7 JANUARY 1865, Page 9

A fight for the Championship came off on Wednesday at

Cop- thorne, on the borders of Kent, Sussex, and Surrey, between Andrew Marsden and Joe Wormald. The latter won from the first, and the fight seems to have been brutal beyond all precedent. Marsden, though a man of singular power and beauty of frame, had comparatively little skill, and by the twelfth round had been so fearfully punished that he was unable to strike, but in that condition was four time put up and four times knocked down like an ox. Seven more rounds were gone through, till at last Marsden's friends thought his life in danger and withdrew their man. The enjoyment of the spectators would we doubt not have been greatly increased if Wormald had been allowed to kill his opponent out- right, and then the public would have had some redress. As it is, neither spectators nor seconds will be prosecuted for allowing a man already crippled to be beaten nearly to death by an opponent who had scarcely received a scratch. And then men who ought to know better talk about the " manliness" of the prize-ring !