She saw with dismay his attractive display of "store" goods. Then her face flushed as he began to set out whisky bottles and glasses. Her first impulse was to gather up her belongings and get home as quickly as possible. In her perplexity she looked around for little William. Regarding a circus with such contempt herself, it had never occurred to her that he would care to see it. He was a timid little fellow, who always hid when company came to the house, and he had never been away from home more than a dozen times in his life. The crowds frightened him, and he stayed as closely as a shadow at his grandmother's elbow until the music began. Then he forgot himself. It thrilled him indescribably, and he watched with longing eyes as the people crowded into the tent. It seemed to him that he must certainly go wild if he could not follow, but they had sold nothing. Even if they had, he would not have dared to ask for enough money to pay his admission, it seemed such an enormous sum. As she began to nod in her chair he began to edge nearer the tent. He could catch now and then a word of the clown's jokes, and hear the roars of laughter that followed. When the clown began to sing, William had one ear pressed against the tent. People clapped and cheered uproariously at the last line of every stanza. He could not hear enough of the words to understand why. In the general commotion he was conscious of only one thing: he was on the outside of that tent, and he must get inside or die. Regardless of consequences, he threw himself on the grass and wriggled around until he succeeded in squeezing himself under the canvas. There was a moment of dizzy bewilderment as he sat up and looked around. Then some cold, squirming thing touched the back of his neck. He gave a smothered cry of terror; it was the elephant's trunk. He had come up directly under the animal "from t'other side of the world, that could eat a six-foot cock of hay at one meal." As he sat there, shivering and blubbering, afraid to move because he did not know which end of the clumsy monster was head and which tail, he heard a loud guffaw. The pock-marked Irishman who had charge of the nine-banded armadillo had seen the little side-show, and it doubled him up with laughter. He roared and slapped his thigh and laughed again until he was out of breath. Then he gravely wiped his eyes and drew the boy out from under the great animal. William clung to him, sobbing. Then the warm-hearted fellow, seeing that he was really terrified, took him around and showed him all the sights. In the delight of that hour, home, grandmother, and the world outside were completely forgotten.