And now another call for the appointed sport is drowned by the flat-boatmen singing the ancient tune of Mear.

You can hear the words-- "Old Grimes is dead, that good old soul" -- from ribald lips and throats turned brazen with laughter, from singers who toss their hats aloft and roll in their seats; the chorus swells to the accompaniment of a thousand brogans-- "He used to wear an old gray coat All buttoned down before." A ribboned man in the arena is trying to be heard, and the Latins raise one mighty cry for silence.

The big red man gets a hand over the parson's mouth, and the ribboned man seizes his moment.
"They have been endeavoring for hours," he says, "to draw the terrible animals from their dens, but such is their strength and fierceness, that"-- His voice is drowned.

Enough has been heard to warrant the inference that the beasts cannot be whipped out of the storm-drenched cages to which menagerie-life and long starvation have attached them, and from the roar of indignation the man of ribbons flies.

The noise increases.
Men are standing up by hundreds, and women are imploring to be let out of the turmoil.