Evidently I was at variance with the feeling of the whole club. I spoke to the secretary and got him to take me outside and introduce me to the beaten boy.
He was pretty badly hurt but full of courage.
'How did you come to get in the way of that blow on the chin?' I asked.
'I haven't had any work for some time,' he said to me, 'and I have to keep a mother and sister. I hadn't much to eat this last week so I looked upon this fight as a blessing: it would give me ten shillings even if I were beaten; and if I won I might get ten pounds out of it. If you haven't eaten anything for a couple of days,' he went on, 'you get light and swimmy-like in the head, and so I got it on the chin-a rare jolt; after that I didn't know much what happened till they helped me out here and gave me a whisky and soda. But now I am going off with ten bob and one of them will get me a beefsteak and then I shall feel better.'
I was charmed by the boy's high-spirited pluck, so I said, 'Take a ten pound note, too, and make up your mind that you will win the next fight by keeping your chin tucked into your chest: it isn't well to shove it out too much in the open.'
'Thank you, Sir,' he said laughing, 'I'll do my best.'
I give this incident simply to expose the dreadful cruelty of the average wellbred Englishman. There is a curious want of chivalry in them, and no compassion for the under-dog. I remember two remarkable incidents exemplifying this that may find a place here.
I was one of those who went down the Seine to see a battle on an island in the river between Sullivan and Charlie Mitchell. While they were putting up the ropes, both the combatants stripped off, and it seemed to me a thousand to one on Sullivan. He must have been five feet eleven in height and was superbly made: the very model of a prize-fighter, though he had become far too fat and had put on a veritable paunch; still the power of him took the breath. For years he had toured America, offering any one five hundred dollars who would stay in the ring with him four rounds; but now he was grown fat and scant of breath, like Hamlet.
Charlie Mitchell, whom I knew very well, was an excellent prize-fighter in what we would call today the light heavyweight division. He was about five feet six. in height and very well made; was trained to the hour; and weighed one hundred and sixty pounds or one hundred and sixty-five against the two hundred that Sullivan weighed.
There had been a great deal of rain, and when the men had been in the ring for ten minutes, it was like a mud-puddle and as slippery as a butter-slide.
All through the first rounds, Charlie Mitchell, assured of his superior condition, kept away, forcing Sullivan to run after him again and again round the ring. About the fourth round, Sullivan stopped; he was puffing and blowing like a grampus. 'Say, Charlie,' he bellowed in his deep voice, 'is this a prize-fight or a foot-race?'
Everyone burst out laughing. Sullivan had spoken needlessly. In the next round before he got his wind, Charlie met him and had a set-to in the middle of the ring: he ended it by slipping Sullivan's right and hitting him viciously in the stomach with the left, and then, crossing to the chin with his right, knocked the big champion down. 'It seems to me it is a prizefight,' said Mitchell coolly; but the heavy blow had taught Sullivan his lesson, and he fought more cautiously for the next half hour or so, till the referee said the fight was over as a draw.
It was curious to note how at once the English spectators changed their attitude and began to pay court to Mitchell.
On the way back to Paris everyone except myself seemed disgusted: the fight should have been fought to a finish, they said. What rot it was to spoil the day with a draw. We had seen some brilliant boxing, and I didn't think the day spoilt at all. It had taught me that Sullivan's day was over.
A little later when the news came through that he had been beaten by Jim Corbett at New Orleans in September, '92, I was not surprised. From all accounts, it was almost a replica of the fight which I had seen with Charlie Mitchell. The first rounds Corbett kept well out of reach, and the crowd jeered at him, while Sullivan kept calling out in his deep bass voice: 'Come in and fight.' About the third round Corbett went in to fight, and by the end of the fourth round it was seen that the great John Sullivan was beaten. How he ever lasted twenty-five rounds was a wonder! At the beginning of the twenty-first round, Sullivan made a last attempt to turn the tide and rushed at Corbett, but Corbett was too fast and managed to dodge nearly all his blows. This exertion of Sullivan was the last spurt: from that time on, Corbett kept hitting him as he pleased, and finally sent in a terrific right to the chin and Sullivan fell for the full count. On getting to his feet again, he staggered to the ropes, and said, 'It is the old story: I am like the pitcher that went to the well once too often,' and with the tears running down his face he added, 'I have been beaten by a younger and better man, but I thank God he is an American.'
John L. Sullivan was a remarkable character, for when he went home beaten and broken and met the treatment usually accorded in this world to the defeated, he gave up drinking and became a temperance lecturer. He made good, too, in this new role, and died fairly well off. In my poor opinion, with the solitary exception of Fitzsimmons, he was the best prizefighter I have ever seen, and surely at his best, the best prize-fighter in the history of the ring.
Some time later I went to see Slavin fight Jim Smith at Bruges. At first I was in Smith's camp and welcomed his supporters in the hotel at Bruges. Squire Baird, as he was called, was the principal backer of Smith. He was a millionaire, the result of three generations of Scotch ironmasters. I thought him one of the worst specimens of mankind I had ever seen: foul-mouthed, illiterate; he bragged continuously, but the whole gang did him honor for his wealth.
Next day after some difficulties the ring was pitched and the fight began. The two men seemed fairly well matched: Slavin, a little taller and lighter, but trained to the hour; Smith, strongly made and a good boxer, but clearly suffering from years of good London living. In the first round or two, Slavin took all care, though not afraid to mix it; but after the third round, the fight went all one way; it ended by Slavin knocking Smith down, which surprised the whole crowd of Smith's backers, and most of all, Baird, who kept shouting insults at Slavin from Smith's corner.
Soon afterwards, the crowd of Smith's supporters, drawing the ropes loose, made the way to Smith's corner a sort of lane. Smith stood by his own chair awaiting Slavin's onslaught, and Slavin with rare courage went over to him.
As he entered the lane, blows were showered upon him from Smith's supporters, but he nevertheless went through to Smith and knocked him down in his own corner.
The fight was over and ought to have been given to Slavin then and there, but Baird and his gang were not finished with. They raised a cry of 'Police' and dragged Smith out of the ring and began sponging him and attending to him, thus giving him time to recover, if recovery were possible. Slavin sat in his corner quietly waiting. When Smith came in again to the ring, Slavin again had to go over to his corner to fight him, and now one of Baird's gang used a knuckle duster, and as Slavin passed, struck him heavily on the ear, cutting him so that the blood poured down his neck and shoulders; but he went on to Smith's corner in spite of a hail of blows from the spectators, and again knocked Smith down. At this the referee, to the surprise of every one, gave the fight as a draw.
Turning to the referee, Slavin exclaimed: 'I have come thirteen thousand miles to have a fair fight, and you give it as a draw when the man for three rounds hasn't dared to leave his corner. Look how his supporters hit me and treated me; why in the very first round he wrestled me and shoved his boot nails into my legs'-and he pulled up his short drawers and showed his bleeding thigh. 'I didn't even protest,' he went on, 'I could beat the fellow with one hand. How dare you give it as a draw? There is only one man in the ring!'
The referee replied, 'I did it to save you from the brutes on the other side.'
'Nonsense,' cried Slavin, 'turn them all in; I'll take on the whole damned crew.' Never was there more splendid Irish courage.
At a word from Baird, his crew ran round to Slavin's corner as if to attack him, but Slavin walked to his chair, paying no more attention to them than if they had been a pack of Sunday school children, and not one dared now to lay a hand on him.
Baird's money had queered the whole fight!
But even before Slavin had spoken, I had left Smith's side and gone across to Slavin's corner, and when Baird came to me afterwards, I took no notice of him and wouldn't speak to him.
I returned to the Sporting Club and told the story and insisted that Squire Baird should be turned out of the club as a disgrace, not only to English sport, but to humanity. And I believe he was turned out. A word of mine about him stuck, I believe: remembering he was a product of Scotch ironmasters and Puritans, I said that the iron had entered into his soul.
