"I gave you fair warning,
keep off. I tell you I'll strike the first man, the first one, that
touches me." Then the four who had been appointed to seize me jumped
on me, and I only got one good blow in before they had me down in the
gutter and were beating me on the face and head. I put my hands across
my face, and so did not get any hard blows directly in the face. They
slipped back in a moment, and when I was ready I scrambled up pretty
wet and muddy, and with my face stinging where they had struck. It had
all been done so quickly, and there was such a large crowd coming from
the theatre, that, of course, no one saw it. When I got up there was a
circle all around me. They hadn't intended to go so far. The men,
except those four who had beaten me, were rather ashamed and wished
they were out of it. I turned to Emmerich, a postgraduate, and told
him to give me room. "Now," I said, "you're not able to haze me, and I
can't thrash twelve of you, but I'll fight any one man you bring out."
I asked for the man that struck me, and named another, but there was no
response.

The upper classmen, who had just arrived, called out that was fair, and
they'd see it fair. Goodnough, Purnell and Douglas, who don't like me
much, either. Ruff was beside me by this time.

He hadn't seen anything of it, and did not get there until he heard me
calling for a fair chance and challenging the class for a man. I
called out again, the second time, and still no one came, so I took
occasion to let them know why I had done as I did in a short speech to
the crowd. I said I was a peaceable fellow, thought hazing silly, and
as I never intended to haze myself, I didn't intend any one to haze me.
Then I said again, "This is the third time, will one of your men fight
this fair? I can't fight twelve of you." Just then two officers who
had called on some mill-hands, who are always dying for a fight, and a
citizen to help them, burst into the crowd of students, shouldering
them around like sheep until they got to me, when one of them put his
arm around me, and said, "I don't know anything about this crowd, but
I'll see you're protected, sir. I'll give 'em fair play." One officer
got hold of Ruff and pretty near shook him to pieces until I had to
interfere and explain. They were for forming a body-guard, and were
loud in their denunciations of the college, and declaring they'd see me
through if I was a stranger to 'em.

Two or three of