Sullivan republican. [volume] (Laporte, Pa.) 1883-1896, 1890-04-11
THE LITTLE ROPE. WALKER.


A great many years ago-more than
half century, in fact-a family of
French acrobats Travelled through
Europe and made their living by giving
entertainments in the villages through
which they passed.
They did not perform in theatres or
opera houses because there were none in
the hamlets of France and Germany in
those days. No, this family of aero
bats performed in the market place or
on the open green, and stretched their
long rope from the ground to the top of
the tallest steople.
All the members of the family were
acrobats, and their parents before them
had been acrobats, too, journeying from
one village to another, and buying
their bread with the pennies and six
pences that the country people threw
into the fathers hat. I said that all
the members of the family were aero
bats, but had forg often little Henri,
who was only four years old, and too
young, therefore, to do his share in
amusing the public. So little Henri
went about with his father and
mother and sister and big brother,
and slept in the wagon at night and
...ay-Sd with tho big dog or s.saidlod
about the village green while his elders
were dancing on the long rope. 1t was
his sister Jeanne who took care of him,
washed and dressed him in the morn
ing, put him to bed at night, and
taught him to say his prayers before he
went to sleep. She was kind, good
girl, and little Henri loved her NOR than
any one in the world, and when he
saw her take her long pole in her hand
and ance gracefully up the long rope
toward the top of the steeple while the
people looked on and clapped their
hands, he though there was no one in
the world as lovely and charming as
his sister Jeanne.
One day they stopped in beautiful
old-fashioned village on the banks of
the Rhine. They stretched their long
rope from the ground to the top of the
steeple, and Jeanne took her pole in
her hand, bowed and smiled to the
people and dan ced lightly and grace
fully up toward the top. And little
Henri, standing on tho ground, with
his fathers cane in his chubby hands,
watched her with as much delight as if
he had never seen her do it before. But
when she had gone about half the dis
tance gust of wind shook the rope;
she tumbled, almost lost her balance,
and cried out in terror.
'Tm coming" screamed little Hem
ri, and while his mother turned away
her face, and his father implored him
to return, he balanced his cane as his
sister balanced her pole and ran up the
rope to help her. 1t was the first time
he had ever been on slack rope in his
life, but he was not afraid, nor did it
make him dizzy. He ran up to where
Jeanne was clinging and threw himself
into her arms. She held him tight un-
til his father came and carried him
down. t'He will make q great rope
walker" said his mother, as she clasped
the little boy in her arms. '.He takes
to it as duck takes to water. 1t must
be in his blood" said the father; and
from that day little Henri's education
as tight-rope walker began.
Years afterward this same little boy
stretched a rope across Niagara Fall
and walked across it as easily as if it
had been a barn floor, and then the
whole world resounded with the fame
of Blondin. And one day, after he
had performed in Paris in the presence
of thous ands of people, he sat in his
tent and told me the story of how he
had run up the long rope to save his
sister. -Pttsburg d spatch.