It landed with an impact that was loud and not agreeable to the ear. The
dog dropped with a frightful howl and, yelping madly, fled.
Simultaneously, cries arose about the ringside, and the dog's owner, an
alcoholic blaze in his eye, spat bitterly into his two palms and headed
straight for Peter.

"What in the blank-blank d' yer mean by kickin' my blank dog, you
blank-blankety-blank, you?" he inquired.

"I meant that he was behaving as no dog should," explained Peter, "and
the same remark applies to you."

He was not without skill at fisticuff, was Hackley. With the speed of a
tiger, he let out first his left fist, then his right, at Peter
Maginnis's head. But instead of arriving there, they collided with a
forearm which had about the resiliency of a two-foot stone-wall.
Simultaneously, Peter released his famous left-hook--had of the Bronx
Barman at ten dollars a lesson--and the fight was over.

Mr. Hackley's head struck first, and struck passionately; men picked him
up and bore him limply from the field. And Peter, a tiny spot of red in
the corner of his right eye, spoke thus to the horseshoe of watching
faces:

"You're a devil of a fine gang of red-hot sports, aren't you, boys? A
whole regiment of you with no more decency than to pick on one man like
this. I come from a white man's country where this kind of thing doesn't
go--thank God! And any man who has formed a bad opinion of my manners
and my general style of conversation can just step out into the ring and
let me explain my system to him."