and heaven knows what! There's the fat man, who
comes in with the twenty-three dresses on, and turns out to be the
living skeleton! There's the clowns, the sawdust, the white horse that
dances a hornpipe, the candles stuck in hoops, just as in our own dear
country.

My dear wife, in her very finest clothes, with all the world looking
at her, was really enjoying this spectacle (which doesn't require any
knowledge of the language, seeing that the dumb animals don't talk it),
when there came in, presently, "the great Polish act of the Sarmatian
horse-tamer, on eight steeds," which we were all of us longing to see.
The horse-tamer, to music twenty miles an hour, rushed in on four of
his horses, leading the other four, and skurried round the ring. You
couldn't see him for the sawdust, but everybody was delighted, and
applauded like mad. Presently, you saw there were only three horses in
front: he had slipped one more between his legs, another followed, and
it was clear that the consequences would be fatal, if he admitted any
more. The people applauded more than ever; and when, at last, seven and
eight were made to go in, not wholly, but sliding dexterously in and
out, with the others, so that you did not know which was which, the
house, I thought, would come down with applause; and the Sarmatian
horse-tamer bowed his great feathers to the ground. At last the
music grew slower, and he cantered leisurely round the ring; bending,
smirking, seesawing, waving his whip, and laying his hand on his heart,
just as we have seen the Ashley's people do. But fancy our astonishment
when, suddenly, this Sarmatian horse-tamer, coming round with his four
pair at a canter, and being opposite our box, gave a start, and a--hupp!
which made all his horses stop stock-still at an instant.

"Albert!" screamed my dear Jemmy: "Albert! Bahbahbah--baron!" The
Sarmatian looked at her for a minute; and turning head over heels, three
times, bolted suddenly off his horses, and away out of our sight.

It was HIS EXCELLENCY THE BARON DE PUNTER!

Jemmy went off in a fit as usual, and we never saw the Baron again; but
we heard, afterwards, that Punter was an apprentice of Franconi's, and
had run away to England, thinking to better himself, and had joined Mr.
Richardson's army; but Mr. Richardson, and then London, did not agree
with him; and we saw the last of him as he sprung over the barriers at
the Tuggeridgeville tournament.

"Well, Jemimarann," says