FIFTY YEARS OF A SHOWMAN'S LIFE 



party on their arrival at each department in order 

 that his lordship might make the necessary 

 presentations of the various stewards in charge, 

 and we could not very well leave any of the de- 

 partments until we had bowed the Royalties 

 back to their carriages. This led to what has 

 always appeared to me the funniest incident in 

 which I ever bore part in connection with shows. 

 The only way, as it appeared to us, to carry out 

 this programme was for the carriages to traverse 

 the main thoroughfares at not too hurried a pace, 

 whilst the president and myself took to our heels 

 and made for our objectives by other lines of 

 route not too effectually barred by the crowds 

 occupying them. Thus we had sometimes to 

 make wide circuits and detours, and at others 

 to avail ourselves of short cuts. This latter 

 course necessitated our dodging in and out of 

 implement sheds, amid reapers, binders, hay- 

 tedders, and such like fearsome impediments to 

 a hurried progress. Once we had to leap and 

 bound amid the pegs and guy-ropes of some 

 marquees, which all but bowled me over, and 

 must have conveyed the impression to an on- 

 looker that we had entered ourselves for an 

 obstacle race. Happily, however, everybody was 

 too much intent upon observing the movements 

 of Royalty to give heed to our gyrations, and so 

 we cannot be said to have seriously jeopardized 

 our dignity. Beyond this, the game was well 

 worth the candle, inasmuch as we accomplished 

 our task to our own and everybody else's satis- 

 faction, for, although we sometimes ran it very 

 close, we somehow always managed to arrive 



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