Down the avenue came boastfully sauntering a lad of sixteen years, although the chronic sneer of an ideal manhood already sat upon his lips.  His hat was tipped with an air of challenge over his eye.  Between his teeth, a cigar stump was tilted at the angle of defiance.  He walked with a certain swing of the shoulders which appalled the timid.  He glanced over into the vacant lot in which the little raving boys from Devil’s Row seethed about the shrieking and tearful child from Rum Alley.

“Gee!” he murmured with interest.  “A scrap.  Gee!”

He strode over to the cursing circle, swinging his shoulders in a manner which denoted that he held victory in his fists.  He approached at the back of one of the most deeply engaged of the Devil’s Row children.

“Ah, what deh hell,” he said, and smote the deeply-engaged one on the back of the head.  The little boy fell to the ground and gave a hoarse, tremendous howl.  He scrambled to his feet, and perceiving, evidently, the size of his assailant, ran quickly off, shouting alarms.  The entire Devil’s Row party followed him.  They came to a stand a short distance away and yelled taunting oaths at the boy with the chronic sneer.  The latter, momentarily, paid no attention to them.

“What deh hell, Jimmie?” he asked of the small champion.

Jimmie wiped his blood-wet features with his sleeve.

“Well, it was dis way, Pete, see!  I was goin’ teh lick dat Riley kid and dey all pitched on me.”

Some Rum Alley children now came forward.  The party stood for a moment exchanging vainglorious remarks with Devil’s Row.  A few stones were thrown at long distances, and words of challenge passed between small warriors.  Then the Rum Alley contingent turned slowly in the direction of their home street.  They began to give, each to each, distorted versions of the fight.  Causes of retreat in particular cases were magnified.  Blows dealt in the fight were enlarged to catapultian power, and stones thrown were alleged to have hurtled with infinite accuracy.  Valor grew strong again, and the little boys began to swear with great spirit.

“Ah, we blokies kin lick deh hull damn Row,” said a child, swaggering.

Little Jimmie was striving to stanch the flow of blood from his cut lips.  Scowling, he turned upon the speaker.

“Ah, where deh hell was yeh when I was doin’ all deh fightin?” he demanded.  “Youse kids makes me tired.”

“Ah, go ahn,” replied the other argumentatively.

Jimmie replied with heavy contempt.  “Ah, youse can’t fight, Blue Billie!  I kin lick yeh wid one han’.”

“Ah, go ahn,” replied Billie again.

“Ah,” said Jimmie threateningly.

“Ah,” said the other in the same tone.

They struck at each other, clinched, and rolled over on the cobble stones.

“Smash ’im, Jimmie, kick deh damn guts out of ’im,” yelled Pete, the lad with the chronic sneer, in tones of delight.