WHEN a boy retorted with the direct challenge, “An’ you da’sn’t back it!” it was a case, if you did not wish to lose caste, of your either taking the aggressive or effecting some honorable compromise.

It was difficult to explain to an outsider, to one not in sympathy with the duello, the deep significance of “da’sn’t back it.” You felt the term, but you could not elucidate it, save, to some extent, by example; you yourself, with a red spot on your forehead, a scratch on your nose, a torn collar to your waist, a rent in your knickerbockers, and a proud spirit in your bosom, being the example.

“Now, I should like to know what you were fighting about,” declared your mother, holding you prisoner at her knee while she stitched your collar so as to make you presentable for supper.

You squirmed, realizing the task before you.

“Well, we were playin’, an’ Ted he tripped me, an’ I said he did it on purpose (an’ he did, too), an’ he said he didn’t an’ I said he did, an’ he said I was a liar an’ da’sn’t back it, an’ I went to back it, an’ he hit me, an’—”

“But what is to ‘back it’?” interrupted your mother.

“Why, to back it—to back it, you know. He said I da’sn’t back it, an’ I had to or else I’d be a coward, an’ he hit me, an’ I hit him, an’—”

“But how could you back being a liar? I don’t understand.”

She was a darling mother, yet at times surprisingly dense.

“I did back it, though, just the same.” That ought to be exposition enough, and you galloped on with your narrative: “An’ I hit him, an’ he hit me right on the forehead,—but it didn’t hurt,—an’ I—an’ then we got each other down, an’ I was gettin’ on top, an’ then the kids pulled him off, an’ a man came by an’ wouldn’t let us fight any more. Ted’s ten, an’ I’m only nine.”

Thus, with a little valorous touch, you finished your story. This much you accomplished, even though you evidently had failed in bringing your mother to a clear perception of “backing it.”

Father looked at you inquiringly.

“What’s that, John? Fighting! With whom?”

“John had a fight this afternoon; have you heard about it?” asked your mother, gravely, of your father at supper.

It was a portentous moment.

“Ted Watson. He tripped me on purpose an’ nearly made me fall when I was runnin’, an’ then he told me I da’sn’t back it. But we didn’t fight long, ’cause a man came by an’ stopped us.”

“You can see he scratched his nose, and his collar was torn almost off his shirt,” supplemented your mother.

“I tore his collar, too—an’ I bet he’s goin’ to have a black eye,” you hastened to state, in palliation.

“W-w-well, I’m astonished, John!” asserted your father, very solemnly.

You fastened your eyes upon your plate, and could think of nothing to say in rebuttal. You had stalked homeward a hero, fondly expecting that your parents would be proud of you, who, only nine, had combatted a boy of ten, and were “gettin’ on top”; but witness how they had wet-blanketed you!

“I told him that he ought to have refused to fight, and it would have made the other little boy ashamed,” informed your mother.

“By all means,” approved your father.

Coming from your mother, the advice, while of course absurd, had not seemed so strange; after all, she never had been a boy, and girls didn’t fight; but your father’s traitorous acquiescence goaded you to desperation.

“Did you ever da’sn’t back it when you were a boy like me, papa?” you appealed; and although you were not fully cognizant of the fact, you had him hip and thigh.

He glanced at your mother, and had you been looking at him instead of still eying your plate, you would have seen his mouth twitch in a funny way.

“You do as mama says. She’s always right,” he answered, and you had a dim suspicion that he was begging the question.

The little encounter between Ted and you was described much more quickly than it had occurred. The duello as practised in your corps did not admit of undue precipitancy in falling to blows. A certain amount of palaver was obligatory first—an exchange of witticism and defiance, beyond which, as often as not, one did not proceed.

When Ted had tripped you, and you had angrily accused him of having done it on purpose, he had denied it just as angrily:

“Didn’t, neither!”

“Did’t, either!” said you.

“Didn’t, neither!” said he.

“Did’t, either!” said you.

“Didn’t, neither. You’re a liar!” said he.

“Did’t, either. You’re another!” said you.

“You’re another ’nother!” said he.

“You’re twice as big as anything you can call me!” said you—a crusher, and quite unanswerable.

“You’re twice as big as that, an’ you da’sn’t back it!” said he, also scoring a point.

“He says you da’sn’t back it! Ya-a-a-a-ah! he says you da’sn’t back it!” gibed the boys about you, glorying in the crisis.

Ted and you were now uncomfortably in the center of a circle which was ever being increased by the jubilant cries of “Fight! Fight!” which summoned spectators from all quarters.

“G’wan an’ back it! You can lick him!” urged your supporters.

“Aw, he’s ’fraid to! He’s ’fraid to!” scoffed your rivals.

Ted and you, grimy fists doubled, not knowing exactly what to do, faced each other. Neither of you wanted to fight. Fighting was being forced upon you. You were to amuse the pitiless crowd.

“I ain’t, either, afraid,” you asserted sullenly.

“I wouldn’t let him trip me up that way, you bet,” inspired a friend on your right, boldly.

“An’ call me a liar an’ everything!” added a friend on your left.

Oh, how solicitous of your honor were they who were not to do the fighting!

“He is a liar if he says I tripped him on purpose,” stoutly reiterated Ted, slightly qualifying his former blunt statement.

“You’re another!” you returned. “Anyhow, it looked as if you tripped me on purpose.”

You, likewise, were hedging a mite.

“There! He called you a liar, too!” admonished the circle to Ted.

“Then he’s another, an’ he da’sn’t back it,” responded Ted, grimly performing his duty.

This harmless verbal fencing might have been continued up to the very present, and the ethics of the duello not have been violated, had not some over-zealous enthusiast pushed Ted and you together, with the result that, in fending each other off, you, according to the eager verdict of the highly observant critics, “backed it,” and he hit you, simultaneously; whereupon, not seeing anything else left to do, at each other you went like a couple of jumping-jacks, until (fortunately, you held, for Ted) the approach of the man caused him to be removed from on top of you.

Flushed, excited, and disheveled, you went your way; and flushed, excited, and disheveled, Ted went his way. Throughout your route, you and your babbling escorts, with many a “Gee!” and “Darn!” discoursed upon what you had done, and what Ted had not done, and what would have happened had the fight lasted only a minute longer.

Loudly you wrangled with them as to which got the worst of it, quite blind to the fact, which now you are free to acknowledge, that the one who got the worst of it was your mother, for she had to mend your clothes.

She was always getting the worst of it. She was the unlucky non-combatant.

The duello produced the best of feeling between Ted and you. Fights were for mutual benefit. Swelling dignity and biceps so demanded expression that they could not forever be gratified by merely playfully poking chums in the ribs.

Therefore it is plain why, when a friend mischievously reported to you, “Say, Speck says he can lick you,” it was all that was required. Like to a strutting cockerel who hears a distant crow, you bristled in answer.

“He can’t, either. I can lick him with one hand tied behind my back.”

Fast flew the news to Speck, and Speck promptly resented the slur, as he should. The boys of the neighborhood were pleased.

Now you, and likewise Speck, are the objects of much flattering attention. You let your following feel your muscle, and they let you feel theirs, and you are firmly convinced that yours is the hardest. Also, you are convinced that you have a great knack at fisticuffs, and are the inventor of a peculiar, irresistible blow which you deliver, the knuckle of the middle finger carefully protruded, under your warding left arm. More or less secretly you have demonstrated it while “fooling” with your companions.

You can chin yourself six times, and you are, in valor and strength, a boy wonder.

Your companions favor you with adulation to a degree compatible with their own self-respect; for most of them, too, are boy wonders.

Well as Speck and you are satisfied with bravado and careful avoidance of each other, it is inevitable that you meet.

“There’s Speck—see? Come on; you ain’t afraid of him!”

You have committed yourself too far for graceful retreat, and in the midst of your crowd you advance boldly to join Speck and his crowd.

The rival clans come together and mingle, but Speck and you pretend not to see each other.

“John says he can lick you, Speck!”

Yes, you have said so, but it was under provocation of, presumably, a direct challenge from him. However, the duello does not thrive on explanations, and Speck and you are in the hands of your friends.

The all-engaging topic has been broached. Speck apparently does not hear. Maybe the matter will be dropped. But no.

“He says he can lick you with one hand—aw, Speck!”

“He can’t, though,” defends Speck.

“Speck says he can’t, either,” obligingly announces his backers.

“Well, he can, I bet you.”

“Bet you he can’t.”

“He’ll show him whether he can or not.”

“Huh! I’d just like to see him once!”

You find yourself hustled forward and set against Speck, who in like manner has been pressed to the front. Your hands hang limply by your side; so do Speck’s. You feel very tame and pale and artificial; not a whit mad; not a whit like fighting. The pugnacity is your seconds’.

Somebody laboriously balances a small block on Speck’s shoulder.

“Knock that off, if you dare,” bids a Speck chorus.

“I will if I want to,” you assert.

“Well, do it, then!” invites Speck.

“I will if I want to.”

“Well, do it, then!”

“I will if I want to.”

You strive to work up steam by biting your lips, and raising your voice, and spitting ferociously into the dust; you are assisted by the irritating shoves bestowed upon you from behind.

“Well, do it, then!”

“I will if I want to.”

Impatient fingers supply you also with a gage of defiance, an impertinent sliver laid athwart your collarbone.

“Now let’s see Speck knock that off!”

Speck disdainfully lifts his hand and brushes the offending chip to the ground.

“Hit him, John!”

“Don’t you stand that!”

“There!” you say, tapping him gently on the breast.

“There!” he answers, tapping you a little harder.

“There!” you return, tapping him harder still.

“There!” he retaliates, tapping you yet harder.

Then with a final “There!” that breaks through all restraint, and amid shrill, rapturous cheers, two pairs of arms begin to whirl with wild rapidity, the sole thought of their owners being a blind offense according to hit-who-hit-can rules.

The engagement did not last long. A horrified and meddlesome old lady interfered, and after informing you both many times that “little boys shouldn’t fight,” your temperature down again to normal, she sent you off with your disappointed encouragers, while she conscientiously watched you out of sight.

Up to date the question whether you can lick Speck or Speck can lick you is no further settled. Henceforth the spirit of amity prevailed between you. Mettle had been proved, the fight had been fought, and now somebody else must furnish entertainment.

Although victory, actual or prospective, of course never was doubtful (either you were winning, or the other fellow was winning, according as to which did the telling), at some times it appeared to a spectator more decisive than at others.

You were feeling very spunky that noon when amid your preserves you descried a stranger boy; but civilly you challenged him. One may witness two bluff but wary fox-terriers thus approach each other, accost, and investigate.

“Hello!” you wagged; that is, said.

“Hello, yourself!” wagged he.

“Say—what’s your name?” you inquired, as you had every right to do.

“Puddin’ tame; ask me again, an’ I’ll tell you the same,” he replied insolently.

At the unmerited rebuff you stiffened.

“Better not give me any of your sass!” you growled.

“Pooh! What’ll you do!” he growled back.

“I’ll show you what I’ll do.”

“You couldn’t hurt a flea.”

“I couldn’t, couldn’t I?”

“Naw, you couldn’t, ‘couldn’t I.’”

Walking circles around each other, after this fashion you and he sowed crimination and recrimination, while larger and larger waxed an audience hopeful of seeing them spring up as blows.

Only when the flurry came did you discover too late how much taller and stronger and older than you he was. Your bleeding nose showed this to you; and cowed and weeping, you retreated in bad order.

“I’ll tell my big brother, an’ he’ll fix you!” you howled threateningly.

“Aw, he ain’t got any big brother,” jeered the heartless crowd, who saw no pathos in your abused organ.

That was true; you had none.

“I’ll tell my father, then,” you wailed angrily—another empty boast; and still sniffling and, fearsomely gory, with the handkerchiefs of yourself and your one faithful companion quite exhausted, you reached the haven of a friendly pump.

Yet you had not been whipped—not exactly.

“Got licked, didn’t you?” unkindly commented various friends and enemies.

“I didn’t, either!” you asserted, indignant. “I had to quit ’cause my nose was bleedin’. It takes more’n him to lick me.”

“He gave you a bloody nose just the samee.”

You would not admit so much as that.

“He didn’t, either; he never touched my nose. It bleeds awful easy. It bleeds sometimes when you just look at it—don’t it, Hen?”