For time is precious, and must not be thrown
away, nohow. Lick you I must, and lick you
I will. Hard."

"But, brother—but, colonel——"

"Rot! " exclaimed the colonel. "Straps
is waiting. Stubs and fences! I'll knock
you into horseshoes and then into
horsenails, if you keep me waiting."

"Have you no merciful feelings? " asked
Zephaniah, as if sorely troubled.

"Not a cent of 'em! Air you ready ?
"Will you take it fighting, or will you take it
lying down ? Some takes it fighting; some
takes it like lambs, lying down. Only make
haste."

"Goliah Quagg," the minister responded,
"I am a man of peace, and not one that goes
about raging with sword and buckler, like
unto Apollyon, or a corporal of the Boston
Tigers; and I would rather not take it at all."

"You must! " the colonel roared, now
fairly infuriated. "Pickled alligators ! you
must. Hold hard, you coon! Hold hard!
for I'm a goin' to begin. Now, once more;
is it fighting, or is it quiet, you mean for to
take it?"

"Well," said brother Zephaniah, "you are
hard upon me, Colonel, and that's true. It's
fighting or lying down, isn't it?"

"Aye," returned the colonel, brandishing
his strap.

"Then I 'll take it fighting!" the man of
peace said quietly.

Colonel Quagg halted for a moment, as if
amazed at the audacity of the Grace-Walker.
Then, with a wild hallo, he rushed upon him
very much as a bob-tailed bull does rush
about under the aggravating influence of flies.
His hand was upon the minister's collar; the
strap that had done so much execution in its
time was swinging high in air, when—

Stay. Can you imagine the rage, astonishment,
and despair of a schoolmaster caned
by his pupil; of the Emperor of China
sentenced to be bambooed by a Hong Kong
coolie; of the beadle of the Burlington
Arcade expulsed therefrom by a boy with a
basket; of a butler kicked by a footpage; of
a Southern planter cowhided by one of his
own niggers; of a Broadway dandy jostled
by a newly landed Irish emigrant; of a
policeman ordered to move on by an apple-
woman; of the Commander-in-chief of the
army in the Crimea desired to stand at ease
by a drummer; of the Pope of Rome blessed
with two fingers by a chorister boy? If you
can imagine anything of this sort,— but only
if you can—you may be able to form an idea
of how Colonel Quagg felt when a storm of
blows, hard, well-directed, and incessant,
began to fall on his head, on his breast, on
his face, on his shoulders, on his arms, on
his legs—all over his body, so rapidly that
he felt as if he was being hit everywhere at
once,—when he found his strap would hit
nowhere on the body of his opponent, but
that he himself was hit everywhere.

Sledgehammers! Sledgehammers were
nothing to the fists of the Grace-Walking
brother. A bob-tail bull in fly time was an
animal to be envied in comparison to the
colonel. He danced with all the vigour of
a nigger toeing and heeling a hornpipe. He
saw more comets than Tycho Brahe or Erra
Pater ever dreamed of. He felt that he was all
nose, and that a horribly swollen one. Then
that he had swallowed all his teeth. Then
that he had five hundred eyes, and then none
at all. Then that his ribs went in and his
blood came out. Then his legs failed under
him, and he fell down all of a heap; or perhaps,
to speak classically and pugilistically, he hit
out wildly, felt groggy, and went down at
the ropes. The tall brother went down atop
of him, and continued pounding away at his
body—not perhaps as hard as he could, but
decidedly much harder than the colonel
liked—singing all the while the little hymn
beginning

   "We are marching through the gracious ground,"

quite softly, to himself.

"Hold hard! " gasped the colonel at last,
faintly. "You don't mean murder, du you ?
You won't hit a man when he's down, much
more, will you, brother ? "

"By no means," answered Zephaniah,
bringing down his fist nevertheless with a
tremendous "bash" upon the colonel's nose,
as if there were a fly there, and he wanted
to kill it. "But you've took it fighting,
colonel, and you may as well now take it
like a lamb, lying down."

"But I'm broke, I tell you," groaned the
vanquished blacksmith. "I can't do no more.
You air so almighty hard, you are."

"Oh! You give in, then ? "

"Aye," murmured Colonel Quagg.

"Speak louder—I'm hard of hearing."

"Yes!" repeated the colonel, with a groan.
"I du give in. For I'm beat; whittled clean
away to the small end o' nothing—chawed
up—cornered."

"You must promise me one little thing,"
Colonel Goliah Quagg," said the reverend
Stockdolloger, without however removing
his knees from the colonel's chest. "You
must promise, before I leave off hammering
of your body, never for to ill-treat by word or
deed any of our people—ministers, elders,
deacons, or brethren."

"I'll promise," replied the colonel; "only
let me up. You're choking me."

"Nor to rile, lick, or molest any other
peaceable critturs as are coming or going
past your way upon Lord's business."

"I promise," muttered the colonel, who
was becoming purple in the face.

"Likewise," concluded Zephaniah,
playfully knocking away one of his adversary's
loose teeth, so as to make his mouth neat
and tidy, "you must promise to give up
drinking of rum; which is a delusion and a
snare, and bad for the innards, besides being