e Sullivan, and Heenan and Sayers, and other great events
in the annals of the squared circle. On one occasion, to excite interest
among his patrons, he held a series of "championship" matches for the
different weights, the prizes being, at least in my own class, pewter
mugs of a value, I should suppose, approximating fifty cents. Neither
he nor I had any idea that I could do anything, but I was entered in
the lightweight contest, in which it happened that I was pitted in
succession against a couple of reedy striplings who were even worse than
I was. Equally to their surprise and to my own, and to John Long's, I
won, and the pewter mug became one of my most prized possessions. I
kept it, and alluded to it, and I fear bragged about it, for a number
of years, and I only wish I knew where it was now. Years later I read
an account of a little man who once in a fifth-rate handicap race won
a worthless pewter medal and joyed in it ever after. Well, as soon as I
read that story I felt that that little man and I were brothers.

This was, as far as I remember, the only one of my exceedingly rare
athletic triumphs which would be worth relating. I did a good deal of
boxing and wrestling in Harvard, but never attained to the first rank in
either, even at my own weight. Once, in the big contests in the Gym,
I got either into the finals or semi-finals, I forget which; but aside
from this the chief part I played was to act as trial horse for some
friend or classmate who did have a chance of distinguishing himself in
the championship contests.

I was fond of horseback-riding, but I took to it slowly and with
difficulty, exactly as with boxing. It was a long time before I became
even a respectable rider, and I never got much higher. I mean by this
that I never became a first-flight man in the hunting field, and never
even approached the bronco-busting class in the West. Any man, if
he chooses, can gradually school himself to the requisite nerve, and
gradually learn the requisite seat and hands, that will enable him to do
respectably across country, or to perform the average work on a ranch.
Of my ranch experiences I shall speak later. At intervals after leaving
college I hunted on Long Island with the Meadowbrook hounds. Almost the
only experience I ever had in this connection that was of any interest
was on one occasion when I broke my arm. My purse did not permit me to
own expensive horses. On this occasion I was riding an animal, a b