Instead of coming, as before, to my extended arms, and seating himself, like a good child, on my knee till time was up, the skipper now staggered towards Snowball, and began rummaging in his jacket. I was too quick for him. Just as he extracted an enormous clasp-knife, I whipped it out of his hand, and passed it to Captain Gabion. On this demonstration, supposing that "legitimate war" was at an end, and my "occupation gone," I was quietly walking away, with my hands in my pockets. But the Captain, having first communicated with the Major, met and stopped me, saying, "Come, we overlook that. The next round." The fourth round presented no novelty. The painting went on; I may say, this time, was pretty well finished. Never was an ugly monkey more completely "beautified" than the poor skipper. He still had his strength and wind, and there was as yet no reason why he should not ultimately win--especially as he hit out like the kick of a horse, and one of his blows, if it told, might have turned the day. I began, however, to be apprehensive that he would soon be put _hors de combat_, by losing the use of his peepers. When, therefore, I sent him in the fifth time, I whispered, "You must try to close, or you'll have the worst of it." Suddenly rushing in, giving his head, and boring on with his right arm extended, the skipper, at the commencement of the fifth round, contrived to get his left about the Major's waist. This led to a grapple, and a short but fierce struggle. The skipper had the advantage in physical power; but the Major was his superior in wrestling, as well as in the nobler science. They fell together, the Major uppermost. On the ground, strength resuming its advantage, the skipper soon rolled the Major over, and had the ascendency. Supposing the round concluded, I was going to pull him off. "Let alone, let alone," said the Major; "leave him to me." The Major, I presumed, was waiting an opportunity for a "hoist." The skipper now, with his right arm extended, held the Major's extended left, pinned down by the wrist. The skipper's left arm and shoulder were passed under the Major's right, so as completely to put it out of commission. With his left hand, the skipper seemed to be pulling the Major's hair. All this was so completely _hors des règles_, that nothing but the Major's veto kept us from interposing. At this juncture of the combat there was evidently something out of the usual course, which particularly interested the nigger. Stooping down almost to a squat, his face peering close over the heads of the two combatants, his big eyes bulging and gloating with eager expectation, his mouth open, his blubber lips projecting, and his two hands uplifted and expanded with intense curiosity, he watched the result. Just in time, I grasped the skipper's thumb! Half a second more, and the Major's eye would have been out of its socket! Captain Gabion, breathing the only execration I ever heard from his lips, choked the skipper off.