The Alaska citizen., 1912-02-26

w II S"fpoSs' Salu l. lHdt you
have got a tough customer on your
hands who looks as il he might
stay the four rounds. All you will
have to do is TO push him up against
the ropes, make a bluff at hitting
him with one hand. and jam his
head into the curtain with the other.
That'l be the office for the stang
hand to swing the mallet. And it's
all over but the counting"
Mike laughed until the tears roll
ed down his face. He and Bill
Whelan would have made a good
team; both physical humorists.
immense" he roared The
sucker would never be able to tell
whether it was me or the mallet
that got him."
OF course he wouldn't. The
chances are that most of those
yokels will be so rattled when they
get into the ring with a real cham.
pion of the world, that they would
not know what happened if the
house fell in on EN-. It's a cinch.' -
The next day told Goldenson
that he could go ahead and adver-
tise that we would stop man a
night or forfeit one hundred dollars
1t cheered him up immensely. so
much SO that on the strength of
the new stuff he cut out the only
two really decent variety acts on
the bill.
We shant need EN- now" he
said. This stopping -all-ccmers
business will get the money into
the house"
He was right, at that
You never saw such crowds as we
drew that season. The show was
terrible to contemplate. but Mike,
in action, with a Knockout as good
as guaranteed, pulled them in by
shoals, and from the opening night
we played to S. r. O., and mighty
little of that.
The mallet trick worked even bet.
ter than | thought it would Mike
got credit for a long string of
knock-outs a few of them were on
the square, of Course-and never a
breath OF suspicion as to how it
was done! That puzzled me, for
had been expecting a howl and
/ had an alibi all ready to spring
but at last | figured that the rea.
son nobody questioned our mallet
method WAS none other than the
old theory OF the quickness of the
hand deceiving the eye.
Seeing is believing. All right
and you may say your eyes are as
good as anybody elses. but when
! two men are scuffling around the
ring, fighting fast with both hands.
1t takes an expert to keep track of
the blows as they are struck. In
mixup, with the men standing
close and failing away in dingdong
style, can you pick out the effective
blows ard separate them from the
ones which miss or are blocked ?
Yes, hear You. You say you can.
but on the level, can you? There
are thousand arguments after ev-
cry big fight, or, for the matter of
that, after every ball game. or any
contest where the action is rapid
and continuous. Every man be-
lieves what he sees, and nine-tenths
Of them see incorrectly.
Now, when Mike, making up his
mind that the dear people had been
given sufficient run for their
money slammed his victim up
against the curtain, made a pass
at him with one hand or both, and
the victim dropped like a log. what
else was there for a fellow to do
but believe his eyes and argue abour
which hand Mike did it with? See
ing Is believing, all right, and you
will remember that we had it fixed
so that they couldn't see the mat
let
A stage hand named Cahiu was
appointed lord high executioner. He
was a good man for the job, be-
cause he took a real pride in il.
or course, he had to experiment
with the first half dozen before he
found out just how hard to hit them
without cracking their skulls, but
Cahlll was sort of a student of
human nature, in his own way, and,
after he had taken a good look at
a fellow, he formed an idea about
the thickness of his skull which
was seldom wrong.
The team work between Mike and
Cahill was beautiful to see. Mike
would swing his victim around. and
run him up against the ropes, take
terrific crack at him with one
hand-that was for the benefit of
the newspaper men in the boxes
heel him under the chin with the
other hand, and down would 90 Mis-
ter One Hundred Dollars. Once
in while, Cahill would become 100