Evening star., 1909-03-14
CULLENESQUE SPIEL
ABOUT jim JEFFR|ES
Has Interesting Talk With the
Boxer and His
Wife.
By CLARENCE l.. CULLEN.


| I spent an hour or so with the Big
Feller and his wife at the Hotel Albany
the other afternoon. l mention Mrs
Jeffries specifically for the reason that
although teeny- weeny in size. she sure is
one great big part of the sketch. Nope
/ don't mean by this that she says to jeff
Here. you jump through this or that
she makes him roll over, play dead, sit
up and beg. and the rest of the. comedy
Just mean that she is Mrs. James j.
Jeffries to Jim and that when all hands
have had their little say about things that
| concern him and his interests she's the
one that he finally puts it up to and
! listens to for advice.
Well. you've all read how Jeffries looks
| He's too big of course-a whole lot too
| big. But that's nothing. He weighed
26O when he started to train for his fight
| with Corbett, and he climbed into the
| ring on that occasion at ID and posi-
lively outboxed-yes. outboXed-the tiger
| ish Corbett from the tap of the gong.
not to say a word of how he outfought
| him.
But the meat on Jeff looks somewhat
different now from the way it looked be-
fore he went to work to get in shape
! to trim Corbett. 1t was just fat that
he had on then. Now, however. jeff has
got that settled look. You savvy that
settled look. The padding looks like it's
on there to stick, as if it's stubborn kind
of padding that'H put up all kinds of
! a squeak and holler before it'll succumb
even to all kinds of hard road runs in
/ blazing suns and that sort of thing.
jeff isn't paunchy. He never was He S
only thrty-eisht inches around the waist
| line now. But | say, he has a sort
of an allarranged and-sha ken Wn-a and
| settled look about him that for sure
/ thing bespeaks the misery he's bound to
= n in,
/ train again for the big people. It's going
| 10 be no snap for him to get down. you
! can bet the bankrol on that. And it
may be. too. that in grinding himself
down he'll be compelled to use a lot of
bear-llke strength. his great asset in
| lighting. Men going on thirty-five years
of age are no longer kids in the heavy
weight fighting game. many a one of
them has found out hitherto to his cha
grin. Huge men of thirty-five are
particularly liable TO settle down physical
ly under a life of comparative ease such
as jeff has been leading of recent years
In way that makes a renewal of train
ing terribly irritating business.
jeff is too big around the chops His
face is full-moonish. The facial meat
looks good and hard and all like that
but there's too much of It, When Jeff S
| in fighting shape his face is as hollow
and ilned and scanned as that of vet
eran soldier who's just returned from a
long tour OF duty fighting Moros in the
Philippines.
His hair certainly is thinning out, too.
Ihats one thing that surprised me- He
used to have an immensely thick mop
or shiny black hemp and ii was, so strong
that it seemed as ii it would take a
derrick TO pull out any one single hair.
NOW, as | say, his hair sure is some
thin. with occasional suggestions here
ana there' OF spots that are going to
! he kind o bleak and bare looking
bimebye. And the hair that he has left
has peculiar brittle. dry sort of a lcok
D1dnt like the looks of the big feller' S
hair at all. But, shucks, if the hair
dope were to be employed where would
old man Fitzsimmons have figured any
time this quarter of a century past?
But, seeing as how you've of course
read all about how the oilermaker stacks
up physically, I'm not going to pursue
that topic. m going to uncoil. however,
a few remarks that he made to me.
didn't ask him outright if he in
tended to fight Johnson. I don't like to
pull these bromidioms on people that
are ANNOYED by them. And that old ques-
ton had been chopped at jeff about nine
teen million times day ever since he
got aboard the train at Los Angeles
TO start on his teeayter tour.
Nope, didn't ask him outright If he
meant to take a wallop at the dnge,
but of course ! had to get something
out of him-he isn't garrulous, YOU know
ana SO SOFI o mOOcleu around the
question by inquiring:
Reckon you're going to have any
! bother worth mentioning getting down
to trim for big work?''
on BET I'd have trouble If | ever took
it into my head to get down to fighting
weight was what he chopped right back
at me. Always did have trouble doing
| that Always did hate It, I'd rather
do year on the rockpile anywhere, than
20 train for fight. I've seen a lot of
yri,, ted
ugly as she bear with cubs when I'm
training for a fight. Well that's right
That's one spot where they've got me
right. | AM ugly when I'm training.
can't help II. You see, I'm big sort of
a lummox. and everybody that knows the
fighting game knows that big men have
the most trouble training. If i could
Eave had my may. last time / trained.
wouldn't have allowed the missis here
nodding his head toward Mrs. Jeffries in
the other room of the suite. within a
thousand miles of me. Not that | didn't
want to see her and all that stuff, but
knew perfectly Well that | was a crab
under training hardships and ! hated to
have her around for me to toss even
her barb once in while when my
crouch was particularly big.
when 1t comes to that. though. |
don't know ET-whether it's ever going
to be part of my game TO get down to
fighting weight again Haven't made
up my mind to that-Y EFT.
There are some reasons-plenty of rea-
sons. But the big reason is this: |
haven't been able to find ont yet after
the light training I've been doing since |
got into the theatrical harness again
just how good or how bad / am. | feel
all right and all that but | may be all
To the punk in reality
Its going TO take me quite a while to
find out whether I'm there with il auv
more. That's the real reason why I'm
hesitating. kind o. and refusing to answer
point blank questions.
Now, here's me. inside and out. I
never was much for that CAB thing YOU
know. even in the days when / knew |
had it and when l knew L could lick
anybody. No matter how sure | felt thai
had the buffalo sign on the gang of
lighters of that day I'm talking about. |
always had sort of little bit of a hold
out-whch kept me from conversationing
overmuch--to the general effect that there
was always Il chance that | might get
walloped. So, pretty confident of myself
as | was at that time. l sort of doped II
out as the policy thing To keep my
tongue between my teeth and let the
other fellows do the ground and iofty
mouth work
Wei, there's all the more reason now
why | should let the talk thing go for
tHe SWeenes and their mates
Now, supposins. for instance that |
here ana now. and proclaim that | was
going to fight. and not only that | was
gong TO fight. but that | was going to
make this Johnson fellow lock like
somebody in an Omaha soup line during
Nebraska blizzard? OF course Won
can see me doing anything like that. not.
but supposing just for the sake of sup