Savannah courier. (Savannah, Tenn.) 1885-1979, 1901-09-27
Old Time Shows.

ris' Recollections of the stage and
its people, and by the way she is
the only person | ever heard utter
u kind word in behalf of poor, de-
luded, half crazed Wilkes Booth.
In her "Recollections" she tou Oh.
es the extremes of humor and
pathos. No ono can read her
first experiences on the stage or
her recolectiOns of Booth with.
out a tear nor can one read her
"Wild horse Of Tartary" without
laughing. 10 see "Old Bob" with
Miles strapped on his back in
Mazeppa come ambling on to the
stage at a snail's gait and stop dead
still in front of a bowling audience
was enough to make dog laugh,
and when Miles je.ked one foot
loose and began to pound sold
Rob" in the side with the force of
a battering ram it was simply side
splitting 10 the people as well as
to the horse.
Reading these sketches put me
to thinking of the shows we used
to have in Savannah and the first
one | recall was Punch and Judy
and the way that Mr.. Punch did
furnish grave yard material made
me SILVER, but when the devil got
Punch it capped the climax, and
fixed me so that | got along with
out sleep that night. My first
circus was "Lake's Mammoth Hip.
podrome." My! These words stag.
gered my Imagination. | would
not have missed that show for a
horse. In the after years | saw
B2rnum and Forcpaugh and the
other big circuses and the Burn
ing of Rome and the Destruction
of Pompeli and Jerusalem on the
day of the Crucifixion, the battle
of Sedan and the Bernese Alps
and Lake Kilauea and the Siege
of Paris and dozens of others,
but none of them took hole of me
like Lakes two-bit, one-tent circus
did.
Besides the circuses we had
other shows in Savannah that
maybe did not come up to the
aesthetic standard but they made
us laugh and / guess that is one
thing shows are made for. Once
there came "Rope Walker" and
stretched his line from the court
house to the old hotel and picked
the banjo and sang "Who loves
later on his gravy and took up
collection and we paid the fiddler
and laughed and were perhaps as
happy as if we had heard Richard
Mansfield in Cyrano de Bergerac.
At another time there came a
blind fellow who was "the whole
show" and sang "Shoot him wild
a ra-a-a-i-l and that will fetch him
down" and when we clapped him
back he played an accompanied
ment on a fiddle with three strings
and sang again "Shoot him wild a
ra-a-a-il and that will bring him
down" snd we all got the worth
of our money and went home hap
by. | heard the Hiwaians sing at
the Worlds Fair but their songs
did not tickle me as the songs of
that blind man did.
At etill another time there came
to Savannah a blind man and his
wife and they sang Little Brown
jug" and laughed the chorus to a
finish. Compared to it the songs OF
Nilsson and Patti were as rubbish,
and then wc had Rip Van Wrinkle
and Enoch Ardcn-two nights by
the same tronpe-equal 10 hun.
dred nights in New York by Mary
Anderson or Charlotte Cushman.
In st. Louis last winter | saw
the Trough Riders at San Juan
Hilln and not long ago in Wash.
lngt0n Clty L saw the "Baltle OF
Manila Bay" done in moving pic.
lures but these did not thrill me
rs did thc shows we had in Sa.
vannah when | was q boy. Strange
that the things we see at homo in
early life are never equalled by
the things we see in after life.
sob how beautiful the moon as
it hangs out to night over the rip
ping waters" said Chicago girl
to her visiting cousin from Boston.
"Y-e-es" lsnguidly drawled the
visitor, "but you just aught to see
! +l,o ,1,oo,, ,yo hnuo Il, Daafnn y