"Come, lad, pull off my boots."
"I will not," said Anthony, savagely, "you had unfair odds. You stood with your back to the window."
"I was guarding my hat. Leave it where it lies, dribble, dribble—drip, and take my place on the floor, and try another bout, if thou wilt. Come on, I am ready for thee."
Mr. Solomon Gibbs stood up, resumed his single-stick, and stepped into the midst of the hall. Anthony, with face on fire with annoyance and anger, stooped for his own weapon, and then took the place with the table behind him, where previously Mr. Gibbs had stood.
"Ready!" called Sol. "Come along! so be I."
Another bout, staves whirling in the air, feet dancing forward, backward, to this side, then to that.
Reports as of pistols, when the sticks met.
Anthony was no match for the old gentleman even now that he had the advantage of the light. Sol was without his wig, he had not resumed it, and his shaven pate exhibited many a scar, the mark of former encounters in which he had got the worst, but in which also he had acquired his skill.
"My foot slipped!" said Anthony, as, having dealt an ineffectual blow from which Uncle Sol drew back, Anthony went forward to his knee, exposing himself completely to the mercy of his antagonist. "It is that cursed wet you have brought in—not fair."
"Choose a dry spot," said Sol.