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[Illustration: IN A CHEAP CAFÉ-CONCERT, MONTMARTRE
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By F. BERKELEY SMITH _Author of “The Real Latin Quarter”_
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY THE AUTHOR AND OTHER ARTISTS
FUNK & WAGNALLS COMPANY NEW YORK AND LONDON MDCCCCIII
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Copyright, 1903 by Funk & Wagnalls Company
Registered at Stationers’ Hall London, England
III. Some “Risqué” Curtains with Serious Linings 78
It is the small boy who crawls under the circus tent who most keenly enjoys the show.
He has watched while the big double-top canvas was being raised and staked taut, transforming the familiar pasture-lot into a magic realm, more alluring and seductive than the best fishing-hole in the town creek.
Following the parade, a cavalcade of golden chariots, caparisoned horses and swaying elephants, the small boy has walked on air, buoyed by the thump and blare of the brass band. Weeks before he had reveled in every detail of the show as revealed in posters on the barn-doors: the lady with the fluffy skirts bounding through the paper hoops from the well-rosined back of her white horse; the merry, painted clown; the immaculate ringmaster in glistening boots; and, last of all, the showman!—generous, genial and big of heart, whose plain black cravat, fitted neatly under his collar as in the lithographs, and whose beaming blue eye seemed an open guaranty of all he promised at the single price of admission.
Should the small boy grow up to be a connoisseur in much that glitters in life besides golden chariots, and yet manage to keep young enough to preserve a kindly feeling toward the lady of perennial youth upon the white horse, should boyish love of the picturesque still abide in him, he will find within the gates of Paris a city after his own heart, a place where gaiety never ceases, where the finesse of amusement has been brought almost to a state of perfection.