n
thing for a man to be flattened to the ground by a slithering of snow
from above just as he opened his door. But it had seldom more than ten
feet to fall. Most interesting of all was the novel sensation
experienced as Thrums began to assume its familiar aspect, and objects
so long buried that they had been half forgotten came back to view and
use.

Storm-stayed shows used to emphasize the severity of a Thrums winter.
As the name indicates, these were gatherings of travelling booths in
the winter-time. Half a century ago the country was overrun by
itinerant showmen, who went their different ways in summer, but formed
little colonies in the cold weather, when they pitched their tents in
any empty field or disused quarry and huddled together for the sake of
warmth: not that they got much of it. Not more than five winters ago
we had a storm-stayed show on a small scale; but nowadays the farmers
are less willing to give these wanderers a camping-place, and the
people are less easily drawn to the entertainments provided, by fife
and drum. The colony hung together until it was starved out, when it
trailed itself elsewhere. I have often seen it forming. The first
arrival would be what was popularly known as "Sam'l Mann's
Tumbling-Booth," with its tumblers, jugglers, sword-swallowers, and
balancers. This travelling show visited us regularly twice a year:
once in summer for the Muckle Friday, when the performers were gay and
stout, and even the horses had flesh on their bones; and again in the
"back-end" of the year, when cold and hunger had taken the blood from
their faces, and the scraggy dogs that whined at their side were lashed
for licking the paint off the caravans. While the storm-stayed show
was in the vicinity the villages suffered from an invasion of these
dogs. Nothing told more truly the dreadful tale of the showman's life
in winter. Sam'l Mann's was a big show, and half a dozen smaller ones,
most of which were familiar to us, crawled in its wake. Others heard
of its whereabouts and came in from distant parts. There was the
well-known Gubbins with his "A' the World in a Box:" a halfpenny
peepshow, in which all the world was represented by Joseph and his
Brethren (with pit and coat), the bombardment of Copenhagen, the Battle
of the Nile, Daniel in the Den of Lions, and Mount Etna in eruption.
"Aunt Maggy's Whirligig" could be enjoyed on payment of an old pair of
boots, a collection of rags, or the like.