The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1903-01-13
LIFE WITH The
COUNTRY CIRCUS
Graft Is Always Good and
Rubes Like to Be
Robbed.
The circus creeps southwark with the

The circus creeps southwark with the
sun, so when the warmer states are ex-
hausted those shows which do not have
winter engagement disband. An in
stinctive knowledge of what is good in
life sends practically the whole troupe
to New York, and late in November
and early in December there is q re-
united circus family. The circus man
IN all his glory, as well as the foreign
vaudevilist, is best seen in Mutterer's
cafe. Here they gather and chat and
chatter, mostly in German or badly
broken English. Aeria1ist, ground work.
er, front door man, concert people,
strong men, all fortify their strength or
gain increase of subtleness by drinking
coffee or chocolate and eating vast
quantities Of cake.
Those who understand German and
are quick to catch broken English can,
at the cost. of a cup of coffee, watch the
artists" and their associates, the
"grafters" at play.
My ankle was off during the first
week.. remarked one of the artists, in
confidential mood, $50 I was allowed
to see little Of the show. I was not
quick to see what was going on, and
we were out three days before l heard
a word of grating. After that 1 didn't
hear much else. / was startled one day
when l stood in the side show by the
Hey-yo-O Bot Dot =
Hey Doti Ho Dot!'
The instant the cry was raised the
crowd rushed to the entrance. One of
the canvass men said, in a matter of
fact way: 'Toipt nothin'. Elerfunt got
knot In its trunk and the keeper was
f1xin It. All things are possible with a
circus. so the people returned to the
higher delights of the snake charmer.
the card writer and the armless wonder.
But there was one missing the unique
assemblage of stupendous curiosities
from all quarters Of the globe That
was Dot who presided over the fish
pond. Her little shallow pan of water
was there. Her pictures were there.
But her fat and bleached self was miss
ing, and the fine prizes she used as a
bait were also gone. In front of the
platform were an officer in uniform.
one of the ticket sellers, and an angry
man.
seen her. said the officer. I'll
have her. She amt goin' to come here
with high-handed robbery
You have full permission to search
said the manager. want no blemish
on the name Of the Great Equestrian
and Geological Show. Your uniform
Will carry you to any part of the
grounds
THE officer swelled with Importance,
and started on with the angry man,
who had been telling the crowd how,
when at her request he had exhibited a
roll Of bills, she had snatched them and
hidden. The ticket seller laughed and
said to me:
What luck that girl has. Not out
week and she lands a whizzer.'
"A whizzer?
Sure. He just sold part of his farm
Dot got his share of the sale. The rube
h &C.. Il
ducked and made hot lam. You We're
Just plucked? Well, when a CRATER
ducks he does q little funny turn, and
the Whizzer thinks he is fooling When
he makes a hot lam he runs under the
tent and makes for the big top or the
dressing room. There he jumps into a
clowns suit or sports for awhile as a
canvas man. Not once in a thousand
times is he caught, and then there is
fight.
That was the first I saw of graft
ing. Following every circus is a crowd
of good men, They usually have a
recognized place and standing, and the
old man never kicks. Some of the
neaner ones let out the grating. and
the one who gets it hires his men on
commission and they have to Whack
up. Almost every circus is full of it.
The performers Whack up to the
equestrian director, and the grafters
Whack up also. There is q lot of graft
There are ground graft, which includes
all the games, pocketpicking ana
tickets; front door graft, which is
mostly ticket butchering. and the big
top and sideshow graft. You know, all
the men who sell are butchers. There
are the peanut butcher, the ticket
butcher, the cane butcher, the popcorn
butcher, the candy butcher and the
sandwich butcher. They sell poor art1-
cles at high price, and they short
change-that is, they give 10 cents
back when they should give so cents
Then the pickpockets buzz the crowd
and bite studs and pinch earrings and
hook chains. All stand together. II
avoided the cry Of Hey, no, Rube,
Rube!' will bring every canvas man,
and jockey to the scene, and they are
tough fighters.
''The big grafters are the ticket me1I
They short change mostly. Then they
get lot Of walk-away money. They
have a couple of cappers who watch
for the men with wads. When one
gets up to the wagon and gets his
ticket the cappers hustle him into the
crowd before he can count his change
or before he can get it. He can't raise
a fuss because the town is usually
fixed, and if he said too much some
one would rap him gently with a tent
peg. Walk away money is looked upon
as honest graft.
.It costs something to fix this. The
advance agent of the grafters finds out
whether grating is allowed in town.