mouth, and which he relit one after the other without for a moment
ceasing his sleight-of-hand performances; another produced a series of
spinning-tops which, in his hands, played all kinds of pranks as they
whirled round--they ran along the stems of pipes, on the edges of
swords, upon wires, and even on hairs stretched across the stage; they
spun round crystal goblets, crossed bamboo ladders, ran into all the
comers of the stage, and made strange music, combining various tones,
as they revolved. The jugglers threw them up in the air, knocked them
from one to the other like shuttlecocks, put them into their pockets
and took them out again, and all the time they never ceased to spin.

But after all the principal attraction was the performance of the
"Long-Noses," which has never been seen in Europe.

These "Long-Noses" were the select company under the immediate
patronage of the god Tingou. Dressed in a costume of the Middle Ages,
each individual wore a pair of wings; but they were specially
distinguished by the inordinate length of their noses and the uses
they made of them. These noses were simply bamboos from five to ten
feet long, some straight, some curved, some ribbed, and some with
warts painted on them. On these noses, which were firmly fixed on
their natural ones, they performed their acrobatic feats. A dozen of
these artists lay upon their backs, while their comrades, dressed to
represent lightning-conductors, leaped from one to the other of their
friends' noses, performing the most skilful somersaults.

The whole was to conclude with the "Pyramid," as had been announced,
in which fifty "Long-Noses" were to represent the "Car of Juggernaut."
But instead of forming the pyramid on each other's shoulders, these
artistes mounted on each others noses. Now one of them, who used to
act as the base of the car, had left the troupe, and as only strength
and adroitness were necessary for the position, Passe-partout had been
selected to fill it on this occasion.

That worthy fellow felt very melancholy when he had donned his
costume, adorned with parti-coloured wings, and had fixed his six-foot
nose to his face; but, at any rate, the nose would procure him
something to eat, and he made up his mind to do what he had to do.

He went on the stage and joined his colleagues; they all lay down on
their backs, and then another party placed themselves on the long
noses of the first, another tier of performers climbed up on t