ay#: using.

[25] #Hard all#: do your best.

[26] #Partisans#: adherents, "backers."

"Take it easy, take it easy--keep away, let him come after you,"
implores East, as he wipes Tom's face after the first round with a wet
sponge, while he sits back on Martin's knee, supported by the Madman's
long arms, which tremble a little from excitement.

"Time's up," calls the time-keeper.

"There he goes again, hang it all!" growled East, as his man is at it
again as hard as ever. A very severe round follows, in which Tom gets
out and out the worst of it, and is at last hit clean off his legs,
and deposited on the grass by a right-hander from the Slogger.

Loud shouts rise from the boys of Slogger's house and the School-house
are silent and vicious, ready to pick quarrels anywhere.

"Two to one in half-crowns on the big un," says Rattle, one of the
amateurs, a tall fellow, in thunder-and-lightning[27] waistcoat, and
puffy, good-natured face.

[27] #Thunder-and-lightning#: probably showy, flashy.

"Done!" says Groove, another amateur of quieter look, taking out his
note-book to enter it, for our friend Rattle sometimes forgets these
little things.

HEAD FIGHTING.

Meantime East is freshening up Tom with the sponges for next round,
and has set two other boys to rub his hands.

"Tom, old boy," whispers he, "this may be fun for you, but it's death
to me. He'll hit all the fight out of you in another five minutes, and
then I shall go and drown myself in the Island ditch. Feint[28]
him--use your legs! draw him about! he'll lose his wind then in no
time, and you can go into him. Hit at his body too; take care of his
frontispiece[29] by and by."

[28] #Feint#: make a pretended attack.

[29] #Frontispiece#: face.

Tom felt the wisdom of the counsel, and saw already that he couldn't
go in and finish the Slogger off at mere hammer and tongs, so changed
his tactics completely in the third round. He now fights cautiously,
getting away from and parrying[30] the Slogger's lunging hits,[31]
instead of trying to counter,[32] and leading his enemy a dance all
round the ring after him. "He's funking--go in, Williams;" "Catch him
up;" "Finish him off," screamed the small boys of the Slogger party.

[30] #Parrying#: warding off.

[31] #Lunging hits#: straight-out blows.

[32] #Counter#: to give a return blow.

"Just what we want," thinks East, chuckling to himself, as he sees
Williams, excited