"You promised to meet me in the winter of 1875, in a barn on Thirty-second street, New York, to fight for a purse of one thousand dollars. You excused yourself to go and change your clothes, and never came back. You published a card in a Pittsburg paper, boasting that you had driven me out of New York. I was in that city two months afterwards. You were then matched to fight Rourke, but the engagement never came off. In the summer of '75 I challenged you to fight me near Pittsburg, when you claimed to have retired from the ring. Now that you have again entered the ring, I tender the above challenge, simply requesting that not more than twenty-five friends of either party shall witness the engagement. "Yours truly, "BEN HOGAN." This fair and manly offer, which certainly gave Allen an opportunity to prove his metal, had he cared to do so, was not accepted. Ben, tired of his attempts to bring the redoubtable pugilist to terms, made no further efforts to bring about a meeting. Shortly afterward he left Grand Rapids, and returned East, striking his old home, Syracuse. There, in company with Charley McDonald, he filled a week's engagement at Barton's Opera House, giving highly successful sparring exhibitions. The desire to return to the oil country took possession of him once again, and with two hundred dollars, which he borrowed of his mother, he set out, in company with McDonald, for his old haunts. In Buffalo he fell in with Joe Goss and Steve Taylor, and the four proceeded together as far as Erie, where they put up at the Reed House, spending a day or two in a jolly manner. At that point they separated, Ben and McDonald going on to Parker's Landing. The two pugilists made arrangements to give a series of sparring exhibitions through the oil towns, but the enterprise did not prove a success. Finally, having got rid of all his money, Hogan struck Elk City with just ten cents in his pocket. He saw that the place offered an excellent field for the sort of work to which he was most accustomed, and he therefore resolved to open a free-and-easy and variety theatre. He endeavored to lease a lot adjoining the premises of a Mr. Spencer, but this gentleman objected to Ben as a neighbor, and the latter was therefore compelled to seek another location. He found a site directly opposite the one first proposed, and, with fifty dollars, borrowed from Mr. Lynch, he went to work to erect a building suitable for his purposes. The lumber, furniture, and other necessary articles he procured on credit, and in a short time had completed his building. This done, he made his way to Petrolia, and there once more made up with Miss Kitty. He promised her, if she would behave herself, to give her a home for life, and she professed to be glad to accept this offer.