wretched horses in bull-fighting is enough of itself to blast the sport,
no matter how great the skill and prowess shown by the bull-fighters.
Any sport in which the death and torture of animals is made to furnish
pleasure to the spectators is debasing. There should always be the
opportunity provided in a glove fight or bare-fist fight to stop it when
one competitor is hopelessly outclassed or too badly hammered. But the
men who take part in these fights are hard as nails, and it is not worth
while to feel sentimental about their receiving punishment which as a
matter of fact they do not mind. Of course the men who look on ought to
be able to stand up with the gloves, or without them, themselves; I have
scant use for the type of sportsmanship which consists merely in looking
on at the feats of some one else.

Some as good citizens as I know are or were prize-fighters. Take Mike
Donovan, of New York. He and his family represent a type of American
citizenship of which we have a right to be proud. Mike is a devoted
temperance man, and can be relied upon for every movement in the
interest of good citizenship. I was first intimately thrown with him
when I was Police Commissioner. One evening he and I--both in dress
suits--attended a temperance meeting of Catholic societies. It
culminated in a lively set-to between myself and a Tammany Senator who
was a very good fellow, but whose ideas of temperance differed radically
from mine, and, as the event proved, from those of the majority of the
meeting. Mike evidently regarded himself as my backer--he was sitting on
the platform beside me--and I think felt as pleased and interested as if
the set-to had been physical instead of merely verbal. Afterward I grew
to know him well both while I was Governor and while I was President,
and many a time he came on and boxed with me.

Battling Nelson was another stanch friend, and he and I think alike