Among the company was an equestrian who appeared as Mdlle Ella, and whose graceful acts of equitation elicited almost as much applause as those of Hernandez, while the young artiste’s charms of face and form were a never-ending theme of conversation and meditation for the thousands of admirers who nightly followed them round the ring with enraptured eyes. It was the same wherever Ella appeared, and great was the surprise and mortification of the young equestrian’s admirers when it became known, several years afterwards, that the beautiful, the graceful, the accomplished Ella was not a woman, but a man! Ella is now a husband and a father.
James Newsome was also a member of the very talented company which Hernandez and his partners had brought together under the roof of Drury Lane. After completing his engagement with Batty, and entering into matrimonial obligations with Pauline Hinné, he had proceeded to Paris, where he applied himself earnestly to the art of which he soon became a leading master, namely, the breaking of horses in what is termed the _haute école_, then almost unknown in this country. The fame which he acquired in Paris procured him an engagement in Brussels, where he taught riding to the Guides, by whose officers he was presented, on leaving the Belgian capital, with a service of plate. From Brussels he proceeded to Berlin, of which city Madame Newsome is a native. There the famous English riding master added to his laurels by breaking a vicious horse named Mirza, belonging to Prince Frederick William (now heir to the imperial crown of Germany), who presented him with the animal, in recognition of his skill. It may here be added, that he had the honour, some years afterwards, of exhibiting his system of horse-breaking before the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Cambridge, by whom it was highly commended.
On the termination of their season at Drury Lane, Hernandez and his partners associated Newsome with themselves in the firm, and made a successful tour of the provinces. In the following season, however, Newsome separated from his partners, and started a well-appointed circus of his own. The distinctive features of his establishment are, that he breaks his horses himself—other circus proprietors, not having the advantage of himself, Batty, and Ducrow, of being trained in the profession, being compelled to hire horse-breakers; and that the performances are not given under a tent, set up for a couple of days only, and then removed to the next town, as in the case of most other circuses, but in buildings erected for the purpose in most of the large towns of the north of England, and permanently maintained.