A GRIMY, wrinkled and slouchy elephant, pudging ahead and straining at his rusty harness, followed by eight horses plodding two and two, was drawing a train of vehicles whose outlines were almost hidden by the dust cloud rolling up from under the scuffing hoofs. Through puffs of dust, glass surfaces sparkled dully, and there was an occasional glint of gilt. The leading waggon could be more plainly seen. “It’s a reg’lar circus cart,” said Brickett, wonderingly. They all perceived that the shape of the waggon’s body was the simulacrum of a large caravel whose bow and stern rose high in the air. There was a gilded, life-size female figure at the bow and a companion figure at the stern. The only man in sight was perched on a high seat let into the fore part of the waggon, the converging lines of the bow meeting just above his head. “But there ain’t been no circus advertised ’round here,” cried Uncle Lysimachus Buck, as he stared. The strange train of vehicles swung wide at the head of the cove to cross the creek bridge. “There’s six of ’em,” commented Amazeen, as the waggons presented their broadsides, “and it’s a circus, dummed if ’tain’t.” One waggon was fastened behind another. Three vans with huge mirrors in the sides were following the big boat-waggon in the lead; the fifth vehicle had a circular body scalloped like a sea shell, and a painted figure held a canopy over it; sixth and last trundled a little red cart of the kind made familiar by circus chariot races. The driver of this strange outfit guided his dripping horses and the huge piloter across the bridge. He cracked a big whip over them, and they came up the short rise toward Brickett’s store, gallantly surging to the work, the faded bridle pompons nodding above the horses’ heads, the dust swirling behind. The elephant shuffled briskly, ragged ears flapping and trunk swaying. The breeze on top of the hill volleyed the dust back on the procession, and when the driver pulled up in the little square with a mighty bellow of “Whoa!” he and his outfit were almost invisible. As the white cloud settled away and revealed the waggons the little group on Brickett’s platform stared open-mouthed at every feature. The gilding was dingy, the paint blistered and cracked, the mirrors streaked and grimy, but the elephant and the chariots and the circus glamour were all there. The man who sat on the high seat wore a dusty tall hat, cocked back so far as to almost rest on his neck. A linen duster was buttoned closely under his gray whiskers--prolongations of his bristling moustache--descending in two trailing streams and framing a smoothly shaved chin. This elderly stranger set his elbows on his knees, the reins hanging loosely, leaned forward and leisurely surveyed the group on the platform. One eye was set and immovable--a glass eye. The other roved and twinkled and shuttled and blinked in lively style.