ct in the ring and an out-of-door
free exhibition of tight-rope walking from canvas top to ground. Once he
went at a difficult feat so eagerly--he was always his own teacher--that
he fell clean off a trapeze sixty feet above ground, and by some kind
providence that watches over boys escaped serious injury.

[Illustration]

"It's queer about falls," said Mr. Potter. "It's often the little ones
that kill. Now, there I fell sixty feet, and you might say it didn't
hurt me at all. Another time, showing in Yucatan, I fell only forty
feet, and smashed two ribs. And the worst fall I ever had was fifteen
feet at the Olympia, in London. I was driving four horses in a tandem
race, and was thrown straight on my head. That time I nearly broke my
neck."

"Twenty-five feet is my best fall," put in Mrs. Potter, smiling. "I was
doing an act on the flying rings, and one of 'em broke. Remember that,
Harry?"

His face showed how well he remembered it. "Perhaps you won't believe
this," he said, "but when I saw her falling I couldn't move. I was
'tending her in the ring, and wasn't ten feet from where she struck. I
could have caught her and saved her if my legs would only have moved.
But there they were frozen, sir, and I just had to stand still and see
my wife come down smash on her head. Pretty tough, wasn't it? She lay
unconscious for two days--that was at Monette, Missouri. Oh, yes, I
remember it!"

I asked Mrs. Potter if she had ever been afraid, and she shook her head.
Never once, not even at Chicago, in the perilous toe swing, when even
the other gymnasts told her she would certainly be killed. She knew her
husband would hold her safe, and she really enjoyed that toe swing more
than any act they ever did.

"I'll tell you this, though," she admitted, "I would be afraid to do
these things with any one except my husband."

"Yes, and I'd be afraid to have her," added Potter. "Why, down in
Mexico, when I broke my ribs, there was a man--a fine gymnast, too--who
offered to take my place so we wouldn't lose our salary, but every time
I saw him practice with my wife it made me so nervous I called it off
and let the salary go."

In spite of these manifest hazards, Potter insists that there is no
healthier life than a gymnast leads. "We never are ill," he said, "we
never take cold, we travel through all sorts of fever-stricken countries
and never catch anything, and we always feel good. Look at that boy of
mine! He's seventeen years o