We have showed six times the last week, and traveled a thousand miles,
and it seems as though there is nothing doing but putting up and taking
down tents, and going to and from the cars, and you can't be tough,
'cause there is always some boss around to tell you to look pleasant if
you are cross, and to tell you to change your shirt or get out of the
show, and if you swear at anything you are called down.

Pa and I put in a good deal of time during the afternoon and evening
performances in the dressing-room, near the door leading to the main
tent. That is the nearest to being in an insane asylum of any place I
was ever in. The performers get ready for their several acts in bunches
or families, all in one spot, and they act serious and jaw each other,
and each bunch acts as though their act was all there was to the show,
and if it was cut out for any reason, the show would have to lay up for
the season, when in fact each one is only a cog in the great wheel, and
if one cog should slip, the wheel would turn just the same. These people
never smile before they go in the ring, but just act as though too much
depended on them to crack a smile. When a bunch is called to go in the
ring, they all look at each other as though it was the parting of the
ways, and they clasp hands and go out of the dressing-room as though
walking on eggs. When they get in the ring they look around to see if
all eyes are upon them, and bow to people who are looking at something
going on in another ring, and who don't see them, and then they go
through their performance with everybody looking somewhere else.

When the act is over the audience seems glad, and clap their hands
because they are polite, and it don't cost anything to clap hands, and
the performers turn some more flip flaps, and go running out to the
dressing-room, and take a peek back into the big tent as though
expecting an encore, but the audience has forgotten them and is looking