It certainly seemed as though something would come of it. There were several strangers amongst the new-comers, and one of them in particular attracted my attention. He was a big, white-faced man, with continually blinking eyes and stupid, vacuous face, and every now and then he gave vent to his feelings by a prolonged animal cry which afforded the most exquisite amusement to his companions, and never failed to produce the utmost consternation in the lecturer's startled face. I don't know why it was so, but I took a violent dislike to that man the moment I saw him. He was so ugly, so like an animal, besides which he was evidently half drunk. He seemed of a different species altogether to the broad-shouldered, ruddy-faced, good-humoured Devonshire men by whom he was surrounded, and a very inferior species too. After a while my attention was distracted from him to the other Luccombites, who were evidently bent upon breaking up the meeting. The lecturer was by no means the sort of man to defy the uproar, and insist upon finishing what he had to say. After a very mild protest, the meekness of which caused a howl of derision from the peace-breakers, he brought his lecture to an abrupt close and sat down. Then my father rose, and spoke a few stern reproving words which had an infinitely better effect. But I was too occupied in watching the extraordinary behaviour of the white-faced man from Luccombe to listen to them. He had half risen to his feet, and was leaning over the back of one of the benches with his eyes and mouth wide open, staring with a stupidly-bewildered look at my father. Suddenly he turned round to his companions. "Say, lads, should you like to see me shut that joker up?" I felt hot with indignation, but I kept still. "Ay, Jack, or Thomas, or whatever your name is," answered one of the Luccombites, "give him a cock-a-doodle-do." The man smiled an ugly, sickly smile. "I'll do better nor that," he muttered. "Listen, you 'ere," and, leaning forward, he shouted out one word at the top of his voice--"Yah! coward!" I saw my father reel backwards as though he were shot, and the word he was uttering died away upon his lips. For a moment I hesitated whether to rush to him or at the man who had yelled out that word. But one glance at his ugly, triumphant face decided me. With two rapid strides I was across the room, and my hand was on his collar. "Come on!" I shouted, "come along!" He turned his fishy eyes up at me in amazement. "What d'ye want? What d'ye mean?" he called out. "Let me go, you young cub, you! You're choking me." "I'll do worse than choke you before I've done," I cried, passionately. "Come outside and fight, you great beast," and I dragged him half across the floor, for he was striving to free himself and shaking like a jelly-fish.