Peter's anger increased. He felt that he had been entrapped into a combat which he would have scorned had he known. The honest wrestling of the dalesfolk was being lowered to serve the purposes of personal ill-will. He could not withdraw honourably--no rule had been infringed--yet he loathed the stake for which they struggled. His spirit disdained the thought of heating itself in a common brawl. He had not the inclination, even if he had had the time, to wonder at the reason for Joel's attitude towards himself. When two men are at grips with each other, there is little opportunity for reflection or philosophising. Thoughts that do come, come like pictures flashed upon a screen, and are switched away in a moment, leaving behind a vague impression of their significance. Before long the bystanders began to realise that in the wrestling of Peter and Joel there was an unusual element. At first they showed their interest without restraint, but, as the struggle grew keener, though neither had the mastery, feeling ran too strongly for much sound. A sudden shout, a long-drawn breath, a murmur that broke off abruptly, eyes which would not suffer the lids to blink, and hands that gripped the hurdles as though they clung for life, were the measure of their excitement. Those gathered round the ring were thrilled by such passions as must have swayed men at a gladiatorial show, when men fought for their lives. The wrestlers grew heated; their bodies smoked; their lips curled back from their teeth; their eyes were bright. The spirit of the savage still sleeps in every man. In Peter it began to awaken, roused by the clutch of Joel's hands. The refinements of civilisation were in danger of falling away from him, and leaving him a creature of brute force, whose one idea was to bear down his enemy with cunning and superior strength. But he drew himself together; he had never lost control of his nature, and he would not do so now. Amid the ferment of his impulses he strove to be calm, to be resistless yet not fierce, to overcome, but without anger. The feeling of the spectators was intensified, as they saw the two figures become motionless, though the veins on their arms stood up like cords, and their bodies were bent in such a manner as showed the straining of the great muscles of their backs and shoulders. Two figures modelled in clay they might have been, instead of two struggling forces. Neither would give in. Their breasts laboured with painful breathing, the breath whistled as it came and went. Down their brows poured the sweat, making their faces shine in the yellow light of the November sun. Their hair was clotted, their shirts were drenched as though they had been dipped in the beck. Peter felt his head grow dizzy. He thought that his temples would burst with the hammering of his blood. The sun got into his eyes and dazzled them, and, though he managed to shift his position, the glitter of it had already filled his brain.