arm, across his back, and along his left arm, and as he
turned his body he kept the trident rolling around crossing his back
and breast and giving it a new impetus with each arm. The trident had
on it two cymbal-shaped iron plates which kept up a constant rattling.

This showman had with him three boy acrobats whose skill he proceeded
to show.

"Pitch the balls," he said.

The largest of the three boys fastened a cushioned band, on which was a
leather cup, around his head, the cup being on his forehead just
between his eyes.

He took two wooden balls, two and a half inches in diameter, tossed
them in the air twenty feet high, catching them in the cup as they came
down. The shape of the cup was such as to hold the balls by suction
when they fell. He never once missed. This is the most dangerous
looking of all the tricks I have seen jugglers perform.

"Shooting stars," said the showman.

The boy tossed aside his cup and balls and took a string six feet long,
on the two ends of which were fastened wooden balls two and a half
inches in diameter. He set the balls whirling in opposite directions
until they moved so rapidly as to stretch the string, which he then
held in the middle with finger and thumb and by a simple motion of the
hand kept the balls whirling.

He was an expert, and changed the swinging of the balls in as many
different ways as an expert club-swinger could his clubs.

"Boy acrobats," called out the manager, as the manipulator of the
"shooting stars" bowed himself out amid the applause of the children.

The two smaller boys threw off their coats, hitched up their
trousers--always a part of the performance whether necessary or
not--and began the high kick, high jump, handspring, somersault, wagon
wheel, ending with hand-spring, and bending backwards until their heads
touched the ground.

One of them stood on two benches a foot high, put a handkerchief on the
ground, and bending backwards, picked it up with his teeth.

The two boys then clasped each other around the waist, as in the
illustration, and each threw the other back over his head a dozen times
or more.

Exit the bear show with the boy acrobats, enter the old woman juggler
with her husband who beats the gong.

This was one of the most interesting performances I have ever seen in
China, perhaps because so unexpected.

The old woman had small, bound feet. She lay flat on her back, stuck up
her feet, and her husband put a crock a foot in