RECOLLECTIONS OF THE GLOVES. 6 



hearing them talked of so much, I cut out card 

 figures of Gregson and " the Game Chicken," Jem 

 and Tom Belcher, Dutch Sam, and all the fistic 

 heroes of the day, and made them fight " in mimic 

 battle o'er again." Unfortunately, or luckily for me, — 

 perhaps, ultimately, the former, — my brothers, Henry 

 and Augustus, ^Yere much addicted to sparring ; and 

 I have, as a child, stood between "Jackson's" knees, 

 and hit at his hand for a quarter of an hour to- 

 gether, to teach me the straight blow. To be taught 

 the art of sparring 07ili/ is no use ; and I would not 

 advise any of the rising sportsmen to suppose that, 

 because they can tap each other (I don't mean the 

 "claret" of either) with the gloves, and stop quickly, 

 they are a match for even a middling and ignorant 

 countryman, for they are not so. To hit him is the 

 best way to stop a " round" man ; and a better illus- 

 tration of what I say cannot be afforded than by 

 quoting the language of that respectable character, 

 the late Mr. William Gibbons, when he was second- 

 ing a friend of his in the prize-ring, who, though 

 game, was not retaliating on his opponent : — " I say, 

 old pal, if you stand there taking every thing and 

 giving nothing, you can^t ivin!^^ 



To learn to hit, therefore, is the first thing for a 

 beginner ; and it seemed to me, that my brothers 

 also thought it requisite that I should be hit, as 

 well as learn to hit, for they put me to spar with 

 an older boy and more set young countryman, a 

 gamekeeper's son, at first ; and when, for my own 

 safety, I had learned, by quick straight hitting, to 

 send his head into the manger of the stable which 

 was always the scene of our exercise, they then set 

 me at a footman, a grown man, who, of course, 



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