e horse in a swift canter, Puss balancing himself
on one leg. As he neared the clown, who stood on a big blue barrel close
to the ringside, Puss gathered himself together for the jump. Through
the tissue-paper he went like a bird on the wing, and landed safely on
the horse's back.

A wild round of applause greeted his daring deed. The children clapped
their hands and screamed, forgetting in their excitement to eat their
peanuts and candy popcorn. The man who carried the pink lemonade in
funny little glasses all set in rows in a tin tray stood still to watch.
He forgot to cry, "Anybody want some delicious, pink lemonade?" because
he was so excited over the success of the new member of the circus
family.

Then all the rest of the actor folk did their stunts; the monkeys played
baseball, and the elephants had a boxing-match, and when all was over
the clown and the circus-lady ran up to Puss, Jr., and said, "You were
the star performer of the whole show!" which, of course, pleased Puss
immensely.

A TERRIBLE FIGHT STOPPED BY USING PLUM-CAKE

As the circus entered a town one bright, sunny morning, the lion and the
unicorn escaped from their cages. Great was the excitement! All the
circus people started after them with long ropes, hoping to be able to
lasso them.

At first the townsfolk were greatly frightened, but gradually, as they
found out that the lion and the unicorn paid little attention to them,
their fear gave way to interest. It seems that the lion was an enemy of
the unicorn, and as soon as they were free they began to fight.

The Lion and the Unicorn were fighting for the crown,
The Lion beat the Unicorn all around the town.
Some gave them white bread, and some gave them brown,
Some gave them plum-cake and sent them out of town.

If it had not been for the plum-cake I verily believe they would have
been fighting still. But as soon as the unicorn saw the plum-cake he
said to the lion:

"What's the use of fighting, Leon? Let's have a truce. In fact, I'm
hungry."

"So am I," replied the lion. "I haven't had a sweet thing since I joined
the circus. And you know how hard it is to see all the little boys and
girls eating candy and popcorn and not be able to get even one little
piece."

"That's quite true," replied the unicorn. "People seem to think all I
require is hay. And as for you, they think raw meat is enough."

With these friendly words they stopped fighting and began to eat