The sniper would come to the inn during the wee small hours of the morning and find it closed for the night. Those gloomy darkened windows seemed to laugh down at him to tell him that he had been kidded. Usually Ketchel and his companions would never hear from the hunter again; that was one sure way of eliminating the pest from the camp. Occasionally, however, there would be some persistent fellow who would come back the next day and seek out the great middleweight. In the latter case, the victim would lament his ill-fortune, only to get a bawling out from Stanley for apparently “disobeying” his orders; Ketchel would tell him that because of his negligence in not doing what he was told, the hunters lost all the snipe. And that evening, immediately following dinner, out on the trail again would go the fighter and his pals to give the pest another little “ride.” * * * * * I first came to know Ketchel when he was introduced to me by Hype Igoe, then his manager as well as a famed cartoonist and boxing scribe for the New York _World_. I cherished the friendship that developed from that introduction and requested assignments to cover Ketchel’s fights in New York, Philadelphia, and Boston, including one of the most thrilling contests I’ve ever seen. In my years of covering the fight beat I’ve witnessed many exciting bouts, but not many offered such a variety of bitter, tornadic milling, rapid footwork and cleverness, as the fight between Ketchel and the celebrated light-heavyweight, Philadelphia Jack O’Brien. This classic battle was fought in an era when referees didn’t interfere as they do today, and when officials were more hard-hearted because they didn’t have to depend on boxing commissions for an assignment. It took place in the ring at Fiss, Doerr, and Carroll’s Horse Mart on East Twenty-fourth Street, near Lexington Avenue, in New York City. I went to report the fight, expecting O’Brien to be defeated rather easily, since he had fourteen years of ring activity behind him and had reached the age of thirty-one. Gloriously handsome and courageous, his opponent was a virile, young, bone-crushing puncher whose hitting power and relentlessly savage attack had earned him the _nom-de-guerre_ of “Michigan Assassin.” Nevertheless, I came away singing the praises of O’Brien, for his display of bulldog courage, consummate ringcraft, iron nerve, and Arctic coolness in time of crisis made him the hero of the evening. The fight was so thrilling, it sputtered and sparked with moments so tense that I could feel my heart beating in my throat from start to finish. O’Brien, with his old fighting head and heart, withstood the wolflike rushes of a slashing, ripping, tearing young opponent. Cunningly hiding his hurts, he bluffed Ketchel time and again into doing things he should have avoided.