There are probably few persons who do not number among the most pleasant recollections of their youth their first visit to a circus, whether their earliest sniff of the saw-dust was inhaled in the building made classical by Ducrow, or under the canvas canopy of Samwell or Clarke. In my boyish days, the cry of ‘This way for the riders!’ bawled from the stentorian vocal organs of the proprietor or ring-master of a travelling circus, never failed to attract all the boys, and no small proportion of

Beginnings of the Circus in England—Tumblers and Performing Horses of the Middle Ages—Jacob Hall, the Rope-dancer—Francis Forcer and Sadler’s Wells—Vauxhall Gardens—Price’s Equestrian Performances at Johnson’s Gardens—Sampson’s Feats of Horsemanship—Philip Astley—His Open-air Performances near Halfpenny Hatch—The First Circus—Erection of the Amphitheatre in Westminster Road—First Performances there—Rival Establishment in Blackfriars Road—Hughes and Clementina. Considering the national love of ev

Fortunes of the Royal Circus—Destruction of Astley’s Amphitheatre by Fire—Its Reconstruction—Second Conflagration—Astley in Paris—Burning of the Royal Circus—Erection of the Olympic Pavilion—Hengler, the Rope-dancer—Astley’s Horses—Dancing Horses—The Trick Horse, Billy—Abraham Saunders—John Astley and William Davis—Death of Philip Astley—Vauxhall Gardens—Andrew Ducrow—John Clarke—Barrymore’s Season at Astley’s—Hippo-dramatic Spectacles—The first Circus Camel. For nearly forty years after the ope

Ducrow at Covent Garden—Engagement at Astley’s—Double Acts in the circle—Ducrow at Manchester—Rapid Act on Six Horses—‘Raphael’s Dream’—Miss Woolford—Cross’s performing Elephant—O’Donnel’s Antipodean Feats—First year of Ducrow and West—Henry Adams—Ducrow at Hull—The Wild Horse of the Ukraine—Ducrow at Sheffield—Travelling Circuses—An Entrée at Holloway’s—Wild’s Show—Constantine, the Posturer—Circus Horses—Tenting at Fairs—The Mountebanks. When Elliston produced the spectacle of the Cataract of t

A few words about Menageries—George Wombwell—The Lion Baitings at Warwick—Atkins’s Lion and Tigress at Astley’s—A Bull-fight and a Zebra Hunt—Ducrow at the Pavilion—The Stud at Drury Lane—Letter from Wooler to Elliston—Ducrow and the Drury ‘Supers’—Zebras on the Stage—The first Arab Troupe—Contention between Ducrow and Clarkson Stanfield—Deaths of John Ducrow and Madame Ducrow—Miss Woolford. Circuses and menageries are now so frequently associated, and the inmates of the latter have at all times

Lions and Lion-tamers—Manchester Jack—Van Amburgh—Carter’s Feats—What is a Tiger?—Lion-driving and Tiger-fighting—Van Amburgh and the Duke of Wellington—Vaulting Competition between Price and North—Burning of the Amphitheatre—Death of Ducrow—Equestrian Performances at the Surrey Theatre—Travelling Circuses—Wells and Miller—Thomas Cooke—Van Amburgh—Edwin Hughes—William Batty—Pablo Fanque. He must have been a bold man who first undertook to tame and train a lion. It has been jocosely remarked that

Conversion of the Lambeth Baths into a Circus—Garlick and the Wild Beasts—Batty’s Company at the Surrey—White Conduit Gardens—Re-opening of Astley’s—Batty’s Circus on its Travels—Batty and the Sussex Justices—Equestrianism at the Lyceum—Lions and Lion-tamers at Astley’s—Franconi’s Circus at Cremorne Gardens—An Elephant on the Tight-rope—The Art of Balancing—Franconi’s Company at Drury Lane—Van Amburgh at Astley’s—The Black Tiger—Pablo Fanque—Rivalry of Wallett and Barry—Wallett’s Circus—Junction

Hengler’s Circus—John and George Sanger—Managerial Anachronisms and Incongruities—James Hernandez—Eaton and Stone—Horses at Drury Lane—James Newsome—Howes and Cushing’s Circus—George Sanger and the Fighting Lions—Crockett and the Lions at Astley’s—The Lions at large—Hilton’s Circus—Lion-queens—Miss Chapman—Macomo and the Fighting Tigers. The haze which envelopes the movements of travelling circuses prior to the time when they began to be recorded weekly in the Era cannot always be penetrated, ev

Pablo Fanque—James Cooke—Pablo Fanque and the Celestials—Ludicrous affair in the Glasgow Police-court—Batty’s transactions with Pablo Fanque—The Liverpool Amphitheatre—John Clarke—William Cooke—Astley’s—Fitzball and the Supers—Batty’s Hippodrome—Vauxhall Gardens—Ginnett’s Circus—The Alhambra—Gymnastic Performances in Music-Halls—Gymnastic Mishaps. When Wallett, the clown, returned from his American tour, he had arranged to meet Pablo Fanque at Liverpool, with a view to performances in the amphit

Cremorne Gardens—The Female Blondin—Fatal Accident at Aston Park—Reproduction of the Eglinton Tournament—Newsome and Wallett—Pablo Fanque’s Circus—Equestrianism at Drury Lane—Spence Stokes—Talliott’s Circus—The Gymnasts of the Music-halls—Fatal Accident at the Canterbury—Gymnastic Brotherhoods—Sensational Feats—Sergeant Bates and the Berringtons—The Rope-trick—How to do it. Though the history of circus performances would be scarcely complete without an occasional passing glance at the music-hall

Opening of the Holborn Amphitheatre—Friend’s season at Astley’s—Adah Isaacs Menken—Sanger’s Company at the Agricultural Hall—The Carré troupe at the Holborn Amphitheatre—Wandering Stars of the Arena—Albert Smith and the Clown—Guillaume’s Circus—The Circo Price—Hengler’s Company at the Palais Royal—Re-opening of Astley’s by the Sangers—Franconi’s Circus—Newsome’s Circus—Miss Newsome and the Cheshire Hunt—Rivalry between the Sangers and Howes and Cushing. After the lapse of several years, during w

Reminiscences of the Henglers—The Rope-dancing Henglers at Astley’s—Circus of Price and Powell—Its Acquisition by the Henglers—Clerical Presentation to Frowde, the Clown—Circus Difficulties at Liverpool—Retirement of Edward Hengler—Rivalry of Howes and Cushing—Discontinuance of the Tenting System—Miss Jenny Louise Hengler—Conversion of the Palais Royal into an Amphitheatre—Felix Rivolti, the Ring-master. Conscious as I am of the imperfections of the foregoing record of circus performances in thi

The Brothers Sanger—First Appearance in London—Vicissitudes of Astley’s—Batty and Cooke—Purchase of the Theatre by the Brothers Sanger—Their Travelling Circus—The Tenting System—Barnum and the Sangers. An impenetrable mist hangs over the early history of the industrious and enterprising gentlemen who now own the ‘home of the equestrian drama’ in the Westminster Road. The names of Hengler, and Cooke, and Adams have been, to our fathers and grandfathers, as well as to the present generation, ‘fami

American Circuses—American Performers in England, and English Performers in the United States—The Cookes in America—Barnum’s great Show—Yankee Parades—Van Amburgh’s Circus and Menagerie—Robinson’s combined Shows—Stone and Murray’s Circus—The Forepaughs—Joel Warner—Side Shows—Amphitheatres of New York and New Orleans. The circus in America is a highly popular entertainment, and is organized upon a very extensive scale, as everything is there, like the country itself, with its illimitable prairies

Reminiscences of a Gymnast—Training and Practising—A Professional Rendezvous—Circus Agencies—The First Engagement—Springthorp’s Music-hall—Newsome’s Circus—Reception in the Dressing-room—The Company and the Stud—The Newsome Family—Miss Newsome’s Wonderful Leap across a green lane—The Handkerchief Trick—An Equine Veteran from the Crimea—Engagement to travel. The picture of circus life and manners which I have endeavoured to portray would not be complete without a narrative of the professional exp

Continuation of the Gymnast’s Reminiscences—A Circus on the move—Three Months at Carlisle—Performance for the Benefit of local Charities—Removal to Middlesborough—A Stockton Man’s Adventure—Journey to York—Circus Ballets—The Paynes in the Arena—Accidents in the Ring—A Circus Benefit—Removal to Scarborough—A Gymnastic Adventure—Twelve Nights at the Pantheon—On the Tramp—Return to London. ‘The circus was near the end of its stay at Greenock when we engaged for “general utility,” and we were not so

Continuation of the Gymnast’s Reminiscences—Circus Men in Difficulties—Heavy Security for a small Debt—The Sheriff’s Officer and the Elephant—Taking Refuge with the Lions—Another Provincial Tour—With a Circus in Dublin—A Joke in the wrong place—A Fenian Hoax—A Case of Pikes—Return to England—At the Kentish Watering-places—Off to the North. ‘Several weeks elapsed before I got another engagement. Two gymnasts can do so much more showy and sensational a performance than one can, that a single slang

Lions and Lion-tamers—Lorenzo and the Lions—Androcles and the Lion—The Successor of Macomo—Accident in Bell and Myers’s Circus—Lion Hunting—Death of Macarthy—True Causes of Accidents with Lions and Tigers—Performing Leopards—Anticipating the Millennium—Tame Hyenas—Fairgrieve’s Menagerie—Performing Lions, Tigers, Leopards, and Hyenas—Camels and Dromedaries—The Great Elephant Since the death of the negro, Macomo, the most successful performer with lions and other large members of the feline genus

Circus Slang—Its Peculiarities and Derivation—Certain Phrases used by others of the Amusing Classes—Technicalities of the Circus—The Riders and Clowns of Dickens—Sleary’s Circus—Circus Men and Women in Fiction and in Real Life—Domestic Habits of Circus People—Dress and Manners—The Professional Quarter of the Metropolis. Circus men are much addicted to the use of slang, and much of their slang is peculiar to themselves. To those who are uninitiated in the mysteries of life among what may be terme