circus was a very paying novelty. The trainer would lie in the cage between the lion and the tigress, while the cubs strolled about over him, and romped among themselves. Then the man would lie on the lion and the tigress on the man.
A little after this Wombwell announced a great attraction in a dog and lion fight. Such a thing would soon be interfered with legally nowadays, but then, although it made a great stir, nobody thought it particularly barbarous. The lion "Nero" was confronted by six bull-dogs. But Nero was apathetic and peaceful, and the dogs were very frightened, and the "fight" was a fiasco. Whereupon on another evening another lion, "Wallace," was produced, with six more bull-dogs. This time the lion was in a worse temper, and the dogs a little more aggressive; soon all the half-dozen were killed or maimed, and Wallace was stalking about the cage with the last in his mouth, just as a cat carries a rat. Wombwell's trainer at this time was "Manchester Jack," a great celebrity in his way, and a man of unusual daring.
Fiction.Fact.
No more lion and dog fights took place after "Wallace" had made the experiment so expensive in the matter of dogs, but various "combats" of a more or less bogus description were leading features for a long time in wild animal performances. A sensational "man and tiger fight" went about the country, and drew much money at fairs until it became whispered that the "tiger" was a big dog sewn up in a false skin.
"Macomo, the African Lion King" (who was really a black sailor engaged in an emergency), had a "lion-hunt" at Manders's menagerie, in which he chevied the animals around the cage. He was a bold man, and upon one occasion entered a cage in which two large strange tigers were fighting desperately, and although himself attacked and badly wounded, succeeded in beating them into submission with his whip.
It was in imitating Macomo's "lion-hunt" that his successor at Manders's, Macarthy—an Irishman who called himself Massarti—met his death. Unfortunately, it seems only too certain that Macarthy, in this, his last appearance, which was at Bolton, was not quite so sober as he should have been, and that, if he had been a little more sober, it might not have been his last appearance. Macarthy laboured under what would seem to be the fatal disadvantage of having only one arm; nevertheless, he had great command over his animals, although there seems little doubt that fear of his violence was at the bottom of their obedience, and that they took a signal vengeance at the first opportunity. He lost his arm in a tiger’s mouth, and the public be-
