CHAPTER XVI
THE SMOUTCHY BOYS.
GENERAL Napoleon Smith had been taken captive by the Comanche Cowboys. Now it is fair to say in this place that they also had their side of the question. Their fathers were, in their own opinion, striving for the ancient rights of the town against an interloping Smith. Why should not they against the son of that Smith and his allies? The denunciations of the Edam Town Council were only transformed into the blows which rained down so freely upon Hugh John's bare and curly head, as he stood at bay that Saturday morning in the corner of the dike.
"Surrender!" cried Nipper Donnan, whose father had moved that the town of Edam take the case up to the House of Lords.
"'A Smith dies but does not surrender'!" replied the son of the man who had declared his intention of fighting the matter out though it took his last copper.
In the calm atmosphere of the law-courts this was very well, and the combatants stood about an equal chance; but not so when translated into terms to suit the Black Sheds of Edam and the links of the castle island.