Billy Whiskers: The Autobiography of a Goat

by Frances Trego Montgomery

"You mean, horrid man to fool us so!" they all said.

And the snake charmer got up and hurried out of the tent for he saw blood in the eye of the champion boxer and he thought he had better get out before the man took hold of him.

Saturday was to be the last day of the circus in Smithville and immediately after the evening performance they were to break camp and move in the night, and be on the road all day Sunday traveling to the next town, where they were booked to give a performance on Monday morning.

Now all this meant quick work and rapid travel, as they could not go by train, there being no railroad to this town, so they had to have their circus horses and wagons move them.

When Billy heard them talking about moving, he thought it would be great fun and looked forward to it with pleasure. But he little knew what was before him.

During the morning performance Billy behaved all right, but in the afternoon he was so excited and anxious to be off that he behaved very badly. He ran around the ring so fast that when the monkey jumped through the paper hoops expecting to land on Billy's back, he was beyond him and the monkey landed on the ground and had to run to catch up. This made the ring-master angry and he hit Billy a sharp cut with his whip, but instead of making him behave better he got worse and worse. He would stand still and shake himself until he nearly made the monkey's bones crack; and when the ring-master hit him, he stood on his hind legs and the monkey had to cling to his horns to keep from falling off. When Billy found he could not throw the monkey, he ran for the pole in the center of the ring that supported the tent, and tried to butt him off but the monkey was too quick for him and dodged every time. At last Billy tried rolling with him, but this the ring-master could not allow as it would ruin the saddle strapped to his back. He gave him a few good cuts with the whip that stung like everything and this turned Billy's wrath from the monkey to him, and like a shot he was up and after the ring-master. He planted his horns in the middle of the ring-master's back and ran him to the edge of the ring where he gave him a butt that sent him flying to the other tent.

Billy was punished for this and told he should have no supper, and he understood what they said although they did not suppose he did.

"All right," he thought, "no supper, no performance, for I won't behave and take my part unless I am fed. But I will find something to eat even if they won't feed me, for a goat can eat almost anything from tin cans to apples."

The man who had tied Billy had scarcely gotten out of sight when he commenced to chew his rope in two and when it dropped apart, Billy walked over and commenced to eat the elephant's food. This the elephant did not like. He told Billy to stop and go eat his own supper, but Billy would not, neither would he take the trouble to explain to the elephant that he hadn't any supper and was expected to go supperless. Now if he had only told the elephant, who had always been a good friend of his, he would gladly have given him half of his supper; but Billy was in a contrary mood and would say nothing, but kept on eating. This provoked the elephant, so he quietly wound his trunk around Mr. Billy and lifting him from the ground, set him on top of the lion's cage that was standing near. Billy was more surprised when he found himself standing on top of the lion's cage than he had ever been in his life, but only for a minute for he jumped down and disappeared through a tear in the canvas of the tent. As he ran away he heard all the animals laughing, though you might have called it the lion's roar and the hyena's call, and above all the racket he heard the head animal keeper asking what all this racket was about; and although they all tried to tell him by each giving his particular call, he was too stupid to understand animal talk, so lost all the fun of the joke.