la Capoul, with whom you were a little bit in love, as you may as well confess, as indeed were all the lady performers of the troupe. A quick entrechat of twinkling feet by way of salutation to the public and then at a single bound, presto, hop! there you are erect on your great platform of a saddle. There is a crack of the whip, a furious storm of sound from the brasses of the orchestra, the truffled horse falls into his mechanical little gallop and hop! hop! away you go!
What an Olympian creature you were in those days, comtesse! The number of your years was seventeen, and you had the legs of the Capitoline Venus. What strength and grace! and that perfection of beauty that it takes the New World to produce with its crossing and blinding of different strains. The murmur ran through the throng: "It is the beautiful Adah! the American!" and then, carried off your feet by this gale of triumph, you pirouetted away more audaciously than ever.
The first part of the performance always wound up with a long, crackling fire of bravos. While the assistants were climbing upon their stools with their hoops and streamers in preparation for the next part of the programme, and the clown was amusing the gallery gods by knocking his comrade flat, face downward, and then picking him up delicately by the seat of his trousers, you were making the circuit of the ring at a walk, perched on the edge of your saddle as lightly as a butterfly. That was the moment that afforded the keenest enjoyment to your admirers. Proudly erect did you hold your goddess-like head, garlanded with flowers, and from the skirts of gauze that eddied and swirled about your form your sublime
