Evening star. [volume], May 26, 1929, Page 6, Image 96

About Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972

Image provided by: Library of Congress, Washington, DC

                
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, In the Kingdom of Tiny People. A group of midget* photographed in a Pari* garden.
By FLORENCE BARNES.
HIDDEN among the trees of Paris, in the
heart of the Bols de Boulogne, has
been discovered the Kingdom of Little
People—the Lillputlan village where
the gay Parisians came to look at themselves,
as it were, through the large end of the opera
glass.
A toy train meets visitors at the Mg gate
in the Jardain d’Acdamation and tugs them
through a cool Jungle of shrubbery, everybody
sitting two by two on the toy seats and hold
ing on with both hands at the curves. The
engine is not as tall as the engineer when he
stands up. It tilts the passengers perilously to
the right, and then way over to the left, and
finishes with a flirting snap-the-whlp that
lands the sightseen with a flourish on a low
platform.
Inside, the dwarfs are waiting, SO at least.
It is like “Gulliver's Travels” to walk into a
'village whose houses were not 10 feet high and
hullt like a Punch and Judy show to bring the
midgets onto a level with their guests.
These booths are frail things of stucco and
plaster; small roosts with tiny stairs like a
chicken-run at the side. Up these minute
Stairs come the midgets by 9 o’clock each morn
ing, for it is all but a crime for any of the
troupe to be late. Their acts at the theater
did not start before 10, but all the world knows
that curious ones come early and stay late,
where a circus is concerned, and this is the
smallest circus one had ever seen out of the
•land of toys, and Its tiny entertainers must
be in their booths, ready to strut about and
■sell post cards of themselves to the early
birds.
f"kVER each one’s booth is painted a title,
V* nice a calling card. These were all grand
-folk, apparently, scions of Latin and Teutonic
Mobility. Lords and ladles, and even royalty.
The bourgeoisie know their place and step
hurriedly out of the path when- the smallest
Tof Shetland ponies canters past, bearing to the
'Hippodrome Prussian officers with pasty, flat
laces; commanding generals nearly three feet
high. Their uniforms are cut by military tai
lors and fitted like wax, and the tiny gray cloth
coats are as perfect as any at Potsdam. Their
'ladies, too, are slender, beautiful walking dolls,
the last word in chiffons from Vienna and
Budapest. These aristocrats of the colony are
more delicately modeled than the others. Their
hands have long fingers and good nails, and the
haughty heads are small, to match the neat,
slender figures.
But the grinning little rough-necks, who are
not so expensively finished, enjoy themselves
just as thoroughly as their finer kin. They de
light In being looked at in wonder, and swag
ger about with their betters, their enormous
heads and stumpy figures heavy with more
than Importance. They look like cakes that
had risen too fast and been spoiled In the
baking.
Most dwarfs come from Germany, mainly
from the Black Forest, and many of them
are said to have been deliberately stunted for
show purposes. There aie pigmies, too. In
Italy and the Tyrole and the Balkans. The
uglier they are the more pompously they strut
and their little faces are thrust Into the lime
light at every possible opportunity. They de
light In being photographed and In adding
themselves to already satisfactory groups.
The village was built for the Summer sea
son only; light booths, tossed together for
show and not permanence. Every one ap-
THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C. t MAY 26, 1929—PART 7.
A Paris Garden, Where Gathered the
Midgets of Many Nations--- Everything
on a Dollhouse Seale--r Troubles of
the Lilliputians.
patently went home to roost, for there seemed
to be no sleeping quarters. The aristocrats
did, anyway, riding off on the fat ponies after
the last show, through the Bols and tbs gate
and the smiling people In the streets, haughty
and aloof from such %ho were not so fortunate
as to be bora different from the rest of the
pack. A few may have done light housekeep
ing somewhere, but the quarters were all too
frail and exposed for much privacy. >
There was street after street of these booths,
like a toy town, with toy furniture In the
main room for the midgets to sit on and rest
between shows, and sheafs of post cards to be
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Mrs. Tom Thumb and Primn.
sold, showing them In their "gets. 1 * Some*
times they smoked and threw matches down
like everybody else, but as there was also a
toy lire department and police force, nobody
felt at all uneasy about It, but wandered about
the streets between shows, visiting their friends
and talking over their neighbors; not bowing
to one another If they did not want to, or
passing some rival In haughty disdain.
But they all had to be at the Hippodrome
on time. When the bell rang, the fat ponies
came racing in, with platforms strapped on
their backs for gay little ballerinas (jandng
on their toes, and a six-foot ring master close
at hand to catch anybody who might lorn
her balance and fall off.
Here came his royal highness, the Prince
Smaun Sing Hpoo, hardly two feet high and
as black as his own Burmese gods. He would
saunter into the ring and bow to the audience
with the gravity brooming a prince of India,
hand his top hat and his frock coat to his
attendant and as gravely proceed to whirl
Indian clubs as large as cream bottles, to lift
real cannon shot that whacked on the floor when
he dropped them, to swing by one arm on a
trapeae, way out over the breathless audience
and back, and then stand at ease, flexing his
muscles for an admiring gallery as if—pouf I
It were nothing at all!
CINQ had a sweetheart, a pink German mid*
u get even tinier than hi««n> and with no
apparent scruples as to race and color hi a
future husband. She was a blond, with a fig
ure like a fat doll, and a small head covered
with fussy golden hair, Just the type a dark
Oriental would adore. Also, ■*«» was called
“Princess”—most suitable for a rajah’s bride.
There was a Si. Bernard dog in the troupe,
belonging to two Kentucky dwarfs nam»d
Laibal. Sing was terrified of the antm*i it
must have looked like 'a mammoth to tdm.
Sing would scramble onto my knee for sanc
tuary and say in perfect English: "Isn’t it a
devil dog! Did you bring’your poodle today?
Where is he? Did he really cross the ocean
and walk on his hind legs down the deck? Make
him walk now.” Standing on my lap with
that pinched little face Just above my own, I
could not realise that he was alive—a man of
21 and engaged to be married. He was a
talking toy with the mind of a child.
“Will you come to my show again today?"
patting my cheeks with those dark little hands.
“Have you any chocolates?”
It was the big dog’s owner who first dis
covered to us the prise of the whole show.
“Are you the only American midgets, Mr.
Daibal? You and your wife?"
“Good heavens, no! Didn’t we know who
was right over there back of the band stand?
Well, come and seel”
“By George! It’s Mrs. Tom Thumb!” It
was. There she stood in her booth, selling
a post card with her picture on it. She was
like a letter from home in that foreign land,
the very breath of New England, in her Vic
torian bustle and crimps, her ulster and specks
—she was getting ready to go home—the funny
little plush dress laced in at the waist like
an hour glass; but, above all, the plain Yankee
accent when she said, “My dear, you are good
to see. Come again tomorrow. It will be my
birthday.” She put on a mink tippet because
it was cool, and an old-fashioned bonnet, and.
Indeed, I wanted to go with her, not to lose
so soon this new-found bit of home that rode
away with the small fat husband, Count Primo
Magrl, Tom’s successor, whom I had entirely
forgotten to mention.
Patient little gentleman, Primo, in name
only; he never ventured to steal her thunder.
Gallantly he escorted her to the theater and
then back to their booth whenever their turn
was due. He was punctillious about everything
but his necktie. He detested the feeling of
anything around his throat and never, as ter
as his friends can testify, wore either a col
lar or cravat, even with a dress suit. A fat
diamond stud fastened his collar-band and a
still larger diamond called attention to the
fat hand that was rarely without a great black
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