Careers of Danger and Daring

by Cleveland Moffett

Dedication

I DEDICATE THIS BOOK TO
MY TWO LITTLE CHILDREN
ANNE EUNICE
AND
CLEVELAND LUSK
IN LOVE AND THE HOPE THAT
IT MAY HELP THEM, AS THEY
GROW UP, TO FORM HABITS OF
COURAGE AND USEFULNESS.
AUGUST, 1901. C. M.

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CONTENTS

The Steeple-Climber
		PAGE
i	In Which We Make the Acquaintance of "Steeple Bob"	[3]
ii	How They Blew Off the Top of a Steeple with Dynamite	[14]
iii	The Greatest Danger to a Steeple-Climber Lies in Being Startled	[21]
iv	Experience of an Amateur Climbing to a Steeple-top	[29]
The Deep-Sea Diver
i	Some First Impressions of Men Who Go Down Under the Sea	[40]
ii	A Visit to the Burying-ground of Wrecks	[54]
iii	An Afternoon of Story-telling on the Steam-pump Dunderberg	[63]
iv	Wherein We Meet Sharks, Alligators, and a Very Tough Problem in Wrecking	[71]
v	In Which the Author Puts on a Diving-suit and Goes Down to a Wreck	[78]
The Balloonist
i	Here We Visit a Balloon Farm and Talk with the Man Who Runs It	[87]
ii	Which Treats of Experiments in Steering Balloons	[99]
iii	Something About Explosive Balloons and the Wonders of Hydrogen	[110]
iv	The Story of a Boy Who Ran Away in a Big Balloon	[117]
The Pilot
i	Some Stirring Tales of the Sea Heard at the Pilot's Club	[130]
ii	Which Shows How Pilots on the St. Lawrence Fight the Ice-floes	[141]
iii	Now We Watch the Men Who Shoot the Furious Rapids at Lachine	[148]
iv	What Canadian Pilots Did in the Cataracts of the Nile	[160]
The Bridge-Builder
i	In Which We Visit a Place of Unusual Fears and Perils	[173]
ii	The Experience of Two Novices in Balancing Along Narrow Girders and Watching the "Traveler" Gang	[182]
iii	Which Tells of Men Who Have Fallen from Great Heights	[197]
The Fireman
i	Wherein We See a Sleeping Village Swept by a River of Fire and the Burning of a Famous Hotel	[209]
ii	What Bill Brown Did in the Great Tarrant Fire	[222]
iii	Here We Visit an Engine-house at Night and Chat with the Driver	[233]
iv	Famous Rescues by New York Fire-boats from Red-hot Ocean Liners	[241]
The Aërial Acrobat
i	Showing That it Takes More Than Muscle and Skill to Work on the High Bars	[255]
ii	About Double and Triple Somersaults and the Danger of Losing Heart	[264]
iii	In Which the Author Tries His Hand with Professional Trapeze Performers	[272]
iv	Some Remarkable Falls and Narrow Escapes of Famous Athletes	[284]
The Wild-Beast Tamer
i	We Visit a Queer Resort for Circus People and Talk with a Trainer of Elephants	[293]
ii	Methods of Lion-tamers and the Story of Brutus's Attack on Mr. Bostock	[304]
iii	Bonavita Describes His Fight with Seven Lions and George Arstingstall Tells How He Conquered a Mad Elephant	[317]
iv	We See Mr. Bostock Matched Against a Wild Lion and Hear About the Tiger Rajah	[328]
v	We Spend a Night Among Wild Beasts and See the Dangerous Lion Black Prince	[339]
The Dynamite Worker
i	The Story of Some Millionaire Heroes and the World's Greatest Powder Explosion	[348]
ii	We Visit a Dynamite-factory and Meet a Man Who Thinks Courage is an Accident	[358]
iii	How Joshua Plumstead Stuck to His Nitro-Glycerin-Vat in an Explosion and Saved the Works	[367]
The Locomotive Engineer
i	How it Feels to Ride at Night on a Locomotive Going Ninety Miles an Hour	[377]
ii	We Pick Up Some Engine Lore and Hear About the Death of Giddings	[388]
iii	Some Memories of the Great Record-breaking Run from Chicago to Buffalo	[395]
iv	We Hear Some Thrilling Stories at a Round-house and Reach the End of the Book	[406]

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

About one half the chapters in this book appeared serially in "St. Nicholas Magazine," the other half in the "New York Herald," and two chapters on the Locomotive Engineer, and one on the Wild-Beast Tamer appeared in "McClure's Magazine." Thanks are extended to all these for permission to republish.

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