"Le roi est mort, vive le roi," is as true on the cinder-path as in the great world outside.
But as I sat in my room, a winner, with the cheers still echoing in my ears, and good money awaiting me, it was a sad heart that beat under my jersey.
For the "red pottage of Esau" I had sold my birthright.
It was on a June day back in the late "sixties" that I first saw Angus MacLeod, the hero of my story of "The Hollow Hammer."
I had given a boxing-lesson to a little jeweller in South Boston who was burdened with a pugilistic ambition, and was walking leisurely homeward, enjoying the fine weather and the exercise in the open air. As I sauntered along at an easy pace, with my eyes wandering here and there, something in the day or the neighborhood reminded me of the "Old Country," and particularly the ancient town of Bury. I think it must have been the sight of the iron-foundry down the street, with the flames streaming from its chimneys.
I know I was harking back to almost forgotten scenes, and old acquaintances who had doubtless long ago forgotten me (excepting one, perhaps), when a chorus of rough voices brought me to myself with a start. The noise came from behind the high fence which shut in the iron-works yard, and I could not make out what it meant until I reached the open gate and looked in.