It was Orpheus fallen from his high estate.

What a mockery the glare of the lamps and the capers of the mountebanks were, and how satisfied were we to enjoy it all without going inside.

I hear the "Waterloo veterans" still, and remember their patriotic outbursts: On the sixteenth day of June, brave boys, while cannon loud did roar, We being short of cavalry they pressed on us full sore; But British steel soon made them yield, though our numbers was but few, And death or victory was the word on the plains of Waterloo.
The storm-stayed shows often found it easier to sink to rest in a field than to leave it.

For weeks at a time they were snowed up, sufficiently to prevent any one from Thrums going near them, though not sufficiently to keep the pallid mummers indoors.

That would in many cases have meant starvation.