Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-01-05
BALOERDASH OF PUGS
Depressing Features in Connec-
ton With Big Prize Fights.
YARNS OF PRESS AGENTS
How the ''Champeen of the Nit
Fiesta" Talks.
SAVAGENESS OF THE SIMIANS
Style of the Pushers Of the Pencil
From the ''Scene of the Battle"
and the Pictures.
sAvAGENESs OF THE sIMIANS


Special Correspondence of The Star.
NEW YORK. January 4. 1907.
If these pugs would only fight. and spare
the rest of it,
Spare us the preiiminar ies that is. The
def business; the ''weigh-in at o'clock
or ''weigh-in ringside" balderdash; the
noisy vaporinss as to the size of the purse;
the inevitable press agent row" over the
division of the purse-eO per cent to the
winner and 40 to the loser, and all of that
interminable humbug, when it is generally
an even split. anyhow; the purely fictitious
scrap between the two bruisers as to how
the money for the motion pictures shall be
"cut up the carefully prepared fiare-up
over the kind of gloves to be used and the
sort of bandages to be permitted; the long,
dreary wrangle over the selection of the
referee and then, along toward the final
days of training, the grisly, idiotic yarns
about the difficulties encountered by the
swatters In making the weight-these are
the depressing features in connection with
a big prize fight in these modern days that
make good many folks-and even folks
that aren't SO averse TO punchfests-hate
to pick up their newspapers.
And yet there must be a demand for
this sort of stuff or it wouldn't be printed.
The bug papers of New York seem to
know this. You heedlessly buy one of those
while away your dismal ride uptown on
elevated or subway, and you find the whole
front page of the bug publication devoted
to pictures, with huge block-type text, of a
pair Of hairy, abnormally muscled anthro-
poids of civilization, naked to the waist and
crouching or squaring off in their charac-
teristic fighting attitudes. You look up and
down the car. and you find every man
and not a few women-in the gazing,
rapt, at that front page, and you conclude,
Of necessity, that the bug journal folks
know what they are about and understand
their clienteles in a way calculated quite
to extract the substance from your pickeS-
mincey mental criticisms.
Methods of the Old Days.
In the old days the clouters. with their
followers, used to stink on board a large,
or hotfoot out to clearing in the woods,
and bang each other about to their hearts
content. The predminaries were all arranged
in the back room of some grogs nry-as, in
deed they are to the present day. though
that fact doesn't appear in the stuff writ
ten in advance OF modern scraps. The tip
would be circulated among the low fore
heads as to where the fight was to pulled
Off and it would be pulled off at that place.
as per schedule. No four or five months of
advance plugging No mastering" of each
other in the newspapers by the elegant
and "gen'lmanly" matchmakers. No neat
Iy-arranged plans to excite the fear that
the scrap would be declared off on account
Of the bucking of one of the principals
over the matter of weight, or the division
of the coin or what not The pair of bull
neclSed whackers would just fix up tight,
or have 1t fixed up by persons possessing
enough intelligence to arrange such mat
terS and then they'd SLOUGH on to some
place or other and hammer each other up.
1t was rough biting, of course but 1t was
soon over with. and there were no echoes.
Therc'd be no claims and counter-claimS.
The loser would make no printed lamenta-
TONS The winner would refrain from pub
lie gloating. 1t was all very business
Hike and tough If one of the scrappers
didn't care to fight-didn't see" the way it
had been arranged to split the purse-hed
simply stay away from the tight, that s all
I was once in the close vicinage when
thing of this sort happened. 1t was on
board a barge anchored in the middle of
the Hudson or North river. off Hoboken.
It was to be bare-knuckle fight to a fin
ish, between a pair of WO-pounders only
one of the briIisers made his appearance
The other one reneged for some reason or
other-he didn't like the way the money
was to be cut" he had gone off on a
jamboree, or something OF the Sort ANY
how, he was absent at the time he should
have toed the scratch, when the other
man was ready, in fighting rig. The bunch
on board the barge were keenly disap-
pointed. One of the gang, large person
with his hair growing close to his eyes, felt
sorry to see the crowd so disappointed. He
narrowly examined the fighter who was
ready Then he shot his derby hat into the
| ring.
"Tsay," he observed to the crowd, out of
the southeastern corner of his facial orifice,
.dey amt nottin' mean bout me. hate
| t see youSe mugs git a punk break wen
youse has come out here t tsee scrap. so
I'll fight dis stiff meself."
He got tremendous hand. They stripped
| him and fixed him up in lighting tops. And
he sailed in and slugged that other fellow
| to a standstill in thirty-two as brutal, har-
rowing rounds as were ever seen on any
worlds history
Three Months Overdue.
The clangor of the typewriter keys is
now an overture that lasts some three
months before a prize fight comes off, -
and for a month or after the mitt fiesta
is over the harpists of the one string keep
right on hurting at us their impressions of
what happened what didn't happen, of
what was meant to happen and what
wasn't what The said and what The meant
to say" and thus on, ad nauseam. The
consequential as boys Christmas drum a
couple of days after Christmas. But they
will keep banging away at 1t!
To anybody possessing even symptom OF
a sense of humor, and who knows some
thing of prize fighters and their match
makers and their encourages of hangers
on, the printed remarks in advance OF these
fights is bound to be entertaining-referenc
is had to their printed remarks as they ap-
pear in the saffron sheets.
II am perfectly free to admit, BIZ Nc
Glue the ''champeen's" matchmaker, is
made to say In one of these publications.
that Mister O'Fewdge, the gentlemanly
representative of the gentleman who wishes
to engage my principal in pugilistic COM
bat is a shrewd and keen matchmaker. At
the same time l cannot forbear, in this con-
nection from observing that /. too, have
been more or less directly connected with
matters appertaining to the American prize
ring for a considerable number of years,
and, inasmuch as have the peculiar honor
of representing the champion in these nego-
tiations it would certainly appear If he
should be willing to waive certain points
upon which he has taken SO wholly impos-
sible stand
As Actually Said.
Rather down-stage and srandiose, is 1t
not? But the way Mr.. Biff McGlue actually
SAYS 1.-THE way l have heard some fifty
Bifr McGlues say it-more nearly resembles
this:
sTsay youse is a reporter, hey? Well.
femme unwind youse somet'in- Dat
O Fewdge shine is all t de pork He on'y
thinks he's wise mug. He amt begun.
tsee? Put dat in yr pape-he amt begun.
He amt in de pitcher. Tsay, I was maxim
daSa matches when he was wurkin FIR de