8.—Both hit over, and Rimmer fell.
9.—Rimmer exerted every effort to gain the superiority, rallied well, and threw Molineaux.
10.—Molineaux appeared almost ferocious, and went in determined to repay him for past favours. He followed Rimmer, milling him to every part of the ring, and at length floored him.
11.—Rimmer rallied, and showed pluck. Some good hits exchanged, but Rimmer hit widely, without judging distance, and gave his head doubled in his chest, which stopped several blows, and he at length came down.
12.—Rimmer made a body hit, which again fell short, and almost in a state of frenzy he ran in, caught Molineaux up by the thighs, and threw him in the Lancashire style. Many cried “Foul,” others “Fair,” but the fight went on.
13.—Rimmer struck Molineaux over the mouth, when the Black ran in and threw him.
14.—A rally. Rimmer closed, and a complete trial of strength ensued. Both fell, Rimmer bringing down his man by Lancashire ingenuity.
15.—Rimmer retreated round the ring, Molineaux following, and at length by a severe blow in the wind, brought him down, when he was indisputably “dead beat.”
At this time the ring was broken; peers, ploughmen, fighting men, chimney-sweepers, costermongers, were all in one tumultuous uproar, which continued for at least twenty minutes, without any reason being assignable. At length, however, by the exertions of Cribb and others, the ring was restored, and the combatants, who had neither left the ring, were again set-to. Six more rounds were fought, but greatly to the discomfiture of Rimmer, who could hardly stand. During this time he received about ten more tremendous blows and then gave in. Rimmer displayed great courage; he has an unfortunate knack of giving his head when he hits, and appears to be timid of advancing towards his adversary, by which errors many blows fall short.
Such is the contemporary report: the slang version may be found in “Boxiana,” vol. i., pp. 365, 366. Of the formidable powers of Molineaux at this time, of which some writers who recorded his later career have expressed themselves sceptical, this battle and that with Blake must be convincing proof. No pugilist from this time offered a challenge to Molineaux, nor could he get a battle on until Tom Cribb, who had publicly announced his retirement from the ring, was called upon to “prevent the championship of England from being held by a foreigner,” or as Pierce Egan oddly calls the American nigger ‘a Moor’. Poor Pierce’s geography was sadly confused, and the term “the Moor” occurs—perhaps from some jumbled reminiscences of Othello, in his stage readings—in a hundred places in his work as a favourite epithet for the States’ black whose ring career we are now tracing. Molineaux had now once again to enter the lists with the Champion, which he did on the 28th September, 1811, at Thistleton Gap, Leicestershire, where, after a desperate battle of less than twenty minutes, he fell before the conquering arm of Cribb. See p. 256, ante.