“No! No! No!” said Uncle Ike, as he shuddered with disgust at the thought that the good Lord should be mixed up in such things just to make newspaper sensations. “There is not much going on that the Lord is not an eye-witness of, but when it comes to being on one side or the other of a prize fight He has got other business of more importance. He watches even a sparrow's fall, but it is mighty doubtful in my mind whether he paid any attention as to which of the two prize-fighting brutes failed to get up in ten seconds. Boxing is all right, and I believe in it, and want all boys to learn how to do it, in order that they may protect themselves, or protect a weak person from assault, but it ought to stop there. Men who fight each other for money ought to be classed with bulldogs, wear muzzles and a dog license, and be shunned by all decent people,” and the old man lit his pipe with deliberation and smoked a long time in silence. “But they make money, don't they?” said the boy, who thought that making money was the chief end of man. “Think of making thirty thousand dollars in one night!” “Yes, and think of the train robbers who make a hundred thousand dollars a night,” said the old man; “and what good did any money made by train robbing or prize fighting ever do anybody? The men who make money that way, blow it in for something that does them no good, and when they come to die you have to take up a collection to bury them. Don't be a prize fighter or a train robber if you can help it, boy, and don't ever get the idea that the Lord is sitting up nights holding pool tickets on a prize fight.” “Uncle Ike, why didn't you go to the circus the other night? We had more fun, and lemonade, and peanuts, and the clown was so funny,” said the boy; “and they had a fight, and a circus man threw a man out of the tent; and a woman rode on a horse with those great, wide skirts, and rosin on her feet and everywhere, so she would stick on, and----”