kind
expressions, the gentleman with the diamond, the Koh-i-noor, as we called
him, asked, in a very unpleasant sort of way, how the old boy was likely
to cut up,--meaning what money our friend was going to leave behind.

The young fellow John spoke up, to the effect that this was a diabolish
snobby question, when a man was dying and not dead.--To this the
Koh-i-noor replied, by asking if the other meant to insult him. Whereto
the young man John rejoined that he had no particul'r intentions one way
or t'other.-The Kohi-noor then suggested the young man's stepping out
into the yard, that he, the speaker, might "slap his chops."--Let 'em
alone, said young Maryland,--it 'll soon be over, and they won't hurt
each other much.--So they went out.

The Koh-i-noor entertained the very common idea, that, when one quarrels
with another, the simple thing to do is to knock the man down, and there
is the end of it. Now those who have watched such encounters are aware
of two things: first, that it is not so easy to knock a man down as it is
to talk about it; secondly, that, if you do happen to knock a man down,
there is a very good chance that he will be angry, and get up and give
you a thrashing.

So the Koh-i-noor thought he would begin, as soon as they got into the
yard, by knocking his man down, and with this intention swung his arm
round after the fashion of rustics and those unskilled in the noble art,
expecting the young fellow John to drop when his fist, having completed a
quarter of a circle, should come in contact with the side of that young
man's head. Unfortunately for this theory, it happens that a blow struck
out straight is as much shorter, and therefore as much quicker than the
rustic's swinging blow, as the radius is shorter than the quarter of a
circle. The mathematical and mechanical corollary was, that the
Koh-i-noor felt something hard bring up suddenly against his right eye,
which something he could have sworn was a paving-stone, judging by his
sensations; and as this threw his person somewhat backwards, and the
young man John jerked his own head back a little, the swinging blow had
nothing to stop it; and as the Jewel staggered between the hit he got and
the blow he missed, he tripped and "went to grass," so far as the
back-yard of our boardinghouse was provided with that vegetable. It was
a signal illustration of that fatal mistake, so frequent in young and
ardent natures with inconspicuous calves and n