After a perilous night in running the blockade, when they were fired on
and escaped only by sending up rockets and passing as one of the
blockading squadron, General Keith and Gordon transferred at Nassau to
their steamer. The vessel touched at Halifax, and among the passengers
taken on there were an American lady, Mrs. Wickersham of New York, and
her son Ferdy Wickersham, a handsome, black-eyed boy a year or two older
than Gordon. As the two lads were the only passengers aboard of about
their age, they soon became as friendly as any other young animals would
have become, and everything went on balmily until a quarrel arose over a
game which they were playing on the lower deck. As General Keith had
told Gordon that he must be very discreet while on board and not get
into any trouble, the row might have ended in words had not the sympathy
of the sailors been with Gordon. This angered the other boy in the
dispute, and he called Gordon a liar. This, according to Gordon's code,
was a cause of war. He slapped Ferdy in the mouth, and the next second
they were at it hammer-and-tongs. So long as they were on their feet,
Ferdy, who knew something of boxing, had much the best of it and
punished Gordon severely, until the latter, diving into him, seized him.

In wrestling Ferdy was no match for him, for Gordon had wrestled with
every boy on the plantation, and after a short scuffle he lifted Ferdy
and flung him flat on his back on the deck, jarring the wind out of him.
Ferdy refused to make up and went off crying to his mother, who from
that time filled the ship with her abuse of Gordon.

The victory of the younger boy gave him great prestige among the
sailors, and Mike Doherty, the bully of the fore-castle, gave him boxing
lessons during all the rest of the voyage, teaching him the mystery of
the "side swing" and the "left-hand upper-cut," which Mike said was "as