"Now, Buck Bradford, we'll settle this business. I'm going to know who's master, you or I," cried Ham.
"All right, Ham; you shall know in about two minutes and a half," I replied, choking with wrath, as I hauled in the horse.
Then commenced a struggle which it is impossible to describe. I do not myself know what I did, only that I thrashed, squirmed, and twisted till I found myself behind the seat with my antagonist; but he held on to my coat-collar as though his salvation depended upon the tenacity of his grip. Finally I doubled myself up, and came out of my coat. In the twinkling of an eye, I sprang upon him, and tumbled him out of the wagon, into the dirt of the road. Though he was a year older and two inches taller than I was, while he had been clerking it in the store, I had been nursing my muscles with the shovel and the hoe, the pitchfork and the axe; and I was the stronger and tougher of the two. I could do more, and bear more, than he. A fight depends as much upon the ability to endure injury as it does to inflict it.
The rough usage I had given Ham was very disheartening to him; while I, with the exception of being a little shaky about the head from the blow of the mail-bag, was as fresh as ever.
"Have you found out who's master yet, Ham?" I demanded, edging up to him.
He looked sheepish, and retreated a pace at every step I advanced. At this point, however, the black horse started, and I was obliged to abandon the field for a moment to attend to him, for the reins had fallen under his feet. I turned the horse around, and then I saw that my cowardly assailant had armed himself with a club.
I was always very fond of a dog and a horse, and had a taste for everything appertaining to these animals. Darky, as the black horse was called, and my dog Bully, were prime favorites with me. If I bore a divided love, it was so equally divided that I could not tell which I liked the best. I was fond of working over the horse, the wagon, the harnesses, and most especially I had a decided _penchant_ for a graceful whip; but I wish to protest, in the same breath, that I never used it upon Darky. Though I was a firm believer in corporal punishment for vicious boys and vicious horses, I did not think he ever needed it. I had a suspicion that Ham Fishley had never had half enough of it, owing to the fact that he was a spoiled child. It seemed to me then that a good opportunity had come to supply the deficiency, even if it were administered strictly in self-defence.