Brown, as he heard what Bunny said. Or rather, Bunny's father did not
hear exactly, for he had been thinking about something else. But he had
caught the name Fred Ward.
"Bunny thinks that colored banjo player with that medicine show may be
Fred Ward," said Mrs. Brown. "Do you think it would be of any use to
inquire, Daddy?"
"Why, that _is_ a medicine show, isn't it!" exclaimed Mr. Brown, as
though he saw it for the first time. "And it's just like the one we
heard about that had a boy banjo player with it."
"There's a boy banjo player now," said Bunny. "He's going to play,
Daddy, too! Do you think it could be Fred?"
The man who was selling the bottles of medicine, after telling the
people how much good it would do them, had stopped to let the boy
traveling with him play the banjo.
There are, or there used to be, many such traveling medicine shows.
Sometimes there would be a whole troop of Indians, some real and some
make-believe, that would be engaged by the seller of the medicine. He
would have the Indians do some of their queer dances and then, when a
crowd had collected, he would sell some medicine--maybe some he said the
Indians made themselves.
Another medicine seller would go about with a gaily painted wagon,
carrying a cornet player, a singer or a banjoist to attract a crowd.
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