Adventure, June 1911 — page 17: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

wy Adventures with YourMoney “Wait a clara fe Sullivan replied, “TT go toeGans’ corner as soon as this round is over and find out what’s doing with him.” - Mr. Sullivan went over to Gans’ corner ‘and came back. * ; “Gans says he can’t win this fight, but he won’t lose. He'sa good ring-general and he'll pull us-out. Don’t bet any more money. Am going to stay close to the ring- Watch close.”’ se was apparent during the next ten rounds that Gans was availing himself of every opportunity to impress upon the audience that Nelson was inclined to use dirty fighting tactics, and soon Nelson was being hooted for foul fighting. Gans, on the other hand, appeared to be fighting fair and like a gentleman. Soon it was evi- dent that Gans had won the sympathy and ‘favor of the audience. The fight had continued through the - fortieth round, when Mr. Sullivan again repaired to Gans’ corner and held another animated whispered conversation with him. In the forty-second round Gans of a sudden went down, rolled over and, hold- ing his hand under his belt, let out a yell of anguish that indicated to the excited multi- tude that Nelson had fouled him fright- fully. “In another instant Mr. Sullivan had clambered into the ring. Confusion reigned. The audience was on its feet. Pushing his fist into the referee’s face, Mr. Sullivan cried: ‘“‘Now, Siler, you saw that foul, didn’t you? It’s a foul, isn’t it? Gans wins, doesn’t he?” All of this happened quick as a flash. Mr. Siler, pale as a ghost, whispered some- thing inaudibly. Mr. Sullivan, turning to the assemblage and raising both arms to the skies, yelled: . “Gentlemen, the referee declares Gans the winner on a foul!”’ The audiencé acclaimed his decision with salvos of applause. There did not appear to be a man in the crowd who doubted a foul had been committed, although Nelson at once protested his-innocence. Next day Mr. Sullivan told me that in or near the twenty-fourth round Gans had broken his wrist and knew he could not win the fight by a knockout. He also said that Gans went down in the forty-second round in order to save the day. “7 von that fight,” said Mr. Sullivan. 203 - “T told Gans while he was* in his corner aiter the fortieth round that if he lost he would be laying down on his friends, that he had the audience with him, and that it was time to take advantage of Nelson’: foul tactics.” This was my first experience. In prize- fighting, and my last. My sytipathies were, however, with the winner. Gans’ tactics throughout up to the'last round were gentlemanly and those of Nelson unfair. Even the partisans of Nelson who had wagered on him agreed after the fight that the battle put up by the negro up to the forty-second round was a white man’s fight and he was entitled to win. Nelson had been guilty of foul tactics in almost every round, but the probabilities are that Gans was not disabled by a foul blow in the forty-second round and.that he took advantage of the sentiment in his favor, which had been created by his manly battle up to that time, to go down at a psychological moment. - I saw Mr. Siler after the contest, and he appeared pleased that his decision was so well received, but he assured me that if he was invited to referee another bout in any mining camp he would decline the job. x THE Sullivan Trust Company, of i Ny) course, won a big bet on the result, SSS} but it lost a bigger one as an out- come of the battle on the very next day. The impression created by Announcer Sulli- van’s attempt to reach lofty flights of elo- quence in his speech to the fight-audience was bad for the trust company, and it required the use of over $100,000 on the day following to meet the flood of selling orders in Sullivan stocks which poured into the San Francisco Stock Exchange. THE YEAR OF BiG FIGURES I SOON recouped these stock-market losses. At about four o’clock one afternoon, a few days afterward, a miner who had been at work during the day on the Loftus-Sweeney lease of the Combination Fraction, called at the office of the trust company and asked me to buy 1,000 shares of Combination Fraction stock for him. He divulged to me that just as he was coming off shift he had learned that a prodigious strike of high- grade ore had been made at depth. Com- bination Fraction had closed that afternoon Go DOOKS CO ANUC 5}