A Bear Hunt in Nordland. 5 



from his parlour in Panton-street, I traced him to obscure lodgings 

 somewhere in Soho, where I used often to pay him a visit. He 

 was confined to his room with rheumatic gout, or something of the 

 sort, but still could hobble about. It seemed as if he was deserted 

 by all his friends, and very hard-up j but his room was filled with 

 trophies of the past, and among them I recollect a silver cup which 

 the old man would fill with ginger-wine, of which he was very 

 fond ; and I used to drink this wine out of the champion's cup, and 

 listen to his description of past scenes in which he had been so 

 stirring an actor. Till his great battle with Molyneux came upon 

 the carpet, old Tom would sit quietly enough in his easy chair, only 

 now and then nourishing, and making occasional passes into empty 

 space at some unseen and imaginary opponent. His defeat by one 

 Nicholls he dismissed very summarily, by the trite but energetic 

 observation, that if he had only been in condition, " he could have 

 pumped thunder on fifty Nicholls'sj" but when he came to Moly- 

 neux, nothing but a tableau vivant would suffice. I had to repre- 

 sent the black, and after I had been placed in approved position by 

 old Tom (with my head thrown forward, my left arm straight out, 

 my left fist almost level with my chin), the old man would throw 

 himself into attitude before me, and, despite his bandaged legs and 

 rheumatics, would show me how he dashed the black's left arm 

 aside, and inflicted that tremendous jaw-breaker which won the 

 fight. " Gently, Tom, play light," I used to sing out as the old 

 man became excited j and his fist used to come in dangerous 

 proximity with my head, as he showed me how he finished off his 

 formidable opponent with his favourite one, two. It was a rich 

 play, but one which I was always prudent enough to rehearse upon 

 ginger-wine. "When I go into that question, sir," observed a 

 pompous old stump orator once to me in Australia, who was for 

 closing all the ports, and leaving the colonists to depend solely on 

 their own resources, " I become excited, but I could argue it for 

 hours, sir, upon coffee." And so it was with me. I hardly know 

 which might have been most dangerous, the old Lapland bear- 

 hunter's spear, or old Tom Cribb's fist, if either play had been re- 

 nearsed upon anything stronger than ginger-wine or coffee. 



