' wid der perlice, I'm de best
in der business."

This last statement was entirely impromptu, and inspired by the
presence of Policeman McCluire, who, with several others, had been
detailed to keep order. McCluire took this challenge calmly, and
looked down and smiled at Hefty's feet.

"He looks like a stove on two legs," he said to the crowd. The crowd,
as a matter of policy, laughed.

"You'll look like a fool standing on his head in a snow-bank if you
talk impudent to me," said Hefty, epigrammatically, from behind the
barrier of his iron mask. What might have happened next did not
happen, because at that moment the music sounded for the grand march,
and Hefty and the policeman were swept apart by the crowd of Indians,
Mexicans, courtiers, negro minstrels, and clowns. Hefty stamped across
the waxed floor about as lightly as a safe could do it if a safe could
walk. He found Miss Casey after the march and disclosed his identity.
She promised not to tell, and was plainly delighted and flattered at
being seen with the distinct sensation of the ball. "Say, Hefty," she
said, "they just ain't in it with you. You'll take the two prizes
sure. How do I look?"

"Out o' sight," said Hefty. "Never saw you lookin' better."

"That's good," said Miss Casey, simply, and with a sigh of
satisfaction.

Hefty was undoubtedly a great success. The men came around him and
pawed him, and felt the dents in the armor, and tried the weight of it
by holding up one of his arms, and handled him generally as though he
were a freak in a museum. "Let 'em alone," said Hefty to Miss Casey,
"I'm not sayin' a word. Let the judges get on to the sensation I'm
a-makin,' and I'll walk off with the prizes. The crowd is wid me
sure."

At midnight the judges pounded on a table for order, and announced
that after much debate they gave the first prize to Miss Lizzie
Cannon, of Hester Street, for "having the most handsomest costume on
the floor, that of Columbia." The fact that Mr. "Buck" Masters, who
was one of the judges, and who was engaged to Miss Cannon, had said
that he would pound things out of the other judges if they gave the
prize elsewhere was not known, but the decision met with as general
satisfaction as could well be expected.

"The second prize," said the judges, "goes to the gent calling himself
the Black Knight--him in the iron leggings--and the other prize for
the most original costume goes to him, too." Half the crowd cheered at
this,