"You've no right to be on the road with a lion roaring like that!" Willis shouted severely.
"Wal, young feller, you've no right to be on the road with such a hog smell as that!" the driver retorted. "Our lion is the best-behaved in the world; he wouldn't ha' roared ef he hadn't smelt them hogs so strong."
"But you have damaged us!" I cried. "Our horses have run away and smashed things! You'll have to pay for this!"
Another man, who appeared to be the proprietor, now came from a wagon in the rear of the cavalcade.
"What's that about damages?" he cried. "I'll pay nothing! I have a permit to travel on the highway!"
"You have no right to scare horses!" Willis retorted. "Your lion made a horrible noise."
"His noise wasn't worse than your hog stench!" the showman rejoined hotly. "My lion has as good a right to roar as your hogs have to squeal. Drive on!" he shouted to his drivers.
The show moved forward. The Fat Lady looked back and laughed, and the Wild Man pretended to squeal like a pig; but the gypsy fortune teller smiled and said, "Too bad!"
Having got no satisfaction, we returned hastily to chase our runaway team. We came upon it less than a hundred yards away, jammed fast between two pine trees. Parts of the harness were broken, the wagon body was shattered, and ten hogs were at large.
For some minutes we were at a loss to know what to do. How to catch the hogs and put them back into the wagon was a difficult matter, for many of them weighed three hundred pounds, and moreover a live hog is a disagreeable animal to lay hands on. But, taking an axe, we cut young pine trees and constructed a fence round the wagon to serve as a hogpen. Leaving a gap at one end that could be stopped when the hogs were inside, we then set near the wagon the troughs we had brought, poured the dry corn into them and called the hogs as if it were feeding time. Most of them, it seemed, were not far away. As soon as they heard the corn rattling into the troughs all except three came crowding in. Presently we drove two of the missing ones to the pen, but one we could not find.