“Fighting is strictly prohibited on board ship,” sung out Bainbridge, one of the older midshipmen, in a sarcastic voice.
“Squabbling, you mean,” chimed in another one. “That, I grant you, is unbecoming an officer and a gentleman; but when two fellows have a falling out in the steerage, why, the regulation squints exactly the other way; it means that the two fellows must have it out, like gentlemen, and no bad blood afterward.”
“Just what I think,” said Somers; “and as I hate fighting, I want to get through with all I shall have to do in that way in as short a time as possible; so I will settle with two other young gentlemen to-day against whom I have an account. Then, if I get my eye blacked, I will only have one hauling over the coals for three scrimmages.”
“You don’t mean to fight three fellows in one day?” asked Bainbridge in surprise.
“Yes,” answered Somers nonchalantly.—“Decatur, you settle the particulars,” and he walked off, as composed as ever.
“I told you fellows what a Trojan Somers was when he was started,” remarked Decatur, “and now you’ll see for yourselves. He is wiry and as strong as a buffalo, and he is first-class with his fists, and—— Well, you’ll see!”
As these little affairs were conducted strictly according to the code, they were arranged in a very business like manner. Fair play was the watchword, and all the midshipmen who were off duty assembled to see the fun. When Somers had knocked the wind out of his first adversary and brought him to apologize, it was proposed that the other affairs should be postponed; but Somers, being in for it, and the exercise rather warming his blood, invited his persecutor Number Two to “come on.” He came on, with disastrous results in the way of a good, wholesome pounding and a swelled nose. The third encounter following, Decatur begged Somers to be allowed to take his place.
“Why, I’m like Paul Jones!” cried Somers, laughing, as he sponged off his neck and head. “I haven’t begun to fight yet.”
True it was that Somers was then perfectly able to do up Number Three in fine style. As he stood astride over his opponent, who frankly acknowledged himself whipped, a mighty cheer went up from the surrounding audience of midshipmen, and every one of them, including his late opponents, came forward to shake Somers’s hand. The noise of the cheer penetrated from the hold up to the wardroom, where some of the lieutenants were sitting around. Stewart smiled significantly.
“I think I know what that means,” he said. “The fellows have been running a rig on Somers, and I predict he has come out ahead. That fellow has an indomitable spirit under that quiet outside.”