Sport: Gentleman Jim

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A wild-eyed woman, her large face splashed with her husband's blood, sat at the edge of a prize-ring, screaming something. "Hit him in the slats, Bob," said she, addressing her husband, Pugilist Robert Fitzsimmons, "in the slats." In the 14th round, he took her advice, let his left try the middle of his debonair, dancing opponent; the referee's arm rose and fell: James J. Corbett ceased to be heavyweight champion.

After that he tried to come back, failed, settled down to the life of a gentleman and memories. His gentility has become recognized far and wide, his memories have taken shape in his mind, he has written* a book†. Like John Keats, he was a livery-stable keeper's son. His father intended him for the priesthood, but he crossed himself and went out to lick the boys. His first fight was with Joe Choinyski, whom he calls "one of the gamest and best fighters that ever lived"—a slugging match on a raft in San Francisco Bay. Then he made a wreck out of Jake Kilrain, was matched with John L. Sullivan, the Strong Boy of Boston. Sullivan "fell hopelessly on the ground, on his stomach, and rolled over on his back." After that battle, Corbett made milk famous all over the world by drinking a glass of it to celebrate his victory. Came a night when he was the guest at a supper in the Savoy Hotel, London, at which Loie Fuller, dancer, and Mme. Yvette Guilbert performed for him as if he were royalty. Where another would thump his chest in robust braggadocio, he speaks with a sly wink and a deprecating gesture, for he wants the reader to understand that Corbett was a prize-fighter who wore a gardenia in his buttonhole.