Dad says this circus life is making me pretty tough.



CHAPTER IX.


The Bad Boy Feeds Cayenne Pepper to the Sacred Cow--He and His Pa
Ride in a Circus Parade With the Circassian Beauties--A Tipsy
Elephant Lands Them in a Public Fountain--Pa Makes the Acquaintance
of John L. Sullivan.


I am learning more about animals every day, and when the season is over
I will be an expert animal man. Animals naturally have a language of
their own, and lions understand each other, and bears can converse with
bears, but in a show, all animals seem to have a common language, so
they understand each other a little.

I found that out when I put a paper of cayenne pepper into a head of
lettuce and gave it to the sacred cow. She chewed the lettuce as
peacefully as could be, and swallowed the cayenne pepper, and then
stopped to think. You could tell by the expression on her face that when
the pepper began to heat her up inside she wanted to swear, although she
was a sacred cow. She humped herself, and shivered, and then bellowed
like a calf who has been left in the barn to be weaned, while its mother
goes out to pasture, and the sacred bull, her husband, he came and put
his nose up to her nose, as much as to say: "What is the matter,
dearie?" and she talked sacred cattle talk to him for a minute, and then
the bull turned to me and chased me out of the tent. Now, as sure as you