-master by a gentleman named Vivian,
who was quite new to the profession, and whose
adoption of it added another to the changes which
he had already known, though he was still quite a
young man. He had been a lawyer's clerk, then a
photographic colourist, and afterwards an actor ; and
was a quiet, gentlemanly fellow, unlike the majority
of circus men, who are generally a fast, slangy set.
He had married early, and his wife, who was an
actress, had an engagement in London — a frequent
cause of temporary separation among those whose
business it is to amuse the public, whether their
lines lie in circuses, theatres, or music-halls. Joe
Kidley^s wife was in London, and Sam Sault had
left his better half in Manchester. Franks, and
Adams, and old Zamezou, and Jem Ridley, and the
head groom had their wives with them ; but two of
the five were connected with the circus, Adams's
wife taking money at the gallery entrance, and the
groom's riding in entrees.

* How did we do ballets ? Well, they were
ballets d' action, such as used to be done at the
music-halls by the Lauri family, and more lately by
Fred Evans and troupe. The Paynes starred in

And Circles Celebrities. 275

them at one time, but generally they were done by
the regular members of the company, usually by
Alf Burgess, and Funny Franks, and Joe Hogini,
with Adele Newsome in the leading lady's part, the
subordinate characters being taken by Marie New-
some and Jane Adams, and my partner and I, and
Charley Ducrow.

^ Who starred with us at this time, besides the
Paynes ? Well, there was Hassan, the Arab, who
did vaulting and balancing feats, and his wife, who
danced on the tight rope. He vaulted one night over
a line of mounted dragoons from Fulwood barracks,
turning a somersault over their heads and drawn
sabres. Didn't we have accidents in the ring some-
times ? Well, none of a very serious character, and
nearly all that happened in twelve months might be
counted on the fingers of one hand. Coleman slip-
ped off the bare back of a horse one night, and cut
his hand with a sword. Burgess had a finger cut
one night in catching the knives for his juggling act,
which used to be thrown to him from the ring- doors
while he was on the globe, and keeping it in motion
with his feet. Adele Newsome was thrown one
night, and pitched amongst the spectators, but re-
ceived no injuries beyond a bruise or two. Lizzie
Keys slipped ofl" the pad one night, but came down
comfortably on the sawdust, and wasn't hurt at all.
Fred fell from the trapeze once, and that was very

276 Circus Life

near being the most serious accident of all. He
fell head foremost, and was taken up insensible by
the fellows at the ring-doors, and carried into the
dressing-room. We thought his neck was broken,
but Sam Sault, who had seen such accidents before,
pulled his head right, and, when his senses came
back to him, it did not appear that he was much
the worse for the fall after all. Then my turn came.
One night, when the performances were to commence
with a vaulting act, I went to the circus so much
more than half tight that I was advised on all sides
to stand out of it, and Henry, the manager, very
kindly said that I should be excused ; but, with the
obstinacy of men in that condition, and their usual
belief that they are sober enough for anything, I
persisted in going into the ring with the rest.
What happened was just what might have been
expected, and everybody but myself feared. In-
stead of clearing the horses I touched one of them,
and, in consequence, instead of dropping on my feet,
I was thrown upon my back ; and that accident, with
a violent attack of inflammation of the lungs, laid
me up for two or three weeks, during which I was
treated with great Hberality by Newsome, and
received many kindnesses from more than one of
the good people of York.

^ My partner and I had a benefit while we were

And Circus Celebrities. . I'jy

in York, but we didn^t make more tlian £3 by it.
The way benefits are given in circuses is by admit-
ting the tickets sold by. the party whose benefit it
isj and of course the number of tickets a circus man
can sell among the inhabitants of a town where he
was a stranger till the circus appeared, and where
he has lived only two or three months, can't be very
great. We were thankful for what we got, however,
and had new trunks made on the strength of it —
black velvet, spangled. Soon after this we removed
to Scarborough, where I had a rather perilous ad-
venture. I attempted to ascend the clifi", and found
myself, when half way up, in an awkward position.
I had reached a narrow ledge, above which the cliff
rose almost perpendicularly, without any projection
within reach that I could grasp with one hand, or
plant so much as one toe upon. Descent was almost
as impracticable as the completion of the ascent, for,
besides the difficulty of having to feel for "a footing
with my feet while descending backward, a portion
of the cliff, which I had been standing upon a few
minutes before, had given way and plunged down
to the beach. It seemed probable that the ledge I
was standing upon might give way if I stood still
much longer, and in that case I should go down
after it. So I shouted " help ! " as loud as I could,
and in a few minutes I saw the shako-covered head

278 Circus Life

of a volunteer projected over the edge of tlie preci-
pice, and heard him call out, '^A man over the
cliff ! " His corps was encamped on the cliff, and
in a few minutes I was an object of interest to a
large number of spectators, whom his alarm had
attracted to the edge of the cliff. Presently a rope
was lowered to me, and held fast by men above,
while I went up it, hand over hand, as I did every
night in the circus, when we ascended to the
trapeze.

'When we had been in Scarborough about a
month, my partner and I had a disagreement, and I
left the circus, and procured an engagement for
twelve nights at the Pantheon music-hall. That
completed, " the world was all before me, where to
choose ! " I thought there might be a chance of
obtaining an engagement at one or other of the
music-halls at Leeds and Bradford, and I visited
both towns ; but without meeting with success. By
the time I arrived at the conclusion that I must
return to London I was pretty nigh hard up. I
counted my coin the morning I left Leeds, and
found that I had little more than enough to enable
me to reach Hull, where I expected to receive a
remittance from " the old house at home ! ^' I
had a long and weary walk to Selby, where I sat
down beside the river, to await the arrival of the

And Circus': Celebrities. 279

steamer that runs between Hull and York. Once
more I counted my money, and had the satisfaction
of ascertaining that I had just one penny above the
fare from Selby to Hull. I shoved my fingers into
each comer of every pocket, but the search did not
result in the discovery of a single copper more. It
was something to have that penny, though, for be-
sides being thirsty, I was so fatigued that I needed
some sort of stimulant.

'"\ must have half a pint,*^ I thought, and I
went into the nearest public-house, and had it.
Then I sat down again, and looked up the brown
Ouse, where at last I saw the black hull and smoking
funnel of the steamer. As soon as she came along-
side the landing-place, I went aboard, and descended
into the fore-cabin, where I lay down, and smoked
my last bit of tobacco, after which I dozed till the
steamer bumped against the pier at Hull. There
I was all right, as far as my immediate wants were
concerned. I dined, replenished my tobacco pouch,
and strolled up to Springthorp's, to see if there was
any chance there. There was no immediate opening,
however, and on the following day I took a passage
for London in one of the steamers running between
the Humber and the Thames/

28o

CHAPTER XYI.

Continuation of the Gymnast's Reminiscences — Circus Men in Diffi-
culties—Heavy Security for a small Debt— The SheriJaPs Officer
and the Elephant— Taking Refuge with the Lions— Another Pro-
vincial Tour — With a Circus in Dublin— A Joke in the wrong place
—A Fenian Hoax — A Case of Pikes— Return to England — At the
Kentish Watering-places— Off to the North.

* Several weeks elapsed before I got another en-
gagement. Two gymnasts can do so much more
showy and sensational a performance than one can,
that a single slang doesn't go near so well as a
double one, and it is, in consequence, only those
who produce something novel, such as Jean Price's
long flight and Avolo's performance on two bars,
who can procure single-handed engagements.
Knowing this to be the case, I looked about for a
new partner, and found that the Brothers Athos had
separated, and that one of them was in just the
same fix as myself. When we met, and talked the
matter over, however, a difficulty arose in the fact
that we had both worked as bearers, — that is, we

Circus Celebrities, 281

had supported our respective partners in the double
tricks, that require one man to bear the entire
weight of the other, as in the drop, or when one,
hanging by the hocks, holds a single trapeze for
the other to do a trick or two upon beneath him.
Our respective necessities might have urged us to
overcome this difficulty if Christmas had not been
approaching, at which season unemployed gymnasts
and acrobats often obtain engagements at the
theatres, as demons and sprites. Athos got an
engagement to sprite at the East London, and I was
left out in the cold.

' Newsome's circus had moved, in the mean time,
from Scarborough to Middlesborough, where some
changes were made in the company. Burgess and
two or three more left, and my late partner was
among them. I heard afterwards one of the many
stories that are current in circuses of the devices
resorted to by circus men in difficulties to evade
arrest. A friend of one of the parties who had
ceased to belong to Newsome's company called at
the house where he had lodged, and found that he
had left, and that his landlady didn't know where
he had gone to.

' " But I am sure to see him again," said she,
" for he has left a large box, so heavy that I can't
move it.'*

282 Circus Life

' " Then you can have good security for what he
owes you/' observed the friend. "1 suppose he
owes you something ? "

' " Well, yes/' rejoined the woman, " he does
owe me something for board and lodging/'

' Her lodger never returned, however, and his
friend meeting him some time afterwards in York,
alluded to the manner in which he had " mysteriously
dried up," as his friend called it.

' " Ah, I was under a heavy cloud ! " observed
the defaulter. " What did the old lady say about
me?"

' " That she was sure to see you again, because
you had left a heavy box in the room you occupied,"
replied his friend.

' " I should think it was heavy," said the other.
" Couldn't move it, could she ? "

'His friend replied in the negative, and he
laughed so heartily that he spilled some of the ale
he was drinking.

' " What is the joke ? " inquired his friend.

t " Why, you see, the box was once full of togs,"
replied the mysterious lodger, *'^but when I left
Middlesborough such of them as were not adorning
the person of this swell were hypothecated."

' " What is the meaning of that hard word ? "
inquired a third circus man who was presents

And Circus Celebrities. 283

' " In the vulgar tongue, up the spout," replied
the defaulter.

' " Then what made the box so heavy ? " inquired
his friend.

' " A score of bricks/' suggested the third party.

' " Wrong, cully," said the Artful Dodger. " I
couldn't have smuggled bricks into the room without
being observed ; but a big screw went through the
bottom of^the box, and held it fast to the floor.''

' Another of the stories I have alluded to relates
to a man that used to look after an elephant in a
circus, and put him through his performance. He
got pretty deeply in debt — the man I mean — in a
midland town where the circus had been staying
some time, and his creditor, not being able to obtain
payment, and finding that the company were about
to remove to another town, determined to arrest him.

'The cavalcade of horses, performing mules,
camels, and other quadrupeds was just ready to start
from the circus when the sheriff's officer appeared on
the scene, and tapped his man on the shoulder. He
was recognized at a glance, and the man ran into
the stables, with the sheriff's officer after him.
Running to the elephant, the debtor dived under its
belly, and took up a safe position on the other side
of the beast. The officer attempted a passage in the
rear, but was cut off by a sudden movement of the

284 Circus Life

elephant's Mnd quarters. Then lie screwed up his
courage for a dive under the animaPs belly, but the
beast turned its head, and fetched him a slap with
its trunk.

' " I'll have you, if I wait here all day,*' said he,
as he drew back hastily.

' " You had better not wait till I unfasten this
chain," says the elephant keeper, pretending to do
what he threatened.

^ The officer growled, and went off to find the
proprietor ; but he didn't succeed, and when he re-
turned to the stables, his man was gone. That was
as good a dodge as the lion-tamer's, who, when the
officers went to the circus to arrest him, took refuge
in the cage containing the lions. They looked
through the grating, and saw him in the midst of a
group of lions and lionesses. They were philosophic
enough to console themselves with the reflection that
their man would come out when he wanted his din-
ner ; but they had not waited long when the lions
began to roar.

' " The lions are getting hungry," says the
keeper. " If he lets them out of the cage, you will
have to run."

' The officers exchanged frightened glances, and
were out of the show in two minutes.

' To return to my story ; my late partner found

'And Circus Celebrities. 285

himself in mucli the same fix as myself, and this dis-
covery paved the way for a mutual friend to bridge
over the gulf that had kept us apart. As soon as we
had agreed to work together again, we got a twelve
nights' engagement at the Prince of Wales concert-
hall at Wolverhampton. We found the other pro-
fessionals engaged there very good people to pal with,
and spent Christmas Day with the comic singer and
his wife, two niggers also being of the party, and
bringing their banjo and bones to promote its hilar-
ity. While we were in Wolverhampton, we arranged
for twelve nights, to follow, at the London Museum
music-hall at Birmingham, which has received its
name from the cases of stuffed birds and small ani-
mals of all kinds, which cover all the wall space of
the front of the bar and the passage leading to the
hall. After our twelve nights there, we were engaged
for six nights longer ; and then we went down to
Oldham, for a twelve nights' engagement at the Co-
operative Hall. For all these engagements, and for
all We made afterwards, the terms we obtained were
four pounds ten a week.

* Our next engagement was with a circus in
Dublin, to which city we crossed from Liverpool.
The company and stud of this concern were very
different in strength and quality to Newsome's, and
they were doing very poor business. It is very

2,86 Circus Life

seldom that a circus proprietor ventures upon the
experiment of an Irish tour, which more rarely
pays, both because of the poverty of the people,
and the difficulty which all caterers for their amuse-
ment find in avoiding grounds for manifestations of
national antipathies between English and Irish. Of
this we had an instance on the first night of our
engagement. I dare say you have heard Sam
Collins or Harry Baker, or some other Irish comique,
interlard a song with a spoken flourish about the
Irish, something after this fashion : — " Who was it
made the French run at Waterloo ? The Irish !
Who won all the battles in the Crimea ? The Irish !
Who put down the rebellion in India ? The Irish !
Who mans your men of war and recruits your
army ? The Irish ! Who builds all your houses
and churches ? The Irish ! Who builds your
prisons and your workhouses ? The Irish ! And
who fills them ? The Irish ! " In England this is
laughed at, even by the Irish themselves ; but in
Ireland nothing of the kind is tolerated. One of
the clowns delivered himself of this stuff in the
ring, and was warmly applauded until the anti-
climax was reached, when such a howl burst forth
as I shouldn't have thought the human voice could
utter. The fellows in the gallery jumped up, and
raved, stamped, gesticulated, as if they were Ojib-

And Circus Celebrities. 287

beways performing a war-dance; and everybody
expected that the seats would be pulled up, and
flung into the ring, as had been done in another
circus, under something similar circumstances, some
time before. But the storm was hushed as sud-
denly as it arose. It happened fortunately that our
performance was next in the programme, and that,
knowing how popular everything American was in
Ireland, we had provided for its musical accompani-
ment a fantasia on American national airs, such as
" Yankee Doodle,^' '' Hail, Columbia ! » and « The
star-spangled banner." The band struck up this
music as the oflending clown ran out of the ring,
expecting to have a bottle flung at his head, and the
howlers in the gallery hearing it, and seeing pink
stars on our white trunks, thought we were Yankees.
The effect of our appearance, and of the music, was
like pouring oil on the waves. The howling ceased,
and harmony was restored as suddenly as it had
been interrupted.

' This was the time, you must know, when the
Fenian plot was in everybody's mouth, and when
the wildest rumours were in circulation of an in-
tended rising in Ireland, and the coming of
Americans, or rather Americanized Irishmen, to
support it. One day, while we were in Dublin, a
superintendent of constabulary received an anonym-

288 Circus Life

ous letter, informing him that a case of pikes had
been buried at a spot near the Liffey, which was so
particularly described that the men who were sent
to search for it had no difficulty in finding it.
When they had dug a pretty deep hole, they found
a deal box, which was raised to the surface, and
carted off to a police-station, with an escort of con-
stabulary. It was opened in the presence of the
superintendent, and there were the pikes ! — not
such as Slievenamon bristled with in '48, but a
couple of stale fishes.

' Before leaving Dublin, we arranged for a twelve
nights' engagement at the Alexandra music-hall, at
Ramsgate, which, as you perhaps know, is under the
same management as the Raglan, in London. The
Sisters Bullen, and Miss Lucette, and the Brothers
Keeling were at the Alexandra at the same time ;
and, as music-hall professionals are, as a rule, dis-
posed to fraternize with each other, we had a very
pleasant time. From Ramsgate we went to Dover,
for twelve nights at the Clarence music-hall, and
then back to Ramsgate for another twelve nights at
the Alexandra.

'Among the professionals engaged for the
following week at the Clarence was a versatile lady
bearing the name of Cora "Woski, and the town,
during the second week of our engagement, was

And Circus Celebrities. 289

placarded with the inquiry, " Have you seen Cora ? "
This soon became a common question in the streets,
and at all places of public resort ; and one of the
company, entering the Clarence on the day the bills
appeared, without having seen one of them, was
equally surprised and confused at being greeted with
the inquiry, " Have you seen Cora ? " He was only
slightly acquainted with the querist, and it happened
that he was engaged to marry the only lady of that
rather uncommon name whom he knew.

' " What do you know of Cora ? " he demanded,
his face reddening as he frowned upon the ques-
tioner.

* " Why, she is coming here," returned the
amused querist, who saw at once the cause of the
young fellow^s confusion.

' " How do you know ? " was the next question
of the bewildered artiste.

' " How do I know ? Why, it's all over the
town," was the reply.

' A nudge from a friend drew the other's atten-
tion from his tormentor for a moment, and, following
the direction of his friend's glance, he saw upon the
wall one of the placards bearing the question with
which he had been greeted on entering the bar.

' Engagements now followed each other pretty
close. Eeturning to London after our second en-

19

290 Circus Life.

gagement at Ramsgate, we were soon afterwards
engaged for twelve nights at Macfarlane's music-
hall, Dundee, and six nights, to follow, at a similar
place of amusement at Arbroath, under the same
management. We found the Gregories there, with
their performing dogs ; and there was a ballet, in
which the pretty illusion of Parkes's silver rain was
introduced. No other engagement awaited us in
the north when we left Arbroath, and we returned
to Dundee, and from thence to London.'

291

CHAPTER XVII.

Lions and Lion-tamers — Lorenzo and the Lions — Androcles and the
Lion — The Successor of Macomo — Accident in Bell and Myers's
Circus — Lion Hunting — Death of Macarthy — True Causes of
Accidents with Lions and Tigers — Performing Leopards — Antici-
pating the Millennium — Tame Hyenas — Fairgrieve's Menagerie
— Performing Lions, Tigers, Leopards, and Hyenas— Camels and
Dromedaries — The Great Elephant.

Since the death of the negro, Macomo, the most
successful performer with lions and other large
members of the feline genus has been Lorenzo, who
travelled with Fairgrieve's menagerie for several
years preceding its dispersion in the summer of
1872. On the death of George Wombwell, in 1850,
his collection, which had grown to an almost un-
manageable extent during nearly half a century,
was divided, according to his testamentary direc-
tions, into three parts. With one of these his widow
continued to travel until 1866, when she retired
from the business, and the menagerie was trans-
ferred to Fairgrieve, who had married her niece.

292 Circus Life

Another third was bequeathed to Wombwell's niece,
Mrs Edmonds, who travelled with it until the close
of 1872, when it was announced for sale. Who
had the remaining third I am unable to say ; it was
travelling for several years in the original name, as
the menageries of Fairgrieve and Edmonds did
long after WombwelFs decease, and is now owned
by Mrs Day.

Fairgrieve' s group of performing animals con-
sisted of several lions and lionesses, a tigress, two
or three leopards, and a hyena. Tigers are not, as
a rule, liked so well by lion-tamers as lions ; but
Fairgrieve's tigress exhibited as much docility and
intelligelfce as her performing companions. There
was a famous lion, named . Wallace, with which
Lorenzo represented the story of Andi'ocles, the slave,
who, flying from the cruel tyranny of his Roman
master, met in the forest in which he sought refuge
a lion that had been lamed by a thorn. Observing
the suflering of the beast, which made no hostile
demonstrations, he ventured to approach it, and
was allowed to extract the thorn from the elastic
pad of its foot, the lion testifying its gratitude for
the relief by rubbing its head against him. Some
time afterwards, the fugitive was captured, and was
doomed by his master to be exposed in the arena of
the amphitheatre to a recently trapped lion. But,

And Circus Celebrities. 293

to the amazement of the spectators, the lion, instead
of falling upon Androcles, and tearing him to pieces,
seemed to recognize him, and, after rubbing its
head against him, lay down at his feet. It was the
lion from whose foot Androcles had extracted the
thorn in the forest. The slave told the story and
received .his pardon and his liberty on the spot.

The successor of Macomo was an Irishman
named Macarthy, who had previously travelled, in
the same capacity, with Bell and Myers's circus ;
and in 1862, while performing with the lions belong-
ing to that establishment, had his left arm so
severely mangled by one of the ' beasts that he had
to undergo amputation. This circumstance seems
to have added to the edai of the unfortunate man's
performances, but he had neither the nerve of
Crockett and Macomo, nor their resolution to ab-
stain from stimulants. Whether from carelessness
or nervousness, he often turned his back upon the
animals, though he had been repeatedly cautioned
that it was dangerous to do so ; and to this circum-
stance, and his intemperate habits, the lion-taming
fraternity attribute his terrible end.

It is to be observed that Macarthy lost his life,
not in the course of the ordinary performances of
lion-tamers, but while giving a sensational exhibition
termed 'lion-hunting,' which had been introduced

294 Circus Life

by Macomo, and consists in chasing the animals
about the cage, the performer being armed with a
sword and pistols, and throwing into the mimic
sport as much semblance of reality as may be possi-
ble. It will be obvious that this is a dangerous
exhibition, and it should never be attempted with
any but young animals. For ordinary performances,
most lion-tamers prefer full-grown animals, as being
better trained ; but when lions become full-grown,
they are not disposed to be driven and hustled
about in this manner, and they are so excited by it
that it cannot be repeatedly performed with the
same animals.

Macarthy had been bitten on three occasions
previously to the catastrophe at Bolton. The first
time was in 1862, when he lost his left arm, as
already related; the second while performing at
Edinburgh in 1871, when one of the lions made a
snap at his arm, but only slightly grazed it. The
third occasion was only a few days before the acci-
dent which terminated his career and his life, when
one of the lions bit him slightly on the wrist. The
fatal struggle at Bolton was preceded by a trifling
accident, which may perhaps have done something
to lessen the never remarkable steadiness of the
man^s nerves. In driving the animals from one end
of the cage to the other, one of them ran against his

And Circus Celebrities. 295

legs, and threw him down. He regained his feet,
however, and drove the animals into a comer. He
then walked to the centre of the cage, and was
stamping his feet upon the floor, to make the beasts
run past him, when one of the lions crept stealthily
out from the group and sprang upon him, seizing
him by the right hip, and throwing him upon his
side. For a moment the spectators imagined that
this attack was part of the performance; but the
agonized features of Macarthy soon convinced them
of their mistake. A scene of wild and ten-ible
confusion ensued. Three other lions sprang upon
Macarthy, who was vainly endeavouring to regain
his feet, and making desperate lunges amongst the
excited animals with his sword. Presently one of
the lions seized his arm, and the sword dropped
from his hand. Several men were by this time
endeavouring to beat the animals ofl", and to slide a
partition between the bars of the cage, with the view
of driving them behind it. This was a task of con-
siderable diflBculty, however, for as soon as one lion
was compelled to relinquish his hold, another took his
place. Fire-arms and heated bars of iron were then
procured, and, by applying the irons to the paws
and jaws of the lions, and firing upon them with
blank cartridges, four of them were driven behind
the partition.

296 Circus Life

Maca.rtliy was then lying in tlie centre of the
cage, with the lion which had first attacked him
still biting and tearing him. Discharges of blank
cartridge being found ineffectual to make it loose
its hold of the unfortunate man, the heated iron was
applied to his nose, and then it released him, and
ran behind the partition, which had been drawn out
a little to admit him. Even then the terrible scene
was not concluded. Before the opening could be
closed again, the lion which had been foremost in
the onslaught ran out again, seized Macarthy by
the foot, and dragged him into the corner, where aU
the lions again fell upon him with redoubled fury.
A quarter of an hour elapsed from the commence-
ment of the attack before he could be rescued ; and,
as the lions were then all caged at the end where
the entrance was, the opposite end of the cage had
to be opened before his mangled body could be
lifted out.

This lamentable affair caused an outcry to be
raised against the exhibition of performing lions
such as had been heard a few years previously
against such feats as those of Blondin and Leotard.
' The display of wild animals in a menagerie/ said
a London morniug journalist, ' may be tolerated, and
even encouraged for the sake of science, and for the
rational amusement of the public; but there is no

And Circus Celebrities. 297

analogy between tlie case of beasts secured in strong
dens, and approached only with the greatest caution
by wary and experienced keepers, and that of a car-
avan open on all sides, illuminated by flaring gas,
and surrounded by a noisy audience/ The dis-
tinction is one without a difi'erence, even if we sup-
pose that the writer mentally restricted the term
'menagerie' to the Zoological Gardens; for the pro-
prietor of a travelling menagerie, or a circus, consults
his own interests, as well as the safety of the public,
in providing strong cages, and engaging wary and
experienced keepers. It is childish to talk of pro-
hibiting every performance or exhibition from which
an accident has resulted. Some years ago, one of
the keepers of the Zoological Gardens in the Regent's
Park, being somewhat intoxicated, chose to irritate
a hooded snake, which thereupon seized him by the
nose. He died within an hour. Would the jour-
nalist who proposed to exclude lion-tamers from
menageries and circuses close the Zoological Gardens
on that account ?

' The caravans,' continues the author of the
article just quoted, ' are tenanted by wild beasts
weary with previous performances, irritated by the
heat and the clamour around them, and teased by
being obliged to perform tricks at the bidding of a
man whom they hate, since his mandates are gen-

298 Circus Life

erally seconded by tlie blows of a whip or the searing
of a branding-iron. Kow and again, in a well-order-
ed zoological collection, some lazy, drowsy old lion,
who passes the major part of his time in a corner of
his den, blinking at the sunshine, and who is cloyed
with abundant meals, and surfeited with cakes and
sweetmeats, may exhibit passable good-nature, and
allow his keeper to take liberties ; but such placa-
bility can rarely be expected from animals moved
continually from place to place, and ceaselessly
pestered into going through movements which they
detest. Lions or tigers may have the cunning of that
feline race to which they pertain ; yet they are as-
suredly destitute of the docility, the intelligence, or
the fidelity of the dog or the horse ; and such cunning
as they possess will prompt them rather to elude
performance of the tasks assigned them, or to fall
upon their instructor unawares and rend him, than
to go through their feats with the cheerful obedience
manifested by creatures friendly to man. It is no
secret that the customary method of taming wild
beasts for purposes of exhibition is, to thrash them
with gutta percha whips and iron bars, and when it
is considered necessary, to scarify them with red-hot
pokers/

I quote this for the sake of refuting it by the evi-
dence of one who, unlike the journalist, understood

And Circus Celebrities. 299

what he was writing about. The ex-lion king, whose
experiences and reminiscences were recorded about
the same time in another journal, and who must be
admitted to be a competent authority, says, ' Violence
is a mistake ; ' and he adds, that he has never known
heated irons to be held in readiness, except when
lions and lionesses are together at times such as led
to the terrific struggle in Sanger's circus, which has
been related in the seventh chapter. The true causes
of accidents with lions and tigers are intemperance
and violence. ' It's the drink,' says the ex-lion king,
' that plays the mischief with us fellows. There are
plenty of people always ready to treat the daring fel-
low that plays with the lions as if they were kittens ;
and so he gets reckless, lets the dangerous animal —
on which, if he were sober, he would know he must
always keep his eye — get dodging round behind him ;
he hits a beast in which he ought to know that a
blow rouses the sleeping devil ; or makes a stagger
and goes down, and then they set upon him.' He
expected, he says, to hear of Macarthy's death from
the time when he heard that he had given way to in-
temperance ; and we have seen how a hasty cut with
a whip brought the tiger upon Helen Blight.

To this evidence of the ex-lion king I may add
what I witnessed about thirty years ago in one of the
smaller class of travelling menageries, exhibiting at

300 Circus Life

the time at Mitcham fair. There were no lions ortigers,
but four performing leopards, a hyena, a wolf which an-
ticipated the Millennium by lying down with a lamb,
and several smaller animals. The showman entered
the leopards' cage, with a light whip in one hand,
and a hoop in the other. The animals leaped over
the whip, through the hoop, and over the man's back,
exhibiting as much docility throughout the perform-
ance as cats or dogs. The whip was used merely as
part of the properties. Indeed, since cats can be
taught to leap in the same way, without the use of
whips or iron bars, why not leopards, which are
merely a lai-ger species of the same genus ? The
showman also entered the cage of the hyena, which
fawned upon him after the manner of a dog, and al-
lowed him to open its mouth. The hyena has the
reputation of being untameable ; but, in addition to
this instance to the contrary, and another in Fair-
grieve's menagerie. Bishop Heber had a hyena at
Calcutta, which followed him about like a dog.

When Fairgrieve's collection was sold by auction
at Edinburgh in 1872, the lions and tigers excited
much attention, and good prices were realized,
though in some instances they were not so great as
had been expected. Eice, a dealer in animals, Avhose
repository, like Jamrach's, is in Ratcliff Highway,
bought, for £185, the famous lion, Wallace, aged

And Circus Celebrities. 301

seven years and a half, with which Lorenzo used to
represent the story of Androcles. The auctioneer
assured those present that the animal was as tame
as a lamb, and that he was inclined to enter the cage
himself, and perform Androcles ' for that time only/
but was afraid of the lion's gratitude. There were
six other lions and three lionesses, five of which
were also bought by Rice, at prices varying, accord-
ing to the age and sex of the animals, from £80
for a full grown lioness, and £90 each for lions a
year and a half old, to £140 for full-grown lions,
from three to seven years old. A six-year old lion
named Hannibal, said to be the largest and hand-
somest lion in this country, was bought by the
proprietors of the Zoological Gardens at Bristol for
£270; and his mate, four years old, was bought by
Jennison, of the Belle Vue Gardens, Manchester, for
100 guineas. The third lioness realized £80, and
the remaining lion, bought by Jamrach, £200.

The magnificent tigress, Tippoo, which used to
perform with Lorenzo, was also purchased by Jam-
rach for £155 j and the same enterprising dealer
became the possessor of three of the four leopards
for £60. As these leopards, two of which were
females, were trained performing animals, the sum
they realized must be considered extremely low.
Another leopardess, advanced in years, realized only

302 Circus Life

6 guineas. Ferguson, tlie agent of Van Amburgh,
the great American menagerist, secured the spot-
ted hyena for £15 ; while a performing hyena
of the striped variety was knocked down at only
three guineas. A polar bear, ^ young, healthy, and
lively as a trout,^ as the auctioneer said, was sold iov
£40, a Thibetian bear for 5 guineas, and a pair of
wolves for 2 guineas.

Hice, who was the largest purchaser, became the
possessor of the zebra for £50. The Bactrian
camels, bought principally for travelling menage-
ries, brought from £14 to £30. The largest male
camel, twelve years old, was sold for £19 ; and
another, six months younger, but a foot less in
stature, for £14. Of the three females, one, six feet
and a half high, and ten years old, brought £30 ;
and another, of the same height, and only half the
age of the former, £23. The third, only a year and
a half old, and not yet full grown, brought £14.
All three were in young. A baby camel, nine weeks
old, realized 9 guineas. The male ^ dromedary,' as
it was described in the catalogue, but called by
naturalists the Syrian camel, was sold for £30,
and the female for 20 guineas. Menagerists restrict
the term ' camel ' to the Bactrian or two-humped
variety, and call the one-humped animals drome-
daries ; but the dromedary, according to naturalists.

And Circus Celebrities. 303

is a small variety of the Syrian camelj bearing tlie
same relation to the latter as a pony does to a horse.
The animals described as dromedaries in the cata-
logue of Fairgrieve's collection were, on the con-
trary, taller than the Bactrian camels.

There was a -spirited competition for the two
elephants, ending in the female, a musical phenom-
enon, playing the organ and the harmonium, being
bought by Rice for £145 ; and the noble full-tusked
male, rising eight years old, and seven feet six inches
in height, being purchased by Jennison for £680.
This enormous beast was described as the largest
and cleverest performing elephant ever exhi-
bited. In point of fact, he is surpassed in stature,
I believe, by the Czar's elephant, kept at his
country residence at Tzarski-Seloe ; but that beast's
performances have never gone beyond occasionally
killing his keeper, whilst the elephant now in the
Belle Vue Gardens, at Manchester, is one of the
most docile and intelligent beasts ever exhibited.
He will go in harness, and was accustomed to draw
the band carriage when a pai'ade was made. He
will either drag or push a waggon up a hill, and
during the last eighteen months that the menagerie
was travelling, he placed all the vans in position,
with the assistance only of a couple of men to guide
the wheels.

304 Circus Life.

The entire proceeds of tlie sale were a little
under £3,000. The daily cost of the food of the
animals in a menagerie is, I may add, far from a
trifle. The quantity of hay, cabbages, bread, and
boiled rice, sweetened with sugar, which an elephant
will consume, in addition to the fruit, buns, and
biscuits given to him by visitors, is enormous. The
amount of animal food for the carnivora in Fair-
grieve's menagerie was about four hundred-weight
a day, consisting chiefly of the shins, hearts, and
heads of bullocks. Each lion is said to have con-
sumed twelve pounds of meat every day; but this
is more, I believe, than is allowed in the Gardens of
the Zoological Society. The appetite of the tiger
is almost equal to that of his leonine relative ; and
all these beasts seem to insist upon having beef for
dinner. We hear nothing of hippophagy among
lions and tigers in a state of confinement ; though,
in their native jungles, they eat horse, pig, deer,
antelope, sheep, or goat indiscriminately. The
bears get meat only in very cold weather ; at other
seasons, their diet consists of bread, sopped biscuits,
and boiled rice.

3^5

CHAPTER XVIII.

Circus Slang — Its Peculiarities and Derivation— Certain Phrases used
by others of the Amusing Classes— Technicalities of the Circus—
The Riders and Clowns of Dickens — Sleary's Circus — Circus Men
and Women in Fiction and in Real Life — Domestic Habits of
Circus People — Dress and Manners— The Professional Quarter
of the Metropolis.

Circus men are mucli addicted to the use of slang,
and much of their slang is peculiar to themselves.
To those who are uninitiated in the mysteries of
life among what may be termed the amusing classes,
the greater part of their vocabulary would seem an
unknown tongue ; but a distinction must be made
between slang words and phrases and the technical
terms used in the profession, and also between the
forms of expression peculiar to circus men and those
which they use in common with members of the
theatrical and musical professions. These distinc-
tions being duly observed, the words and phrases
which are peculiar to the ring will be found to be

20

3o6 Circtcs Life

less numerous than might be expected from the
abundance of slang with which the conversation
of circus artistes seems to be garnished ; though it
is probable that no man, not even a circus man,
could give a complete vocabulary of circus slang,
which, like that of other slang-speaking classes, is
constantly receiving additions, while words and
phrases which have been long in use often become
obsolete, and fall into disuse.

There is an impression among circus men that
much of the slang pecuhar to themselves is derived
from the languages of Italy and Spain, and the
affirmative, si, has been cited to me as an instance ;
but I have never heard this word used by them,
and its use has probably been observed only in the
case of men or women who have recently been in
Italy. The few words in common use among the
class which can be traced to an Italian or Spanish
origin may be counted on the fingers of one hand.
Bono (good) is used both as an adjective, and as an
exclamation of approval or admiration. Dona (lady)
is so constantly used that I have seldom heard a
circus man mention a woman by any other term.
The other words referred to are used in monetary
transactions, which are the constant subject of slang
among all classes of the community. Saulty (penny)
may be derived from the Italian soldij and duey

And Circus Celebrities. 307

(twopence) and tray saulty (threepence) are also of
foreign origin, like the deuce and tray of card-players.
Dollar is in constant use as the equivalent of five shil-
lings, and money generally is spoken of as denarlies,
which may be a corruption of the Latin denarii.

Mot is a term of contempt, used in strong and
emphatic contradistinction to bono; and of late
years it has been adopted by other sections of the
amusing classes, and by young men of the 'fast'
sort, who seem to think the use of slang a com-
mendable distinction. Toe rags is another expres-
sion of contempt, less frequently used, and chiefly
by the lower grades of circus men, and the acrobats
who stroll about the country, performing at fairs
and races, in the open air. These wanderers, and
those who are still seen occasionally in the back
streets of the metropolis, are said to ' go a-pitching ; '
the spot they select for their performance is their
' pitch,' and any interruption of their feats, such as
an accident, or the interference of a policeman, is
said to ' queer the pitch,' — in other words, to spoil
it. Going round the assemblage with a hat, to
collect the largesses of the on-lookers, is ' doing a
nob,' and to do this at the windows of a street,
sometimes done by one performer standing on the
shoulders of another, is ' nobbing the glazes.' The
•sum collected is the ' nob.

3o8 Circus Life

The verb ' to fake/ means, in the thieves' voca-
bulary, to steal ; but circus men use it in a different
sense, ^ faked up ' meaning ' fixed,' while ' fake-
ments * is applied particularly to circus apparatus
and properties, and generally to moveables of any
kind. ' Letty ' is used both as a noun and a verb,
signifying ' lodging ' and ' to lodge/ To abscond
from a place, to evade payment of debts, or from ap-
prenticeship, is sometimes called ' doing a bunk,' but
this phrase is used by other classes also, circus men
more frequently using the phrase, ' doing a- Johnny
Scaparey,' the last word being accented on the
second syllable. The circus is always called the
' show ; ' I have never heard it termed the ' booth,'
which is the word which Dickens puts into the mouth
of Cissy Jupe, the little daughter of the clown of
Sleary^s circus, in flarcZ Times. Gymnasts call their
performance a ' slang,' but I am not aware that the
term is used by other circus artistes. The joke or
anecdote of a clown is called ' a wheeze,' and he is
said when engaged in that part of his business, to
be ' cracking a wheeze.'

Balloons, banners, and garters are merely special
applications to circus uses of ordinary English terms.
A balloon is a large hoop, covered with tissue paper,
held up for an equestrian artiste to jump through ;
a banner is a bordered cloth held horizontally, to be

And Circus Celebrities. 309

jumped over, — what Albert Smith calls a length of
stair carpet ; and garters are narrow bands held in
the same manner, and for the same purpose. When
an equestrian fails to clear these, he is said to 'miss
his tip/ which is the gravest article of Childers's
impeachment of Jupe, in Dickens^s interesting story
of the fortunes and misfortunes of the Gradgrinds
and the Bounderbys. Dickens put two or three
other words into the mouth of the same member of
Sleary's company which I have never heard, and
which do not appear to be now in use. Jupe is
said to have become ' loose in his ponging/ though
still a good ' cackler ; ' and Bounderby is reminded
sarcastically that he is on the ' tight jefif.' Childers
explains that 'ponging' means tumbling, 'cackling'
talking, and * jeff' a rope.

' Cully ' is the circus man's equivalent for the
mechanic's * mate ' and the soldier's ' comrade/
' Prossing ' is a delicate mode of indicating a desire
for anything, as when old Ben, the drummer, in
Life in a Circus, says, in response to the acrobat's
exhortation to his fair companion, to make the best
of things, — * That's the philosophy to pitch with !
Not but what a drop of beer helps it, you know ; and
I declare my throat's that dry that it's as much as I
can do to blow the pipes.' ' Pro ' is simply an abbre-
viation of 'professional,' and is used by all the

3IO Circus Life

amusing classes to designate actors^ singers, dancers,
clowns, acrobats, &c., to whom the term seems to be
restricted among them. Amongst all the amusing
classes, the salary received is the ' screw,' the
* ghost walks ^ when it is paid, and an artiste is
' goosed,' or * gets the goose,' when the spectators
or auditors testify by sibillant sounds disapproval or
dissatisfaction. As in every other avocation, there
are a great many technical terms used, which are
not to be confounded with slang. Such is ' the
Plymouth/ a term applied to one of the movements
by which gymnasts return to a sitting position on
the horizontal bar, after hanging from it by the hands
in an inverted position. ' Slobber swing ' is applied
to a single circle upon the bar, after which a begin-
ner, from not having given himself sufficient impetus,
hangs by the hands. The 'Hindoo punishment' is
what is more often called the 'muscle grind,' a
rather painful exercise upon the bar, in which the
arms are turned backward to embrace the bar, and
then brought forward upon the chest, in which
position the performer revolves.

Having mentioned that Dickens has put some
slang words into the mouths of his circus characters
which I have not found in use among circus men of
the present day, I cannot refrain from quoting a pas-
sage in Hard Times, and giving a circus man's brief,

And Circus Celebrities. 311

but emphatic, commentary upon it. Speaking of
Sleary's company, the great novelist says : — ' All the
fathers could dance upon rolling casks, stand upon
bottles, catch knives and balls, twirl hand basins,
ride upon anything, jump over everything, and stick
at nothing. All the mothers could (and did) dance
upon the slack wire and the tight rope, and perform
rapid acts on bare-backed steeds.' The circus man's
criticism of this statement, and of all the circus busi-
ness introduced into the story, was summed up in
the one word — ' Rot ! ' Sleary's people must cer-
tainly have been exceptionally clever, so much ver-
satility being very rarely found. There are few
clowns and acrobats who can ride, even in the ordin-
ary, and not in the circus acceptation of the word ;
and of a score of equestriennes who can ride a pad-
horse, and fly through hoops and balloons, and over
banners and garters, there will not be found more
than one or two who can perform rapid acts on the
bare back of a horse.

So far, also, from ' all the mothers ' doing all
the performances mentioned by Dickens, there are
more often none who do them. I call to mind at
this moment a circus in which seven of the male
members of the company were married, not one of
whose wives ever appeared in the ring, or ever had
done so.

312 Circus Life

The picture of tlie domestic life of the men and
women performing in Sleary's circus differs as much
from reality as their versatile talents and accomplish-
ments differ from the powers exhibited by the riders,
clowns, and tumblers of real life. The company
seems to be a rather strong one, and most of the men
have wives and children ; yet the whole of them, in-
cluding the proprietor, are represented as lodging in
one house, an obscure inn in an obscure part of the
outskirts of the town. Such deviations from prob-
ability do not lessen the interest of the story, which
I have read again and again with pleasure ; but they
render it of little or no value as a picture of circus
life and character. Circus men, if married, and ac-
companied by their wives, will generally be found
occupying private apartments. Eiders and others
who are unmarried sometimes prefer to lodge in pub-
lic-houses, and often have no choice in the matter,
owing to the early hours at which the inhabitants of
provincial towns retire to rest, and the unwillingness
of many persons to receive ' professionals ' as lodg-
ers, which applies equally to actors and vocalists.
But the Pegasus's Arms must have had an unusual
number of apartments for a house of its class to have
accommodated all Sleary's people, with their families ;
and the company must have been gregarious in a
very remarkable degree.

And Circus Celebrities. 313

The dress, the manners, and the talk of circus
men are peculiar, but in none of these particulars
are they at all ^ horsey,' as all Sleary's company are
described, unless they are equestrians, and even
these are less so than grooms and jockeys. They
may be recognized by their dress alone as readily
as foreigners who have just arrived in England, and
who do not belong to those social classes that
affect the latest Parisian fashions, and in which
national distinctions have disappeared. Watoh the
men who enter a circus by the side-doors about
eleven o'clock in the forenoon, or walk on two or
three successive mornings, between ten and twelve,
from Westminster Bridge to Waterloo Eoad, and
you may recognize the acrobats and rope-dancers of
the circuses and music-halls by their dress ; you may
meet one wearing a sealskin coat, unbuttoned, and
displaying beneath a crimson velvet vest, crossed
by a heavy gold chain. He is a 'tip-topper,' of
course ; one of those who used to get their fifty or
sixty pounds a week at the Alhambra, or who has had
nuggets thrown to him at San Francisco and Mel-
bourne. Perhaps the next you will meet will be a
man of lower grade, wearing a brown coat, with velvet
collar, over a sealskin vest, with a brassy-looking
chain festooned across it. Another wears a drab
over- coat, with broad collar and cuffs of Astrakhan

314 Circus Life

lamb-skin ; an Alpine liat, with a tail-featlier of a
peacock stuck in the band^ is worn jauntily on his
head ; a pin, headed with a gilt horse- shoe or horse's
head or hoof, adorns his fancy neck-tie ; and an
Alaska diamond glistens on the fourth finger of an
ungloved hand. Further on you meet a man whose
form is enveloped in a capacious blue cloak, and
whose head is surmounted by the tallest felt hat,
with the broadest brim, you have ever seen. But
you are not done with these strange people yet.
You have nearly reached the end of York Road
when there issues from the office of Roberts or
Maynard, the equestrian and musical agents, a man
wearing a low-crowned hat and a grey coat, braided
with black; or, it may be, a black velvet coat,
buttoned across his chest, whatever the weather may
be, and ornamented with a gold chain festooned
from the breast-pocket to one of the button-holes.

This is the professional quarter of the metropolis.
At least three-fourths of what I have termed the
amusing classes, whether connected with circuses,
theatres, public gardens, or music-halls, — actors,
singers, dancers, equestrians, clowns, gymnasts,
acrobats, jugglers, posturers, — may be found, in
the day-time at least, within the area bounded
by a line drawn from Waterloo Bridge to the
Victoria Theatre, and thence along Gibson Street

And Circus Celebrities. 315

and Oakley Street, down Kennington Road as
far as the Cross, and thence to Vauxhall Bridge.
Towards the edges of this area they are more
sparsely scattered than nearer the bridges. They
are well sprinkled along York Road, and in
some of the streets between the Albert Embank-
ment and Kennington Lane they constitute a con-
siderable proportion of the population. You may
enter Barnard's tavern, opposite Astley's, or the
Pheasant, in the rear of the theatre, and find circus
and music-hall artistes making two to one of the men
before the bar.

They are, as a class, a light-hearted set, not
remarkable for providence, but bearing the vicissi-
tudes of fortune to which they are so liable with
tolerable equanimity, showing a laudable desire to
alleviate each, other's ills to the utmost extent of
their power, and regarding leniently each other's
failings, without exhibiting a greater tendency to
vice than any other class. There is not much
education among them, as I have before indicated,
and they are not much addicted to literature of any
kind. This seems to arise, not from any deficiency
of natural aptitude for learning, but from their
wandering lives and the early age at which they
begin to practise the feats by which they are to be
enabled to live. The training of a circus rider, a

3 1 6 Circus Life

gymnast, or an acrobat begins as soon as lie or she
can walk. From tbat time they practise every day,
and they are often introduced in the ring, or on the
platform of a music-hall, at an age at which other
children have not left the nursery. They wander
over the United Kingdom — Europe — the world. The
lads whom you see tumbling in one of the quiet
streets between the Strand and the Victoria Em-
bankment one day, may be seen doing the same
performance a week or two afterwards on the sands
at Kamsgate, the downs at Epsom, or the heath at
Newmarket. The equestrian or the gymnast who
amazes you at the Amphitheatre may be seen the
following season at the Hippodrome or the Circo
Price. They may be met passing from one con-
tinent to another, from one hemisphere to another,
sometimes gorgeously attired, sometimes out at
elbows, but always light-hearted and gay, excepting
perhaps the clowns, who always seem, out of the
ring, the gravest and most taciturn of the race. I
do not know how a moral phenomenon of such
strangeness is to be accounted for ; perhaps all their
hilarity evaporates in the saw-dust, or on the boards ;
but I am afraid that their humour is very often forced,
their jests borrowed from the latest collection of
facetiae,, their merry interludes with the ring-master
rehearsed before-hand.

And Circles Celebrities. ^ly

They are, as a rule, long-lived, and seem never
to become superannuated. Stickney died at forty,
I believe ; but Astley was seventy-two when he
departed this life, Pablo Fanque seventy -five,
Madame Saqui eighty, and Saunders ninety-two.
Constant practice enables even gymnasts and acro-
bats to continue their performances when they are
far down the decline of life ; and I have seen
middle-aged, and even grey-headed men, who had
been ' pitching ' or ' tenting ' all their lives, and
could still throw a forward somersault, or form the
base of an acrobatic pyramid. Both men and women
generally marry young, but the latter go on riding
or rope-dancing until they are superseded by
younger ones ; and their husbands ride, vault, tum-
ble, or juggle, until their —

' little life

Is rounded with a sleep.'

The human mind craves amusement in every
phase of society, and in none more than in that
which is exemplified in the large towns of Europe
and the United States, where, and especially among
the commercial and industrial classes, the brain is
in activity, the nerves in a state of tension, from
morn till eve. Eeleased from business or labour for
the day, the nervous system requires relaxation;

3 1 8 Circus Life

and if its demands are not attended to, the strain of
the day cannot long be sustained. The entertaining
classes are, therefore, a necessary element of pre-
sent society; and, in now taking leave of them, I
cannot too strongly urge upon all who may read
these pages the appeal which the inimitable Dickens
has put into the mouth of Sleary : ' People mutht
be amuthed. They can't be alwayth a-leaming, nor
they can't be alwayth a-working ; they an't made
for it. You mutJit have uth. Do the withe thing
and the kind thing too, and make the betht of uth ;
not the wutht.' Let us indeed make the best of
our entertainers ; for we owe them much.

THE END.

INDEX.

PAQB

Abbott, the clown . . . .

. . .247

Adams, the equestrian

. 62, 86

„ ,, clown ....

. 263

Adrian, Miss, the equestrian

. 203

Agouste, the juggler

. 110

Airec, the gymnast ....

. 162

Alexander, Brothers, the acrobats .

. 192

Amburgh, Van, the lion-tamer

. 89, 97, 117

„ „ „ circus proprietor

. 238

American circuses ....

. 223

Ames, the circus proprietor

. 252

Anderson's circus ....

. 247

Angela, the female Samson

. 231

Arab vaulters, first in England

85

Arthur and Bertrand, the clowns .

. 167

Astley, Philip, the equestrian

17, 28, 46, 48, 51, 53

„ Mrs, the equestrian

19

„ John, the equestrian

29, 33, 46, 53, 56

Atalie, the man with the iron jaw .

. 231

Athos, Brothers, the gymnasts

. 280

Atkins's lion and tigress at Astley' s

. 79

Avolo, the gymnast

. 193

Azella, the female gymnast

. 179

fiailey's circus and menagerie

. 245

Balize, the lion-performer .

. 246

Banks, the horse-charmer .

4

Bannister, Miss, the equestrian

.66

,, the circus proprietor

. 66

Baptiste, the rope-dancer . . . .

. 27

Bamum, the great showman

. 221, 225, 226

Barr, the falconer . . . . .

. 143

Barry, the clown . .

96, 109, 118, 142

320

Index.

Barry, the lyrical jester
Barrymore, the manager
Batty, William, the circus proprietor
Bell, the acrobat
„ the equestrian .
„ and Myers' circus
Bellinck, the rope-dancer .
Berrington. See Parelli
Bibb, the clown
Blight, Helen, the lion-queen
BUss, the equestrian
Blondin's circus
Blondin, the rope-walker .
Boleno, the clown .
Bologna Family, posturers and rope-dancers
Bond, the equilibrist
Bonnaire, the gymnast
Bradbury the elder, the equestrian

„ Alfred, the equestrian
Bridges, the rope-dancer

„ Amelia, the equestrian

,, Anthony, the equestrian

,, John, the equestrian
Broadfoot, the equestrian manager
Brown. See Tournaire.
Bull-fights in circuses
Bunn, the manager ...
Burgess, the vaulter and globe-performer
Burnell, the circus proprietor
Burt, the clown

Campbell's circus and menagerie
Carl, the wire- walker
Caroline, Madame, the equestrian
Carr, the globe -performer .
Carre, the circus proprietor
Carter, the Uon-performer .
CasteUi, the gymnast
Catawba Indians, feats of the
Chapman, Miss, the lion-queen
Chiarini, Beatrice, the equestrian

111,

181,

FAGB

. 212

65

97, 100, 138

34

. 211
92

. 67

192, 203, 210

132

241

55

157

61

39,44

165

153

55

174

61

142

142, 203

125, 140, 203

. 119

79, 107

58

254, 262, 275

245

22

246
166
158

45

181

90, 110

162

45
132
175

Index.

321

FAQB

ChristofF, the rope-dancer .

. 258

Clark, the posturer ....

10

Clarke, the circus proprietor

. 55, 69, 139

„ Miss, the rope-dancer

. 56, 97

Clementina. See Sobieska.

Cline, the rope-dancer and ascensionist .

. 59, 83

Coleman, the equestrian

262, 275

Collet, the acrobat • . . .

34

Columbia, the circus proprietor

. Ill

Conquest, the manager

. 187

Conrad, Brothers, the gymnasts ,

245, 252

Constantine, the acrobat and posturer

. 65

Cooke, Alfred, the equestrian

. Ill

„ Emily, „ „ . .

. 143

„ George, the rope-dancer

59

„ Henry Welby, the equestrian

. 143

„ Hubert, „ „

. 192

„ James, the circus proprietor

. 135

„ „ „ equestrian

. 139

„ John Henry, the equestrian

. 143, 192, 212

„ Thomas, the circus proprietor

96, 98, 111, 139

„ William „ „ „

139, 143, 161, 215

Cook, Wooda, the equestrian

. 212

Copeland, the circus proprietor

. 96, 98, 139

Corelli, the child gymnast •

. 186

Costello, the gymnast

. 166

Costmethopila, the equestrian

19

Cottrell, Miss, the equestrian

. 192

Coup, the circus manager .

. 226

Crockett, the lion-performer

. 128

Cross's menagerie ....

. 60, 73

Grossman, the acrobat

. 31, 34, 40, 43

Croueste, the clown

. 145

Crowther, the actor

120, 122

Dale, the equestrian

119, 139

Darby. See Fanque.

Davis, the equestrian manager

46, 63, 56, 68, M

Dawson, the acrobat . . . .

22

Dean, the equestrian

. 246

Debach, the globe-performer

. 140

21

322

Index.

PAGE

Delavanti family, the acrobats

. 160

„ George, the equestrian

. 175

Delpini, the manager and singer .

. 27

Derious, the gymnast

. 245

Dewhurst, the clown

. 97, 100, 104

Dubois, the clown ....

46

Ducrow, father of the equestrian .

43

„ Andrew, the equestrian

53, 5£

, 61, 79, 83, 95

„ „ (the younger) equestrian

. 193

„ Charles, the equestrian

193, 263

„ John, the clown

86

„ "William, the equestrian .

. 241

Dugee, the rope-dancer

15

Eaton and Stone's circus .

. 12S

EUa, the equestrian ....

. 126

Elliot, Brothers, the acrobats

143, 188

Ellis, Brothers, the gymnasts

. 162

Elliston, the manager

48, 58, 80

Ellistria. See Ellis.

Elsler, Mdlle, the ascensionist

143, 240

Espagnole, La Belle, the rope-dancer

36, 44, 46

Fanque, Pablo, the circus proprietor . 97,

99, 117, 135, 160, 192

Farci. 8ee Ferzi.

Farini, the gymnast . . . .

. 186.

Fawkes, the posturer and juggler

12

Ferzi, the rope-dancer

16

Fish, the equestrian

. 210

Fitzball, the hippo-dramatist

51, 140

Forcer, the manager

8

Forepaugh's circus and menagerie

. 241

Fossett's circus

. 161

Francisco, Brothers, the gymnasts

.

144, 162

Franconi, the circus proprietor

HI, 117, 121

Franconi's circus

46, 55. 136, 142, 190

Franks, the clown .

188, 197, 263, 275

Fredericks, the equestrian .

. 193

French's circus

. 245

Frowde, the clown .

197, 203

Gallot, the equestrian

,

52

Index.

3^3

PAGE

Gardner and Forepaugh's circus and menagerie

. 241

Garlick, the lion-performer

103

Garmon, the acrobat

21,27

Geraldine, MdUe, the gymnast

. 240

Germani, the equestrian juggler

. 110

Ginnett's circus

1

46, 150

Glee-men, Anglo-Saxon

2

Grady's circus

. 248

Graham, the conjurer

. 147

Grainger, the acrobat

27

GriflBn, the equestrian acrobat

20,22

GriflSths and wife, equestrians

19

Grimaldi, the manager

. 26

„ „ clown

36

Guillaume, the circus proprietor

182

„ Maddalena, the equestrian

183

flail, the rope-dancer

8

Handy, partner of Philip Astley .

. 45

Hanlon, Brothers, the gymnasts

1

75, 186

Harwood, the equestrian actor

120

Hassan, the vaulter ....

146

Haven's, De, circus ....

247

Haynes. See Senyah.

Hemming, the equestrian .

139

Hemmings, Cooper, and Whitby's cirfcus .

248

Heng, the acrobat ....

65

Hengler, the rope-dancer .

48, 110, 1

25, 195

„ Charles, the circus proprietor

198

,, Edward Henry, the rope-dancer

198

„ John Milton, the rope-dancer

188, 195

„ Miss, the equestrian

. 187, 192, 207, 210

Hengler' s circus

]

23, 160, 187, 192, 201

Henry, the circus manager .

266, 276

Hernandez, the equestrian .

121, 125

Hilton, the circus proprietor

. 131

„ Miss, the lion-queen

. 131

Hinne, the circus proprietor

. Ill

„ Pauline, the equestrian

. Ill

Hogini family, clowns and acrobats

. 192, 203, 263

HoUoway's circus .

.

64

3H

Index.

Hongh, the acrobat .
Howes and Gushing' s circus
Hughes, the equestrian

„ „ circus proprietor
Hontley, the acrobat

„ Miss, the equestrian

Ingham, the acrobat
Italian Brothers, gymnasts .

Jahna, Sadi, the contortionist
Janno, the acrobat .
Jenkins, the acrobat
Jenkinson, the acrobat
Johnson, the equestrian
Johnson's circus
Jones, the equestrian
Josephine, Mdlle, the equestrian
Julien, the gymnast

Keith, the clown
Kelly, the vaulter .
Kemp, the pole performer .
Keys, Miss, the equestrian ,
King, the bottle equilibrist .

Lake's circus

Lawrence, the vaulter

Lee, James, the showman .

„ Layater, the vaulter .

,, Thomas, the equestrian
Lefort, the pole-sprite
Lent, the equestrian manager
Leonard, the equestrian
Leotard, the gymnast
Lloyd, the equestrian
Longuemare, the ascensionist
Lonsdale, the acrobat
Lorenzo, the lion-performer
Ludovic, the equestrian
Lulu, the female gymnast .

FAOB

15
123, 130, 191, 204
. 23,35
97, 216
. 21, 27
. 25

40
142, 144

. 270

15

33,34

34

17

. 246

22

. 246

153, 162

145, 181, 190
225,242

. 109
264, 275

. 165

. 247

38

. 131

98, 102, 104

101, 120

. 117

. 252

101

153, 156, 162

188, 211

. 57

34

. 291

. 101

163, 175, 185

Index.

325

Macarte, Mme, the equestrian
Macarthy, the lion-performer
Macomo, the lion-performer
Magilton, the gymnast
Majilton, the hat-spinner .
Manchester Jack, the lion-performer
Manders, the menagerist
Mariana, Signora, the rope-dancer
Markutchy, the equestrian .
Masotta, the equestrian

,, Mdlle, the equestrian
Maynard, the equestrian agent
Mears, the gymnast .
Menken, Miss, the equestrian actress
Miller, the equestrian
Milton, the circus proprietor
Monf roid, Mdlles, the equestrians
Montague, the equestrian manager
Morris, the acrobat .
Mulligan, the vaulter

Nathans, the circus proprietor

Nemo, Brothers, the jugglera

Nevit, the acrobat .

Newsome, the circus proprietor 98, 107, 109,

„ „ Jion-performer

„ Miss Adele, the equestrian

„ „ Emma, „

„ „ Marie, „

Niblo, the gymnast .
Nomora's feats of activity
North, the vaulter .
„ the showman
Noyes's circus

O'Donnel, the antipodean equilibrist
O'Donnell, Miss, the equestrian
Older's circus and menagerie
Olmar, the gymnast
Oscar, the equestrian

Parelli. the gymnast

126, 138,

187.

159,
190,

PAGE

228
293
129, 132
161
167, 229
89
132
27
18
109
142
257
193, 269
176
22
62
190
146, 191
65
97

245
170
22
»,27o
132
J, 275
264
264, 275
153
16
94
246
248

61
102
247
186
192

166

270,

263,

326

Index.

PAGB

Pastor, the equestrian . . .

. 245

Pauliere, Mdlle, the equestrian

. 231

Payne family, the pantomimists

. 275

Pentland, the clown

. 252

Pereira, Mdlle, the female gymnast

. 180

Phillipi, the conjurer. See Graham.

Phillips, the acrobat

20

Plege, the rope-dancer

. 98,

109, 117

Polaski, the equestrian

. 97

Porter, the acrobat ....

24,40

Powell, John, the equestrian

. 97,

117, 125

„ "William, „

192, 195

Price, the equestrian

16

, „ vaulter ....

86,94

„ Brothers, the gymnasts

163, 255

Price's circus ....

. 184

Price and Powell's circus .

. 195

Rayner, the acrobat . . . -

15,.

21, 27, 35

„ the Misses, the tight-rope dancers

15

Redmond, the rope-performer

169, 171

Richer, the acrobat and rope-dancer

21,

27, 44, 46

Ridgway, Brothers, the gymnasts .

. 164

Ridley, Brothers, the acrobats

162

263, 272

Rivolti, the ring-master ...

. 211

Rizareli, Brothers, the gymnasts .

175

187, 246

Roberts, the artist and scene-painter

66

„ the equestrian agent

, 256

Robinson, the equestrian

. 174

„ „ „ manager .

. 239

Robinson's, John, circus and menagerie .

. 248

„ Alexander, circus

. 247

Romaine, Madame, the rope-dancor

. 35

Rossi's, Signora, feats of activity .

16

Ryan, the circus proprietor

96,118

Sadi Jalma, the contortionist

. 270

Sadler, founder of the "Wells

8

Samee, Ramo, the juggler .

67, 170

Sampson, the equestrian

16

Sam well' 8 circus ....

64,96

Index.

327

Sandy, Little, the clown

Sanger's circus . . . 123, 128, 179, 188,

Sanger, John and George, the circus proprietors

„ Miss, the equestrian
Saqui, Madame, the rope-dancer .
Sault, the gymnast .
Saunders, the circus proprietor
Saxoni, the rope-dancer
Senyah and wife, the gymnasts
Sextillian, the acrobat and equilibrist
Simpson, the equestrian vaulter
Smith, the equestrian
Sobieska, the equestrian
Soullier, the circus proprietor

„ Mdlle, the equestrian
Stanfield, the artist and scene-painter
Stickney, the equestrian

„ Robert, the equestrian .

„ Samuel, the circus director

Stokes, the vaulter .

„ ,, equestrian manager
Stone and Murray's circus .
Stowe's circus
Strand, the lion-performer .

Talliott's circus

Taylor, the equestrian

Thayer's circus

Thompson, the equestrian manager

Toumaire, the circus proprietor

„ Marie, the equestrian .

Townsend, the equestrian M. P.
Tully, the acrobat .
Twigg, the equestrian manager
Tyers, proprietor of Vauxhall Gardens

Vangable, Miss, the equestrian
Vernon, the ring-master
Verrecke, the gymnast
Vilderini, the posturer
Vincent, Miss, the actress .

192,
191,

PAGE

210, 213

193, 218

214

189

63,56

271

49

43

180, 240

168

12

40

24

140

142

85

61, 63, 94, 107, 247

252

246

11

160

240

248

132

161

18,30

247

118

111

246

151

27

218

13

18,31
262, 274
. 153
. 136
. 122

328

Index.

Vintners, the ascensionists .
Violante, the rope-walker .
Virginie, Mdlle, the equestrian
Vivian, the ring-master
Vokes family, the pantomimists

Walker, the vaulter and rope-dancer
"Wallett, the clown and posturer
"Ward's circus
Warner, the circus proprietor

„ Annie, the equestrian
Watson, Lucille, the equestrian
Watson's circus
Wells and Miller's circus .
Welsh. See Price, Brothers.
West, the equestrian manager
Wheal, the clown .
Wheeler and Gushing' s circus
White, the lion-performer
WhittajTie, the clown
Whitton, the acrobat
Widdicomb, the ring-master
Williams, the acrobat
„ „ jester

„ „ vaulter

Willio, the contortionist
Wilson's circus
Wombwell, the menagerist
Wooler's letter to Elliston
Woolford, Miss, the rope-dancer

Young, Miss, the rope-walker

Zamezou, the acrobat
Zebras at Astley's .

64, 96,

98, 118,

FAGB

85

13

. 241

. 274
. 260

101, 104
135, 145, 158
. 247
. 242
. 246

231, 253
. 247

61
. 142
. 246
. 110

. 182
65
87
15

. 210
63

. 154

. 246

74

81

59,87

. 157

257. 263
; 79

JOHN CHILDe AND SON, PRINTEBS.

March, 1881.

CHATTO & WiNDUS'S

List of Books.

New Series of Three-and-Sixpenny Books.

Crown 8vo, cloth extra.

Merrie England in the Olden Time. By G. Daniel. Illust.
Circus Life and Circus Celebrities. By Thomas Frost.
Tavern Anecdotes and Sayings. By Charles Hinoley.

With Illustrations. [Frost.

The Old Showman and the Old London Pairs. By Thomas
The Story of the London Parks. By Jacob Larwood. Illust.
The Life and Adventures of a Cheap Jack. By C. HiiNDLey.
The Lives of the Conjurors. By Thomas Frost.

Crown 8vo, Coloured Frontispiece and lilustrauons, cloib gilt, js, ba.

Advertising, A History of.

From the Earliest Times. Illustrated by Anecdotes, Curious Speci-
mens, and Notes of Successful Advertisers. By Henry Sampson.

Crown 8vo, cloth extra, with 639 Illustrations, 75. 6d.

Architectural Styles, A Handbook of.

Translated from the German of A. Rosengasten by W. Collett.
Sandars. With 639 Illustrations.

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Artemus Ward's Works :

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The Fallen Leaves. By Wilkie

Collins.

Jezebel's Daughter. W.Collins.

Deceivers Ever. By Mrs. H.
Lovett Cameron.

Juliet's Guardian. By Mrs. H.
Lovett Cameron.

Felicia. M. Betham-Edwards.
Olympia. By R. E. Francillon.

The Capel Girls. By Edward

Garrett.
Robin Gray. Charles Giubon.
For Lack of Gold. By Charles

Gibbon.

In Love and War. By Charles

Gibbon.
What will the World Say .» By

Charles Gibbon.

For the King. Charles Gibbon.

In Honour Bound. By Charles
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Queen of the Meadow. By

Chaki-es Gibbon.
In Pastures Green. By Charles

Gibbon.
Under the Greenwood Tree.

By Thomas Hardv.

Garth. By Julian Hawthorne.
Ellice Quentin. By Julian

Hawthorne.
Thomicroft's Model. By Mrs.

A. W. Hunt.
Fated to be Free. By Jean

Ingklow.

Confidence. Henry James, Jun.
The Queen of Oonnaught. By

Harriett Jav.
The Dark Colleen. By H. Jay.
Number Seventeen. By Henry

KiNGSLEY.

Oakshott Castle. H. Kingsley.
Patricia Eemball. By E. Lynn

Linton.

22

BOOKS PUBLISHED BY

Piccadilly Novels — continued.

The Atonement of Learn Dun-
das. By E. Lynn Linton.

The World Well Lost. By E.
Lynn Linton.

Under which Lord ? By E.
Lynn Linton.

With a Silken Thread. By E.
Lynn Linton. I

The Waterdale Neighbours.

By Justin McCarthy. I

My Enemy's Daughter. By

Justin McCarthy.
Linley Rochford. By Justin

McCarthy.
A Fair Saxon. By Justin

McCarthy.

Dear Lady Disdain. By Justin

McCarthy.
Miss Misanthrope. By Justin

McCarthy.
Donna Quixote. By Justin

McCarthy.

Quaker Cousins. By Agnes

Macdonell,
Lost Rose. By Katharine S.

Macquoii).
The Evil Eye. By Katharine

S. Macquoid.
Open ! Sesame ! By Florence

Marryat.

Written in Fire. F. Marryat.

Touch and Go. By Jean Mid.

DLEMASS.

Whiteladies. Mrs. Oliphant.

The Beat of Husbands. By

James Payn.
Fallen Fortunes. James Payn.
Halves. By James Payn.
Walter's Word. James Payn.
What He Cost Her. J. Payn.
Less Black than we're Painted.

By James Payn.

By Proxy. By James Payn.
Under One Roof. James Payn,
High Spirits. By James Payn.
Her Mother's Darling. By Mrs.

J. H. RiDDELL.

Bound to the Wheel. By John

Saunders.

Guy Waterman. J. Saunders.

One Against the World. By

John Saunders.
The Lion in the Path. By

John Saundeks.

The Way We Live Now. By

Anthony Trollope.
The American Senator. By
Anthony Trollopk.

Diamond Cut Diamond. By

T. A. Trollopk.

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This Son of Vulcan. By W.

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The Golden Butterfly. By W.

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By Celia's Arbour. By Walter

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The Monks of Thelema. By

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'Twas in Trafalgar's Bay. By

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Seamy Side. Besant and Rice.

Grantley Grange. By S. Beau-
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Popular Novels — continued.
An Heiress of Red Dog. By

Bret Hartk.

The Luck of Roaring Camp.

By Bret Hartb.
Gabriel Conroy. Bret Harte.
Surly Tim. By F. E. Burnett.

Jxiliet's Guardian. By Mrs. H.

LovETT Cameron.
Deceivers Ever. By Mrs. L.

Cameron'.

Cure of Souls. By Maclaren

Cobban'.

Antonina. ByWiLKiECoLLiNs.

Basil. By Wilkie Collins.

Hide and Seek. W. Collins.

The Dead Secret. W. Collins.

The Queen of Hearts. By
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My Miscellanies. W. Collins.
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The Moonstone. W, Collins.
Man and Wife. W. Collins.
Poor Miss Finch. W. Collins.
Miss or Mrs. P W. Collins.
NewMagdalen. By W.Collins.
The Frozen Deep. W. Collins.
The Law and the Lady. By

Wilkie Collins.

The Two Destinies. By Wilkie

Collins.
The Haunted Hotel. By Wilkie

Collins.
Fallen Leaves. By W.Collins.
Felicia. M. Betham-Edwards.
Rozy. By Edward Eggleston.
Filthy Lucre. By Albany dk

FONBLANQUK.

Olympia. By R. E. Francillon.

The Capel Girls. By Edward
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Robin Gray. By Chas. Gibbon.
For Lack of Gold. By Charles
Gibbon.

What will the World Say ? By

Ch.'vrles Gibbon.

In Honour Bound. By Chas.

Gibbon.

In Love and War. By Charles

Gibbon.
For the King. By Charles

Gibbon.
Queen of the Meadow. By

Charles Gibbon.

Dick Temple. By James

Greenwood.
Every-day Papers. By A.

Halliday.
Under the Greenwood Tree.

By Thomas Hakdy.

Garth. ByJuLiAN Hawthorne.
Thornicroft's ModeL By Mrs.

A. Hu.vT.
Fated to be Free. By Jban

Ingelow.
Confidence. By Henry James,

Jun.

The Queen of Connaught. By

Harriett Jay.
The Dark Colleen. By H. Jav.
Number Seventeen. By Henry

KiNGSLEV.

Oakshott Castle. H.Kincslev,

Patricia Kemball. By E . Lynn

Linton.
The Atonement of LeamDundas

By E. Lynn Linton.
The World WeU Lost. By E.

Lynn Linton.
Under which Lord ? By Mrs.

Ll.STON.

The Waterdale Neighbours.

By Justin McCarthy.
DearLadyDisdain. Bythesamf.

My Enemy's Daughter. By

Jlstin McCarthy.
A Fair Saxon. J. McCarthy.
Linley Roohford. McCari hy.
Miss Misanthrope. McCarthy.
Donna Quixote. J. McCarthy.

24

BOOKS PUBLISHED BY

Popular Novels — continued.
The Evil Eye. By Katharine

S. Macquoid.

Lost Rose. K. S. Macquoid.
Open! Sesame i By Florence

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Little Stepson. F. Marryat.
Fighting the Air. F. Marryat.
Touch and Go. By Jean

MiDDLEMASS.

Mr. Dorillion. J. Middlemass.

Whiteladies. ByMrs.OLiPHANT.

Held in Bondage. By Ouida.

Strathmore. By Ouida.

Chandos. By Ouida.

Under Two Flags. By Ouida.

Idalia. By Ouida.

Cecil Castlemaine. By Ouida.

Tricotrin. By Ouida.

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Folle Farine. By Ouida.

Dog of Flanders. By Ouida.

Pascarel. By Ouida.

Two Little Wooden Shoes. By

Ouida.

Signa. By Ouida.
In a Winter City. By Ouida.
Ariadne. By Ouida.
Friendship. By Ouida.
Walter's Word. By J. Payn.
Best of Husbands. By J. Payn.
Halves. By James Payn.

Fallen Fortunes. By J. Payn,
What He Cost Her. J. Payn.
Less Black than We're Painted.

By Jambs Payn.

By Proxy. By James Payn.
Under One Roof, By J. Payn.
High Spirits. By Jas. Pavn.
The Mystery of Marie Beget.

By Edgar A, Pok.

Her Mother's Darling. By Mrs.

J. H. RiDDELL.

Gaslight and Daylight By

Georgb Augustus Sala.
Bound to the Wheel. By John

Saunders.

Guy Waterman. J. Saunders.
One Against the World. By

John Saunders.

The Lion in the Path. By John

and Katherinb Saunders.
Match in the Dark. By

Sketchlev.

Tales for the Marines.

Walter Thornbury.

The Way we Live Now.

Anthony Trollope.

The American Senator.

Anthony Trollopk,

Diamond Cut Diamond.

T. A. Trollops.

A Pleasure Trip on the Conti-
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Adventures of Tom Sawyer.

By Mark Twain.
An Idle Excursion. By Mark
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A.

By

By
By
By

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Lindsay's Luck. By the Author of " That Lass o' Lowrie's."
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