The Press., 1898-06-02
THE OLD CIRCUS MAN.
HIS TALK ABOUT THE FIRST SOuvE-
 MRS GIVEN BY SHOW PEOPLE,

They Were Distributed by the Great Gi-
 rafre A Thrilling Incident Which At.
 tended One Performance-How the Peo-
 pie Stood on the Giraffe's Shadow.
 "The first souvenirs ever knew of being given out in the show business" said the old circus man, "we gave away in our show at the time we had the big IS foot giraffe. We never had an at traction that beat the big giraffe. The people were just carried away with him. There wasn't anything about him but what interested them, even the slightest little things. On clear days, when we were where we could do it and the sun was right for us, we used to get the giraffe out in front of the entrance of the main tent and have him stand there like great sentry. People used to stop and look up at him, and then the first thing you know somebody'd dis cover his shadder. Anybody'd cast a long shadder at that hour of the day, of course but the giraffe's shadder reached as far as you could see. And as soon as one man begun to look at it 40 others did, and then you'd see 'em. I've seen 1, 000 people at a time line up long that shadder and just stand along the edge of it down past the main tent and the sideshow tents, just standing there lookin at it. The giraffe was great, but his shadder fairly staggered 'em. And there they'd stand till the sun dropped down under the edge of the earth, and the first thing they knew there wasn't any shadder. Then they'd stare at each other for minute, and then all bunch up together again and look at the giraffe till we took him in.
 "We used to have line on the pro- gramme saying that at o'clock and at o'clock the great giraffe would hand around ice water. That's where the sou venirs come in. We used to give away the glasses the water was in. The glasses were marked, Souvenir of the Great Giraffe, and whoever got lem could keep lem. The seats in our circus were divided into four sections. We used to give away four dozen tumblers at every performance, one in each section. When the time come, we'd march the giraffe around the edge of the ring, and in front of each section his keeper would hand him wire holder holding dozen glasses, which he would take by the handle in his mouth. Tall as he was, he could reach easy to the highest back seats. It's astonishing how people used to grab for those glasses. It seems as though the whole section would stand up on the seats and all grab for the holder when it come near 'em. They'd spill the water and get wet and have the greatest time you ever heard of. but nobofy got hurt, and so we just let her buzz along. But finally something did happen.
 "At one evening entertainment when he was serving out the souvenirs, when we come to one of the sections, there was man sitting on the fourth tier from the top who picked up his boy, bright looking youngster about 10 years old, who was sitting alongside of him, and sat him up on his shoulder. The giraffe lifted the holder up and swept it along the seats with the people grabbing, and when it come near this man with the boy on his shoulder the man just lifted him up so that the boy could stand on his shoulders. He was going to get one anyway, and when the holder came along the boy made grab for it. There was only one glass left in it then, but the boy got it. He upset it lifting it out of the holder and scattered the water all over everybody, but that didn' t count. He got the glass and was com ing down with it when his father, in- stead of feeling him jounce down on his shoulder, felt his weight growing light CT, and the next minute he and every r. o1r lol sv, air. When the giraffe saw the last glass go, he lifted the holder, the way he al- ways did, to clear the people before swinging it around and down to the keeper. This time when he lifted it the buttons on the outside of the cuff of the boys jacket got caught in the wires. They were sewed on the way mothers sew on buttons, and they held the youngsters weight easily, and when the giraffe lifted the holder up he lifted the boy with it.
 "Then there was a scene. We knew the giraffe wouldn't hurt a fly, but it looked to the people as though he had the boy in his teeth and was going to sling him through the other end of mo- where. The whole audience rose up and stood leaning forrard, watchin and never sayin boo, but the giraffe swung his neck around as gentle and easy as the arm of a crane and lowered the holder and the boy hanging to it safe into the arms of the keeper in the ring. The boy hadn't even dropped the tun- bier.
 "Then the people did boiler. and the giraffe walked off as stately as you please, the boy climbed back up to his pop, and the show went on. Nobody hurt, but when we run out of the tum- blers we had on hand we adopted an other style of souvenir. ''-New York | Sun. : His Choice.
 The Elderly Colonel It seems so un- gallant to say so. but women fashions were much more charming when l was