Evening journal., 1900-03-07
TOLD BY TIE CIRCUS MAN.
The Greatest Of All Giants Enters In
the Farmers Moving Matches.

the Farmers moving Matches.
III anything" said the old circus
man. "the great giant used to come
out strongest in competitive contests.
You see. there he showed for not only
what he was. but even greater. by the
contrast OF course, he was always
IN contrast, but here the contrast was
made more striking; but we never
failed TO enter him in any sort of
competitive contest that we could get
him into Moving contests, for in.
stance. the giant was very strong In;
and We never missed an opportunity
TO put him into one OF these when we
could. The old man was always on
the outlook, sharp, for this sort OF
thing in any form, and II he ran up
against moving match coming off.
say the day the circus struck the
town, he'd get the old man into IL
romehow, sure; not. OF course, enter
ing him as a giant or a big man, or
anything Of that sort, but simply as
an unknown. He used TO go equipped
for this moving business.
Il suppose that the average scythe-
blade would be three feet or there
nbouts In length, and the snath maybe
four feet and half long. Well, now,
the giants scythe had blade about
ten feet long and a handle about fif-
teen. Those farmers would get to-
gether In a grass lot to see what a
man could do say, in half an hour,
everything to count; width OF swath,
forward cut, cleanness and evenness
Of the moving, and so on. l suppose
that man might cut a swath five feet
wide, possibly more, but more likely
less, and his cut as he stepped for
ward with even swings of the sharp
Bcythe might be a foot TO eighteen
inches. The young farmer and some
old ones, too for that matter. would
try, one after another, In this competi-
tion, every man swinging along In
line style, till pretty much all OF them
had had their chance at il and then
they'd begin calling for the unknown,
an then we'd bring up the giant.
And he never failed to make SEN
Eation when he appeared; but when
he stepped into the field and took off
his coat and tossed it into the wagon
alongside the lot. and took his scythe
out of the wagon. with its ten-foot
blade and flfteen.foot snath, and rolled
up his sleeves and took the scythe and
set to moving, then there was a SEN
swath Why, you ought to see the
giant The farmers cut maybe five
feet, the giant fifteen. They'd step
forward a foot or a foot and half
with every sweep. the giant four or
five feet. And he was a good mower,
too; cutting close and even and clean
from side to side. Just think OF it,
win youi-a man cutting a path flf-
teen feet wide and going forward five
feet at every strokel
Pretty soon the giant would stop
and pull a scythe-stone out of his
bootleg-this stone was three feet
long, as long as an ordinary scythe
blade-and sharpen his scythe with
Il; and then he'd drop the stone In his
bootleg and go to moving again And
pretty soon he'd get dry and want
some cider; and that's where he used
to come In again with business We
had jug that was as big around as
a barrel in. the biggest part of II, and
that was pretty near as tall, but a
regular jug In shape and we used to
get this over the fence to him wher-
ever he was. and he'd lift that up as
easy as cOud be and turn II up, look
ing like a balloon up there turned up
| In that way, and take big, long drink
and then set it down and go to NOV.
ing again.
We'll, when the giant had got
through moving there wasn't likely to
be much grass left In that lot to NOV,
and there never was any doubt about
who'd won the prize. And he used to
cut as wide a swath smong the farm
ers as he did In he grass. There
wasn't a farmer for miles around but
used to come to the show and bring
his family Maybe they'd ha' come
anyway, but the giants moving hit
em hard; and as for the rest of the
community, why 1t Just simply got
'em all.
My, my; but It makes me sigh to
think Of the great old giant."--N. Y.
! Sun. '.,.