Behind his mask of chalk his old eyes burned with a brave light in them still, for his life had been one of trying struggle. He spoke of the death of his only daughter, of the hardships of many touring adventures in many lands.
“I went with my family to Constantinople to start a circus there, and it took me five years to earn enough money to return, for we not only lost all we had, but were forced into debt.
“We managed to get free at last and returned to Paris. Here we worked hard, all of us, and at last we opened again a circus of our own. My son-in-law was the trapeze performer, and my boy was a clown like myself. We had with us a family of old friends, the Lorettis—you may remember them? The opening night of that show brought with it the old sensation of ruin staring us in the face. We opened the doors that evening just thirty-five thousand francs in debt. Gradually by hard work we managed to pull out of it, and,” he added, “to-day, thank God! I am free from worry and anxiety. I know that I can make but a living at the best. I get my money here; it is not much, but I get it regularly, and here I shall stay. I am sixty years old and have been a clown nearly forty years of my life.”
Photo by F. Berkeley Smith
A COUNTRY CIRCUS
He excused himself for a moment and ran out into the ring, turned a flipflap, and ran tripping over things in a fruitless endeavor to assist the lady in pink tulle on her cantering white horse. A pantomime followed in which a second clown, his son, having killed him in a comic duel, doubled his father up, packed him neatly in a barrel, and wheelbarrowed him out of the ring.
“You see,” continued the father seriously as he rejoined me, having divested himself of the barrel and run the wheelbarrow out of the way of an advancing herd of elephants, “it is different with your big American shows. An artist there never gets credit for his work. With so many acts going at once it is impossible for him to be fairly seen. He can play only to a small section of the house, and, if he is doing high trap work like my son-in-law, he no sooner gets a neat trick worked up than the bell rings and down the rope he has to come.
“Well, sir, I must wash up and be getting along; we have dinner at home at six and I have a little special marketing to do for we have some old friends coming.”
