The St. Johns herald., 1896-11-21

pen to disappoint me was dispelled
 when we came to the courthouse square
 for there, just beyond the temple of jus
 tice, in the vacant lots, was spread the
 mighty tent. Sure those vacant lots
 had been doubled in size since last
 saw them, for no common space could
 entertain an establishment so vast as
 this. Why, there were walls of canvas on the right hand and on the left hand of the mammoth tent, and there were succeSslons of smaller tents that stretched away into bewildering vistas, and before them all everywhere tugged
 the great advertisements, wonderful in picture, exotic in text. There was a
 noise, hustle, hurry, a nervous ten
 sion, unknown in the town. No man
 had more time than suff1ced for the scantiest of greetings, unless accosted
 by soldier, in which case he would talk interminably, or a sharper, in
 which case he would invest disastrous ly. The only calm, contained men were those law-defiers who looked with such | honest faces into the wavering eyes of honest men and beguiled them to their ruin. For there were three-card games and "chuck-a-luck," popular among the soldiers, and wheels of fortune and straight faro. Only the most beggarly pretense of Secreting all this crime was made. The 'short change" man, who | fiourished in one place and disappeared to rise in another, was on the ground and was remembered. There were as- | sistant marshals with large stars, and they walked in and out of all tents at will. But they saw nothing less than quarreling men, and reused to activity only to prevent fighting.
 Just before noon the parade started. We watched the wonderful aggregation of marvels form into line. To youths bred in an environment where some of the odOr of sanctity might reach them 1t seemed most shocking that so much profanity was needed in assembling a great moral aggregation. Furthermore, there was quality about that profan- ity have never known equaled. It was intense, incisive, terse, emphatic, sul- phurous, full of murder and flashing with the lightnings of blasphemy. I have ridden behind mule whackers" on the plains and have spent vacations where the voice of the first mate of river packet could assail my ears. But l have found no man whose profanity matched the splendid wickedness of the circus employe in the old days of wagon transportation.
 The parade was thing to marvel at. In the front was carriage resplendent above above anything in the town and bearing the dusty human who was yet more than mortal, for he owned "the show"
 Then came the band in a golden char lot that quite satisfied me- If anything in my reading eQualed that could not recall It. How many there were in the band, what they played, or whether they played we'll, these things did not impress me. For behind them came the elephant. He walked alone, stately or sore-footed, and how was to know? He swung like the rocking of 0 hay stack in a storm and his driver prodded him. Then came the cars. Upon the sides of each were painted such pictures as must have whetted the curiosity of the unlearned. But two were opened. In one was 'the massive and blood sweating behemOth of holy wrlt"-a hippopotamus! In the other a man sat in safety with unclaimed lions on his every hand.
 What more there was in the parade, how many ladies in remarkable skirts and gentlemen in the armor of knights, how many clowns and how many cages, do not know. But it was a magnificent spectacle. It wound about those streets that had always before been common place, and it grew more wonderful as it advanced. know, for followed it.
 And then it vanished into the spread ing walls of the canvas city and was lost. The beauty and the loveliness would have vanished from the earth but for the glare and flare and marvel of that circus day.
 John was in the line before the ticket wagon, but his progress was slow for time, and again he was pulled from his place to give frantic greeting to some one whose son or brother or father was in the service. That was why soldiers came home on furlOUgh-to tell when | the war would end and to talk hope fully to the friends of the boys at the | front.
 But finally he stood at the wonderful | door of the ticket wagon, where money | was leaping from the hand of the coun- tryman in exchange for pleasure. h. stantly he was away again. The fat, hot | man that sold tickets cared nothing for | the blue uniform. He saw nothing that | interested him beyond the bills laid 1 down. And these he whisked from sight l half savagely.
 Our tickets were in our hands. We | had passed the insolent, broad -jawed | fellow at the gangway of ropes, and | stood in the most amazing place in the l world. To the left were rows of won- i derful cages-now opened-and in each ] was marvel of animal life. I never | had seen them, but somewhat of natu- ral history had been opened to me in | books, and could call them by name.
 A man may live a thousand years and win great honors, but he will never feel so keen joy as thrills in the boy of 10 when he stands in the center of an un- expected circus and menagerie.
 I sought the elephant in vain, because my little eyes had not been adjusted |