tion been continued, it would undoubtedly have raised a blister.

One of the amusing experiments tried at a later time was that of a tall
young man, diffident, pale and modest, being given a broom carefully
wrapped in a sheet, and told that it was his sweetheart. He accepted the
situation and sat down by the broom. He was a little sheepish at first,
but eventually he grew bolder, and smiled upon her such a smile as
Malvolio casts upon Olivia. The manner in which, little by little, he
ventured upon a familiar footing, was exceedingly funny; but when, in a
moment of confident response to his wooing, he clasped her round the
waist and imprinted a chaste kiss upon the brushy part of the broom,
disguised by the sheet, the house resounded with roars of laughter. The
subject, however, was deaf to all of the noise. He was absorbed in his
courtship, and he continued to hug the broom, and exhibit in his
features that idiotic smile that one sees only upon the faces of lovers
and bridegrooms. "All the world loves a lover," as the saying is, and
all the world loves to laugh at him.

One of the subjects was told that the head of a man in the audience was
on fire. He looked for a moment, and then dashed down the platform into
the audience, and, seizing the man's head, vigorously rubbed it. As this
did not extinguish the flames, he took off his coat and put the fire
out. In doing this, he set his coat on fire, when he trampled it under
foot. Then he calmly resumed his garment and walked back to the stage.

The "side-show" closed the evening's entertainment. A young man was told
to think of himself as managing a side-show at a circus. When his mind
had absorbed this idea he was ordered to open his exhibition. He at once
mounted a table, and, in the voice of the traditional side-show fakir,
began to dilate upon the fat woman and the snakes, upon the wild man
from Borneo, upon the learned pig, and all the other accessories of
side-shows. He went over the usual characteristic "patter," getting more
and more in earnest, assuring his hearers that for the small sum of ten
cents they could see more wonders than ever before had been crowded
under one canvas tent. He harangued the crowd as they surged about the
tent door. He pointed to a suppositious canvas picture. He "chaffed" the
boys. He flattered the vanity of the young fellows with their girls,
telling them that they could not afford, for the small sum of ten cents,
to miss this great sho