The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-05-10

injured limb up with a bandage after smearing the wound with arnica"
 Thinking of lions in general a smile stole over the features of the gray haired trainer Twenty years ago." he unused. T thought some of introducing an act to be called Daniel in the Lions Den l was to sit on a sort of settee in cage, and the lions were to rush in at me through chute. But I never could get anybody to put up any money for it.
 q am getting little too old to train animals now" resumed the veteran, with a sign. q have been at it steady since 1867, with the exception of one season, when I opened up little grocery stors at Ninth street and Avenue G. But MT. Bailey sent for me and I gave up my grocery store, which was not to my lik- ing for the call of the circus"
 Like Tales From Wonder Book.
 Once launched upon his experiences the old man told stories of the tanbark and of the circus upon the road which sounded like the tales from some modern wonder book. There was. for instance, the one concerning the wreckage of car at Defiance, O.. which contained a leopard and two lions. The occupants of the cage got out and gave Conklin and the circus men lively time or IL before they got them back again. The circus was leaving Defiance at the time The cages had been loaded on flat cars. Just as the train was toiling slowly out of the city the chain depending from coal chute beside the tracks caught in the roof of the cage and ripped big hole in it. Out sprang the three ani- mals. Two of them stood in sort of daze on the roadbed of the railroad, and the third, a lion, made off across the fields.
 We took the side piece of tent-a strip about 90 feet long" explained Conklin, "and made a chute of this after we had removed the hind wheels and the door of the cage, which is detached with out much difficulty. Then, while my men held the canvas chuts I got behind and slowly drove the lion and the leopard into the chute. The men kept edging forward with it until they had the make shift pen right up against the door or the cage. Then we got them Tn anu closed the exit We sealed up the open ing as best we could with boards. The second lion we found that night half a mile away He had entered barn and killed q COW. l discovered that by near ing the moans of the COW. We awoke the farmer and told him of 1t, but he wasn't anxious to venture into the barn. So I had a cage wheeled up to the ooor of the barn and, armed with a whip went in The lion was standing over the dead cow He had caught it by the jaws and brought it down in that way without even scratching it. I asked the farmer what he would take for his COW and he said he would call it square for $3O, so paid him and drove my lion into the cage.
 Wrecked In Tunnel.
 s.Once when I was with Coles circus, he went on the entire circus train was wrecked in what was known as Tunnei No. ', near Parkersburg, w. Va. Ih9 train ran off the track and the cages were thrown this way and that to each side of the tunnel Most of them were broken apart, and in the next few min utes that tunnel was filled with all sorts of wild animals, from kangaroos to monkeys. It was at night the tunnel was dark, and we could not see much except their eyes flashing. We got lanterns and ropes and roped those animals for hours. Then we loaded them back into the cages, making them as secure as. we could. We caught all the animals in the tunnel ex- cept the monkeys. These got out and for n week afterward farmers delivered stray monkeys to us or told us where we could find them We had blacksmiths straighten the bars of the cages, and they didn't like the job very much. With scrapers and poles we drove the animals into one end of the cage, where we held them while the blacksmiths strengthened out the bars at the other end. Ask MT. Cole. He will tell you all about it'