30 Boxing and Athletics, 



discipline to the last in getting their fellows out of the ship^ 

 and when the last order was, " Swim for your lives ! " over- 

 board they went, and all reached land safely. In days of 

 the past, the aspirants to the Ring at prizefighters' benefits 

 consisted often of young gentlemen who " had the keys of 

 the street ! " in other words, rough young fellows who slept 

 under the dark arches, or in the markets : many of the 

 costermonger class or their allies, the rough-and-ready school 

 who had to elbow theii' way through the vvorld from child- 

 hood. Coal wharves supplied a good many of them, and so 

 did the river stairs, where the boatmen kept their wherries* 

 I knew all the school pretty well, and I can conscientiously 

 say that rough as many of them were, they were always 

 ready to earn an honest penny, no matter how tough the 

 job might be — I don't mean in boxing, but in their ordinary 

 life, — and they had the keenest sense of justice and of kind- 

 ness, and the most utter contempt for a flash snob. More- 

 over, they were very funny in their remarks. '' Oh ! 'ere's 

 a friend of Prince ^albert's, gentlemen, just come from 

 Buckingham Palace to say the greens must not be biled too 

 long before supper," was the remark I once heard from one 

 of them to an over-dressed snob, who jDushed the s]3eaker 

 out of the way. " I sa}'', governor," another would ask, '' I 

 see you a speakin' to Mr. Spring ; could you ask hun to let 

 my mate go on at the beginning ; he wants a shower of browns 

 very bad, and has set to at Ben Oaunt's and Owen Swift's.'' 

 " What's his name ? " *' Cranky Jack, of Billingsgate 

 Market, sir : it's wery clever he is"— introducing me to a 

 young gentleman with a lignum vitce face and very short 

 hair. And if room could be found for Cranky Jack befoie 

 the great stars appeared, the gratitude of his friends for my 

 putting their " pal" in the way of having his head punclied 

 was unbounded. 



Well, T will admit it was a very rough school, and some 



