The Reader who has attentively accompanied us through the biographies which form the contents of our first and second volumes will not find the memoirs in this third and concluding volume of less interest and variety of incident than the former.
The period comprised herein extends from the year 1835 (the first appearance of Bendigo), and contains the battles of Caunt, Nick Ward, Deaf Burke, William Perry (the “Tipton”), Harry Broome, Tom Paddock, Harry Orme, Aaron Jones, Nat Langham, Tom Sayers, and Jem Mace, closing with the last Championship fight between Tom King and John Camel Heenan, on the 10th of December, 1863.
In these chapters of the “Decline and Fall” of Pugilism it has been the aim of the author to “write his annals true,” “nothing extenuate nor set down aught in malice;” leaving the deeds of each of the Champions to be judged by the “test of time, which proveth all things.”
In these pages will be found all the battles of the actual Champions, and of those who contended with them for that once-coveted distinction. It must be evident, however, that the space of three volumes thrice multiplied would not suffice to record the numerous battles of the middle and light weight men of this period; indeed, they do not come within the scope of this work. As these include some of the best battles of the later days of the P. R., and for the greater part fall within the memory of the writer of these pages, he will collect them in a series of “Pencillings of Pugilists.” These “Reminiscences” of the Ring, will form, when completed, a concurrent stream of pugilistic history, subsidiary and contemporary with this last volume of this work.
In bidding farewell to his subject the writer would plead, with the Latin poet—
“Nor is the book the index of my mind,
But as I feel an honest wish to find
Some way of pleasing, be it grave or witty;
Accius were else the greatest brute in Rome,