hat had seen his father through a campaign for
district attorney a number of years before rested on his ears, causing
them to protrude unnaturally, while a full-dress coat with pointed tails
that just cleared the floor gave him a quadrupedal appearance. This coat
was the wearer's conception of sartorial perfection, having been cut out
by his own hands from an old raincoat of his father's. A pair of
painter's overalls with a hectic past completed his costume.

And while the audience gazed with interest at the ringmaster, the
ringmaster was gazing with equal interest at the audience. He was trying
to make himself think that the circus was solely responsible for the
gala dress that confronted him, although his better judgment should have
told him that most of those present were thus gayly clad for Cottontop
Sigsbee's party that was to take place at the conclusion of the
performance.

After cracking the whip a few times to show how skillfully it could be
done, the ringmaster proceeded to deliver a highly entertaining lecture
prepared by himself in collaboration with one Job, and to assure his
hearers that his show possessed the only "genuine blood-sweatin'
behemoth of Holy Writ now in captivity, regardluss of the claims of
jealous compet'ors exackly as advertised."

As he gave a preliminary shake of the drop-curtain the anticipations of
the audience ran high, for they distinctly smelled something suggestive
of the odor of wild animals; but alas, it was only a faint reminiscence
from the curtain. After one or two false starts the ringmaster drew back
the curtain.

"Behold now behemoth, ladies and gent'mun!" he cried with a sweeping
gesture of the hand toward the center of the stage.

With a craning of necks and a straining of eyes the audience beheld a
quadruped about the size of Sport and the color of stove-blacking,
manacled by a huge log-chain to a Nubian animal trainer who bore a
striking resemblance to Gizzard Tobin, although bereft of all clothing
save a pair of swimming trunks and a sparse coating of black.

The murmur of disapproval that greeted this tableau was quickly quelled
by the ringmaster, as he brought the curtains together and began to
declaim in a loud voice:

"Not so pre-vious, ladies and gent'mun! Not so pre-vious, I beg of you!
The best is yet to come! You have not seen this wonderful Biblic animal
p'form!... Why, ladies and gent'mun, he sweats blood! Bl-l-l-l-ud!...
Real,--rich,--red,--human bl-