I may say that the last time our hero ever assumed to be an M. D. was just before his last arrival in New York. He was standing one day in Winan's drug store in Tarport, Pa., when a man entered, and upon inquiring for a physician, Ben told him that he followed that profession. Then he explained to the stranger precisely what ailed him, and prescribed--a seidlitz powder. All this was done in the presence of the doctor, and purely for a joke. Nevertheless, Ben took the two-dollar fee which the man offered him. After his brief but by no means inglorious career as a physician, Ben left Washington and returned to New York. There, happening to meet Joe Coburn, the conversation turned upon Ben's fight with Allen. "Would you be willing," asked Coburn, "to meet Allen again?" "I am ready," answered Ben, "to fight him at any time, under any circumstances, and for any stake, be it love or money!" This induced Coburn to exert himself to bring about a match; and while the negotiations were pending, he and Ben took a joint benefit at Harry Hill's. Ben then printed a challenge in the papers, in which he offered to fight Allen for two thousand five hundred dollars a side. This challenge brought Allen from the West. After considerable talk, a match was finally made for one thousand dollars, to come off in New York City. The place selected was a barn in Thirty-second street, and the conditions were that only twenty men should witness the contest. On the day appointed for the battle, Ben and his friends, including Budd Riley and Coburn, assembled in a saloon near the proposed fighting ground. The time appointed for the fight was ten o'clock in the morning. Promptly at that hour Allen, accompanied by Arthur Chambers, Billy Edwards, and Micky Coburn, made his appearance. He was not so prompt, however, in coming to time. He claimed that it was absolutely necessary for him to go down town to his hotel, for the purpose of changing his clothes. So he went--and that was the last seen of him. Ben and his friends waited around for a long time, but Allen must have found his toilet exceedingly difficult to arrange that day. The fight fell through, and from that time forward New York sporting men have taken very little stock in Tom Allen. [Illustration: _HOGAN TRAINING FOR HIS FIGHT WITH TOM ALLEN._] CHAPTER XXI. The Girl Ben Met in Owney Geoghegan's--A Confiding Sea Captain--Adventure in Little Falls--Pitching a Man Across the Erie Canal--Return to Syracuse. Ben remained in New York at this time for a month or so, during which time he met with an adventure which it is worth while to relate.