Port Royal standard and commercial. [volume] (Beaufort, S.C.) 1874-1876, 1876-05-04
Circus Riders and Horses.

lieved to be the most dashing and fin
ished bareback rider now in the ring,
saws an article on the circus ring, has
six finely trained horses, and Charlie
Fish, who ranks next to him in this
line. has four or five. The Melville
brothers, three of them, have six horses
for their acts. Frank is very fine pad
and George bareback rider. So the list
might be extended almost indefinitely.
But the performers themselves grumble
that their salaries have not increased In
proportion with this added expense to
them and Tightening of the burdens OF
the manager. They are only employed
less than half the year, on an average,
but during all the other portion must
maintain their horses and keep them In
training at their own cost.
Still they get very comfortable pay.
James Robinson gets $500 per week for
himself alone, and last season he
got $3.50 for himself and two boys.
Charlie Fish gets about $3.50 the Mel
vile brothers, $3.50; Dockrel and wife,
$500. These are, of course, the largest
salaries for equestrians, who are the
best paid persons about circus below
the grade Of proprietor, but it may be
said that the general pay of pad riders
runs from 800 to 500 per week each,
and of bareback riders from 800 to
$500, according to their individual e1-
cellence and popularity and the necessi-
ties of the management.
The pad riders generally accepted as
the best in the country at the present
time are, in addition to those mentioned,
OF. Reed, VIM. Dutton, Romeo Sebas-
tian, Bob Stickney. Mile Viola Riv-
ers), Mrs. Burdeau, Mrs. Cook, Nine.
De Berg, and Mollie Brown. The latter
is a daughter of Nine. Tournaire, the
finest menage equestrienne who ever was
in this country, and who will travel this
season with Montgomery Queens circus.
1t would be ungallant to say, or even to
insinuate, how many years Nine.
Tournaire has been one OF the queens OF
ring, but if anybody has any doubts
about circus life promoting longevity
and maintaining perennial youth, let
him hunt up that lady in the ring, gaze
upon Frank Whittaker's brown locks,
and then ask some wel-posted old-timer
how they both date to the nations birth
day.
Some horses can never be broken or
trained 80 as to be reliable for service in
the ring, while others evince a natural
aptitude, or perhaps talent for 1t, and
learn very easily all that is required OF
them. Generally it takes from eighteen
months to two years to get horse so
well trained for pad riding that he will
not shy, or bolt, or break his gait in the
ring, but will keep steadily on his
round, Indifferent to what is going on
upon his back, or beside him, or even
under his feet, if the luckless rider hap
pens to tumble there, where he has no
business to be. In some instances, how
ever, horses have been known to act
we'll before an audience the very first
time they have been put in the ring.
Generally horse is educated for but
q single service. If for pad riding he, is
kept to that; &; if one of two or four
trained together for the comparatively
rare double and quadruple acts, he is
not allowed to muddle his equine brains
by Striving with knowledge of hurdle
leaping or tricks and so on. Generally
old horses are best, because they have
settled into steady gait, and if they
have no ingrained vices, are most re,
liably phlegmatic under extraordinary
but possible circumstances.
The hallucination pervades many
minds that circus men have secret and
ingenious ways of frescoing their re.
markable calico horses, using walnut
Juice and other compounds to dye
patches of milk-white steeds until the
parti .colored effects are obtained. This
is an error, however. They buy ur
horses which are "not colored, but
born that way" No special breed oi
horses produces these freaks OF color,
but the finer bloods, it is said, seldom
show them. "We recruit from dung
hill stock, says an old circus man.