sundown on the 8th of August, 1215, that he was no longer plain Bowles, but rather Sir Bors the Bowless, Knight of the Artful Arm, and known to his intimates as "The Fire-eater"; that he had just been challenged to fight his seven hundred and forty-seventh fight, and (for the seven hundred and forty-seventh time) he had accepted. He soon added to the stock of his information the fact that, as the challenged party, he had the choice of time, place and weapons.

He was naturally a little perturbed at first, for the most formidable warrior that he ever remembered fighting was his little sister, whose hair he had pulled when they were children, and the biggest thing he had ever killed was undoubtedly the hen that he had run over on the Boodle Road. He felt inclined, therefore, in the first flush of terror, to propose as the time 1925, as the place Puddlesby Football Field, and as the weapon, motor-tyre valve pins, at two hundred yards. He even got as far as mentioning these conditions to his friend Sir Hugh the Hairy, who, however, did not seem particularly struck with the suggestion, but made a counter-proposal of maces on horseback at the neighbouring lists in three days' time.

Before our hero knew what he was about he found that he had agreed. He got through a deal of heavy thinking on his way home to his castle, but had fortunately completed his plan of campaign before he arrived, for the esquire of his enemy was awaiting him there, demanding to know the details of the coming contest. He made the conditions suggested by Sir Hugh, merely adding that the maces must be smooth and not knobbed, as was customary in the better-class combats of that day.

He then began to make his preparations. At first he was considerably depressed by the entire absence of all rubber, until dire necessity compelled him to find a serviceable substitute in the shape of untanned ox-skins. These he carefully sewed together with his own knightly hands, coating the stitches over with pitch and resin. He was a good workman and did not fail to be ready in time.

When the hour of combat arrived he vanished into the painted pavilion reserved for him at one end of the lists, accompanied only by his faithful esquire. Hastily he donned his suiting of reinforced ox-hide, which covered the whole of his person from head to foot, and hung stiffly in folds all round him. Then, holding out a metal tube which was attached to the front of the costume, he presented it to his esquire, saying in the vernacular of those stout times—

"Ho, varlet! Blow me down yon hole till there be no more breath in thy vile bodie. Blow me hard and leally. Blow an thou burst in ye blowinge."

Whereupon the trusty varlet blew.

Thus it fell out that when the trumpet sounded and the Black Baron of Beaumaris, his foe, rode forth from his sable pavilion, armed cap-à-pie in a suit of highly-polished steel and bestriding a black and rather over-dressed charger, he saw through the chinks of his lowered visor an object which he would undoubtedly have mistaken for a diminutive observation balloon if he had lived a few centuries later. In short, Sir Bowles, having been sufficiently inflated by his now exhausted esquire, had inserted his valve-pin into the tube (which he had tucked away and laced up like an association football), and now emerged upon the lists with a feeling of elation that he had not experienced for several days.

They approached each other. It was with some difficulty that our hero wielded his mace, owing, first, to the inflated condition of his right arm, and, secondly, to the unaccustomed weight of the weapon. His hold also upon his curvetting steed was a little precarious, and he hoped that no one in the crowd would notice the string that tied his legs together beneath the horse's belly.

If the Baron was surprised at what he saw he made no sign, but, riding straight at his strange antagonist, he dealt him a mighty blow on the left side of the head, which had quite an unlooked-for result. The string which attached our