THE LIFE OF A SPORTSMAN 



scientific manner. Our boxing matches, or prize-figlits, as 

 they are now called, are contests of the same kind as the 

 fights of the gladiators, only upon a lower scale ; with this 

 difference, that no man — unless he chooses — is opposed to 

 unequal force ; and if we could divest the mind of the fact 

 that the contest is not so much for glory as for money, such 

 has been the display of manly intrepidity, firmness, gallantry, 

 activity, presence of mind, and strength, which some of our 

 late prize-fights have called forth, that no man need be 

 ashamed of having viewed them with interest. At all events, 

 suppress boxing wholly, and there will be an end to that 

 sense of honour, spirit, and gallantry which distinguishes the 

 common people of this country from those of all others, and 

 they will resort to practices, and the use of weapons in their 

 quarrels, which they now scarcely think of; and which are 

 cowardly and disgraceful, because they are commonly resorted 

 to in the dark, or when the object of vengeance is off his 

 o-uard. They would decide their quarrels with knives instead 

 of fists, and the life of no man, in the lower ranks of society, 

 who had given much cause of offence, could be said to be safe. 

 In fact, a great lawyer has pronounced the laws of boxing to 

 be the laws of peace, " teaching that no unfair advantage shall 

 be taken by either of the combatants, and putting a stop to a 

 malio-nant mode of procuring satisfaction. They inculcate a 

 love of fair play, and fbster the natural courage of our country- 

 men, whilst they create a disgust in their minds for the 

 treacherous use of the stiletto or knife." 



'Still,' Mr. Raby would sa}^ 'it is not impossible that 

 the system of prize-fighting, which Broughton calls " a truly 

 British art," may become the reproach, rather than the 

 characteristic of our countrymen. The persons who take up 

 the profession of public prize-fighters are of nearly the lowest 

 grade in society, and are too often unable to resist a bribe to 

 induce them to do wrong — that is, to sell their battles for 

 jnoney — although there are, and have been, many honourable 

 exceptions. They partake, indeed,' he would say, ' of some of 

 the oblo([uy that attached to the Roman gladiators, humorously 

 set forth in a Greek epigram on a bad tenant, from the pen of 

 Palladius, which has been thus translated : — 



' " I let my house, the otlier day. 

 To one who dealt in corn and hay : 



16 



