The Brute

Between the two stalwart men who fronted one another, stripped to
trousers and shoes, there was not so much to choose. Woodhull perhaps
had the better of it by a few pounds in weight, and forsooth looked less
slouchy out of his clothes than in them. His was the long and sinewy
type of muscle. He was in hard condition.

Banion, two years younger than his rival, himself was round and slender,
thin of flank, a trace squarer and fuller of shoulder. His arms showed
easily rippling bands of muscles, his body was hard in the natural vigor
of youth and life in the open air. His eye was fixed all the time on his
man. He did not speak or turn aside, but walked on in.

There were no preliminaries, there was no delay. In a flash the Saxon
ordeal of combat was joined. The two fighters met in a rush.

At the center of the fighting space they hung, body to body, in a
whirling melée. Neither had much skill in real boxing, and such
fashion of fight was unknown in that region, the offensive being the
main thing and defense remaining incidental. The thud of fist on face,
the discoloration that rose under the savage blows, the blood that
oozed and scattered, proved that the fighting blood of both these mad
creatures was up, so that they felt no pain, even as they knew no fear.

In their first fly, as witnesses would have termed it, there was no
advantage to either, and both came out well marked. In the combat of the
time and place there were no rules, no periods, no resting times. Once
they were dispatched to it, the fight was the affair of the fighters,
with no more than a very limited number of restrictions as to fouls.