Jerry-Go-Round

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Tom chases Jerry through the sidewalk as the title cards and credits are shown. Jerry gives Tom the slip and Tom turns around the other way in anger. Jerry stops short when he sees a lion's mouth, but it is only an ad for a local circus. Seeing Tom approach in fury, Jerry sees no alternative but to jump into the lion's mouth. He disappears as Tom pulls up in bewilderment. He pulls some of the advert off and reveals that Jerry was lucky enough to hit a hole in the fence and is disappearing in the distance.
Tom follows Jerry into the circus and Jerry hides behind a post as Tom dashes by him. Jerry laughs and walks away when he is splashed with a tear from an elephant that cries in pain because she had stepped on a tack. Jerry removes the tack and the elephant hangs back, afraid of Jerry (as he is a mouse), and when Tom approaches him, the elephant picks him up with her trunk and beats him like a drum on the stool. Jerry shows the elephant the tack and the elephant looks at her foot, and finding nothing there, hugs Jerry in gratitude. Tom pulls up a ladder and swipes the mouse hoping to flee with him. Tom meets the elephant's anger and she uses her trunk to claim Jerry. After putting him safely on her head, the elephant uses her trunk as a hammerhead to knock him and the ladder to the ground. She then returns to hug the mouse. Tom emerges from the ground, dazed and then falls unconscious.
Later, Tom is sitting behind a stool, annoyed, as the elephant and Jerry participate in the circus with the clowns. Jerry and the elephant dance in the spotlight and pass a ball back and forth. Tom aims a slingshot at the ball and busts it. The elephant looks for her friend in concern and Tom ascends a high-rise ladder to reach the mouse, who is hanging onto the 300-foot (91Â m) high wire by his feet. Tom slicks across the wire and stomps on it repeatedly to bounce Jerry into his hands before he walks over the wire back to the ramp, only to run into the irate elephant, now thinking he's disturbing the audience and attempts to catch him. She uses her weight to pull both of them all the way down to the ground and she takes away with Jerry from Tom's hand by vacuuming up with her trunk, then releases the cat, launching him out of the circus tent.
Later when respawning, Tom chases Jerry into a ladder that leads to a diving board. Jerry sees the bowl of water 200 feet (61Â m) down and holds back until Tom approaches and he can see no alternative. Tom barely misses the mouse and ends up diving himself. Jerry makes a successful dive, and the elephant happens to come by and vacuum up all the water, kissing and taking Jerry away with her. Tom, still in midair, sees the empty bowl and points down in dismay before impact. Tom crashes through the ground with such a force and he falls all the way into the hell. A devil takes him back up to the surface and throws him out as if to say that it's not a Tom's time yet.
The elephant is now back in her stable and playing with Jerry, throwing him up into the air and then vacuuming him back to her trunk. Tom sticks out a stick with a pepper shaker on one end and puts the pepper inside her trunk nostrils. She elicits a gigantic sneeze which throws Jerry miles and miles from the circus. Tom runs backwards with a baseball glove to catch the mouse, but somehow the elephant has come near Tom. He runs up the elephant's leg and perches himself on her trunk to catch the mouse. However, the elephant has other plans for Tom and she rolls up her trunk and throws the cat off her. She then catches the glove and also catches Jerry, and proceeds to hug the mouse again.
And the final scene, Jerry and the elephant are now leading the circus parade with Jerry playing the bugle and the elephant playing a very loud drum which causes the cymbals to rise and then crash together. While Tom hides in a manhole to create a violence at the parade by putting a dynamite on the road so it will explode when the elephant stomps on the switch. However, the crashing pushes the dynamite stick back with Tom as he closes the manhole without knowing it. The elephant steps on the switch and Tom gets exploding defeat and waves a "The End" flag in white, then the elephant shuffles and scuffs at it onto the ground in dismay.

Question: Why does Tom run backwards?
Answer: to catch the mouse