Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-02-01
DEATH AND BURIAL OF A COMRADE
Natural Gas Man Predicts Bright, Clear
Atmosphere for Pittsburg in
the Near Future.
BANK NOTES AS SPECTACLE POLISHERS.
Interesting Chats With and About Men, Picked Up in
Tcurs Of the City.

he gave out yesterday, while he was seated
in his cozy little office in the Bijou, sur
rounded by cloud of cigarette smoke and
pleasant memories:
Possibly the happieSt time l ever spent
in the show business was when was with q
river circus, and yet there were sad scenes,
too. A river circus, you know, is one that
travels along the river in steamboat and
gives shows on land the same as do other
regular ciTcuses. Our boat was the Parole.
We did the Mississippi river and its South
ern tributaries. Among them were the Red
and White rivers, Bayou Douche and the
Yazoo river. The country and the climate
are beyond description in the winter season,
except on rainy days. We showed in day
light and usually moved at night Life
was poem of existence.
The Circus Mans Easy Life.
1.-The climate was enervsting and we all
fell into sort Of a happy, easy existence,
and did not care whether the world moved or
stopped. 1t made but little difference
whether salaries came or not No one ever
objected. One day we would live on chicken
and wild turkey, and possibly the next on
salt bacon and hard tack. 1t was all one
and the same. Life ran too smooth for any
one TO murmur. One Christmas, and it's not
more than ten years ago. we ate Christmas
dinner in our shirt sleeves and then settled
II BY playing hotball with oranges in one OF
the great groves that line Bayou Douche.
I'VE carried about 100 men. Rapidly of
movements was one of the great features of
the Southern river shows. Night was the
favorite time for saying goodby The
strongest reasons for favoring the darkness
was to escape the intense heat and the
numerous SherifS.
But Sherifs will be Sherifs, he added
with a sigh. There is a strange affinity
'twixt them and the show business. They
were part Of our life then. Still, we had
good time.
A Grand Holiday All Round.
Sundays were our great days. Then we
would pull into one of the beautiful islands,
where both the ground and the trees are
covered with a soft rich moss. We would
take all the stock ashore and such of the
animals as could be allowed to run at large,
and all would enjoy day of rest. The boys |
INDUCED in all kinds of games, and there
were eight or ten female performers to add |
lie to the party. |
1T was up the Red river that had the |
strangest experience of my life. The owner
Of the show had discovered his wife was un
faithful. He was a crack shot, and we all
expected duel, but instead he was cold as |
a refrigerator. At sunset he ordered both |
his wife and her lover to pack their trunks. |
The lover hesltated, but a revolver was |
argument enough for him to proceed. The |
boat was run into the shore and the couple |
and their baggage landed on the west bank. |
TINS husband waved farewell as the boat |
showed of, and the woman tainted. That
did not move him, for he ordered the baud |
out on the upper deck and made it play |
The Girl / Let Behind Me- while be |
stood AMI watched until bend in the river |
hid the faithless wife from view.
"Ali over the cotton belt" said he, eve |
showed 10 from !, 900 to /. 200 people at each |
performance, and there would only be half |
dozen white persons In the audience, and |
less than dozen seats would be sold at the |
ticket office. 1t was frequent occurrence |
for planter or storekeeper there to buy |
1000 tickets with the understanding that |
we were only to give one show and that at |
night.
A Substitute for Cold Cash
"What prices the negroes had to pay L do |
not know, but 1 do know that many a !
planter has paid for the entire labor on a !
wears crop of cotton by one of these per- |
formances. The Southern negro would |
rather 60 to a circus than to heaven. Thev |
never have any money. All the land is |
owned by the planter and storekeepers.
The negroes raise cotton for half the |
crop, the owner furnishing everything. The |
negro starts in at the first OF the year and |
the storekeeper gives him what provisions |
he thinks be needs and at prices made only |
10 suit the storekeeper. When the crop is
gathered at the end OF the year, the negro,
If he is lucky, has a balance OF IS or $40
coming to him. This he spends for bad
whisky during the holidays and then starts
in the new year as poor as before. But they
were always ready for show.
"We had brass band with us. A musi-
cal education was not one OF the require
ments for admission, and when it played it
only created disturbance. They were mu-
sicians that burglarIzed nature, for they
breathed in good air and only blew out dis
coro. Nevertheless, we were often 40 miles
from a railway or telegraph station. A
brass band OF any kind was i novelty. In
daylight the band played on the top deck.
The negroes would leave their work as soon
as they heard it, and follow along the river
banks until the shore would be lined. 1
have seen them follow the boat for five or
six miles, and when the canvas was raised
they were willing to give all they could earn
in year for admission.
Death at Night on the River.
while we were in the Yazoo river was
sent on ahead to join the advance boat at
Greenwood, Miss. Abe Ogden, one of the
best known bill posters in the country, was
with the boat. The pilot was down
with the fever and dying. At midnight
Ogden came to me and said, Come
quick! 1 can hear the death
cabin he was dead. 1t was dark, uncanny
night at best with drizzling rain falling.
1 never felt so much unnerved in nv life as
that lonely night when we kept watch over
the dead. Each shadow seemed a phan-
tom and the monotonous patter of the rain
made the Loneliness more terrible.
I'VE did not know what. to do.
1t would be ten days before we would reach
town where we could buy coffin; and be-
slues that, We had eight towns to bill in that
time. We could not keep the body in that
climate without 1t decomposing. The only
thing was TO bury him at daybreak There |
were some cottonwood planks on board and
with the aid of negro, who afterward |
proved to be an escaped convict, we EN-
ployed the hours until morning in making
rough coffin. 1t was strange work, and / |
eau remember how | shuddered when every |
rail was driven.
He Was Given a Christian Burial
AT dawn we reached :he head of Honey |
Island. Placing the rude coffin in a boat |
beside us, we rode to the farm of Miss Jen-
ME MeAfee. 1t was cloudy, raining and |
muddy, circumstances depressing enough |
on an ordinary occasion but on this the /