Rapidly adopting the very line of tactics they had just been so severely censuring, they simply denied the whole thing.
What! the truth of the Bloomsbury dispatch?
Yes, every word of it! Had not Bloomsbury seen the Projectile?
No! Were not his eyes good for anything?
Yes, but not for everything! Did not the Captain know his business?
No! Did they mean to say that the bowsprit of the _Susquehanna_ had not been broken off?
Well, not exactly that, but those naval gentlemen are not always to be trusted; after a pleasant little supper, they often see the wrong light-house, or, what is worse, in their desire to shield their negligence from censure, they dodge the blame by trying to show that the accident was unavoidable.

The _Susquehanna's_ bowsprit had been snapped off, in all probability, by some sudden squall, or, what was still more likely, some little aerolite had struck it and frightened the crew into fits.

When answers of this kind did not lead to blows, the case was an exceptional one indeed.

The contestants were so numerous and so excited that the police at last began to think of letting them fight it out without any interference.
Marshal O'Kane, though ably assisted by his 12 officers and 500 patrolmen, had a terrible time of it.

The most respectable men in Baltimore, with eyes blackened, noses bleeding, and collars torn, saw the inside of a prison that night for the first time in all their lives.
Men that even the Great War had left the warmest of friends, now abused each other like fishwomen.