Peck's Bad Boy with the CircusPeck, George W. (George Wilbur)
General
Peck's Bad Boy with the Circus
Peck, George W. (George Wilbur)
Boys -- Juvenile fiction; Circus -- Juvenile fiction
The bearded woman came next, with her whiskers done up in curl papers,
and then the fat woman got one foot through the transom, and she
couldn't get it back in, and the train hands got an ax and were going to
cut her leg off, and save one foot, at least, when pa got a move on him,
and took the ax and broke out the side of the car, and got her out.
Eight or nine men lifted her tenderly onto a stack of hay, and she
wrapped it around her, 'cause she left her clothes in her berth.
[Illustration: Pa Got an Ax and Cut the Fat Woman Out.]
Well, it was a sight when the people were got out of our car, and they
let it burn, to light up the scene, and pa and I and the boss canvasman
went along the ditched train, and helped people out. The giant was in
two upper berths, and he got one leg out of the transom over one berth,
and one leg out of the transom over the other berth, and we pulled his
legs, but he couldn't make it, so pa took an ax and made both berths
into one, and got him out.
The giant shook himself and started on a run across the marsh, but he
mired up to his neck, and a farmer who heard the noise came to order us
off his hay field for trespass, and yelled: "Here's a head of some of
your performers cut off away over here," and he was going to bring it
in, when the farmer found the head was alive, and he ran away from it.
In an hour we had everybody out, and made beds for them by spreading out
hay cocks, and nobody seemed to be hurt so very much. We heard a
locomotive whistle up the road, and some one said the relief train was
coming with doctors and nurses, but the show owner who was with us said:
"Relief doctors, nothing. That is a train-load of lawyers and claim
agents to settle with us. The doctors will not come till to-morrow. Now,
everybody pretend to be hurt awful bad, and strike the sharks for
$10,000 apiece, and come down to $100, if you can't do any better."
It was getting daylight, and the relief train stopped, and the good
Samaritans came wading into the hay marsh, bent on settling with us
cheap. The first lawyer asked the principal owner how many were killed,
'cause they could figure exactly how much they have to pay for a dead
one, but the live ones are the ones that make trouble for a railroad,
'cause they can kick and argue. The boss said nobody was dead, but the
giant, who was mired in out of sight. The giant heard what was said, and
he yelled that he was alive, and wouldn't settle for less than $20,000,
but the claim agent said the giant would be dead in 15 minutes in that
quicksand, so he would let him sink, and pay for him as a dead one.
The giant said if they would pull him out of the mud he would settle for
$100, and they pulled him out, and the rest of the injured were going to
mob him for settling so cheap.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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