INDEX TO VOLUME I.

END OF VOLUME I.

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EDINBURGH

[1]. Pietro Torrigiano’s history has an English interest. He was certainly a “fighting man.” While serving as a volunteer in the army of Pope Alexander VI. he modelled some bronze figures for some Florentine merchants, who invited him to go with them to England. Here he was a favourite with “bluff King Hal,” who employed Torrigiano to execute the tomb of his father, Henry VII. in Westminster Abbey, for which he received the then large sum of £1,000. Employed to execute a sarcophagus for Cardinal Wolsey—the Ipswich butcher’s son—his work (once intended to enclose the coffin of Henry VIII. at Windsor) by the “irony of fate” was destined to enshrine the remains of a greater English hero. Nelson lies beneath the dome of St Paul’s in the sarcophagus sculptured by Torrigiano for Wolsey, his inner coffin being made from a piece of the French flagship L’Orient, blown up at the battle of the Nile. Torrigiano died in Spain in the prisons of the Inquisition, having been condemned as a sacrilegious heretic for demolishing a “statue of the Virgin,” which having been paid inadequately for by a niggardly nobleman, the Duke of Arcoss, he broke in pieces with his mallet. The incensed grandee had him arrested, and Torrigiano, to avoid being roasted at an auto da fé, refused food and so perished, A.D. 1522.

[2]. See Apollon., Argonaut.; Theocritus, Idyll. 22; Apollodorus, b. i., c. 9.

[3]. Statius, Thebais, vi., v. 893; Lucan, Pharsalia, iv., 598; Juvenal, Sat. iii., 88.

[4]. The inquiring reader will find the sex of “the Trojan horse” settled in some humorous scholia to Pope’s “Dunciad,” book i., line 212, quizzically attributed to Richard Bentley, the famous critic, under the alias of Martinus Scriblerus. And at this present time of writing we may note that the axe-wielding ex-premier, the Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone, in his great speech on introducing the Reform Bill (March 19, 1866), borrowed a metaphor from this ancient fable with eloquent propriety—

“Scandit fatalis machina muros

Fœta armis.”

[5]. Forsyth’s “Remarks during an Excursion in Italy,” p. 117.

[6]. In Blaine’s “Cyclopædia of Rural Sports,” art. British Boxing, p. 1219. Longmans 1860.

[7]. An intelligent correspondent of The Sporting Life newspaper, in a series of letters from Germany, written in July, 1863, gives a graphic and blood-tinted picture of “How the Students fight at Heidelberg,” which we would commend to the perusal of the pedagogues of our public schools. We have space for no more than a few fragmentary sentences, but the whole is worth serious thought on the part of those who “teach the ingenuous youth of modern nations.” The writer says:—“I will now describe to you three duels, out of many I have witnessed. The first with the sabre, the other two with schlagers. The first was between the præses, or head man of one of the principal corps, and an officer in the German army. It appears that the officer was at one time a student in the University of Heidelberg, which he quitted to enter the German service. Being quartered at Mannheim, which is close to Heidelberg, he determined to revisit the place, when, for some reason or other unknown to me, he was at once drawn into a duel by the præses of the corps. Allow me to remark, en passant, that an unfortunate student was killed here in a sabre-duel some three or four months ago. A court of inquiry was held, and it was proved by the medical men that the deceased had a remarkably thin skull, which would easily have been fractured by the slightest blow, a fall, or anything of that sort. The result was that all parties were acquitted. But I must return to my sabre-duel. While I was passing through Heidelberg, Old “Puggy” came and told me there would be a sabre-duel early the next morning in the Ingle Suisse, or “Angels’ Meadow,” a small meadow up in the mountains, surrounded by trees, and where all the sabre and pistol duels came off. The “Angels’ Meadow” is about ten minutes walk from the Hirsch Gasse. I suppose it has derived its name from its extreme beauty, but I think the “Devil’s Meadow” would be a more appropriate name, for during the last twenty years no end of fatal duels have taken place there. I took care to be on the ground early, in order to get a view, which I did by mounting a tree. The attendance was very small, as only a limited number are allowed to be present at a duel which is likely to be attended with loss of life. Each man arrived on the ground in a carriage, the student being accompanied by the University doctor, while the officer had a medical friend. While the seconds and umpires were arranging preliminaries, the men were prepared by their respective doctors. The combatants in this case were prepared as follows:—A leather pad to protect the stomach, and a woollen one guarded the lower parts. The sword arm was covered as usual, and a leather apron put on. The whole upper part of the body was left open to attack. The ring was made, the seconds, umpire, and referee took up their respective positions, and the two doctors undoing their cases of instruments, laid them on the ground ready for any emergency. The terms were that the men, if able to scratch, were to fight fifteen minutes, not including rests and stoppages. The umpire of the student (the student being the challenger) now prepared to give the word. Previous to this, a sabre, with schlager handles, was handed to each man. At the word Silentium, you might have heard a pin drop. Gebunden, or the order to bind them, was then given, and a silk handkerchief was tied round the wrist, and fastened to the handle. Gebunden ist was the reply, which means, “bound it is.” Auf de mensur, “go into position and scratch,” Faretz, “ready,” and Los, “go at it,” were called, and at it they went with a will, the guard used being the schlager-guard, and not the English sword exercise. Two or three rounds were fought, when the officer got a fearful wound on the side of the head. The round was of course over, and after a few restoratives had been administered, silence was again called. I may as well state here, once and for all, that this was the only wound the officer got; not so with the student, the wounds he received about the head were of a fearful character, and round after round he came up. The time having expired, the student was carried to his carriage; and, owing to the injuries received, he could not leave his room for several months. When he left his room, he went to the seaside. It is needless for me to say that both of them will carry the marks of this contest to the grave.

“It was on April 10, during vacation, and while there were scarcely any students in Heidelberg, I was sitting at my window, and saw four or five students go towards the Hirsch Gasse; I followed them, and when I arrived there the men were stripping. All being in readiness, they were led out of the house, each arm being carefully supported by the seconds. One of these gentlemen was a student from Munich, the other was a Heidelberger, and the men were placed opposite to each other. Silence was called, and the fight began. The first round occupied considerably less than half a minute, and was finished by the seconds springing in and terminating the round, because one of the schlagers was bent. The second round followed without any result. The combatants are never allowed to be in mensur more than three-quarters of a minute—scarcely ever half a minute: these short rounds are done to rest the arm. In the third round, the Munich man got a cut on the cheek, a Bluticher, or “a blood,” was the cry. The seconds cried “halt!” and “a blood” was scored to the Heidelberg student. The fourth round was a teazer for the Munich man, for he got his nose divided clean in two. No surgeon could have done it better: you could have laid one half back on one cheek, and the other half on the other. After this, the Munich man lost his nerve, and every round he only came up to be receiver-general. At last he got a fearful cut behind the head, dividing an artery. Seeing this, the surgeon immediately stopped the duel, after they had been at it seven minutes (fifteen minutes was the time they had to fight). The wounded man was taken inside the inn, where every necessary attention was paid him which his condition required. I never saw the man again.

“The second schlager duel which I saw was between a Prussian and a Schwabian: both fine men. The morning was a wet one, so they fought in a cart-shed. Having gone into a detailed account of two other duels, it will not be necessary for me to do so in this one; suffice it to say, the surgeon made them fight out the full time (fifteen minutes), and the Prussian got no less than six ugly cuts about the head; fearful gashes they were. He had to keep his bed; and, like most of these duellists, will carry the marks to the grave. As he was led out of the shed, he presented a piteous spectacle; and I only wish some of the detractors of the P.R. could have seen him as I did. These two schlager duels are good average samples.”

The writer adds, after some sensible remarks on these sickening and murderous savageries, “I write thus strongly, because I cannot and will not believe that any one who has the good of his country at heart can decry a well-conducted P.R., as it might be if legalised, or at the least winked at and tolerated.” As to the fatal encounters with knife, rifle, and revolver in the Transatlantic States, they stain almost every sheet of their journalism.

[8]. As it would overload the page with notes to give authorities for these remarks, we may observe that the opinions upon pugilism of the celebrated Mr. Windham, Mr. Harvey Combe, Sir Henry Smith, the Duke of Hamilton, Francis Duke of Bedford, Lord Yarmouth, Mr. Barber Beaumont, Sir John Sinclair, the first Lord Lowther, and other legislators of both Houses, will be found under the periods with which they were contemporary, together with the dicta of justices and judges as occasion called them forth. Anecdotes and extracts from the writings or speeches of Dr. Johnson, Dr. Parr, Dr. Drury, Adam Smith, Sir Walter Scott (in Paul’s Letters to his Kinsfolk), Professor Wilson, Lord Byron, Tom Moore, Sir Robert Peel (the late), and other admirers of the pugilate, are scattered in the places where they appropriately occur.

[9]. On this point the Hon. Grantley Fitzhardinge Berkeley, M.P. for Gloucester, has expressed himself with outspoken candour in “A Letter on the Sports of the People, and their Moral Effects,” which is invaluable as the testimony of one who has shared in the sports and studied the customs of his countrymen. He says:—“Looking at a mere prize-fight got up by the backers and friends of each party, it seems, in its abstract position, to be an useless brutality for two men, having no personal cause of quarrel, to bruise each other for the possession of gold; but, regarding it in another light, as the necessary display of a fair standard of combat, by the rights and regulations of which, throughout the country, all quarrels determined by personal conflict are to be settled, in this light it assumes a character of safe and wholesome public example, which its most strenuous opposers cannot with justice deny. In my mind, then, the prize fight and fair boxing-match are the means of teaching the people to become advocates for honest and gallant decisions in all cases of quarrel, and that the encouragement of the use of the fist is the greatest antidote that can be offered to the revengeful and dastardly resort to the assassin’s knife.

“In freedom from war, in the retirement and blessings of the country, there are no gallant deeds to keep alive the emulation and courage of the English peasant; then I hold that any amusement which tends to the display of personal gallantry, is calculated to be beneficial to the human mind. In spite of all the outcry raised by self-dubbed humane societies, and the abuse to which they often stretch the power vested in them for better purposes; in spite of the sickly preachings of diseased and over-sensitive minds, there is no set of people more angry with the fact of two armies being in presence of each other without fighting, than those whose health or inclinations confine them to the tea-table and fireside, and who would faint at the mere sight of their own blood.

“It is the man who cannot leave home, that cries out for war; it is the man who has no chance of bleeding, that calls for blood. A paper on the breakfast-table, which brings a return of thousands slain, is, to the appetite of those sickly sophists, an agreeable stimulant. ‘Humanity’ makes a capital banner for a cavilist, ignorant of the matter of the subject he condemns, to march under; and ‘no cruelty’ is a cry like the ‘no popery’ cry, which gathers together hosts of unthinking people ready to arraign and pull down they know not what.

“The shrivelled penman, whether clerk or layman, whose thews and sinews have wasted through inactivity, sits at his desk and condemns recreations, pastimes, and pleasures, the value of which he has never known, and the loss of which, in consequence, is immaterial to him; while hosts of others, conscious of their own more secret mental deformities, are zealous to hang charges of immorality on any superficially available corner of the characters of their neighbours, for the sole purpose of sustaining one reputation on the ruins of another.”

[10]. Vide Mr. Henry Mayhew’s admirable pen and pencil sketches of “London Labour and the London Poor.”

[11]. It is a curious statistical fact that of twenty murders, accompanied with brutal violence, committed in 1862–3–4, the writer traced no less than eleven to inhabitants of England not native born. A more recent atrocity, the railway murder of Mr. Briggs, we owe to a German immigrant; the five preceding ones (out of eleven) to Irishmen, who bear a proportion to Englishmen as 5 to 150, or 1 in 30 of the population. Then comes in close sequence, the brutal assassination and mutilation of a German (Fuhrup) by his countryman Karl Kohl; and later we find recorded a knife and shillalah fight between Italians (Gregorio Mogni and Serafino Pelizzioni), who among them stabbed several persons and killed an Irishman, one Michael Harrington, the initiatory feud being the merits of Garibaldi on the Italian side, and his Holiness Pio Nono on the Irish.

[12]. This shows that the professors of gymnastics were numerous at the time.

[13].

“To Fig and Broughton he commits his breast,

To steel it to the fashionable test.”

And in Bramstone’s Man of Taste we read:—

“In Fig, the prize-fighter, by day delight.

And sup with Colley Cibber every night.”

[14]. The “Ring” in Hyde Park (not the drive so called) was formed in 1723, by “order of his Majesty,” and encircled by a fence. It was situated about 300 yards from Grosvenor Gate. The area is still visible—a circle of very old trees belted by a plantation of younger ones. It was the scene of many impromptu conflicts, especially among the “chairmen” and “linkmen” of the two first Georges’ reigns, and the early part of the third. Fights were stopped here by the “Bow-street myrmidons” towards the close of the last century, and the ring itself obliterated in 1820.

[15]. This assertion is found in contemporary writers, and in Pancratia, p. 34. The ponderous Doctor himself was not only an advocate, but a practitioner of the fistic art. His strength and personal courage were undoubted, as well as his humanity. We have the authority of his biographers for his knock-down of Davies, the bookseller, in King-street, Covent Garden, and among the anecdotes of the day current and printed, is one of his successfully “instructing” a bullying drayman who was beating a cripple; as for his humanity and strength, we have the well-known and oft-repeated fact of his carrying pick-a-back (despite his prejudice against Scotchmen,) a disabled Scottish beggar to the hospital in Crane-court, Fleet-street.

[16]. “Boxiana” in two or three places says 1740. That was the period when George Taylor, the proprietor of the Tottenham Court booth, was beaten by the renowned Broughton.

[17]. The residence of George the Third, wherein he received the address of the Corporation of London on his accession (June 16, 1727); and also the mansion of his son Frederick, Prince of Wales, above-mentioned, who died in his father’s lifetime. Here were held the glove matches above alluded to. Here, too (afterwards called Saville House), George the Third was proclaimed, on the 26th October, 1760, and received the great bodies of the State. Its subsequent history—as Miss Linwood’s Gallery of Needlework, rooms for sparring and fencing exhibitions, conjuring, etc., cafe chantant, casino, and restaurant—brings us to its fate by fire in the month of March, 1865, and its proposed resuscitation in 1879, as “The Alcazar” theatre, concert-room, and hotel. Sic transit, etc.

[18]. This was written in 1747. It had been well had the Captain’s friendly caution been remembered.

[19]. Richard Humphries, “the gentleman boxer,” who beat Mendoza in 1788, is here alluded to. He was five feet nine inches. We suspect Broughton was an inch or two taller (Slack was five feet eight and a half inches); but his bulk, in old age, took off his height.

[20]. “Pancratia,” p. 46, edit. 1811.

[21]. This clumsy, inefficient, and easily stopped blow has later claimants to the honour of its invention. It is simply the most dangerous to the boxer who tries it, and the most awkward delivery of the fist.

[22]. A provincialism for crushing and rubbing.

[23]. This conduct would, of course, have lost the Frenchman the fight in modern times. There are some odd points of resemblance in Pettit’s fighting and that of Heenan in his Wadhurst fight with Tom King, although one was fought on turf the other on a stage. Heenan did not, however, “rogue” it like the Frenchman, and walk off, but “took his gruel” till beaten out of time.

[24]. George Meggs, the collier, was from the pugilistic nursery of Bristol. After this surreptitious seizure of the championship, he returned to his native place, we presume, for in July, 1762, we find him fighting “a pitched battle for a considerable sum (“Fistiana” says £100) with one Millsom, a baker, of the rival city of Bath.” This came off at Calne in Wiltshire, when, after a fierce battle of forty minutes, Millsom was acknowledged the conqueror. In the next month (August, 1762), Meggs, having challenged Millsom to a second combat, was a second time beaten.

Parfitt Meggs, noticed hereafter, a noted west country boxer, also surrendered to Millsom. Parfitt afterwards beat a namesake of the retired champion Slack (whose Christian name was John, not Jem), in the year 1765, at Lansdown, near Bath, which has made a mess in more than one “history.” In “Fistiana” (1864 edit.), under Meggs (Parfitt) are several fights, including two defeats by Tom Tyne (1787) and a victory over Joe Ward in 1790, about all which history is silent, while under Tom Tyne we are told he was twice beaten by Mendoza; when and where we know not. He was, however, beaten by Bill Darts (afterwards champion) at Shepton Mallett, in 1764, which does not appear under Meggs’ name.

[25]. Pierce Egan alters this to eight stone and a half, to agree with his statement that he fought men double his weight.

[26]. The reporter’s statement shows that, according to the modern practice, Taylor had lost the fight.—He was merely fighting for an off-chance, a foul blow, or a wrangle. Ed.

[27]. Pancratia, pp. 52, 53.

[28]. “Tom Juchau, the paviour,” once bid fair to seize the championship—on June 20th, 1764. His name in pugilistic circles was “Disher;” how derived, we might in vain inquire. His first fight of importance was with Charles Cohant (or Coant), a butcher, who had fought several severely-contested battles. Cohant, being the best known man, was the favourite, and the contemporary account says, “During the first twenty-five minutes ‘Disher’ was scarcely able to give him a single blow, but was knocked down several times. At thirty-five minutes odds were so high that money was offered at any rate. At this time Disher (Tom Juchau) changed his mode of fighting, and giving Cohant a most tremendous blow, by which he fell; the odds immediately changed in his favour. After this they fought but four rounds, when Disher, having played in several dreadful blows, Cohant yielded, acknowledging himself to be vanquished. The fight lasted forty-seven minutes.” There is a Spartan brevity, an heroic simplicity, and a simple trust in the reports of these olden fights, which is truly “refreshing” (we believe that is the tabernacle phrase) in these days of prose-showering and persiflage.

The next report is equally commendable for its brevity. “On August the 27th (1765), Millsom, who had defeated the two Meggs (see ante), fought a battle with Thomas Juchau, the paviour, at Colney, near St. Alban’s, in which he failed to enjoy his usual triumph, Juchau proving his conqueror.” After half a page of undated rigmarole, headed “Tom Juchau,” Pierce Egan says, vol. i., p. 74, “The paviour was now considered a first-rate man, and soon matched himself against some of the most distinguished pugilists.” We cannot find that he ever fought again.

[29]. Lyons (champion, 1769) has no mention of his exploits, except his conquest of the heroic Bill Darts, June 27, 1769, for the championship. For twenty-five minutes Darts had it all his own way, and ten to one was laid upon him, when Lyons recovered second wind, and in forty-five minutes wrested the championship from him. The battle took place at Kingston-upon-Thames. No other notable fight is credited to Lyons.

[30]. Daily Advertiser, May 17, 1771, and Monthly Register for May of the same year.

[31]. “Boxiana,” vol. i., p. 83.

[32]. Joe Hood, see post, p. [53].

[33]. “Historical Sketches and Recollections of Pugilism.” 1 vol. London, 1803.

[34]. Elisha Crabbe, though a professor of some notoriety, does not take much rank by this conquest over a boxer of upwards of fifty years of age. His next fight was with Bob Watson, of Bristol, June 9, 1788 (see Appendix to Period II., in the memoir of Watson), wherein he was beaten, but not disgraced. His last fight was with Tom Tyne (see Tyne), wherein he was also defeated. Elisha, who was in height 5 feet 8 inches, was a man of great muscular power. For many years he filled the responsible position of a peace officer at the Mansion House of the City of London. He resigned this and became a licensed victualler in Duke’s Place. He was a civil, obliging man, and always an object of popular attraction among the people of his own persuasion. He died suddenly on board the Gravesend packet, June 9, 1809, on his return to London, and was buried with Jewish tokens of respect.

[35]. The following shows that police interference was occasional, even in these early times. “May 11, 1773, a boxing match took place at the Riding School, Three Hats, Islington, between John Pearce and John White, both shoemakers, for £10 a-side. At the commencement of the combat White seemed to have somewhat the advantage, but Pearce having recovered his wind, and given White several severe falls, was on the point of winning, when the high constable and his attendants mounted the stage, and put an end to the contest.”—Daily Advertiser, May 13th.

[36]. “Pancratia,” p. 63.

[37]. Bath’s name appears as Booth in “Fistiana,” under Hood, but his battles are omitted in their alphabetical place. The most important were—beat William Allen, 40 min., Barnet, Aug. 20, 1776; beat Joe Hood, £50, 20 min., Maidenhead, Sept. 8, 1778.

[38]. Life of Johnson in “Historical Recollections of Boxing, etc.” 8vo., 1804; copied in “Pancratia,” (1811), pp. 65, 66.

[39]. As even an opponent of so good a boxer, Love’s name deserves a line or two. On January 14, 1788, after the fights of Johnson and Ryan and Mendoza and Humphries had brought back to pugilism the highest patronage, Bill Love and Denis Ketcher, an Irish boxer, fought for 20 guineas. Love was seconded by W. Savage, and Ketcher by his brother. “There were not less than 10,000 spectators of this fight, who were highly surprised and gratified by the dexterity of Ketcher. In size and strength Love was superior, but in forty-five minutes he was obliged to yield the laurel to the superior adroitness of his opponent.” (“Pancratia,” p. 77.) Love’s next appearance was more successful. On January 22, only eight days after his defeat by Ketcher, Love fought George Ring (generally misprinted King), the Bath baker, a well-known pugilist, whose defeat of Edwards, on his first arrival in London, had made him much talked about. Love beat him cleverly in thirty-seven minutes, in “the Hay Fields, Bloomsbury.”

[40]. Called Bill Ward in “Recollections” and in “Pancratia.” His name is correctly given in “Fistiana.” Warr beat Wood (Captain Robinson’s coachman) at Navestock, Essex, December 31, 1788; was twice beaten by Mendoza (see Mendoza); beat Stanyard, “a pugilist of celebrity from Birmingham,” for 100 guineas, in ten rounds, thirteen minutes, at Colnbrook, October 26, 1792.

[41]. It would be injustice to omit a short sketch of what our Yankee friends would call so “tall” a boxer as Isaac Perrins. His immense strength was “yoked with a lamb-like disposition.” In Birmingham, where he had long followed his occupation as foreman of a large manufactory, he was respected by his employers, and beloved by the workmen under him. Perrins was far from an illiterate man. In his general conversation he was intelligent, cheerful, and communicative, and possessed of a considerable share of discernment, which, after he quitted his calling as a coppersmith at Birmingham, and became a publican at Manchester, was of great service to him in business. His house was well attended by customers of a superior class. Isaac, too, had a natural taste for music, and, at one period of his life, was the leader of a country choir in psalmody. In company, Perrins was facetious, full of anecdote, and never tardy in giving his song; and was a strong instance in his own person, among many others which might be cited, if necessary, that it does not follow as a matter of course that all pugilists are blackguards! The following anecdote from a work entitled “The Itinerant,” not only places the good temper and amazing strength of Perrins in a conspicuous point of view, but exhibits one of the peculiar traits of an erratic histrionic genius, whose reckless riot ruined and extinguished his higher gifts. “It happened that Perrins, the noted pugilist, made one of the company this evening. He was a remarkably strong man, and possessed of great modesty and good nature; the last scene took such an effect on his imagination, that he laughed immoderately. Cooke’s attention was attracted, and turning towards him with his most bitter look, ‘What do you laugh at, Mr. Swabson, hey? Why, you great lubber-headed thief, Johnson would have beat two of you! laugh at me! at George Cooke! come out, you scoundrel!’ The coat was soon pulled off, and, putting himself in an attitude, he exclaimed, ‘This is the arm that shall sacrifice you.’ Perrins was of a mild disposition, and, knowing Cooke’s character, made every allowance, and answered him only by a smile, till aggravated by language and action the most gross, he very calmly took him in his arms as though he had been a child, set him down in the street, and bolted the door. The evening was wet, and our hero without coat or hat, unprepared to cope with it; but entreaty for admission was vain, and his application at the window unattended to. At length, grown desperate, he broke several panes, and, inserting his head through the fracture, bore down all opposition by the following witticism: ‘Gentlemen, I have taken some panes to gain admission, pray let me in, for I see through my error.’ The door was opened, dry clothes procured, and about one o’clock in the morning we sent him home in a coach.” Despite the second-hand wit, the credit remains with the pugilist.

In the “Annual Register,” under date of December 10, 1800, we read, “Died at Manchester, aged 50, Mr. Isaac Perrins, engine-worker. This pugilistic hero will ever be remembered for the well-contested battle he fought with the celebrated Johnson, in the month of October, 1789. Perrins possessed most astonishing muscular power, which rendered him well calculated for a bruiser, to which was united a disposition the most placid and amiable. His death was occasioned by too violently exerting himself in assisting to save life and property at a fire in Manchester. He was sincerely lamented by all who knew him.” Perrins needs no further epitaph than this tribute of one who knew him.

[42]. The account does not say whether blows had been exchanged, but we presume there had.—Ed.

[43]. Those who witnessed the memorable third fight between Caunt and Bendigo (at Sutfield Green, Oxfordshire, Sept. 19, 1845), so unfairly reported at the time, may think they are perusing an account of it. So does pugilism, like history, under like circumstances, “reproduce itself.”—Ed.

[44]. This seems to have been such a hit as that with which the Tipton closed accounts with Tass Parker in their last fight, or Tom King gave Mace at the conclusion of their second meeting. Those hits, when a man is “shaky,” are receipts in full.—Ed.

[45]. Jacombs, whose provincial triumphs are unrecorded, was a strong rough, with an Englishman’s heirdom, unyielding pluck. We find only one other notice in the journals of the time. “March 10 (1790). A desperate contest was fought at Stoke Golding, near Coventry, between Jacombs, the Warwickshire boxer, and Payne, of Coventry. At setting-to Jacombs was the favourite, but after a most severe conflict of two hours, in which the combatants contested ninety-five rounds, and during which both the combatants were several times thrown from the stage, Payne was declared victorious. The conduct of Payne was cool, but admirably courageous, whilst that of Jacombs seemed brutally passionate. He seemed to depend more upon driving and bruising his opponent against the railings than fair and open fighting with the fists.” We regret to say that Jacombs has had too many successors in this unmanly art, even with the less dangerous ropes and stakes of the modern ring.

[46]. Tom Tring in person, but not in physiognomy, resembled the late burly and clumsy boxer Ben Caunt. He was, however, a civil, inoffensive, and mild looking giant. He was the original of several Academicians’ drawings and paintings of Hercules. “He challenged all England” (except his friend Tom Johnson—a judicious exception), “for one thousand guineas;” so do the advertising hair-dressers: but when Pierce asks us to believe that poor Tring’s “qualities as a pugilist were of a most tremendous nature, and few men appeared who were capable of resisting his mighty prowess,” and of his being “clad in the rich paraphernalia (which of the princesses married him?) of royalty,” we begin to ask ourselves whether we are reading the history of Tom Thumb. To support this magniloquent introduction, we are told he beat Tom Pratt, “a very formidable man,” in 1787, a guinea to four shillings, “Pratt ran away, leaving Tom in possession of the ring.” We find, instead of this, under date of August 19th, 1787, that “a boxing match was contested on Kennington Common, between Jacob Doyle, the Irish boxer, and Tom Tring, which the latter won with ease. Tring is said to be the finest made man in England, and the talents of several of the first artists have been employed to delineate the symmetry of his person. As a boxer he possessed little science, but good courage.” (Quoted in “Pancratia,” p. 72). A terrible “street fight” with one Norfolk, a bricklayer, is here improvised, to introduce his thrashing by Big Ben. Poor Tring was another of the victims of the heartless dandy and unprincipled egotist miscalled “the first gentleman of Europe,” without a particle of the gentleman in his whole composition. Tring obtained a precarious living as a model to Sir Joshua Reynolds, Hooper, Sir William Beechey, and others, and earned a crust as a street porter. He was a civil inoffensive fellow; in height six feet two inches, and weighing fifteen stone in prime condition. He died in the pursuit of his humble calling in the year 1815.

[47]. “Fighting for darkness,” a few years since, became a sort of calculated “off-chance,” to save bets among the “down the river” second-class pugilists of the London ring.—Ed.

[48]. Rather too small for big men.—Ed.

[49]. The distribution of duties of seconds, and a third party in care of the water, etc., in modern times, is noted elsewhere.—Ed.

[50]. Daily Advertiser, January 22, 1790.

[51]. Mendoza’s last ring battle may be considered as that with John Jackson in 1795. His return to the ring to fight out a quarrel with Harry Lee, in 1806, and the foolish exhibition in 1820 with old Tom Owen, are solecisms, and do not disturb the arrangement by Periods.

[52]. A contemporary writer, in 1790, says of him: “Mendoza is a pugilist better initiated in the theory of boxing than perhaps any of his cotemporaries, and has produced some exceedingly expert pupils. In his manner there is more neatness than strength, and it has been said, more show than service; his blows are in general deficient in force, but given with astonishing quickness, and he is allowed to strike oftener, and stop more dexterously, than any other man; he is extremely well formed in the breast and arms, but his loins are very weak; his wind is good, and he possesses excellent bottom.”

[53]. This would have lost Mister Packer the battle by the modern rules.—Ed.

[54]. See notice of Warr in Appendix to Period II.

[55].

1— Thomas Wilson 2— John Horn 3— Harry Davis 4— John Lloyd 5— Thomas Monk 6— John Hind 7— William More 8— John Williams 9— Richard Dennis 10— George Cannon 11— A. Fuller 12— T. Spencer 13— William Taylor 14— John Knight 15— John Braintree 16— William Bryant 17— John Matthews 18— Tom Tyne 19— Ditto 20— George Hoast 21— George Mackenzie 22— John Hall 23— William Cannon 24— George Barry 25— George Smith 26— William Nelson *27— Martin (the Bath Butcher) *28— Richard Humphries *29— Ditto *30— Ditto *31— William Warr *32— Ditto *33— John Jackson *34— Harry Lee *35— Tom Owen.

Such is the list; see “Boxiana” (Vol. iii. p. 489). There is “a curious felicity” in the selection, as, with the exception of Tom Tyne (Nos. 18, 19), whose two defeats by Mendoza are unrecorded, and those with an asterisk, not one name ever figures as fighting anybody else on any discoverable occasion.

[56]. Mendoza was at that period fifty-seven years of age, while Owen was nearly six years younger; an important difference—supposing all other circumstances equal—at such an advanced (we had almost said absurd) time of life for a fistic exhibition.

[57]. Tempora mutantur, et nos mutamur in illis.—Virgil.

[58]. Sam Martin, known as the Bath Butcher, fought many good battles in “the West Countrie.” On his coming to London, however, he was unlucky in being pitted against such masters of the art as Humphries and Dan Mendoza. To Sam’s battle with Humphries, the author of “Pancratia” (p. 68), attributes “the revival of pugilism, and its high patronage.” The result is related in the text.

Martin was next matched against Mendoza. His defeat, April 17, 1787, will be found in that boxer’s biography. His last battle of importance was with Bligh, “the Coventry Champion,” a riband weaver of that town. It came off at Evesham, in Oxfordshire, on the 7th of April, 1791, for 50 guineas a side. George Ring, the Bath Baker, seconded Martin; a local boxer (Brooks), picked up Bligh. Martin’s two defeats, and Bligh’s local fame, made the latter the favourite, at six and seven to four. After a severe contest, Martin was hailed as conqueror.

[59]. This was an unjustifiable interference on the part of the second.—Ed.

[60]. As a matter incidental to the history of pugilism, we cannot omit a short notice of Colonel Aston. The story has a spice of romance, and “points a moral” in favour of the principles we are advocating. We copy the “News from India” in the World for 1799. “Colonel Aston being for a short time absent from his regiment, a misunderstanding occurred between Major Picton[[171]] and Major Allan with a lieutenant. Immediately on the return of the colonel, he was made acquainted with the affair, and wrote his opinion, in a private letter, that the behaviour of the two majors was somewhat ‘illiberal’ to their subaltern officer. The letter being shown, Majors P. and A. demanded a Court of Inquiry, which was refused by the commander-in-chief, as calculated to destroy ‘that harmony among officers so essential to the support of discipline in regiments on foreign duty.’ Major Picton now called upon Colonel Aston to demand an explanation of the term ‘illiberal.’ Colonel Aston ‘did not think himself bound to account for his conduct in discharge of his duty as Colonel to any inferior officer; but if Major Picton had anything to reproach him with, as a private gentleman, he was prepared to give him any satisfaction in his power.’ This brought it into the domain of a private quarrel (!), and the next day they met by appointment, accompanied by their seconds. Major Picton had the first fire: his pistol snapped, which was declared equal to a fire by the seconds. Colonel Aston immediately fired in the air, declaring he had no quarrel with the major.” Would not a rational man think this punctilious foolery was settled; but no! We continue our quotation. “Notwithstanding the kindly manner in which this affair had been apparently settled, to the reciprocal satisfaction of the code of the duello, Major Allan the next day demanded satisfaction for the private opinion expressed by the colonel of his conduct. A similar answer was returned, that the colonel denied his right to call upon him to explain any act of his official duty; that he was at all times ready to vindicate his private conduct, but at the same time was unconscious of having offended Major A. The latter, however, assumed a tone of vehemence and authority, which rendered the meeting on the part of the colonel unavoidable. Major Allan fired the first shot—the seconds did not perceive the ball had taken effect. The colonel, having received the fire, appeared unhurt, stood erect, and with the greatest composure levelled his pistol with a steady hand, shewing he had power to fire on his antagonist. He then leisurely drew it back, and laying it across his breast, said, ‘I am shot through the body; I believe the wound is mortal, and therefore decline returning the fire: for it never shall be said that the last act of my life was dictated by a spirit of revenge.’ He sat down on the ground, was carried home, where he languished in excessive agony for several days, and without a murmur expired.

“Colonel Harvey Aston was brother to the pretty Mrs. Hodges, well known in the sporting world. He married Miss Ingram, the daughter of Lady Irwin, and sister to the Marchioness of Hertford, Lady William Gordon, Lady Ramsden, and Mrs. Meynell, whom he left with a young family to deplore this melancholy accident.” The chivalrous honour, manly forbearance, and moderation of this staunch patron of pugilism shines through every phase of this deplorable case of manslaughter. We call things by their right names.

[61]. Fewterel is said by Mr. Vincent Dowling, in his obituary notice of John Jackson, to have been a Scotchman; we think it probable from what we here give.

The only other contest of Fewterel’s, worth preserving, is his battle with a Highlander, on the Leith Ground, Edinburgh, March 23, 1793. The Highlander, whose calling was that of an Edinburgh chairman, was reputed a phenomenon among his brethren of the Scottish capital.

“Fewterel, when stripped, appeared very corpulent, and by no means in the condition in which he fought Jackson. The Highlander was by far the finer and stronger man, and was reported to possess wonderful readiness and courage. They set-to at about eight o’clock in the morning, and the first knock-down blow was given by Fewterel, who sent his antagonist a surprising distance, there being no roped enclosure. The next round he also brought down the Scot by a severe blow in the chest. In the next round the Highlander got in a well-hit stroke under Fewterel’s right eye, which cut him severely. He, however, stood firm, and kept cool. The next blow Fewterel got in, he again brought him down, and this so enraged the Highlander, that during the remainder of the contest he never recovered his temper. This gave Fewterel a decided advantage, and though he afterwards received many severe blows, he constantly reduced the strength of his antagonist. At length he put in a hit under the Highlander’s jaw that laid him senseless on the grass. Thus terminated the contest, after thirty-five minutes. The Scot soon, however, recovered, but was unable to walk home. The match was 50 guineas to 30 guineas. The odds were given to Fewterel, who generously gave the man he had beaten 10 guineas, the sum he (Fewterel) was promised if he won the battle.”—“Pancratia,” pp. 111, 112.

[62]. “The second boxing match was between Elisha Crabbe, the Jew, who beat Death (see ante) and Watson of Bristol; won by the latter. The third between two outsiders.”

[63]. That the everyday use and familiar handling of deadly weapons lead to their reckless use, we may quote a few recent instances from the history of our descendants in America. The horrible assassination of the great and good President Abraham Lincoln, and the ferocious use of a “billy” and a bowie-knife upon the helpless and prostrate Mr. Secretary Seward, his son, Major Frederick Seward, and an attendant, are offsprings of a familiarity with daily outrages by lethal weapons, and the general resort to them to redress injury or resent insult. The death of the assassin Booth is the culmination.

[64]. Eheu fugaces anni—not only have the men departed, but their local habitations have vanished. The spacious hotel, once Wallace’s, now the Alexandra, and palatial mansions, cover the ground extending from Hyde Park Corner (on the side of St. George’s Hospital), towards St. Paul’s new Puseyite pinnacles at Knightsbridge. Even “the Corner” itself—the world-famed “Tattersall’s” has migrated. It will be known only to the remainder of the present, and the next rising generation, as the splendid club-room and spacious horse-mart at the junction of the Brompton and Kensington Roads.

[65]. About 1790, Lord Barrymore was in the hey-day of his riot and “larkery” at Brighton, where the Prince of Wales had just finished that grotesque kiosk known as the Pavilion, once the scene of royal orgies, now a cockney show-shop of London super mare. The Lord Barrymore, who was Hooper’s patron, was the head of the family firm nicknamed Newgate, Hellgate, and Cripplegate, from colloquial, acquired, or personal peculiarities. On hearing these elegant sobriquets, the Prince is said to have objected to the omission of the lady sister of the trio from this nomenclature, and ungallantly suggested the name of “Billingsgate,” as a fourth of the family.

One anecdote is too characteristic of the actors to be lost. “In one of his wild freaks, his Lordship, from his lofty phaeton, struck with his driving whip a Mr. Donadieu, a respectable perfumer of Brighton, who was driving in his gig, for not getting quickly enough out of his impetuous Lordship’s way. Mr. Donadieu drove after him, but his lordship’s terrible high-bred cattle soon distanced him. The next morning Mr. D., perceiving Lord Barrymore upon the Steyne, in company with several sporting men, went up to him and remonstrated upon the ungentlemanly usage he had experienced the previous day. His Lordship replied insultingly, and struck the perfumer. The tradesman was an Englishman, and at once returned the blow. A smart rally convinced the eccentric peer that his credit as a boxer was at stake, for his resolute opponent drove him before his attack. Lord Barrymore tried to take an unfair advantage, when the Prince of Wales, who had witnessed the whole fracas from a window of the Pavilion, called out in a loud voice, ‘D——e, Barrymore, fight like a man!’” In the Hon. Grantley F. Berkeley’s volumes, “My Life and Recollections” (London, Hurst and Blackett, 1865), vol. i., pp. 49–78, is a curious sketch of Brighton at the close of the 18th century, with anecdotes of Colonel Hanger, Lord Barrymore, John Jackson, etc., and the ladies whom the heir apparent delighted to honour. The specimen of the Prince’s style, in the anecdote of the Royal Harriers, pp. 70, 71, will show that the “first gentleman of Europe” was facile princeps in the then fashionable accomplishment of swearing. Grantley Berkeley makes a slip in the closing lines of his notice of Lord Barrymore, which it may be worth while to correct. He says: “A rapid career of reckless extravagance was brought to a sudden close whilst marching with a detachment towards Dover: the musket of one of his men went off, eventually causing his (Lord Barrymore’s) death.” We must acquit the Berkshire militia of this charge of clumsy or intentional homicide. We extract from the memoir of a contemporary: “Lord Barrymore was a lieutenant of the Berkshire militia stationed at Rye, and was marching a party of French prisoners to Deal. They marched through Folkestone to the top of the succeeding hill, and halted at a small public-house to refresh his men and the prisoners. Admiral Macbride and General Smith met his lordship there; he was in high spirits, and accepted an invitation to dine with them at Deal. Lord Barrymore had marched at the head of his party from Rye; he now ordered his valet-de-chambre, who drove his curricle in the rear, to procure him a pipe of tobacco, saying, ‘I’ll ride and smoke while you drive.’ He was in high glee, counted up the score with chalk on a slate, à la Boniface; imitated Hob, from ‘Hob in the Well,’ a farce he was very partial to; treated all about him; gave the landlady a kiss, and leaped into the curricle. He gave the fusil to his servant, who placed it carelessly between his legs and drove off. They had scarcely proceeded fifty yards when the piece went off. The contents entered his lordship’s right cheek, forced out the eye, and lodged in the brain: he was pointing to the coast of France at the moment. He lived forty minutes, groaning heavily, but never spoke again. The fusil was loaded with swan shot; he had been killing gulls and rabbits on his way from Rye to Folkestone. An inquest was held on the 8th of March, the verdict ‘Accidental Death.’ He was interred on Sunday, March 17, 1793, in the chancel of the church at Wargrave.”

[66]. In “Fistiana,” Wright is, by a slip, called “Lord Barrymore’s man.” Cotterel’s fight is also omitted under Hooper.

[67]. This battle does not appear under Hooper’s name in “Fistiana.”

[68]. There not being time for the second contest between Stanyard, of Birmingham, and Andrew Gamble, the Irish champion, it was postponed to the next day. See Gamble, in Appendix to Period II.

[69]. Maddox will find his place under Cribb’s period. His first fight was in 1792, his last with Bill Richmond in 1809.

[70]. See Wood’s memoir, Appendix to Period II., post.

[71]. “Fistiana” misprints it sixteen minutes.

[72]. A memoir of this well-known boniface, whose memory yet lives with old ring-goers, (he died at his house at Plumstead, Kent, in 1843), will be found in its chronological order.

[73]. “The Historian” inflicts a second thrashing by his hero and pal “Ould Tom Owen” on poor Hooper, ten weeks afterwards, at the same place, under similar circumstances. We suspect “Ould Tom,” as Pierce Egan calls him, who had a lively imagination, to say the least, must have narrated a dream to his “philosopher and friend.”

[74]. These exceptional events are out of ring chronology, properly speaking. Owen and his opponent, old Dan Mendoza, belonged, as pugilists, to a previous generation.

[75]. There was a boxer at this period, Bill Jones, who fought Dunn, Tom Tyne, and Bob Watson, who has been confounded with Paddington Jones.

[76]. See Life of Jem Belcher in Period III.

[77]. “Boxiana” and “Fistiana” date this fight in June. January is the correct date; see “Pancratia,” p. 123, and the Daily Advertiser of the date.

[78]. “Boxiana” confounds him with Tom (Paddington) Jones.

[79]. Though Anderson was not, or pretended not to be, good enough for Watson, Lord Barrymore, who saw the fight, matched him for 50 guineas against Tom Tight, an Oxford bargee. They fought on Wargner Green, Berks, January 4, 1790, when Anderson knocked the bargeman almost out of time in the third round, six minutes only having elapsed.

[80]. See Life of Gully, post.

[81]. Cullington was a sporting publican, landlord of the Black Bull, in Tottenham Court Road, a personal friend and backer of Jem Belcher, then called “The Bristol Youth.”

[82]. Pierce Egan says, “a man of the name of Bourke, a butcher.” Much confusion has been occasioned by the absurd penchant of “the historian” (as Pierce was wont to style himself) to Hibernicise and appropriate to Ireland the names and deeds of fistic heroes. Teste his twist of “the Streatham Youth” into O’Neale, his ludicrous magniloquence in the case of several Irish roughs in “Boxiana,” on whom he has expended his slang panegyric (see Corcoran, Gamble, Hatton, O’Donnell, etc.), and his thousand and one claims of “Irish descent” for most of his heroes. Joe Berks (spelt Bourke or Burke in “Boxiana” and “Fistiana”) was a native of Wem, in Shropshire. He was a powerful heavy made man, a little short of six feet high, and weighing fourteen stone. His career was unfortunate, from being pitted against such phenomena of skill as Jem Belcher and Henry Pearce, for his game and strength were unimpeachable. From “Pancratia,” p. 126, under date of September, 18, 1797, we learn that Joe Berks was a cooper, and that at that date he fought one Christian, a shoemaker, and much fancied as a boxer by the sons of Crispin, a severe battle in Hyde Park. The contest lasted fifty-five minutes, during which there were twenty-two rounds of hard boxing. Berks, despite a wrangle for a “foul,” was declared the conqueror. Berks’ subsequent pugilistic career will be read in the memoirs of his conqueror. His successive defeats by Belcher, Pearce, and Deplige, and his violent temper, lost his patrons, and he sunk into poverty. A dishonest act, under the influence, as it was urged in his defence, of liquor, led to his imprisonment. Here one firm friend of the unfortunate stepped forward, John Jackson, who, by petition, procured his liberation. Berks enlisted, and when his kind benefactor last heard of him he held the position of non-commissioned officer in the Grenadier company of a regiment serving under the Duke of Wellington (Sir Arthur Wellesley) in Spain.

[83]. Alluding to the treaty of Amiens with Napoleon I., the preliminaries of which were signed October 1, 1801.

[84]. The old city house of detention and correction was so called; its successor, the “Giltspur Street Compter,” is now also demolished, and its prisoners sent to Holloway.

[85]. These are the exact words of the original report.

[86]. Another of the hors d’œuvres of a casual turn-up. Tom’s last battle, properly speaking, was in 1813, with Dogherty, see post, p. 160.

[87]. A silly exaggeration of the “Aquila non gignunt columbæ.” We know eagles don’t beget doves, or the reverse; but though a healthy or unhealthy constitution may be transmitted, neither poets, philosophers, preachers, or pugilists, are begotten hereditarily.

[88]. “Son of the renowned Michael Ryan,” says Pierce Egan, who devotes to him a biography. Michael’s “renown” consisted in being twice beaten by Tom Johnson, which was no disgrace, and then by Mike Brady, an Irish rough, in twenty minutes, which was. Bill, who was a drunken Irish braggadocio, after winning his first fight with Belcher, wrangled a battle with Caleb Baldwin (see Baldwin), and beat Clarke, June 17, 1806.

[89]. See Appendix to Period IV.

[90]. Pearce was in his twenty-sixth year, and the senior of Belcher by nearly five years; but his constitution was undebauched, and his fame matured. Belcher began his fighting career at seventeen years with Britton, two or three years too early.

[91]. Isaac Bittoon had beaten Tom Jones, and made a draw with George Maddox, and at this time was in good repute as a boxer. See Appendix.

[92]. It may be as well here to note that wherever practicable, the best contemporary report has been used of these earlier fights, which will account for discrepancies between some of them and the embellished accounts in “Boxiana.”

[93]. He was born August 21, 1783, at Bristol.

[94]. A bit of slang for the King’s Bench Prison, afterwards called Abbott’s Priory, Tenterden Park, Denman’s Priory, etc., from successive C. J.’s of the K. B. It is now abolished, and its site a barrack.

[95]. This would now lose the fight.—Ed.

[96]. Gin. The name of a celebrated distiller (Sir John Liptrap) at Whitechapel. As “Hodges” is now sometimes used for the same spirituous “blue ruin.”

[97]. Successively in the occupation of Ned Baldwin, Young Dutch Sam, Johnny Hannan, and the late Ben Caunt.

[98]. This is the contemporary report. That in “Boxiana,” and copied into “Fights for the Championship,” is a re-written version.

[99]. From the contemporary report. A perusal of merely the first round in “Boxiana,” or its copyists, will show the unfaithfulness of the vamped reproduction in these cases.

[100]. Bell’s Weekly Dispatch, May 14, 1808.

[101]. See Cropley, Appendix to Period III.

[102]. There is some obscurity about this, as to whether the fight with Tom Jones, July 13, 1801, is attributable to Dutch Sam, or to Isaac Bittoon. (See Bittoon.) “Boxiana,” “Fistiana,” etc., give it to Bittoon, we suspect erroneously; for we find in a contemporary newspaper the following:—“Monday, July 13, 1801.—A boxing match was fought on Wimbledon Common, between Elias, a Jew, and Tom Jones. In the first twenty minutes Tom evidently had the advantage, and during this time great sport was afforded to the amateurs by the science displayed. Elias, however, put in a hit so forcibly behind Tom’s ear, that Tom immediately fell, and gave up the contest.” And see “Pancratia,” p. 136, where the battle is given in chronological order under this date.

[103]. See Baldwin (Caleb), Appendix to Period III.

[104]. This is the first distinct notice we find of administering the “upper-cut;” the most effective blow in a rally, most difficult to guard against, yet so generally missed by the less-skilled boxer. The “chopper,” or downward blow, of which our forefathers talked, can only be administered to an incapable off his guard, or a “chopping-block.”—Ed.

[105]. “Pancratia,” p. 237.

[106]. “Boxiana” (vol. i., p. 323), and the Chronologies, say at “Moulsey Hurst.” This is from the contemporary account.

[107]. As in the interval between these two battles, Mr. Fletcher Reid, a great patron and backer of the Belchers, paid the “debt of nature,” this seems the right place for a brief obituary notice which we find in the journals:—“On Thursday morning, January the 24th (1807), died, at Shepperton, Surrey, where he had resided for the last two years, Mr. Fletcher Reid, well-known in the sporting world, particularly as one of the greatest patrons of gymnastic genius. The evening preceding he had spent jovially amongst some select companions, and retired to rest at rather a late hour. In the morning his servant found him dead. Mr. Fletcher Reid was a native of Dundee, in Scotland, near to which he had succeeded to estates, by the death of his mother, which afflicting intelligence he had received only two days previous to his decease. He left a wife and two children, who for some time past had resided with his mother.” The following lines, rather questionable in taste, appeared in a monthly publication some time afterwards:—

“In the still of the night, Death to Shepperton went,

And there catching poor Fletcher asleep,

He into his wind such a finisher sent,

That no longer ‘the time’ could he keep.

“Thus forced to give in, we his fate must lament,

While the coward, grim Death, we must blame,

For if in the morn he to Shepperton went,

He feared Fletcher’s true science and game.

“Then repose to his ashes, soft rest to his soul,

For harmless was he through life’s span,

With the friend of his bosom, enjoying the bowl,

And wishing no evil to man.”

“February, 1807.”

[108]. “Recollections of an Octogenarian,” 8vo., London, 1812.

[109]. Pierce Egan says, “Seabrook was so completely frightened out of all his conceit, that he almost bolted from the spot.” What that may mean we cannot explain.

[110]. Coady’s other exploit was being beaten by Bill Treadway, in twenty-seven minutes March 16, 1798, in Hyde Park.

[111]. This is what modern reporters would call “forcing the fighting.”

[112]. This decision is utterly at variance with the rules of the ring. The cool non-sequitur of the reporter that, as Coady refused to appear, the battle was declared a drawn one, is not the least amusing incident. Mr. Vincent Dowling has booked it as a victory to Maddox, which it undoubtedly was. See “Fistiana,” voce, Maddox.

[113]. The memoir of Caleb Baldwin in “Boxiana,” vol. i., pp. 301–314, omits all mention of this fight.

[114]. Copied in “Pancratia,” p. 136, from the Oracle newspaper. This battle is also overlooked by “the historian,” in his life of Caleb.

[115]. Jack Lee was then thought a rising pugilist; his previous battle was a draw with Solly Sodicky, a Jew. He must not be confounded with Harry Lee, who was beaten by Mendoza.

[116]. In the travels of Pallas in Tartary, he describes himself, after a weary sledge journey through snowy steppes, as coming in sight of the corpse of a malefactor swinging on a gaunt black gibbet as a warning to “land pirates.” He congratulates himself on this mark of having arrived on the “confines of civilization.”

[117]. Blows in the short ribs are so called by the older ring reporters.—Ed.

[118]. Stephenson had been beaten by Jack Carter. (See Carter, Period IV.) Robinson was an old stager, fourteen stone weight; his fights, not worth detailing, are chronicled in “Fistiana.”

[119]. Massa Bristow seems here to have fought his best fight; despite the tuition of Richmond and his Fives Court practice, he merely beat an unknown (Little Tom) for 20 guineas in a clumsy fight at Holloway, July 19, 1817, and was then thrashed by a fourth-rate pugilist, Pug M’Gee, at Shepperton Range, September 30, 1817, in sixty-five minutes, 40 rounds.

[120]. This proved to be the afterwards renowned Jack Randall.

[121]. Ben Stanyard, who is stated to have been the victor in seventeen battles in the midland and western counties, does not figure in the chronologies; this draw and his defeat by Bill Warr (see Warr), October 26, 1792, are all that appear to his name.

[122]. Noah James, a discharged trooper, appears to have been a bruiser of Gamble’s own stamp. He is stated in “Fistiana” to have beaten Smith at Navestock, December 31, 1788, and Solly Sodicky, the Jew (a cross), at Hornchurch, Essex, February 13, 1793; but these battles were fought by one James, a waterman. See “Pancratia,” pp. 82 and 111. There was also a Joe James, beaten by Faulkner, the cricketer. (See Faulkner, ante.)

[123]. In “Fistiana,” under O’Donnell, Harry Holt is stated to have defeated him in 1817. It was another boxer of the same name, said to be a relative of the subject of our sketch.

[124]. The account in “Boxiana” deserves transferring, as a model of accuracy and diction:—

“O’Donnell, the celebrated Irish hero, fought Tom Belcher for a subscription purse of 20 guineas, at Shepperton Common, Surrey. Considerable science was displayed by Belcher upon this occasion; and O’Donnell showed himself also entitled to respectable attention; but who was completely satisfied in fifteen rounds, when Belcher was proclaimed the conqueror.”

[125]. The paragraph runs thus in the papers of the day:—“July 13 (1801). A boxing match was fought on Wimbledon Common, between Elias, a Jew, and Tom Jones. For the first twenty minutes Tom evidently had the advantage, and during this time great sport had been afforded by the excellent science displayed on both sides. Elias, however, put in a hit so forcibly behind Tom’s ear, that he immediately fell and gave up the contest.” And see “Pancratia,” p. 144., where the paragraph is reprinted. The Elias was, doubtless, Dutch Sam.

[126]. Bittoon’s name is spelt with a P (Pittoon) in the contemporary reports.

[127]. See Tom Tough (Blake), in this Appendix.

[128]. The battle would have been over, and Bittoon the victor, with a modern referee.—Ed.

[129]. The site of the present Harley Street, Oxford Street. The report states the spot differently. “On Tuesday morning, February the 18th [1794], a battle was fought between Jack Holmes, the hackney coachman, and a manufacturer of à-la-mode beef, in a field behind Gower Street, Bedford Square. After four or five tolerably good rounds, the contest was put an end to by the cry of a foul blow. The seconds chose an umpire, Captain Hamilton, who, greatly to the disappointment of the kiddies who lacked more fun, decided it in favour of the beef-eater. This very much discomfited the son of Jehu, who certainly had held the whip-hand over his antagonist the whole time, and he voluntarily offered to renew the battle for another guinea, but his opponent declined.”

[130]. As “Boxiana” is scarce and out of print, a specimen of the inflated bombast of its author may be amusing. The memoir of Gregson (who occupies six lines in the Chronologies), all his recorded fights having been defeats, is thus headed and introduced, with a profusion of capital letters:—

“BOB GREGSON, P.P.,

One of the most distinguished Champions of Lancashire,

and

POET LAUREATE

TO THE HEROIC RACE OF PUGILISTS.

I dare do all that may become a man;

Who dare do more, is none.

“In recording the most prominent traits of the celebrated pugilists, from the earliest professors of the gymnastic art down to the present milling æra, when passing in review, ‘Boxiana’ has found none more entitled to peculiar attention than the hero of the present sketch.” Said sketch then starts off from Fig, glances at Broughton, George Taylor, Slack, the ‘prodigies of valour performed by Corcoran as a bruiser;’ and refers to Humphries, Mendoza, Bill Warr, Hooper, Jackson, Pearce, the Belchers, and Berks. Gully, Cribb, and Molineaux too are dragged in as foils to Bob Gregson! The proëmium thus concludes:—“But, notwithstanding the above variety of qualifications, it has been reserved for Bob Gregson alone, from his union of pugilism and poetry, to recount the deeds of his brethren of the fist in heroic verse (like the bards of old, in sounding the praises of their warlike champions), whose pretensions to the former are beyond all dispute, and respecting the latter, one of the most distinguished works of sporting celebrity has given place to the poetic effusions of his muse.”

[131]. To many who have not the opportunity of perusing the writings of “the author of Boxiana,” as he was wont to call himself, this criticism may appear unduly harsh: this imputation we should be sorry to lie under. While writing these pages, two well filled volumes have been published by the Hon. Grantley Berkeley, entitled “My Life and Recollections,” embracing reminiscences of the first half of the present century, and of persons and events in society. The writer is happy to have so thoroughly competent a confirmation of his condemnation. He may premise also, that the very argot of which Pierce Egan proclaimed himself a professor was not radically English, but the low slang of Irish ruffianism. Mr. Grantley Berkeley says (vol. i., pp. 107, 108):—“The extravagances and absurdities of ‘Tom and Jerry’ were brought into vogue by a low-caste Irishman, known as Pierce Egan, sometimes a newspaper reporter [only in his later day] of fights, etc., and sometimes a low comedian in third-rate Dublin and London theatres. [He was a compositor in Smeeton’s printing office in St. Martin’s Lane.] His ‘Life in London’ was very popular, and he dramatised it at the Adelphi [this was done by Billy Moncrieff] with marked success. He brought out a similar play in the Irish capital, called ‘Life in Dublin,’ and a third in the flourishing commercial port on the Mersey, called ‘Life in Liverpool.’ His ‘Boxiana’ was considered as a text-book on fights and fighting men; and his elaborate and exaggerated descriptions of ‘a mill,’ as prize-fights were designated, were stuffed full of slang, the delight of a large circle of male readers. He assisted in starting a sporting newspaper, the still flourishing Bell’s Life in London [this is totally wrong], and subsequently an opposition one, with a similar title. It failed, and he long outlived his reputation as an author, for he was totally destitute of literary invention: the characters in his stories were thoroughly conventional, and his style never rose above that of an ordinary penny-a-liner. He was a coarse-looking man, who seemed only to have associated with the very lowest society in England and Ireland. Indeed, he used to make boast of his familiarity with the riff-raff of both capitals. The intense vulgarity of his writings grew distasteful; and though he produced several works of imagination, all have sunk into oblivion. Indeed they predeceased their author a good many years. He died totally forgotten by his once innumerable patrons, and the literature of the ring died with him.” The last phrase rounds a period; but a second thought would have told Mr. Berkeley that the really good ring reports which, from about 1824 to a late period, at intervals filled the columns of the Morning Chronicle, Bell’s Life in London, the Weekly Dispatch, and other papers, were none of them from the coarse and illiterate pen of “the historian,” but from those of George Kent, Mr. G. Daniels; and principally from those of Mr. Smith, Mr. V. G. Dowling, the writer of this work, and other qualified reporters. Whether the ring itself is dead is another question, which we may now answer in the affirmative with Mr. Grantley Berkeley.

[132]. In Tom Moore’s satirical squib, entitled “Tom Cribb’s Memorial to Congress” (p. 38), he thus ironically glances at Gregson’s pugilistic laureateship:—

“A pause ensued—till cries of ‘Gregson’

Brought Bob, the poet, on his legs soon—

(My eyes, how prettily Bob writes!

Talk of your Camels, Hogs, and Crabs,

And twenty more such Pidcock frights—

Bob’s worth a hundred of these dabs:

For a short turn-up at a sonnet,

A round of odes, or pastoral bout,

All Lombard Street to nine-pence on it,

Bobby’s the boy would clean them out!)”

[133]. The accounts in “Boxiana” and “Fights for the Championship,” are verbal reprints of each other. The above is the contemporary report.

[134]. This would by the modern rules be illegal.

[135]. The unreported rounds in this and other places, are supplied in “Boxiana” and its copyists; as well as a great quantity of vamping up, the details of which Pierce Egan must have imagined.

[136]. See Life of “Molineaux, post, Chapter II.”

[137]. These, as in several other instances, are resumés of the principal reports of writers who witnessed the fight itself. Where worth preservation we have preferred the ipsissimis verbis of the reporter.

[138]. Shakespere tells us “losers have leave to rail.” Among other things Molineaux declared he was “sold.” A weekly print had the following “impromptu,” of course “fait à loisir”:—

AN IMPROMPTU,

On its being said, in allusion to the late battle, that Molineaux had been “sold.”

The Black, to say at least, is bold,

That in the battle he was sold:

If so—by Auction—for ’tis known,

When he was sold, Cribb knocked him down!

[139]. See note A., Appendix to Period IV. Captain Barclay, Allardyce of Ury.

[140]. In “Boxiana,” this house is elegantly metamorphosed into “The Prad and Swimmer,” the original name not being thought sufficiently incongruous.

[141]. “On the Champion’s quitting his trade of coal-merchant for that of victualler, at the sign of the King’s Arms.

“Black Diamonds adieu! Tom’s now took to the bar,

The fancy to serve with new charms—

For a ‘chop’ or a glass, to mill or to spar,

They’ll be at home to a peg at the Arms!

The lovers of truth, without crime, may here fib,

On the pleasures of sporting can sing;

Then ye swells give a turn to gallant Tom Cribb,

That he may ne’er quit the ‘Arms of his King.’”

[142]. This speech was thus poetically paraphrased in a weekly journal, from which we quote a few of the lines:—

“THE CHAMPION’S RETIREMENT.

“‘Every puny whipster gets my sword.’—Shakspeare.

“No so with our champion of Britain’s proud throng,

He still rears his crest for the fight or the song;

‘Bout friendship or fighting he can’t make a speech,

O’ the latter he’d much rather practise than preach.

A lapse of ten years or more soon roll’d away,

Since Afric’s brave bully proclaim’d it Tom’s day;

He then, like a game cock, retired with his pickings,

In peace to provide for his old hen and chickens;

When, lo! a cock crow’d on his walk in the west,

Supposing ‘Old Tom’ of Old Tom had the best;

But Tom left his ‘Hodges,’ gout, crutches, behind,

Reducing his belly, increasing his wind:—

The fight was proclaim’d, and some money put down,

To see who’d best claim to their country’s renown.

Cribb came to the scratch, like a hero, to meet

His man, but he back’d out;—now wasn’t that Neat?

“AN OLD MILLER.”

[143]. This has since been done, as is shown in our engraving.

[144]. This fight is omitted from “Fistiana,” and the name of Burrows given as Molineaux’s first opponent.

[145]. Pierce Egan makes it “Sturton” Island in this and other places.

[146]. This is the newspaper report. Pierce Egan, in his diffuse life of Richmond, passes it over entirely, until he comes to Richmond’s victory (in August, 1809) over Maddox, when he alludes to it as “turn-up five years previously.”

[147]. Jack Holmes was for many years a well known public character. In “Fistiana” he is described as beaten by Tom (Paddington) Jones in 1786. This was another Holmes, not “the Coachman.” The latter’s only recorded battles are, that with Tom Tough (Blake), and that with Richmond reported above.

[148]. “Boxiana” says, in an undated and unplaced line and a half, “Richmond now entered into an unequal contest with Tom Cribb.”

[149]. This is a blunder in “Boxiana” (if ever the battle did take place), for 1808, and is so corrected in “Fistiana.”

[150]. See Tom Moore’s Poem, “Tom Cribb’s Memorial to Congress.”

[151]. “The Fancy,” a selection from the Poetical Remains of the late Peter Corcoran, of Gray’s Inn, Student at Law.—Pseudonymous.

[152]. The term “navvy” or “navigator,” now applied to the labourers who do the earthworks, embankments, and excavations of our railways, seems anomalous; it, however, was derived from the fact that the early canals, which these men dug, were called “navigations,” not only in common speech, but in legal documents and Acts or Parliament. Those who worked on the “navigation” were called “navigators.” The name has remained, though a viaduct has taken the place of an aqueduct.

[153]. This is Pierce Egan’s report. Shelton was 5 feet 10 inches; Burn (who is always by him called Burns) 6 feet 1 inch. Johnson was a trifle under 5 feet 9 inches, Perrins 6 feet inches in his stocking feet. See ante, p. 61.

[154]. He was a backer of pugilists, and kept the Goat, in Lower Grosvenor Street.

[155]. This term perhaps may not be generally understood. To “hocus” a man is to put something into his drink of a narcotic quality, that renders him unfit for action. On the morning alluded to, Randall, in company with some “friends,” partook of a bottle of red wine mulled, into which, he asserted, the sleepy potion must have been introduced by some scoundrel of the company.

[156]. He vanquished the great black, Molineaux, and a wonderful old man, Richmond, who was a fighter at the age of nearly 60.

[157]. See “Boxiana,” vol. ii., 135.

[158]. This may serve to settle a disputed point as to the colour of “the Belcher,” which has been wrongly said, in a reply to a correspondent in a leading sporting journal, to have been “a blue bird’s-eye.” Principal and seconds were here Bristol men.

[159]. Death’s Doings.

[160]. Another of the too-late battles. Martin closed his real ring career, in 1824, by a drawn battle with Jem Burn.

[161]. Mr. John Jackson.

[162]. Now the Victoria, in the Waterloo Road.

[163]. Poet Laureate to the Fancy.—Ed.

[164]. See Note A, p. 258.

[165]. Egan says, “Pentikin, a Scotch baker.” Certainly Scotchmen have almost a monopoly of London baking, but the reporter of the day makes Pentikin a Cornish man.

“By Pol, Tre, and Pen,

Ye shall know the Cornish men.”

[166]. This is set down in “Fistiana” as a victory to Nosworthy.

[167]. Since the above lines were penned, Alfred Henry Holt, after several years’ service on the Morning Advertiser, Bell’s Life in London, and latterly on the Sportsman, has fallen in the struggle of an exciting and laborious profession, at the early age of thirty-nine years. He died of heart disease somewhat suddenly on the 20th of November, 1865, and lies buried in Nunhead Cemetery, leaving a widow and a son (Henry), who follows the profession of his father and grandfather, and now holds the trustworthy position of Secretary and Scorer to the International Gun Clubs of Brighton, London, and Mentone, or Nice.

[168]. Tom Reynolds, born at Middleton, county Armagh, Ireland, 1792, was brought up in Covent Garden Market, where, in after years, he was a potato merchant. “Boxiana,” vol. ii., pp. 429-441; vol. iii., pp. 458-462, gives the usual number of victories to the youthful “Tight Irish Boy,” over “big” unknown men, and a turn-up in the Fleet Prison with George Head, (in which Reynolds was defeated in nine minutes, says “Fistiana,” while Pierce Egan says he was victorious). Tom’s greatest exploit, however, was his conquest of Aby Belasco in one hour and twenty minutes, at Moulsey, July 23, 1817. It was a game battle on both sides. His next battle was with Church, in September of the same year, at the same place, which he also won in half an hour. His subsequent affairs were a draw with Johnson (the broom-dasher), at Canterbury, November 11, 1817; beat J. Dunn, fifty-four minutes, twelve rounds, Kildare, July 4, 1820; beat Simmonds, seven rounds, Macclesfield, August 21, 1820; fought a draw with Dick Davis, £200 a-side, Manchester, July 18, 1825. Reynolds died in Dublin, May 15, 1832, in his forty-first year.

[169]. Mr. John Jackson.

[170]. Dick Curtis, his brother.

[171]. Afterwards the renowned cavalry officer under the Iron Duke in the Peninsula, and slain at Waterloo.—Ed.