"Circus" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... reflection that too much success may lead the winners into the professionalism which is so associated with betting and so close to pugilism. Candor, however, compels me to state that a long acquaintance with the acrobatic folk who have to do with the circus, a large number of whom practice in our gymnasium every winter, has raised our ...
— Twenty Years At Hull House • Jane Addams
... rival of those of Verona and of Arles; at a respectful distance it emulates the Colosseum. It is a small Colosseum, if I may be allowed the expression, and is in a much better preservation than the great circus at Rome. This is especially true of the external walls, with their arches, pillars, cornices. I must add that one should not speak of preservation, in regard to the arena at Nimes, without speaking also of repair. After the great ruin ceased to ...
— A Little Tour in France • Henry James
... carriage had hired one o' them plumes for the day, and had it niddle noddling on her head. It were the Queen's Drawing-room, they said, and the carriages went bowling along towards her house, some wi' dressed-up gentlemen like circus folk in 'em, and rucks* o' ladies in others. Carriages themselves were great shakes too. Some o' the gentlemen as couldn't get inside hung on behind, wi' nosegays to smell at, and sticks to keep off folk as might splash their silk stockings. I ...
— Mary Barton • Elizabeth Gaskell
... the midst of this inaccessible circus, where the escaped cannon was tossing from side to side, a man appeared, grasping an iron bar. It was the author of the catastrophe, the chief gunner, whose criminal negligence had caused the accident,—the captain of the gun. Having brought about the evil, his intention was to repair it. Holding ...
— Great Sea Stories • Various
... country circuses are of course popular. Perhaps in no other part of the world can a circus obtain so critical and appreciative an attendance. Christy Minstrels and conjurors apparently do well, considering how very poor some of the miscellaneous entertainments which visit Australia are, it is most remarkable that they should contrive to ...
— Town Life in Australia - 1883 • R. E. N. (Richard) Twopeny
... the full development of the mental powers. This is exhibited in the performance of well-trained dogs, especially among pointers and setters. Again, in the feats performed by educated animals in the circus, where the elephant has lately endeavored to prove a want of common sense by standing on his head. Nevertheless, however absurd the trick, which man may teach the animal to perform, the very fact of their performance substantiates ...
— Eight Years' Wandering in Ceylon • Samuel White Baker
... rock. This old Bath mysteriousness seems haunted by the ghosts of Burney, Johnson, Goldsmith, Wilkes, Quin, Thrale, Mr. Pickwick, and dozens more. Fashion and gentilily hover round its stately homes. Nothing rouses such ideas of state and dignity as the Palladian Circus. There is a tone of mournful grandeur about it—something forlorn. Had it, in some freak of fashion, been abandoned, and suffered, for a time at least, to go to neglect and be somewhat overgrown with moss and foliage, ...
— Pickwickian Studies • Percy Fitzgerald
... head with rage. "I don't go anywhere," she screamed. "Never! I never went to a circus in my life, and all the boys and girls around here go every year. Tip always goes—always; he manages to slip in. Oh, Tip'" and she opened the gate and went out to him on the sidewalk, a new thought having come to her, "can't you do something to ...
— Tip Lewis and His Lamp • Pansy (aka Isabella Alden)
... habit of this bird to make a large circus, some ten or twelve feet in diameter, in the forest, which it clears of every leaf and twig and branch, till the ground is perfectly swept and garnished. On the margin of this circus there is invariably a projecting branch or high arched rest, at a few feet elevation from the ...
— The Truth About Woman • C. Gasquoine Hartley
... Consolidated Circus!" cried Pepper. "The one and only aggregation of stupendous wonders on the face of the globe! The marvelous twisting and death-defying acrobat! Walk up and see the blood-curdling exhibition! It will cost you but the small sum of a dime, ten cents; children double ...
— The Mystery at Putnam Hall - The School Chums' Strange Discovery • Arthur M. Winfield
... Petingill went, all sorts of treasures went with her. The children liked to have her come, for it was as good as a fairy story, or the circus, to see her things unpacked. Miss Petingill was very much afraid of burglars; she lay awake half the night listening for them and nothing on earth would have persuaded her to go anywhere, leaving behind what she called her "Plate." This stately word meant six old teaspoons, very thin and bright ...
— What Katy Did • Susan Coolidge
... gardens of the Palais Royal, that place of shops and puppet-shows, of circus and cafes, of gaming houses and brothels, that universal rendezvous, on that Sunday morning when the news of Necker's dismissal spread, carrying with it dismay and fury. Into Necker's dismissal the people read the triumph of the party hostile ...
— Scaramouche - A Romance of the French Revolution • Rafael Sabatini
... over again. The second time, after another trial of three weeks, the jury "hung" again, but we did not give up. It had been all fun for us—and for the town. The word had gone about the streets: "Go up and see those two kids fighting the corporation heavyweights. It's more fun than a circus." And we were confident that we could win; we knew that we ...
— Stories of Achievement, Volume III (of 6) - Orators and Reformers • Various
... many people that we thought were going to church; but, instead of that, they led us into a great place that I think was some sort of circus." ...
— Rollo in Paris • Jacob Abbott
... up in New England by a staid old aunt, who never let him go anywhere except to church, Sunday school and prayer meeting. When quite a lad she let him go to New York City to visit a cousin. That cousin took him to see Barnum's circus. It was his first circus, and the wild animals, the bareback riding, trapeze performance, clowns and chariot races bewildered the country boy. Next morning he wrote his aunt, saying: "Dear Aunt, if you'll ...
— Wit, Humor, Reason, Rhetoric, Prose, Poetry and Story Woven into Eight Popular Lectures • George W. Bain
... placed in small recesses in the walls, but I saw none there as I went through, but there were two in marble coffins under glass. In one of the small chambers the party sang in some foreign language, probably Italian, and while I could not understand them, I thought the music sounded well. The Circus of Maxentius, fifteen hundred feet long and two hundred and sixty feet wide, is near the Catacombs, as is also the tomb of Caecilla Metella, which is said to have been erected more than nineteen hundred years ago. It is probably as much as ...
— A Trip Abroad • Don Carlos Janes
... the circus full, The circus full from rim to floor: The lookers on, beyond control, The lookers on now begin to murmur and roar! Some are calling, And others bawling And howling too, with might and main! For they await a sight appalling! 'Tis the day of the brave of Spain! Come on! make ready! Come ...
— Operas Every Child Should Know - Descriptions of the Text and Music of Some of the Most Famous Masterpieces • Mary Schell Hoke Bacon
... entertainment, the city contains several theatres and a permanent circus, but only one of the theatres seemed to be patronized by the best people; namely, the Teatro Nacional, built so late as 1844, and having seating capacity for three thousand persons. The commencement exercises of the military school of Chapultepec are given annually in this ...
— Aztec Land • Maturin M. Ballou
... farther they stopped too, and got off. The tram stops at the end of the Gray's Inn Road, and it was Cyril who thought that one might well find a short cut to the Phoenix Office through the little streets and courts that lie tightly packed between Fetter Lane and Ludgate Circus. Of course, he was quite mistaken, as Robert told him at the time, and afterwards Robert did not forbear to remind his brother how he had said so. The streets there were small and stuffy and ugly, and crowded ...
— The Phoenix and the Carpet • E. Nesbit
... Barnum, his face lighting up with pleasure. "You'd drive a five-legged calf to suicide from envy. If I could take you and Caesar, and Napoleon Bonaparte and Nero over for one circus season we'd drive the mint ...
— A House-Boat on the Styx • John Kendrick Bangs
... he expressed himself as being perfectly satisfied with its results. He brought Pinto and Crewe back with him in his car, and dropped the latter at Piccadilly Circus. Pinto would have been glad to have joined the "Swell," but the colonel ...
— Jack O' Judgment • Edgar Wallace
... several urchins of an inquiring turn of mind drew near and began to make infantile comments, and asked with charming freedom if it was circus. ...
— The Galaxy - Vol. 23, No. 1 • Various
... a little girl once who telled lies," admitted Celia, her shocked accents indicating her full appreciation of the reprehensible character of the practise. "And she went to the circus. Her uncle took her." ...
— Other People's Business - The Romantic Career of the Practical Miss Dale • Harriet L. Smith
... zoological garden. At first he thought he was still dreaming, and turned over to sleep again, but the noise repeated itself. This time it seemed to come from under his bed, and sounded like a lion's roar. Probably a circus had passed and a lion had got loose and was prowling about, seeking what he could devour! He thought of ringing up the house, but demurred, reflecting that whoever answered the bell would probably be the ...
— The Sunny Side of Diplomatic Life, 1875-1912 • Lillie DeHegermann-Lindencrone
... more dependent upon external circumstances. He must have confidence in his leader, he must have been encouraged by success, and he must be treated with severity tempered with judicious flattery. Give him a sword, and let him prance about on a horse like a circus rider, and, provided there are a sufficient number of spectators, he will do wonders, but he will not consent to perish obscurely for the sake of anything or anyone. Trochu has utterly failed in exciting enthusiasm in those under his command; he issues many proclamations, but they fail to strike ...
— Diary of the Besieged Resident in Paris • Henry Labouchere
... ye fair notice it'll be a circus if ye don't let that bear be," warned the forest woman in a ...
— Grace Harlowe's Overland Riders in the Great North Woods • Jessie Graham Flower
... the Jones boy was as nimble as an ape when he found an opportunity to show off his gymnastics; he dearly loved to hang from a limb by his toes, and carry on like a circus athlete ...
— The Boy Scouts' First Camp Fire - or, Scouting with the Silver Fox Patrol • Herbert Carter
... himself, and when he would turn, as he often did, to face the fatigued, wilted, overwhelmed jury jogging along on their jaded steeds, tired out with the long day's jaunt and the rough footing, the mare would move swiftly backward in a manner that would have done credit to the manege of a circus. And at this extreme advantage Persimmon Sneed and his raised adjuring forefinger seemed impossible to be gainsaid. His arguments partook ...
— The Mystery of Witch-Face Mountain and Other Stories • Charles Egbert Craddock
... returned from an Eastern camping trip up amidst the hills about fifteen miles from town. They had experienced some strange adventures while in camp, most of which hinged upon an event that had taken place in Carson one windy night, when the big round-top of a visiting circus blew down in a sudden gale, and many of the menagerie animals ...
— Afloat on the Flood • Lawrence J. Leslie
... is in figs, dates, sponges, silks, and rugs; but the greatest of these is the rug. These stuffs come in loaded on long trains of camels. I may say that no one has any idea of what this animal is like if he has only seen it in a zoo or in a circus parade. I watched the trains by the hour with absorbing interest. The professional, business camel is a big, fine, intelligent animal, who carries himself with the utmost dignity and strides along ...
— A Fantasy of Mediterranean Travel • S. G. Bayne
... chickens. I had heard much said about cock pits and cock fights, but had never seen such a thing. Away over the hill, outside of the range of Thomas' thirty-pound parrot guns, with which he was trying to burn up Atlanta, the boys had fixed up a cock pit. It was fixed exactly like a circus ring, and seats and benches were arranged for the spectators. Well, I went to the cock fight one day. A great many roosters were to be pitted that day, and each one was trimmed and gaffed. A gaff is a long keen piece of steel, as sharp as a needle, that is fitted over the spurs. Well, ...
— "Co. Aytch" - Maury Grays, First Tennessee Regiment - or, A Side Show of the Big Show • Sam R. Watkins
... daughters' feelings. And how are you going to manage? Aren't you afraid that they will hang around, after the show, indefinitely, unless you ask all those who have not received invitations to the dance and supper to clear the grounds, as they do in the circus when the minstrels are going to give a performance not included in the price of admission? Mind, I don't care anything about ...
— Annie Kilburn - A Novel • W. D. Howells
... pleases them in him to-day. All that was only devised for convincing the masses, and people like ourselves recoil from it just as one would recoil from too garish a fresco. What concern have we with the irritating brutality of the overture to the "Tannhauser"? Or with the Walkyrie Circus? Whatever has become popular in Wagner's art, including that which has become so outside the theatre, is in bad taste and spoils taste. The "Tannhauser" March seems to me to savour of the Philistine; the overture ...
— The Case Of Wagner, Nietzsche Contra Wagner, and Selected Aphorisms. • Friedrich Nietzsche.
... usual eating-house near the circus and dined. To the surprise of the waiting-maid, I drank a quart of bitter ale and two glasses of sherry. It was my custom to drink water. She plied me with questions as to whether I was ill or in trouble. I answered ...
— Peter Ibbetson • George du Marier et al
... of exercises: it was adorned with porticos, temples, theatres, baths, circi, basilicae, obelisks, columns, statues, and groves. Authors differ in their opinions about the extent of it; but as they all agree that it contained the Pantheon, the Circus Agonis, now the Piazza Navona, the Bustum and Mausoleum Augusti, great part of the modern city must be built upon the ancient Campus Martius. The highway that leads from the bridge to the city, is part of the Via Flaminia, which extended as far as Rimini; and is well paved, like ...
— Travels Through France and Italy • Tobias Smollett
... This altar, the oldest in Rome, was raised in memory of the visit of Hercules to our country. Tacitus and Pliny attribute its construction to Evander the Arcadian, forgetting that in prehistoric times the tract of land on which the altar stood, between the Forum Boarium and the Circus Maximus, was submerged by the waters of the Velabrum. It was at all events a very ancient structure, held in great veneration. Its rough shape and appearance were never changed, as shown by a precious—yet unpublished—sketch by Baldassarre Peruzzi which ...
— Pagan and Christian Rome • Rodolfo Lanciani
... a boy kicks the cover off on circus morning, this Northland flings aside her winter wraps and stands forth in her glorious garb of summer. The brooklets murmur, the rivers sing, and by their banks and along the lakes waterfowl frolic, ...
— The Last Spike - And Other Railroad Stories • Cy Warman
... "No-o, not a circus," Old Tilly said doubtfully. "It's some kind of a big picnic. See, there's a kind of a track laid out over there where that flag is. They're going to have some ...
— Three Young Knights • Annie Hamilton Donnell
... till you see what's coming. It beats any circus I ever saw," answered Billy, rubbing his hands with the air of a man who had seen ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, September 1878, No. 11 • Various
... visage, and unsteady eyes. For some years past this aged person had been wandering about among the hills, inquiring of all travellers whom he met for his daughter. The girl, it seemed, had gone off with a company of circus-performers, and occasionally tidings of her came to the village, and fine stories were told of her glittering appearance as she rode on horseback in the ring, or performed ...
— The Snow Image • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... lookin' circus over to Sam's?" sneered Jim. "I'll quit yer place first. Yer kin do it yerself;" and the hired man turned on his lordly heel and slouched over to ...
— The Moccasin Maker • E. Pauline Johnson
... Midway Plaisance, a long avenue out from the fair grounds proper, lined with shows. Here were villages transported from the ends of the earth, animal shows, theatres, and bazaars. Cairo Street boasted 2,250,000 visitors, and the Hagenbeck Circus over 2,000,000. The chief feature was the Ferris Wheel, described in engineering terms as a cantilever bridge wrought around two enormous bicycle wheels. The axle, supported upon steel pyramids, alone weighed more than a locomotive. In cars strung upon its periphery passengers were swung ...
— History of the United States, Volume 5 • E. Benjamin Andrews
... with the incessant commerce of banks, laboratories, chancellories, and houses of business, are the strokes which oar the world forward, they say. And they are dealt by men as smoothly sculptured as the impassive policeman at Ludgate Circus. But you will observe that far from being padded to rotundity his face is stiff from force of will, and lean from the efforts of keeping it so. When his right arm rises, all the force in his veins flows straight from ...
— Jacob's Room • Virginia Woolf
... to one wall and watched; she might have been an excited child at a three-ring circus. Kendric found time to marvel at her even as he shot by her, hurling the whole of his compact weight into the mass of bodies defying him passageway. And as flesh struck flesh, Zoraida clapped her ...
— Daughter of the Sun - A Tale of Adventure • Jackson Gregory
... after his turn at the circus was over poor old Pizarro used to walk home alone under my balcony, open his stable door with his own latch-key, or at least his trunk, and put himself ...
— Spanish Life in Town and Country • L. Higgin and Eugene E. Street
... over the country to shock the nerves of the good gossips with the thought that their neighbors knew more than they. There were no heathenisms of the cities, no tenpins, no travelling circus, no progressive young men of heretical tendencies. Such towns were as quiet as a sheepfold. Sauntering down their broad central street, along which all the houses were clustered with a somewhat dreary uniformity of aspect, one might of a summer's day hear the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 88, February, 1865 • Various
... shall this prize, the inestimable prize, Exposed through crystal to the gazing eyes, And heighten'd by the diamond's circling rays, On that rapacious hand for ever blaze? Sooner shall grass in Hyde-park Circus grow, And wits take lodgings in the sound of Bow; Sooner let earth, air, sea to chaos fall, Men, monkeys, lapdogs, parrots, perish ...
— The Poetical Works Of Alexander Pope, Vol. 1 • Alexander Pope et al
... Jack's "strongest," as his admirers would have put it—it represented, on his part, a swelling of muscles, a congesting of veins, a balancing, straddling and straining, that reminded one of the circus-clown's ironic efforts to lift a feather. It met, in short, at every point the demand of lovely woman to be painted "strongly" because she was tired of being painted "sweetly"—and yet not to lose ...
— The Hermit and the Wild Woman and Other Stories • Edith Wharton
... business. Things, I believe, are going on well at this time of writing, and I am glad for the landlady's daughter and her mother. Sextons and undertakers are the cheerfullest people in the world at home, as comedians and circus-clowns are the most melancholy in ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 26, December, 1859 • Various
... slightly, walked through Leicester Square in the hope of picking one up as it returned down Piccadilly. Numbers of hansoms and four-wheelers passed, or stood by the curb, hailing us feebly, or not even attempting to attract our attention, but every taxi seemed to have its load. At Piccadilly Circus, losing patience, we beckoned to a four-wheeler and resigned ourselves to a long, slow journey. A sou'-westerly air blew through the open windows, and there was in it the scent of change, that wet scent which visits even ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... the exception of firearms, seem to have halted at East cape. The place, with its cave-like dwellings and skin-clad inhabitants, among whom the presence of white men creates the same excitement as the advent of a circus among the colored population of Washington, makes one fancy that he is in some grand prehistoric museum, and that he has gone backward in time several thousand years ...
— The First Landing on Wrangel Island - With Some Remarks on the Northern Inhabitants • Irving C. Rosse
... with the almost spiritually beautiful face of the woman in the dock, came as a surprise to everyone in court. Originally connected with an English circus troupe touring in Holland, she appears, about seventeen, to have been engaged as a "song and dance artiste" at a particularly shady cafe chantant in Rotterdam, frequented chiefly by sailors. From there a man, an English sailor known as Charlie Martin, took her away, and for some months she had lived ...
— Malvina of Brittany • Jerome K. Jerome
... English can not fail to delight the student of letters who cares to interest himself in the matter of sentence-building. Johnson handles a thought with such ease! He makes you think of the circus "strong man" who tosses the cannon-ball, marked "weight 250 lbs." What if the balls are sometimes only wood painted black! Have we not been entertained? ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 5 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... returned Friend Othniel. "You just let me run this circus, and I'll get you out all ...
— His Lordship's Leopard - A Truthful Narration of Some Impossible Facts • David Dwight Wells
... Ward yelled, hoarse with rage, as he would have driven off a trespassing dog. "Get out! Go home where you belong! Don't you know this is private property? Do you think I am keeping a circus here for all the dirty brats in the country to look at? Get out, I tell ...
— Helen of the Old House • Harold Bell Wright
... his tour of inspection, and then, after that amazing street of clubs, he soon found himself in the white glare, the kaleidoscopic movement, and the concentrated excitement of Piccadilly Circus. Then he sauntered through Leicester Square and began to drift northward. The gas torches outside places of entertainment had arrested his slow progress. One of the music-halls in the Square appeared to him as iniquitously gorgeous, and he gazed through the wide entrance at the vestibule ...
— The Devil's Garden • W. B. Maxwell
... the cone.—Ver. 106. In the Roman Circus for the chariot races, a low wall ran lengthways down the course, which, from its resemblance in position to the spinal bone, was called by the name of 'spina.' At each extremity of this 'spina,' there were placed upon a base, three large cones, or pyramids of wood, ...
— The Metamorphoses of Ovid - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Copious Notes - and Explanations • Publius Ovidius Naso
... lacking in taste, as they have proved here and there in Abu Sargah. Above one curious and unlatticed screen, near to a matted dais, droops a hideous banner, red, purple, and yellow, with a white cross. Peeping in, through an oblong aperture, one sees a sort of minute circus, in the form of a half-moon, containing a table with an ugly red-and-white striped cloth. There the Eucharist, which must be preceded by confession, is celebrated. The pulpit is of rosewood, inlaid with ivory and ebony, ...
— The Spell of Egypt • Robert Hichens
... which the juice from the last bunch of grapes is trampled out by the feet of the Indians is generally celebrated by the advent of Hirsch's Circus, from Los Angeles. The proprietor of the circus is a German, and besides owns a menagerie composed of monkeys, jaguars, pumas, African lions, one elephant, and several parrots, childish with age—"The greatest attraction of the world." The Cahuilla will give his last peso, if he has not spent ...
— Sielanka: An Idyll • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... probably dying at his shanty on Davis | |Street as a result of a difficulty between him and | |Isom Werner over a woman they met on their way home | |from the circus last night. | ...
— News Writing - The Gathering , Handling and Writing of News Stories • M. Lyle Spencer
... remember as we stood in the mouldy big Circus, having sundry of the lousy population idling within, whereby I did then liken it to a venerable cheese, in which is some faint stir of maggotry, that thou didst make a memorable speech against the land, where the only vocation of a nobleman is to defile the streets and ...
— Cromwell • Alfred B. Richards
... a mite fer standin' by them beaver!" continued Jabe. "They're jest all right! It was better'n any circus; an' I don't know ...
— The House in the Water - A Book of Animal Stories • Charles G. D. Roberts
... too. Eightyseven that was. Year before we. And the old major, partial to his drop of spirits. Curious she an only child, I an only child. So it returns. Think you're escaping and run into yourself. Longest way round is the shortest way home. And just when he and she. Circus horse walking in a ring. Rip van Winkle we played. Rip: tear in Henny Doyle's overcoat. Van: breadvan delivering. Winkle: cockles and periwinkles. Then I did Rip van Winkle coming back. She leaned on the sideboard watching. Moorish eyes. Twenty years asleep in ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... knew. He had a dim memory of wandering through a labyrinth of sordid houses, of being lost in a giant web of sombre streets, and it was bright dawn when he found himself at last in Piccadilly Circus. As he strolled home towards Belgrave Square, he met the great waggons on their way to Covent Garden. The white-smocked carters, with their pleasant sunburnt faces and coarse curly hair, strode sturdily on, ...
— Selected Prose of Oscar Wilde - with a Preface by Robert Ross • Oscar Wilde
... of the Royal Circus, London, in the year 1806, was the clever performances of a young black bear belonging to one of the clowns—Mr. Bradbury. This bear was so tame that it had travelled from Liverpool to London with its master on the top of the coach, and had made great ...
— Chatterbox, 1906 • Various
... to the young man's house and he told them his history. The circus people had carried him off. For three years he traveled with them in various countries. Then the troupe disbanded, and one day an old lady in a chateau had paid to have him stay with her because she liked his appearance. As he was intelligent, ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... General Service wagons, when fitted with light wooden sides. A furniture van full of blankets, two Corporation water carts, and a bread cart with a large red cross on each side, completed the collection. We feel sure that few Regimental Transports can have looked more like a circus than did ours as we ...
— The Sherwood Foresters in the Great War 1914 - 1919 - History of the 1/8th Battalion • W.C.C. Weetman
... Livy says that these plays neither relieved the minds nor the bodies of the Romans; and, in fact, when on one occasion the performances were interrupted by the overflowing waters of the Tiber which burst into the circus, the people turned from the theatre in terror, feeling that their efforts to soothe the gods had been despised. It was at this time that the earth is said to have been opened in the forum by an earthquake, and that Curtius cast himself into it as ...
— The Story of Rome From the Earliest Times to the End of the Republic • Arthur Gilman
... demons. And he will boss them with an awful voice. And with a red whip he will beat his wife. He will be wicked on that sacred shore, And rattle cruel spurs against the rocks, And shake Calcutta's walls with circus bugles. He will kill Brahmins there, in Kali's name, And please the thugs, and blood-drunk of the earth. I know all this, ...
— American Poetry, 1922 - A Miscellany • Edna St. Vincent Millay
... could never be a great artist, he preferred not to be one at all. On his walls were large classic paintings, not likely ever to find their way to the walls of anyone else. But he tried his hand at popular art as well. A scene in a circus, for instance, was one subject. A pretty little child was engaged to sit in his studio, but as that day he was going to Hengler's Circus to paint the background he, to the delight of the child, took her with him. The little girl played about in the ring, and was noticed by Mr. Hengler, ...
— The Confessions of a Caricaturist, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Harry Furniss
... to serve as a relaxation to this class of mankind, who, since the abolition of the circus and amphitheatre, are compelled to pick up their pleasure wherever they can find it; seeking the best places to witness the struggle of Christian fortitude ...
— The Cross of Berny • Emile de Girardin
... railheads awaiting transportation to the front by motor-lorry. Over the great mound of shells and cartridge-boxes is spread an enormous piece of canvas, often larger by far than the "big top" of a four-ring circus. Then the scene painters get to work with their paints and brushes and transform that expanse of canvas into what, when viewed from the sky, appears to be, let us say, a group of innocent farm-buildings. The next day, perhaps, a German airman, circling ...
— Italy at War and the Allies in the West • E. Alexander Powell
... personality; Shaw loves to laugh at people, he is inclined to make fun of the martyrs. They were possibly quite mistaken in their enthusiasm, but at least they were consistent. I do not feel convinced that Shaw would stand in the middle of Piccadilly Circus and keep his ideals if he knew that it would involve being eaten by lions that came up Regent Street, as the martyrs faced them centuries ago in Rome, but I have little doubt that Chesterton would remain in Piccadilly Circus if he knew that ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Patrick Braybrooke
... standing before a glaringly printed bill, one of many that were tacked upon the walls, which set forth in amazing pictures and double-leaded type the wonders that were to be seen daily and nightly at Olympia, where, for a month past, "Van Zant's Royal Belgian Circus and World-famed Menagerie" had been holding forth to "Crowded and delighted audiences." Much was made of two "star turns" upon this lurid bill: "Mademoiselle Marie de Zanoni, the beautiful and peerless bare-back equestrienne, the most ...
— The Boy Scouts Book of Stories • Various
... arterwards, when I got a chanst, I looked in the school-teacher's dictionary. It said as how the appendix was sunthin' appended or added to, but I couldn't get no more about it. I've hearn tell of a 'devil child' with a tail to it what was travellin' with the circus one year, an' I've surmised as how mebbe a tail had begun to grow on this young feller an' it was ...
— At the Sign of the Jack O'Lantern • Myrtle Reed
... from the statement of the Lexington Intelligencer, that there has been for some time past, an enmity between the drivers of the old and opposition lines of stages running from that city. On the evening of the 13th an encounter took place at the Circus between two of them, Powell and Cameron, and the latter was so much injured that his life was in imminent danger. About 12 o'clock the same night, several drivers of the old line rushed into Keizer's Hotel, where Powell and other drivers of the opposition-line boarded, and a general melee ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... stage and the circus are always trying to find something new, for the same old trapeze performances, trials of strength, performances of rope dancers, etc., have been presented so many times that anyone who invents an entirely new trick is sure ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 1157, March 5, 1898 • Various
... predecessors had consumed in pomp and luxury he diligently applied to the establishment of hospitals; and the multitudes who were supported by his charity preferred the eloquent discourses of their benefactor to the amusements of the theatre or of the circus. His homilies, which are still preserved, furnish ample apology for the partiality of the people, exhibiting the free command of a pure and copious vocabulary, an inexhaustible fund of metaphors and similitudes, giving variety and grace to the most familiar topics, with an almost dramatic exposure ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 3 - "Chitral" to "Cincinnati" • Various
... What cattlemen most fear had happened: a ring. Not a single beast went through the gate. They passed it, at first slowly, then faster and faster, till they were galloping round and round like clumsy circus horses. ...
— In the Musgrave Ranges • Jim Bushman
... luxurious black hair tumbles down and envelopes her like a mosquito net. Her audience night before last was a coldly critical one, of course, and it sat like a bump on a log until Sembrich made her appearance in the mad scene, where Lucheer gives her vocal circus in the presence of twenty-five Scotch ladies in red, white, and green dresses, and twenty-five supposititious Scotch gentlemen in costumes of the Court of Louis XIV. Instead of sending for a doctor to assist Lucheer in her ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... the show was over, Hugh, that I'm out of breath; but I'm getting the same back now, and can soon tell you all about it. In one way, it was as good as a circus, though it did make me grit my teeth to see how that miserable sinner acted. Oh! I just wished for a chance to give him a good kick or two. Why, honest, Hugh, I believe I could willingly assist in tarring and feathering a scamp ...
— The Chums of Scranton High Out for the Pennant • Donald Ferguson
... contents of the two baskets hitherto borne by the couple, giving himself time, however, every now and then to look out of his little black eyes at the rightful owners, with rather a spiteful expression, but protruding at the same time his red tongue, like a clown at the circus, as if enjoying the joke of their picking and he eating. Afterward I learned that they had deposited their baskets on the ground under a loaded bush, for greater facility in securing the fruit, when ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 5. May 1848 • Various
... instead of the old Hotel-Dieu; one of the old bridges has all its houses demolished, and a second nearly so; a new bridge is begun at the Place Louis XV.; the Palais Royale is gutted, a considerable part in the centre of the garden being dug out, and a subterranean circus begun, wherein will be equestrian exhibitions, &c. In society, the habit habille is almost banished, and they begin to go even to great suppers in frock: the court and diplomatic corps, however, must always be excepted. They are too high to be reached by any improvement. They are the last ...
— The Writings of Thomas Jefferson - Library Edition - Vol. 6 (of 20) • Thomas Jefferson
... circus, that's a fact," sez I. "Well, you break it to him gently that Alice LeMoyne is dead. Don't ask me any questions, but do be careful not to shock him, he seems purty ...
— Happy Hawkins • Robert Alexander Wason
... as was his most friendly habit. "Two sweaters, tennis morning, noon and night, no sugar, no beer, no butter, no bread, gallons of hot water—and look at me! Martin, it's a tragedy. If I go on like this, it's me for Barnum's Circus as the world's prize pig. What's ...
— Who Cares? • Cosmo Hamilton
... punish me for fighting Neil, and so when a Mrs. Smithers asked us to spend a week with the McPhersons at her home in Middlesex, I was left behind in London with some friends, but I had great fun. I went to the Tower, and the circus, and the Abbey, and the museum, and everywhere, though I was sorry not to see Bessie, who with her father and mother, was also at ...
— Bessie's Fortune - A Novel • Mary J. Holmes
... chile!" mutters Seagriff, as though talking to himself. "Thet means war, an' the white feathers stickin' up out o' thar skulls, wi' thar faces chalked like circus clowns! War to ...
— The Land of Fire - A Tale of Adventure • Mayne Reid
... amusing incidents. Thus, the circumstance of finding two persons at the corner of Salisbury Square as we left it—two persons who were speaking in French and who eyed us very suspiciously—revived my alarm. They even followed us along Fleet Street towards the Ludgate Circus, and though we dodged them through the cavernous Ludgate Hill Railway Station, across sundry courts and past the stores of Messrs. Spiers and Pond, we again found them waiting for us on our return ...
— With Zola in England • Ernest Alfred Vizetelly
... his disgraceful conduct at the breakfast- table. It was her habit, whenever one of the children fell from grace, to improvise something of a festival nature from which the offender would be rigorously debarred; if all the children sinned collectively they were suddenly informed of a circus in a neighbouring town, a circus of unrivalled merit and uncounted elephants, to which, but for their depravity, they would have been ...
— Beasts and Super-Beasts • Saki
... whirl, with matchless skill, The glancing quoit, the certain javelin throw, While Crowds, with acclamations shrill, The lofty Circus joy'd to fill, And all the honors of ...
— Original sonnets on various subjects; and odes paraphrased from Horace • Anna Seward
... frantic mules. The officers and soldiers of the United States army were a sorry sight, and in pointed contrast to the graceful Californians on their groomed steeds, handsomely trapped, curvetting and rearing and prancing as lightly as if on the floor of a circus. Kearney cursed his own stupidity, and Pico laughed in his face. Beale felt satisfaction and compunction in saturating the silk and silver of one fine saddle with the blood of its owner. The point of the dying man's lance ...
— The Splendid Idle Forties - Stories of Old California • Gertrude Atherton
... the "wonderful calf with five legs and a huming head," and "the philosophical lung-tester," were there. Then there was the Flying Circus and any number of other ingenious contrivances to relieve young ladies and gentlemen from the rural districts of ...
— The Complete Works of Artemus Ward, Part 7 • Charles Farrar Browne
... morning still, deserted, empty and dead. Those who had rushed hitherward seeking gold were gone; be the explanation where it might, shacks stood with doors flung wide; tents had been torn down, outworn articles discarded, dumped helter-skelter into the road. The atmosphere was like that of a circus grounds when the circus was moving on, only a few things left for the last crew ...
— The Desert Valley • Jackson Gregory
... renders the intuition of Lucretius all the more remarkable. But in Rome there were the conditions favourable to its development—imperfect culture, vehement passions unabsorbed by commerce or by political life, the habituation to extravagant excitement in war and in the circus, and the fermentation of an age foredestined to give birth to new religious creeds. When the infinite but ill-assured power of the Empire was conferred on semi-madmen, Ennui in Rome assumed colossal proportions. Its victims sought for palliatives in cruelty and ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... life, half gay, half sordid, of the Wilton Road. He took a room in Jermyn Street, according to Major Forsyth's recommendation, and walked to his club. James had been out of London so long that he came back with the emotions of a stranger; common scenes, the glitter of shops, the turmoil of the Circus, affected him with pleased surprise, and with a child's amusement he paused to stare at the advertisements on a hoarding. He looked forward to seeing old friends, and on his way down Piccadilly even expected to meet one or two of ...
— The Hero • William Somerset Maugham
... was gorgeous. There were mute oysters with wands, drunken oysters with scarves and hat-bands, a sable hearse with hearth-dusters on it, a swindling undertaker's bill, and all the accessories of a first-rate churchyard circus—everything necessary but the corpse. That had been disposed of by the monkey, and the undertaker meanly withheld the use ...
— Cobwebs From an Empty Skull • Ambrose Bierce (AKA: Dod Grile)
... daughter in marriage to a man of considerable interest among the Latins, in hopes he should strengthen himself by this foreign alliance. He also employed the people in finishing the common sewers, and the great Circus which his grandfather had begun; knowing that constant employment was the best means to prevent their brooding over their oppressions, and ...
— Domestic pleasures - or, the happy fire-side • F. B. Vaux
... delight of not less than a thousand people assembled on the street. Diagonally across Broad Street and a short distance below the church is the residence of the late James E. Cooper, P.T. Barnum's former partner, the millionaire circus proprietor. He had been ailing for months and on this ...
— Russell H. Conwell • Agnes Rush Burr
... dollar, which was kept in a little box with a broken earring, a hair chain, a glass breastpin, and an ancient "copper"; and sometimes on circus days or on the Fourth of July he wished there was no hole in it that he might expend it on side-shows and lemonade or on ...
— Good Cheer Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... had your good looks, Miss Cameron," said Mercedes, "added to my natural ability, I'd make Julia Marlowe look like an old-fashioned one-ring circus. Send Mr. Bacon to me, Mr. Barnes. I ...
— Green Fancy • George Barr McCutcheon
... it would be as good as a circus, wouldn't it though?" observed Ginsling. "I wonder who would act as Her Majesty's representative, to vindicate the honor of outraged justice, if our sheriff happened to be the principal in a case of aggravated assault, and our judge had to ...
— From Wealth to Poverty • Austin Potter
... as good as a circus to the inhabitants of Airole; nay, better, for our antics could be seen gratis. The entire population of the village, and apparently of several adjacent villages, collected round the two cars. They made the ring, and—we did the rest. We ate, we drank, and they were merry at our expense. ...
— My Friend the Chauffeur • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... sky, and was among the stars. I say "stars" advisedly. I walked among the stars. I was a child. I was clad in frail, fleece-like, delicate-coloured robes that shimmered in the cool starlight. These robes, of course, were based upon my boyhood observance of circus actors and my boyhood conception of the garb ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London
... think they call themselves). This in itself might be called the modern American school: the elongated and elastic gentleman who finds his co-operator among the thin ones of his race, artistically speaking. I did not get to the circus this year, much to my regret; perhaps I would have found my lost genius there, among the animals disporting themselves in less charitable places. But we cannot follow the circus naturally, and these ...
— Adventures in the Arts - Informal Chapters on Painters, Vaudeville, and Poets • Marsden Hartley
... the pages of Ovid.[33] He does, indeed, advise a lover never to notice the faults of a woman whose favor he wishes to win, but to compliment her, on the contrary, on her face, her hair, her tapering fingers, her pretty foot; to applaud at the circus whatever she applauds; to adjust her cushion and put the footstool in its place; to keep her cool by fanning her; and at dinner, when she has put her lips to the wine-cup to seize the cup and put his lips to the same place. But when Ovid wrote ...
— Primitive Love and Love-Stories • Henry Theophilus Finck
... star-gazer in the "Midsummer Eve." This poetry is evident in the oddest ways, and escapes analysis, so elusive and so original is it, as in the "Street of Shows." Nothing at first thought seems more hopelessly remote from poetry than the country circus, with its lurid posters of the Giant Schoolgirl, the Petrified Man, and the Mermaid, all in strong sunlight; but the heart carries with it its own mood, and this flaring scene has undergone some indefinite transformation by the alchemy ...
— Imaginations and Reveries • (A.E.) George William Russell
... playful. These animals are smooth, and black or gray in color, except the under side which is pure white. They are gregarious and very sociable in their habits. Porpoises race and play with each other and dart out of the sea, performing almost as many antics as the circus clown. They feed on mackerel and herring, devouring large quantities. Years ago the porpoise was a common and esteemed article of food in Great Britain and France, but now the skin and blubber only have a commercial value. The skins of a very large species are ...
— The Harris-Ingram Experiment • Charles E. Bolton
... exploits Charybdis, the whirlpool Chastity, reward of Cheese, as an emblem Chersonese, towns of Chians, obscene name of Children, in procession Chimney, obscene sense Cholozyges, mad ox Chorus (the) protects Agoracritus Cicadas, use and significance Cillicon, a traitor Circus-races, terms of Citizens (Athenian), four classes of Clausimachus, meaning of Cleaenetus, the law as to feeding Cleomenes, King of Sparta Cleon, allusion to treachery of —dead —disgorges tribute —exhortation of —foe of the ...
— The Eleven Comedies - Vol. I • Aristophanes et al
... I've a string of brothers,—I'm the youngest,—but they never helped nobody. They've just knocked around over the world, lookin' out for number one. The oldest died in India. Two are in South Africa now, an' another's on a whaling voyage, an' one's travellin' with a circus—he does trapeze work. An' I guess I'm just like them. I've taken care of myself since I was eleven—that's when my mother died. I've got to study by myself, I guess, an' what I want to know is ...
— Martin Eden • Jack London
... the country, for at least a hundred years. The spirit of the last century lingered in its quiet cottages, in the little ale-house with half-obliterated sign, in its air of absolute repose and leisure. There was no evidence of contest anywhere—except perhaps in a few mouldy advertisements of a circus and of a remarkable kind of soap, that were half peeling off a moss-covered wall. There were not even many indications of life in the place. The sunshine seemed to have the village street to itself. A couple of women stood gossiping over the gate of one of ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird
... from North Shields, and fell overboard, near the Victoria Hotel, Hull, while on watch. It was the first night of Dacrow's Circus appearing in Hull, and Brown's mates had gone ashore, either to see the performance inside, or to hear the music in the streets. I was watchman that night on board the 'Magna Charter' steamer. A heavy gale was blowing ...
— The Hero of the Humber - or the History of the Late Mr. John Ellerthorpe • Henry Woodcock
... sententia judicis, olim Damnatum aerumnis suppliciisque caput, Hunc neque fabrili lassent ergastula massa, Nec rigidas vexent fossa metalla manus. Circus quadrandus: nam—caetera quid moror?—omnes Poenarum facies hic ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume II (of II) • Augustus de Morgan
... being delegated, one day, to take her into town to the dentist, and that upon discovering that the dentist was not in his office, he had taken her to the circus instead. She had been about thirteen, and had eaten too many peanuts, he thought, and had lost a petticoat in full sight of the grand-stand. But how grateful and happy ...
— Sisters • Kathleen Norris
... Jumping on again, I bumped and bobbed back along the grassy, flowery track, over the Indian mound, cried, "Whoa, Jack!" flew over his head, and alighted in father's arms as gracefully as if it were all intended for circus work. ...
— The Story of My Boyhood and Youth • John Muir
... of this town a travelling circus ("Sleary's Horse-riding") had pitched its tent, and, to his amazement, Mr. Gradgrind observed his two eldest children trying to obtain a peep, at the back of the booth, of the ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol III • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... the children nearly drifted out to sea, but they got safely back. After that they went to the big animal show. And in the book "Daddy Takes Us to the Circus," I told you how Hal and Mab were accidentally taken away in one of the circus wagons, and how they traveled all night. And the next day they rode on the elephant's back, and also on a camel's and they went in the big parade. ...
— Daddy Takes Us Skating • Howard R. Garis
... within twenty-five yards. Hanging almost under their ponies' bellies they shot from there, while those farther out daringly stood erect upon their saddles like circus riders and also fired at full speed; then racing in closer they swung low and fired again. Wherever the six men faced, before, behind, right, left, there the scurrying ...
— Boys' Book of Frontier Fighters • Edwin L. Sabin
... They saw the nets, but determined to push through them. One charged them gallantly head first, and as the thick meshes fell tumultuously over his head and back, the second jumped the falling toils twenty yards to his left, taking them most gracefully, as if he were doing a circus trick. Down from the tree sprang the keeper and his men, and seized the helpless stag, while the second, which had jumped and won, stood panting and looking over his shoulder to see what curious game this was. The third broke ...
— The Naturalist on the Thames • C. J. Cornish
... in the swim, Buster," said George, nodding, as if more than pleased. "You see it pays to stick close to these lucky fellows. If we'd gone on ahead now we'd have missed all this circus. ...
— Motor Boat Boys Mississippi Cruise - or, The Dash for Dixie • Louis Arundel
... circus, which came to Keighley, led me into the belief that with a little practice I should make a passable trapezist, or tight-rope walker. So when I got home the first thing I did was to procure some rope &c. With this apparatus I constructed a kind of trapeze and tight-rope in my bed chamber. I used ...
— Adventures and Recollections • Bill o'th' Hoylus End
... of fact, Boy Buggins did start life (as far as his memory carried him) in grubby pink tights and spangles. But he followed in the train of no circus; it was in front of public-houses in a district of London where such pitches recurred with dreary frequency that he cut capers on a strip of carpet. He visited them nightly in the company of a stalwart individual who also wore pink tights. After ...
— A Tall Ship - On Other Naval Occasions • Sir Lewis Anselm da Costa Ritchie
... another? But Hunt Rennie's son was judged to have torn up a letter with deliberate malice, not just taken paper found conveniently on the veranda. Was he four then, or even younger? But he could remember the punishment very vividly. And the time he'd run off to see the circus come into town, he and Shelly ... Cousin Jeff, Cousin Merry, they had tried to beg him off from Grandfather's punishment that time, not that they had succeeded. Drew Rennie at four, at six, at twelve, at sixteen—riding out at night with Castleman's Company, weaving a path ...
— Rebel Spurs • Andre Norton
... these I did not know what it meant, for I had never seen such a circus. The Yankee soldiers found that they had such an army of men and women and children, that they had to build tents and feed them to keep them from starving. But from what I, a little child, saw and heard ...
— Memories of Childhood's Slavery Days • Annie L. Burton
... due, and Ida sprang lightly from the last step into the saddle. It was an informal way of mounting which few girls could have accomplished gracefully; but Ida did it as naturally and as easily as a circus rider, for the trick was a necessity to her who had so often to dismount ...
— At Love's Cost • Charles Garvice
... got a Circus tent? Have you got a merry-go-round?" asked Bunny and Susan. "Do tell us how long you have been ...
— Snubby Nose and Tippy Toes • Laura Rountree Smith
... called Showman Bob. Dandy came trotting up with the ear of corn in his mouth. But when Bob put out his hand for the corn Dandy kicked up his heels and away he went. He ran round and round like a pony in a circus. ...
— Five Little Friends • Sherred Willcox Adams
... centurion of the Immortals, whom we have already introduced to our readers by the name of Harpax; "Not so, Stephanos; that happy time may arrive, but it is not yet come, my gem of the circus. Thou knowest that on this occasion it is one of these Counts, or western Franks, who undertakes the combat; and the Varangians, who call these people their enemies, have some reason to claim a precedency in guarding the lists, which it might not at this moment be convenient to dispute with them. ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... play in Finsbury Circus, it is true," said Herr Liesecke, as he edged past her and reached the gangway just ...
— Howards End • E. M. Forster
... of the embrasure where you are talking with some friends, you gather, from the mere motion of her lips, these words: "My husband would have it so!" uttered with the air of a young Roman matron going to the circus to be devoured. You are profoundly wounded in your several vanities, and wish to attend to this conversation while listening to your guests: you thus make replies which bring you back such inquiries as: "Why, what are you thinking of?" For you have lost the thread ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... now, the clamor of the caged beasts in the circus train could still be heard. To Pauline the creatures seemed less wild and cruel than ...
— The Perils of Pauline • Charles Goddard
... smaller end swung near, Rafe leaped for it and secured a footing on the rolling, plunging log. How he kept his feet under him Nan could not imagine. A bareback rider in a circus never had such work as this. Rafe rode his wooden ...
— Nan Sherwood at Pine Camp - or, The Old Lumberman's Secret • Annie Roe Carr
... stress put on the name "Razumov—Mr. Razumov" pierced the ear ridiculously, like the falsetto of a circus clown beginning an elaborate joke. Astonishment was Razumov's first response, followed by ...
— Under Western Eyes • Joseph Conrad
... the Bank coffee house in Pine Street, opened, in 1828, a pleasure garden, that he named Sans Souci, on the site of a circus building called the Stadium at Broadway and Prince Street. In the center of the garden remained the stadium, which was devoted to theatrical performances of "a gay and attractive character." Later, he built a more pretentious theater that fronted on Broadway. The interior ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers
... practice contest. Two of them were painted gray, one was dingy-white; the fourth shone in delicate pink enamel touched here and there with silver-gilt. Its driver and mechanician were clad in pink also, adding the completing stroke to an effect suggesting the circus rather than the race track. There was much excuse for the laughter of the camps, and that reflection of it lying in ...
— From the Car Behind • Eleanor M. Ingram
... might Miss Selina lay this flattering unction to her soul, and well might the "Herald" declare that "Carlow events were crowding thick and fast." The congressional representative of the district was to deliver a lecture at the court-house; a circus was approaching the county-seat, and its glories would be exhibited "rain or shine"; the court had cleared up the docket by sitting to unseemly hours of the night, even until ten o'clock—one farmer witness had fallen asleep while deposing that he "had knowed this man Hender some eighteen year"—and, ...
— The Gentleman From Indiana • Booth Tarkington
... at him with an expression of pity "Oh! to be sure not. You belong to the pannyrama. I recolleck that the last circus folks that come here never talked about politics. Are you ...
— Round the Block • John Bell Bouton
... cried Jumping Jack. "Clear the shelf, if you please. The Trumpeter has never seen any of my circus tricks!" ...
— The Story of a China Cat • Laura Lee Hope
... torturer, this mother was suffering at the hands of her best-beloved daughter. Her beautiful pale face—her large eyes upturned to heaven, like those that artists give to the pure victims kneeling in the Roman circus—seemed to ask God whether He really had any consolation ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... The circus and the zoological garden are always centers of interest to little children and may be used to great advantage to furnish the point of departure in the study of animal life. Making the animals in some form crystallizes the interest in the animals represented, and awakens interest ...
— Primary Handwork • Ella Victoria Dobbs
... number one, tip-top minin' expert, all right all right," the dog-musher delivered himself oracularly, "but you missed the chance of your life when you was a boy an' didn't run off an' join a circus." ...
— White Fang • Jack London
... show itself after February an army was furnished to guard it. Twenty-five thousand men, infantry and cavalry, surrounded the scaffold. Two generals were in command. Seven guns commanded the streets which converged to the circus of the Barriere ...
— The Memoirs of Victor Hugo • Victor Hugo
... it was a great joke, leaped about and barked with delight. He sprang out of the harness, which was only partly fastened on, and began leaping about in the snow. Finally he stood up on his hind legs and marched about, for Snap was a trick dog, and had once belonged to a circus. ...
— The Bobbsey Twins at Snow Lodge • Laura Lee Hope
... botas were laced with silver, and his saddle was so loaded with the same metal that only a Californian horse could have carried it. John turned up his nose at this gorgeous apparition, and likened him to a "play actor" and a circus rider; nevertheless, he was very curious to see something of the life of the Californian grandee, of which he had heard much and seen nothing, and when Padre Ortega, who was a cousin of the widow, told him that a large company was expected within ...
— The Bell in the Fog and Other Stories • Gertrude Atherton
... school to be "smart." All preacher's sons are so by common concession, and though we may not visit the circus, like others, we get abundance of free tickets for concerts, panoramas, and glass-blowers. Once, indeed, the great Chippewa chief, Haw-waw-many-squaw, having thrown the town into consternation by placards of himself scalping his enemies and smoking ...
— Tales of the Chesapeake • George Alfred Townsend
... old dress," she explained, with a dazzling smile that was a justification in itself; "me likes pretty new dress!" and then, with one hand reaching up to the door-knob, and the other throwing disarming kisses to Samantha,—"By-by! Lady Gay go circus now! Timfy, come, take ...
— Timothy's Quest - A Story for Anybody, Young or Old, Who Cares to Read It • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... directions to himself. "Keep along the pavement. Turn to the right at the Circus. Now down the hill. Easily down the hill. Don't float! Junior Army and Navy ...
— Soul of a Bishop • H. G. Wells
... Piccadilly Circus, with its white sheet of electric light, and, turning into the darker thoroughfares on the northern side of it, walked on until, in a narrow street of the Italian quarter of Soho, we stopped at a private door by the side ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine
... with his face tied up, looking very red in the cheeks and heavy about the eyes.—Hy'r'ye?—he said, and made for an arm-chair, in which he placed first his hat and then his person, going smack through the crown of the former as neatly as they do the trick at the circus. The Professor jumped at the explosion as if he had sat down on one of those small CALTHROPS our grandfathers used to sow round in the grass when there were Indians about,—iron stars, each ray a rusty thorn an ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... are greatly exaggerated—generally by themselves. In a large country like Africa, for instance, I should imagine that it was almost impossible for a man not to get somewhere if he goes on long enough. Give me the fellow who can plunge into the bowels of the earth at Piccadilly Circus and find the right Tube train with nothing but a lot of misleading signs to guide him. However, we are not all constituted alike in this world, and it was apparent from the flush on her cheek and the light in her eyes that Betty ...
— The Clicking of Cuthbert • P. G. Wodehouse
... because of its bad habit of growing so tall and losing its lower leaves. They look like giraffes at the circus. But one ...
— The Library of Work and Play: Gardening and Farming. • Ellen Eddy Shaw
... horse is up to more antics than a trick horse in a circus. You will see, if we ever run across my cousin ...
— Raiding with Morgan • Byron A. Dunn
... want the music to stop one bit. It was happier to be miserable than to be happy without being miserable. I couldn't understand it. . . . . . . Then, all of a sudden, old Ruben changed his tune. He ripped and he rar'd, he tipped and he tar'd, he pranced and he charged like the grand entry at a circus. 'Peared to me like all the gas in the house was turned on at once, things got so bright, and I hilt up my head, ready to look any man in the face, and not afeared of nothin'. It was a circus, and a brass band, and a big ball, all goin' on at the same time. He ...
— Southern Literature From 1579-1895 • Louise Manly
... grew with the interruptions. He had on coming up to town begun to sit for his portrait to a young painter, Mr. Rumble, whose little game, as we also used to say at Mr. Pinhorn's, was to be the first to perch on the shoulders of renown. Mr. Rumble's studio was a circus in which the man of the hour, and still more the woman, leaped through the hoops of his showy frames almost as electrically as they burst into telegrams and "specials." He pranced into the exhibitions on their back; he was the reporter on ...
— The Death of the Lion • Henry James
... afforded by the fine arts, and especially by music, will they become indifferent to, and abhor, exhibitions which involve cruelty to man and animals, such as dog-fights, boxing-matches, dangerous and cruel circus tricks, executions of criminals, etc. The pleasure derived from such brutal exhibitions is the same in kind as that which prompts savages to flay alive their prisoners of war. And the morbid pleasure which so many apparently civilized people take in reading in the newspapers, column after ...
— Chopin and Other Musical Essays • Henry T. Finck
... he pulls as steadily as usual, and they are drawing nearer and nearer to the little cove. Soon they gain a full view of those cliffs where the sea-birds sit, tier upon tier, like spectators in a circus, and the calm air is filled with strange cries. Bee claps her hands in delight; the sight is so novel, and the birds that have taken wing sweep so gracefully around their rocky haunts, that there is a charm, past explaining, in ...
— Fifty-Two Stories For Girls • Various |
