Annie Laurie

San Francisco Examiner/May 20, 1891

He Tells Annie Laurie About the Ethics of the Ring.

HOW HIS WIFE LIKES THE IDEA.

She is Very Much Excited Over the Coming Fight—But She is Sure Her Husband Will Win—How a Fighter Fools the Other Man by Doing What He is Not Expected to Do.

If I had a brother that looked like Mr. Corbett the pugilist, I am very much afraid I should be vain of him. Mr. Corbett is a great big handsome, frank-faced boy. That’s what he looks like, anyway. He says he’s twenty-four, but he doesn’t look an hour over twenty. He is training over at Sausalito, and I went over there to see him yesterday. The house where he is staying is right on the road, and the steps were crowded with men who were talking eagerly. “Talking fight,” I heard afterward.

One of these animated gentlemen told us that Mr. Corbett was upstairs in the parlor, so upstairs we went.

Mr. Corbett was in the corner, very much in the corner. An anxious-eyed speculator was cross-questioning him with determined vigilance, some clerical-looking gentlemen were lurking uneasily in the hall, and every minute or two a newcomer hurried in with a “Halloo, Jim,” and the newcomer was usually greeted with great cordiality and invited into another room to wait.

Everyone that came in said “Halloo, Jim,” and Mr. Corbett was such a great bright-faced boy and looked so happy-go-lucky that I had all I could do to keep from saying “Halloo, Jim,” myself, when I was introduced; but I didn’t. Mr. Corbett didn’t give me a chance to say anything. He just took me by the hand, brought me an easy chair, put it where I could get a good view of the bay, and then he sat down opposite me.

I gazed at him in mute astonishment. He looked no more like a prize-tighter, or at least like what I thought a prize-tighter ought to look, than he did like a Pawnee Indian. We gazed at each other in deadly and embarrassing silence for the space of one long, tedious minute. Then Mr. Corbett laughed. Then I laughed, and then we both began to talk.

POINTS ON FIGHTING

“Now, I can’t ask you any wise questions about ‘form’ or anything like that, and I wouldn’t understand you if you told me without asking. Will you just give me a few plain—what do you call them—oh, yes, pointers on fighting.”

Mr. Corbett laughed again.

“Pointers on fighting,” he said; “why, of course. Where shall I begin?”

 “In the ring. What do you do the first thing when you go in the ring?”

“Well, you know we walk in the ring and sit down in the corner—I in my corner, the other man in his corner. Then the referee makes a little speech, a bell rings and we go at it.”

“How do you go at it? As hard as you can?”

“Oh, no. Good boxers never expect to do anything in the first round. They just size each other up. That first round means an awful lot to a quick-witted man, though. That’s the time when he makes up his mind what he’s going to do.”

“How do you mean?”

“Well, this is what I mean. Say I am fighting a man I’ve never seen fight. I watch him and see where his weak point is. If I see he knows more about boxing than I do I just shut my teeth and fight. Put that in italics, please—Fight. I know that’s the only way to get him, I must beat him by sheer brute force.”

“And if you think you’re equally matched?”

“Then I try to learn his tricks, not forgetting to teach him a few of mine. Illustrate with cuts I mean. There’s no rule to lay down, though. A man must use his wits.”

“Wits in fighting! I thought it was all muscle and pluck.”

“Oh, what a mistake! Why, you’ve got to keep your mind working as fast as your fists; faster.”

HOW HE FOOLS THEM.

“”For instance, sometimes I make a man believe I’m going to give him a smasher with my right, the first instant I get a chance. I double up my fists and fix my eyes on him as if I was burning for a show at him. He’ll forget all about my left, I’ll keep it open by my side and act as if I never had a left hand. All at once, biff!—my left lands and that man gets a surprise party. That’s one of the tricks of the ring.”

When he told me about this he leaned forward in his chair and made a desperate lunge at me with his right hand. Suddenly he jumped to his feet, and boo, that awful left hand nearly frightened me to death.

“Mercy,” I gasped. “I don’t wonder there’s a surprise party.”

“Would you like to see me punch the bag?”

“Would I! Well, I don’t have to stand near the bag, do I?”

Mr. Corbett looked amused. “No,” he said.

The punching-room is fitted with a padded sort of carpet—a thing that looks more like a big, thick mattress than anything else. There’s a twisting-machine in the corner and a pulling-weight on the side. The twisting-machine is to strengthen the wrists, and the pulling-welght is to develop the chest. I couldn’t see what that brawny-chested, supple-wristed man wanted with these arrangements, but he probably knows a trifle—just a trifle—more about his particular business than I do, so I didn’t expostulate.

The principal thing in that room was the bag. After I saw that bag bounding frantically to the ceiling I didn’t know there was anything else in the room—except Mr. Corbett. I knew he was there. So did the bag.

IF HE WINS.

“What does your wife think of all this, Mr. Corbett?” I asked.

“My wife? Oh, she’s greatly excited, of course.”

“What will she do the night of the fight?”

“She’ll sit at home, and—well, she’ll wait.”

“Won’t she be frightened?”

“Oh, no. She’s sure I’ll win. There is a wire from the club to our house and she’ll know the minute it’s settled.”

“What are your plans if you win?”

“We will go East as soon as we can. We want to take a little trip anyway, and that will be a good time. You see, if I win, I shall be on the road to the championship; and then, if I lose I shall leave the ring.”

“Do you ever get nervous yourself when you think of all you have at stake?”

“Get nervous? Of course I get nervous. I’m always nervous before the fight. But the minute I see that ring I forget what nervous means.”

“How did you choose this business?”

“By accident. I was a clerk in a bank, and I used to box a little up at the club. My teachers told me I could box, and I gradually became more and more interested in it. Then I became a boxing-teacher. Then I fought one fight—a professional fight—and that settled it. My family felt terribly about my entering the ring, but I could never see it in that light. If I can be a first-rate fighter, I have nothing to be ashamed of. If I cannot, I shall get out of the business. I don’t want to be a second-rate pugilist.”

“But isn’t your wife afraid you’ll get hurt?”

“No. Those brutal fights are things of the past. I hope brutal fighters soon will be. I don’t see why a man should be a beast because he knows how to defend himself, or because he can make another man work hard to defend himself. This idea of two men standing up and smashing each other is absurd. There’s no science in that. No, I don’t make any pretense to hard hitting. I mean to win on quickness and agility more than anything else.

When we came out of the punching room he threw on a little striped cap.

“I must go for my afternoon spin now,” he said.

“How far do you spin?”

“Oh, about ten miles.”

Mr. Corbett’ spin is a walk, and a springy, rigorous walk it is, too.

The crowd of conversational men on the steps turned as one man and gazed at Mr. Corbett. “Hello, Jim,” they cried, in a mighty voice.

“Hello, boys,” he replied.

“Good form,” said one of the men.

“Mighty good form,” said another.

Then they all nodded. Nodded vigorously.

“He’ll do it,” said a determined looking man.

“That’s what he will,” remarked a particular friend of the determined man.

Then they all nodded again.