When the policeman had picked himself up and blown his whistle, the bystanders fairly tingled with excitement. They saw a little man urging the tall one to submit quietly, and they saw the tall man shake off the little man as one would brush away a fly. The tall man’s hat had fallen off, and the little man was holding it. The tall man was a good-looking fellow, the bystanders remarked, and as he drew himself up, and glared defiance at the approaching enemy, he reminded certain spectators of some heroic subject in sculpture or painting. Of course, this was because they were inclined to be romantic. The bulk of those present saw in Jim merely a young man the worse for drink and spoiling for a fight. A burly sergeant strode up. "Now, then, none of this nonsense," he said roughly. _Crack_! That peculiar straight left met him on the jaw, and the sergeant collapsed on to the gravel. Two more policemen rushed at Jim. Again the long arms shot out. One policeman fell, and the other staggered. Jim followed the latter up and delivered the _coup de grâce_. At that moment Jim felt a muscular hand gripping his neck. He lashed round furiously, then closed with his antagonist, and they fell among the chairs. Jim was on top, and wrenched himself free as a fifth policeman charged at him. A bit of a boxer was this man, young and active, and Jim and he hammered each other with the lustiness of schoolboys. Up and down among the chairs they went, and then Jim, seeing an opening, got home on the point, and turned swiftly to receive the sixth policeman, an enormous fellow who was unfortunately given to over-much beer. He hit Jim on the chest, and Jim gasped; then he hit at Jim again, and Jim, dodging the blow, retaliated with a sledge-hammer slap across the back of the big man’s neck. The big man clutched at a table, and Jim hit him in the spine and upset man and table. Then three policemen, sore and furious, rushed at Jim together, and there was Jim’s close-clipped poll towering above them, and there were Jim’s long arms dealing out donkey kicks, and leaving marks every time. And then Jim retired in good order, face and fists to the foe, towards the buffet, and then, suddenly altering his tactics, he put his head down and butted the middle man of the trio in the stomach, and so made his way through them, and ran into the burly sergeant, who hit at Jim with his truncheon, but missed him, and got a crashing blow in the mouth by way of exchange. And that was Jim’s last good donkey kick, for one of them got him by the leg, another hit him over the hip with his truncheon, and next moment Jim was rolling about the gravel with four of them clinging to him. And, of course, he at length surrendered, and was marched off between two of the policemen to the police-station, the faithful Koko following a few yards behind to bail him out. *CHAPTER VI.* *THE DOCTOR KEEPS HIS WORD.*