The Case of the Misunderstood Brawler

The Intelligencer has a sensational account of a terrible fracas said to have occurred last evening, in which it is related circumstantially how 'Sniffles' of the Tri-Lane was called out of his house by a late deputy sheriff and set upon by a muscular attorney, and how 'Sniffles' got away with the attorney, leaving him covered with blood and dirt, in a very demoralized condition. Soon after reading this account, we met the said attorney without a scratch or other sign of the desperate encounter upon his person. About the same time, we met a deputy sheriff, with one eye and a large portion of his head covered with bandages, for which he would not give any satisfactory explanation, and it naturally occurred to us that he was the victim of the prowess of 'Sniffles,' who, in his fright, had mistaken him for the man he feared, and had pitched in under the idea that he was an assailant. We remember such a case among the incidents of our early boyhood. We lived on a new farm in a heavily timbered section. A young man upon a neighboring farm had 'sat up' with our hired girl till a late hour on Sunday night and had started for home across the clearing. An hour or so after, he returned in a great state of excitement, with the story that he had been attacked by two panthers and had defended himself with a miller-knife with which he had disabled his assailants and escaped with his life. On repairing to the scene of the conflict in the morning, two young calves were found; one dead, and the other badly crippled. It was probably under a similar perturbed state of mind that 'Sniffles' took counsel of his fears and pitched into an unoffending old man, who he mistook for his deadly enemy. Certainly, no man who was not very drunk or imbecile would seek to do 'Sniffles' bodily harm.