ould it be held responsible for the excesses of its
disinterested sympathisers?... Still, the appalling trick showed the
high temperature to which blood had risen in the genial battle between
great rival organs. Persons in the inmost ring whispered that Denry
Machin had at length been bested on this critically important day.

IV

Snape's Circus used to be one of the great shining institutions of North
Staffordshire, trailing its magnificence on sculptured wheels from town
to town, and occupying the dreams of boys from one generation to
another. Its headquarters were at Axe, in the Moorlands, ten miles away
from Hanbridge, but the riches of old Snape had chiefly come from the
Five Towns. At the time of the struggle between the _Signal_ and
the _Daily_ its decline had already begun. The aged proprietor had
recently died, and the name, and the horses, and the chariots, and the
carefully-repaired tents had been sold to strangers. On the Saturday of
the anniversary and the football match (which was also Martinmas
Saturday) the circus was set up at Oldcastle, on the edge of the Five
Towns, and was giving its final performances of the season. Even boys
will not go to circuses in the middle of a Five Towns' winter. The
_Signal_ people had hired the processional portion of Snape's for
the late afternoon and early evening. And the instructions were that the
entire _cortege_ should be round about the _Signal_ offices,
in marching order, not later than five o'clock.

But at four o'clock several gentlemen with rosettes in their
button-holes and _Signal_ posters in their hands arrived important
and panting at the fair-ground at Oldcastle, and announced that the
programme had been altered at the last moment, in order to defeat
certain feared machinations of the unscrupulous _Daily_. The
cavalcade was to be split into three groups, one of which, the chief,
was to enter Hanbridge by a "back road," and the other two were to go to
Bursley and Longshaw respectively. In this manner the forces of
advertisement would be distributed, and the chief parts of the district
equally honoured.

The special linen banners, pennons, and ribbons--bearing the words--

"_SIGNAL:_ THIRTY-FIFTH ANNIVERSARY," &c.

had already been hung and planted and draped about the gilded summits of
the chariots. And after some delay the processions were started,
separating at the bottom of the Cattle Market. The head of the Hanbridge
part of the procession cons