n's
court with young Marco, the son of one of them, who remained with the
Mongol Emperor for seventeen years, during which time he had a better
opportunity of observing their customs than perhaps any other foreigner
since his time. His final return to Italy was in 1295, and a year or
two later, he wrote and revised his book of travels.

The art of printing in Europe was discovered in 1438, and the first
edition of Marco Polo's travels was printed about 1550-59. Our Punch
and Judy was invented by Silvio Fiorillo an Italian dramatist before
the year 1600. I have found no reference to the play in Marco Polo's
works, nevertheless, one cannot but think that, if not a written, at
least an oral, communication of the play may have been carried to
Europe by him or some other of the Italian traders or travellers. The
two plays are very similar, even to the tones of the man who works the
puppets.

In passing the school court on one occasion I saw the students gathered
in a crowd under the shade of the trees. A small tent was pitched, on
the front of which was a little stage. A manager stood behind the
screen from which position he worked a number of puppets in the form of
men, women, children, horses and dragons. These were suspended by black
threads as I afterwards discovered from small sticks or a framework
which the manager manipulated behind the screen. When one finished its
part of the performance, it either walked off the stage, or the stick
was fastened in such a way as to leave it in a position conducive to
the amusement of the crowd. These were puppet shows, and were put
through entire performances or plays, the manager doing the talking as
in Punch and Judy.

After the performance several of the students passed around the hat,
each person present giving one-fifth or one-tenth of a cent.

As I came from school one afternoon, the children had called in from
the street a showman with a number of trained mice. He had erected a
little scaffolding just inside the gateway, at one side of which there
was a small rope ladder, and this with the inevitable gong, and the
small boxes in which the mice were kept constituted his entire outfit.

In the boxes he had what seemed to be cotton from the milk-weed which
furnished a nest for the mice. These he took from their little boxes
one by one, stroked them tenderly, while he explained what this
particular mouse would do, put each one on the rope ladder, which they
ascended, and pe