The farmer rushed in, striking with both fists. Josh seized him about the shoulders, and the two wrestled for a moment, then fell, the farmer underneath. Josh held him by his hair and ears, and was banging his head on the stone pavement. It was now like a fight between bulldogs; blood was flowing. The farmer had the blacksmith's thumb between his teeth, and the latter was roaring with pain. There were loud cries of “Stop it!” Two bystanders were tugging at the great shoulders of Josh.
Henry and I leaped from the wagon, pushed our way through the crowd, and, seizing the blacksmith by his collar, broke their holds with a quick pull and brought Josh's neck to the ground. The farmer was surrounded and pushed away, while the mighty Josh made for me. I was minded to run away, but how could I, after all that Smead had said to me? I expected to be killed, but I could not run away. So I did a thing no man had ever done before when the great Josh was coming. I ran straight at the giant and, as I met him, delivered a blow, behind which was the weight and impulse of my body, full in the face of that redoubtable man. It was like the stroke of a hundred-and-sixty-pound sledge hammer. The man toppled backward and fell into a cellarway, head foremost, burst the door at the foot of the stairs, and stopped senseless on the threshold of a butcher's shop. It was a notable fall, that of this town bully, and his pristine eminence was never wholly recovered. Henry, too, was set upon by rowdy partisans, and was defending himself when the town constable reached the battlefield and arrested Josh and the farmer and me for a breach of the peace. But the incident was not closed.
Friends of the fighters began to discuss the merits of the men and their quarrel in the bar-rooms and stable yards of Griggsby. Feeling ran high, and there was noisy brawling in the streets.
Soon after nightfall a fight began in a bar-room between the two factions represented by farmer boys and horse-rubbers, and was carried into the back yard; and while it lasted one young man was kicked in the chest until he was nearly dead. Word ran through the town that a murder had been committed. The Websterian age of Griggsby had come to its climax, and naturally.
Next day Henry was arrested for his part in the affray. His father, who happened to be in Boston at the time, was summoned by a telegram from Florence. He came, and the result of his coming was the purchase of The Little Corporal for his daughter. I sat with him and his son and daughter when Dan'l Webster Smead told him the story of that day with the insight of a true philosopher.
“The old town is in a bad way,” said Dunbar, when the story was finished.
“But it can be set right,” said Smead, “an' you're the man to do it.”
“How?”
“Buy The Little Corporal for your daughter, an' we'll do the rest,” said Smead.
Mr. Dunbar shook his head. “I'd rather she'd marry some fine young fellow and settle down,” said he.