The tide of ill-fame, in fact, set in so strongly against
him, that Ellen, startled as she had been by his threat of taking to
the highway, doubted him. The poor young man, in truth, led a miserable
life. Nanse M'Collum had not been found, and the unfavorable rumor was
still at its height, when one morning the town arose and found the walls
and streets placarded with what was in those days known as the fatal
challenge of the DEAD BOXER!
This method of intimating his arrival had always been peculiar to that
individual, who was a man of color. No person ever discovered the
means by which he placarded his dreadful challenge. In an age of
gross superstition, numerous were the rumors and opinions promulgated
concerning this circumstance. The general impression was, that an evil
spirit attended him, by whose agency his advertisements were put up at
night; A law, it is said, then existed, that when a pugilist arrived in
any town, He might claim the right to receive the sum of fifty guineas,
provided no man in the town could be found to accept his challenge
within a given period. A champion, if tradition be true, had the
privilege of fixing only the place, not the mode and regulations of
battle. Accordingly the scene of contest uniformly selected by the Dead
Boxer was the church-yard of the town, beside a new made grave, dug at
his expense.
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