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Ebook has 509 lines and 56550 words, and 11 pages

"I looked up just as a black leopard sprang at us. Ali's spear whizzed by my head, hitting the animal in the side. I fired, catching him in mid-air squarely in the chest with an explosive bullet."

"Since the monkey cannot pull his hand out of the bottle while it is doubled up and he hasn't sense enough to let go, he sticks there until the hunter comes along."

"I climbed to the platform and looked down into the trap. There were sixty elephants."

"I felt myself spinning so rapidly that the elephant, my men and the stall were all a blur; and I came up against the wall with a thud. Fortunately, there was a gutter running along the wall, and I dropped into it just as the elephant lunged forward at me."

"We began to prod the rhinoceros..... He put his head against the wall and rooted; the wall toppled over and he lurched out of the pit and into the cage."

"A huge paw shot out and grabbed my ankle. I was jerked off the ground, and, as I fell, my hands caught the limb of a tree..... The brute pulled. I felt myself growing dizzy..... Then Omar grabbed a club and pounded the Orang's arm."

"Then three of us armed with krises took positions so that we should be above the seladang when he charged, and we lowered the sack. He snorted and drew back."

Trapping Wild Animals in Malay Jungles

CIRCUS DAYS

It as the lure of the circus--the tug that every boy feels when a show comes to town--that started me on my career as a collector of wild animals. I use the word collector rather than hunter, because hunting gives the idea of killing and, in my business, a dead animal is no animal at all. In fact, the mere hunting of the animals was simply the beginning of my work, and the task of capturing them uninjured was far more thrilling than standing at a distance and pulling a trigger. And then, when animals were safely in the net or stockade, came the job of taking them back through the jungle to the port where they could be sold. It was often a case of continuous performance until I stood on the dock and saw the boats steam away with the cages aboard. And I wasn't too sure of the success of my expedition even then, because the animals I had yanked from the jungle might die before they reached their destination.

I was nearly seventeen when Sells Brothers' Circus came to Binghamton, New York, where I was living with my parents. That day I joined some other boys in playing hookey from school, and we earned our passes by carrying water for the animals. It wasn't my first circus, but it was the first time that I had ever worked around the animals and I was fascinated. I didn't miss the big show, but all the rest of the day I was in the menagerie, listening to the yarns of the keepers and doing as much of their work as they would allow. That night, when the circus left town, I stowed away in a wagon.

The next morning, in Elmira, I showed up at the menagerie bright and early. The men laughed when they saw me. I had expected them to be surprised and I was afraid that they might send me away, but I found out later that it was quite an ordinary thing for boys to run away from home and join the circus. And the men didn't mind because the boys were always glad to do their work for them. I worked hard and, in return, the men saw that I had something to eat. That night I stowed away again in the wagon.

In Buffalo I was told to see the boss--the head property-man--and I went, trembling for fear he was going to send me back home. Instead, he told me that I might have the job of property-boy, which would give me a month, my meals and a place to sleep--if I could find one. There were no sleeping accommodations for the canvas and property crews; we rolled up in the most comfortable places we could find, and we were always so dead tired that we didn't care much where we slept.

Since those early days in the circus, I've been around the world many times, and I've seen all sorts of men, living and working in all sorts of conditions, but I've never found a harder life than that of property-boy, unless, perhaps, it's that of a Malay prisoner. Sometimes I wonder how I stood it and why I liked it. But I did stand it and, what is more, I loved it so much that I persuaded the boss to keep me on when we went into winter quarters.

The moment we arrived at a town, the head canvas-man rode to the lot on which we were to show and laid it out; that is, he measured it and decided on the location of the tents. The men with him drove small stakes to indicate where the tent-pegs were to be placed. In the meantime, the property gang unloaded the show. Then we drove the four-foot stakes for the dressing-tent into whatever kind of ground the lot happened to have. A man can work up a good appetite by swinging a fourteen-pound hammer for an hour or so before breakfast, but before we started we had also many other things to do. The dressing-tent had to be spread and hoisted; then the properties were sorted and placed in their position for the performers to get ready for the parade. Meanwhile the canvas-gang was getting the "big-top" up. Then, when the parade started, we went to the "big-top" and arranged the properties there, made the rings, adjusted the guys, ropes and wires for the aerial acts and laid out all the paraphernalia for the ground acts. While we were doing these things, the canvas-men were stringing the seats. Then we had breakfast.

No, we didn't care much where we slept--just any spot where we dropped was good enough.

My greatest interest was in the animals, especially the elephants. In my spare minutes--they were mighty few and far between--I talked with the keepers and learned from them many things about the care of animals. When we went into winter quarters at Columbus, Ohio, the head animal-man agreed to let me stay as a keeper.

The next season I went with the Adam Forepaugh show; then with the Frank Robbins show. I learned the circus business from the ground up and I was rapidly promoted. In 1883, I joined R. W. Fryer's show as head property-man and transportation master. It was a responsible position, which required every bit of the knowledge I had gained in the few preceding years. I had charge of all the circus property and I was boss of a large crew of men. The job kept me on the jump day and night. The canvas and property crews were made up of the toughest characters I have ever struck in my life--a man had to be tough in those days. They were hard to handle, but they were good workers and I got along all right with them.

They were always just a little bit tougher than any local talent we came up against on the tour, even though a circus used to attract the worst men for miles around. At Albuquerque one night, four "bad men" came to see the show. When they came up, Fitzgerald, who was one of the partners, was taking tickets at the entrance. He tried to get tickets from them, but they pulled out guns. One of them said: "These are our tickets." Fitzgerald let them in and passed the word along to the crew. The men took seats and, when the show started, they let loose with their guns, shooting through the tents and letting a few bullets fly into the ring. Sometimes a bullet would strike near a performer, raising a puff of dust and scaring him half to death. The "bad men" were sitting with their legs dangling down between the seats. Some of the crew took seats near them, just as if they were part of the audience, and a dozen property-men sneaked under the tent. When the signal was given, they grabbed the dangling legs and pulled. Then the circus-men in the seats jumped up and, without letting the audience know what was happening, they snatched the guns. Down went the "bad men" between the seats. It all happened so quickly and so quietly that the audience didn't realize what had become of them. The canvas-men "toe-staked" them; that is, they hit them over the heads with the toe-stakes that are driven into the ground to keep the seat-stringers from sliding. A toe-stake is of just the proper size and weight to use in a fight, and it is the circus-man's idea of a good weapon. The crew buried the four men while the show was on. I thought there would be trouble before we could get out of town, but the men weren't even missed.

The Fryer outfit had a Pennsylvania Dutchman called Charley. He was one of the strongest men I have ever seen. One night, when the stake-wagon, drawn by eight horses, was stuck in the mire, he lifted the rear end of the wagon on his back while the horses pulled it out. I think that if Charley had got a good swing at a man and used his full strength, he could have killed him with one blow. One day, in Christchurch, New Zealand, while Fitzgerald was taking tickets, a larrikin--a tough--came along and said: "Ticket?--I'll spit in your eye." Fitzgerald knocked him down and called for Charley, who was working at the ticket-wagon. Charley took the larrikin in his arms just as easily as if he had been a baby, and carried him out into the street. There he dropped him and said: "If I have to do this again, I'll hit you." The larrikin didn't come back.

Charley's work at the ticket-wagon was to keep the crowd moving. In front of the ticket-window there was always stretched down a big sheet of canvas covered with sawdust. When a man put down his money for a ticket, the fellow in the wagon passed him out a ticket for the cheapest seat and charged him the highest price--unless the man showed that he knew exactly what seat he wanted; in that case, the ticket-seller shoved his change out so that one or two coins slid off the counter into the sawdust. If the man tried to stop and hunt in the sawdust for his money, Charley pushed him along to make room for the others who wanted to buy tickets. After the crowd had passed into the teat, Charley and his pal would take tap the canvas and sort out the money from the sawdust.

I wasn't in on that "flam" system, but I had another way of making money. As head property-man, I stood near the entrance to the "big-top" and, when people weren't satisfied with their seats, they came to me. I sold them the privilege of taking better seats. The sum acquired in this way was known as "cross-over money" and it was supposed to be turned over to the company. One day one of the partners objected to this arrangement. He decided that he would take the "cross-over money" himself and have me collect tickets at the main entrance. The other partner in the show would not agree to this scheme. "If Mayer takes the 'cross-over money'," he said, "we get half of it, at least; but, if you take it, we don't get any."

That settled the matter, and, considering times and ways, I've always thought that it was a good tribute to my honesty. It was a crude business and every man was out for himself. To break even, a man had to be just as hard as the next one, and to come out ahead, he had to be a bit harder. I liked the game, but I always had the feeling that it wasn't the thing I wanted most. I was interested chiefly in the animals, but, as head property-man, I had little time to be near them.

My desire to learn all there was to know about animals was the main reason why I cultivated the acquaintance and friendship of Gaylord. He was an expert animal-man--probably the best informed in the business--and had been P. T. Barnum's confidential agent for years. He had traveled the world over, time and again.

It was Gaylord who negotiated with the Siamese officials for one of the famous white elephants of Siam. Barnum had his heart set on having one of them for his show and he sent Gaylord out with instructions to go the limit. The stumbling-block in the transaction was that the Siamese believe the spirits of the ancestors of the royal family are transferred to the white elephants. The animals live in the royal palace and are cared for with all the ceremony given to any members of the reigning family. Of course, Barnum's plan was just as unthinkable to them as if he had offered to exhibit the king in his side-show. There was a hot exchange of cablegrams between Barnum in New York and Gaylord in Siam. Finally Barnum offered the government 0,000 for the privilege of borrowing one of the elephants for just one year. He agreed to support a retinue of priests and attendants and to pay all transportation charges. The government would not even consider the proposition so Gaylord gave up in disgust and cabled that the deal was off. But Barnum was not discouraged. When Gaylord returned to this country, he found that the old man was advertising a white elephant from the royal palace of Siam. Barnum had simply used a whitewash brush on an ordinary elephant, with the result that he had a whiter elephant than the Siamese ever dreamed of seeing. The animal was so covered with velvet robes and surrounded by attendants that the audience could not detect the fraud; the general effect was good and the trick brought in a lot of money.

Gaylord was quite deaf when I knew him, and so was Fryer. Sometimes at rehearsal in the morning Fryer would come along and say to Gaylord: "Let's go up on the top seat--I want to tell you something privately." Then they would climb up to the top seats and exchange confidences--shouting at each other so loud that you could hear them all over the lot.

The Fryer show opened in Kansas City and then worked right out to the coast. After a month in San Francisco, we jumped to Hawaii. We showed a month at Honolulu and the King rarely missed a performance. We had a royal box fitted up for him, and he had as good a time as any of the youngsters. From Honolulu we went to Auckland, New Zealand, where we found a twenty-day quarantine on all animals. We managed to get along by giving performances in the Theatre Royal--just the acts that required no animals. After that we went to Australia and showed at all the large towns; then we shipped to Java. Next we visited the Malay Peninsula, where later I was to spend many years in collecting animals.

During these long voyages, I spent much of the time with Gaylord, listening to his stories of experiences with animals. I had many questions to ask and Gaylord, whose fund of information was inexhaustible, always answered them and told me more besides.

Several times during our stay in Singapore, I went to see Mahommed Ariff. He spoke a little English and he was usually willing to talk with me, hoping, perhaps, that we would buy more animals. From him I learned something of the work of collecting as it was done on the Malay Archipelago, but I had no idea, at that time, of entering the business.

The show moved to Penang; thence to Bangkok, Hongkong and Shanghai; then to Japan. It was in Tokyo that Gaylord had one of his bright ideas. He organized, in conjunction with the circus, a Japanese village, and, when we worked back over our route, via Singapore and Australia, we carried forty Japanese with us. Twelve of them were performers and the remainder were artisans. We had miniature Japanese houses, in which the artisans worked at their trades, such as fan-making, wood-carving and embroidering. Also we carried a big stock of cheap Japanese goods, which were sold as the products of our traveling factory. The Japanese village was a great success and brought a lot of money into the show.

In September, 1886, we struck Buenos Aires, where the show had to buck the Carlos Brothers--the big South American outfit--and bad weather. During the long tour we had overcome many obstacles, but that combination was too much. Fryer, Gaylord and Fitzgerald decided to disband, and most of the properties and animals were sold to the Carlos Brothers.

For one week we had luck and took in money; then came nine days of rain. The tent absorbed tons of water, and we had no way of drying it and preventing mildew. It was so heavy that the canvas-man could scarcely handle it.

At Springfield I went out to the lot and found Fitzgerald there; he just stood there, looking at the wet canvas spread out on the ground with the rain beating down on it. The canvas-men had given up--the tent was too heavy to hoist. That was the end of my only adventure as a circus-owner.

The big shows carried an extra tent to meet emergencies, but we couldn't have one, of course. The rain had beaten us to a finish. Even if we could have raised our tent, we should have had no audience, and we weren't well enough supplied with money to follow Bailey's idea of giving a performance if there were only two persons there to see it. Our "Greatest Show in the World" was sunk in an Illinois mud-puddle.

In later years I have stood sponsor for many of the shows and small circuses that visited Singapore. One I well remember belonged to an old friend, A. Bert Wilison of Sydney, Australia, who had been with the advance at the time I was with R. W. Fryer's Circus. He came with his show from Calcutta in pawn, that is to say, he paid as much as he had and the steamship company took a lien on his show or chattels, and if the agent at the port of disembarkment was satisfied, he could put up his tent and show, the steamship agent taking the receipts with interest until the freight and passage money was collected. I happened to be in Singapore at the time and was told a circus had just arrived from Calcutta--"Bert Wilison's African Circus and Equine Paradox." I was wondering who's it could be, as I had never heard of my old friend's rise to proprietor of a show.

I made up my mind to see him, if not for business then as an old showman, never dreaming I was to meet an old friend. The surprise and pleasure was mutual at our meeting, after an absence of nearly fourteen years. The last time we were together was in Buenos Ayres. As I was dressed in an old suit of khaki, I looked to him as if I were stranded. "Well, Charley," he said, "I'm broke, too, but I'll manage to fix you somehow and get you out of here. You come with me, old boy, we'll share what's left of the old show."

I thanked him and said that I was not as badly off as I appeared, but had been in the animal business for a number of years, was settled and pretty well known in Singapore, and if I could be of assistance to him, it was his for the asking.

"Well, Mayer, to tell the truth, I'm in hock with the steamship people. I have not enough to pay for the hauling of my stuff or feed for the horses, let alone to put my wife and child at a decent hotel."

I assured him I would see him through. There were tears in his eyes as he grasped my hand. I went with him to the agent of the British India Company and arranged for the payment of his passage and freight, in fact took care of everything for him. It made me feel good to be again in touch with the old show business; once in it, one never forgets its glamor. I arranged for the lot and feed for the horses, but the performers paid their own hotel expenses. We had still to look for the labor, so I hired coolies, and by night had the top up. At the same time there was a stranded balloonist whom I was befriending, an American named Price, who went broke in India. He had his balloon, which wanted but a little repairing, so I made arrangements with Wilison for Price to join the show and give ascensions and parachute jumps for an attraction.

Well, the show opened and made good. The balloon ascension was something new and it went big, especially when the balloon was anchored and would take people up. Wilison played Singapore two weeks, paid all his debts and was on his feet. I advised him to play Bangkok, and, if possible, get a guarantee from Prince Damvony to show inside the palace, which he did with success. The only thing that marred the career of the show was when Price went up in the balloon and took a parachute jump, he drifted down into the King's household, that is, the women's pavilion, and caused an awful uproar among the inmates. He had to do a lot of explaining to convince the officials that it was no fault of his, that it was unavoidable, as the wind carried him there. I leave my readers to imagine, if they can, the fright and feeling of the women on seeing a man, a European, dressed in tights, dropping amongst them from the skies. It was weeks before the scare wore off, and it was spoken of for years after. The last I heard of Wilison was in Japan, when he intended to go from there to Hawaii and then to Australia.

As the steamer having the Wilison show aboard left the docks, the old fascination of show life seemed to grip me. It brought back wonderful memories of the good old days when one-ring circuses were the real thing. I look back on those days with regret, days when I was the head or Boss Property Man, for next to the Proprietor the Boss Property Man was king of the dressing-tents, and woe to the performer who slighted him. When the Show would make its first start on the road, the Boss Property Man would place the performers' trunks in position. Pay day, the performer who neglected to give his fifty cents or dollar to the Boss Property Man, would find his trunk badly damaged, broken open or no trunk at all on arrival at the next town. It was a custom that few ventured to neglect, for otherwise they might suffer the loss of their wardrobe or part of it, and probably their trunk, and ran the risk of being fired by the management for failure to be ready for their act.

One case in particular I remember when I was with the R. W. Fryer's Shows as Boss Property Man and transportation master. While the Show was still in Sydney, N.S.W., and a week before ending our eight weeks' stay, I told one of the performers, the bearer of a brother act, that is the man that holds the other man on his shoulders and catches him as he jumps or turns somersaults, to get a new trunk as he had an old tin-covered one that had the edges all worn and broken, and every time any of my men handled it they were sure to have their hands or clothes cut and torn. He promised to get one in Melbourne. We played Melbourne eight weeks and went from there to Ballarat, Victoria. He still failed to get a new trunk, and when the Show appeared in Ballarat, his trunk was amongst the missing, dropped or fallen off the train en route during the night. He was fired, and a day or so after got notice from the Government Railroad to come and get some of his belongings that had been picked up along the line. He got a new trunk.

Another character with the same Show was the Musical Clown, named Shilleto, a really good fellow, but seldom sober. I honestly believe that if he were sober he could not do his act. He was a natural born musician. He could play any instrument and play it well.

On arriving at any town, as a joke we would pick some one who had a local reputation as a ne'er-do-well and explain to him Shilleto's weakness, flattery and whiskey, telling him to go up to Shilleto and say, "I beg your pardon, but are you not Shilleto, the great Musical Clown, now with Fryer's American Show. I have seen you a number of times in different parts of Europe but never expected to have the pleasure of seeing you in Australia. You are the greatest I ever saw. Will you allow me to shake hands with you." Shilleto never had been in Europe, although it was his boast that he had traveled all over that continent with shows.

That would settle it. Shilleto's chest would swell up and that person was his guest for days, introduced as his friend, from Europe, often giving him a title. Shilleto never seemed to get wise to the fact that in every town he would meet with some one who had seen him in Europe and with the same story.

It was on one of the visits to New York that the late J. A. Bailey of Barnum and Bailey, sent me a telegram from Chicago to meet him two days later in New York, and, after mutual greetings, asked me how long it would take me to get to India. I told him I intended to stop two weeks in New York and probably three or four weeks in London. "Now, Mayer," he said, "I want you to get to India as soon as possible. Can you start tomorrow?" Tomorrow being a Saturday, I told him no, and then asked why the hurry. What was there in India that was wanted. He then told me that he had reliable information of a huge elephant, one standing fourteen to fourteen and a half feet high, in Bombay. I laughed, saying, "Mr. Bailey, your informant must be mistaken, there are no elephants in Bombay outside of government elephants, and I am sure none of them equal or come near that size." I assured him that I was fairly posted on the size of elephants in captivity throughout India, and reminded him of my standing order from him to secure if possible any elephant of twelve feet or over.

Now the elephant Jumbo was an African elephant and stood eleven feet two inches, and he was thought to be the tallest elephant in captivity, and when Mr. Bailey told me of an Asiatic elephant fourteen to fourteen and a half feet in height, I could not help smiling. "Mr. Bailey," I said, "why not cable to the American Consul at Bombay and have him secure it for you while your representative is on his way." No, he wanted me to start at once, as he said the Ringling Brothers and several others had heard of it and were sending men out, so he wanted me to beat them to it if possible. Money was no object as long as I was able to secure it, and as he was absolutely in earnest, I told him I could start the following Wednesday, July third. He asked me to see what connections I could make, to secure my passage for the following Wednesday and find out the shortest possible time I could make Bombay.

Can my readers form an idea what an Asiatic elephant fourteen to fourteen and a half feet high, and probably weighing from seven to eight tons, would mean to a circus like the Barnum and Bailey Show? What a drawing power it would be! It would mean a million or more. No keener or more wonderful manager than Mr. Bailey lived, but, like many others, was often misled by wonderful tales of strange things. Immense amounts of money were spent in searching for and trying to secure freaks and abnormal animals that never existed outside the minds of the showmen's informants.

As I said, money was no object. Get it! That was all there was to it. "Go get it!" sounds easy, eh?

After looking up the sailings from London to Bombay, I saw that one of the P. & O. steamers leaving London on the fourth day of July was due in Bombay on the twenty-eighth day of that month, and told Mr. Bailey that if I left New York on the third of July, with luck, I would be in Bombay on the twenty-eighth.

I said that was true. I would leave New York on the third and catch the steamer leaving London on the fourth of July at Brindisi, at the tail end of Italy, as it was due there on the fourteenth.

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