revenue. The system worked so well that, in order that the fisc might not be defrauded, in 1696 it was made a capital offence even to engage in a duel without licence obtained; it did not help the matter if neither party were wounded. The most savage

duel ever fought in Scotland or elsewhere was the one between Sir Euan Lochiel and an English colonel, Pellew, when, after fighting till their swords flew out of their hands, they locked in a close embrace, and Lochiel, the weaker of the two, falling underneath, tore several ounces of flesh out of the other's throat with his teeth, keeping them there like a wild beast, and declaring until his dying day that he never tasted a sweeter morsel.' The duel between Sir George Ramsay and Captain Macrae at Musselburgh Links, near Edinburgh, in 1791, seems a very cruel and needless one. The captain severely beat a footman of Sir George who struggled with him for the possession of a chair at the exit of the theatre in Edinburgh, and the next day challenged Sir George for refusing to dismiss the footman, as he thought the man already sufficiently punished. Sir George was shot dead, the captain fled the country never to return, while the unfortunate footman, upon hearing of his master's death, went into convulsions and died in three hours.1

In the Green Isle duelling flourished fifty years ago as much as it did in France. When a Trinity College student asked the Provost what books he had better bring to college, the latter said, 'Never mind the books; bring a case of pistols.' The students were in the habit of settling those little affairs either just before or just after morning prayers. All the distinguished Irishmen a hundred years ago were duellists: Curran, Grattan, Sheridan, Barrington, Fitzgibbon, Flood, O'Connell were often 'out;' and in our day the O'Gorman Mahon had twenty-two affairs to his credit. The Bar led the list. Lords Chancellors and Masters of the Rolls fought like cornets of horse. Lord Norbury fought 'Fighting Fitzgerald' and two others, besides 'frightening' 'Napper Tandy,' as the Irish historians tell us. Galway was great with the pistol, Tipperary with the sword. Two English fines lames, Major Park and Captain Creed, went to Ireland to find foemen worthy of their steel, and found them in Mr. Matthew and Mr. Macnamara-who fought with them in a private room at an inn, wounded them nearly unto death, nursed them back into health, and were

The last duel fought in Scotland was the one between Captain Stewart and Sir Alexander Boswell, son of the famous biographer. It was fought on the seashore near Kirkcaldy in 1830. Boswell was killed at the first fire.

rewarded with their friendship. Colonel Barrington and Mr. Gilbert, two middle-aged married men, had a desperate duel in 1759 because they did not wish to leave an unsettled quarrel as a legacy for their children. They fought on horseback with sword, pistol, and skeen, or Irish bowie-knife. First the pistols were fired, Barrington receiving some of the charge in his face; but he rushed on Gilbert, killed his horse with his broadsword, dismounted, and, putting his skeen to the other's throat, called upon him to ask for his life, on pain of death.' Gilbert agreed to shake hands and be friends, but without condition or apology. Barrington consented. 'Fighting Fitzgerald,' a wellknown character, a cousin of the Earl of Desmond, an Eton boy, an Oxford graduate, and an officer in the 69th Foot, fought eighteen duels, and was thought by many to be mad. He hired a gang of ruffians, waylaid and killed a gentleman on the king's highway, and was hanged at Castlebar. Among others, he encountered Martin of Galway, the Rev. Richard Bate, and Captain Harvey Aston, afterwards killed at Madras in a duel with Colonel Allen. The Aston duel, and another fought by Clive with a Calcutta civilian, indirectly helped British arms to many victories. The first made way for a Colonel Wellesley, afterwards better known under another name, to an important command before Seringapatam. The second had, by displaying the desperate courage of Clive, secured him a military appointment in a time of emergency. There is a good deal of rollicking good-humour about Irish duelling. When Amby Bodkin and Mr. Bourke fought their famous duel, the latter's son, little John, afterwards Sir John, Bourke, was hoisted on the shoulder of a neighbour to see the fun. O'Connell killed in his first duel the Count d'Esterre, and Flood a Mr. Agar, who, when Flood was about to fire in the air, said, 'Shoot, you scoundrel, shoot.' The Irish duelling code has been adopted with certain modifications by duellists, both in England and the United States. It was drawn up by the Irish Bar at the Clonmel Assizes in 1777, and appears to aim at so arranging matters that no Irish gentleman anxious to fight shall be baulked of his wish. The first offence requires the first apology, although the retort may be more offensive.' 'After one fire the retort may be explained away. But if either party,' thẻ code hastens to add, ' would rather fight on, after two shots each the principal who made the retort may explain, and then the original offender tender his apology.' 'When the lie direct is

the first offence, the aggressor must either beg pardon in express terms, exchange two shots previous to apology, or three shots followed by explanation, or fire on till a severe hit be scored by one of the parties.' No "dumb firing," or firing in the air, is admissible.' 'In slight cases the second hands his principal but one pistol; in gross cases two, holding another case ready charged in reserve.'

The great legal authorities of England have held widely different views of duelling at different periods. Sir William Blackstone defines Courts of Chivalry' as Courts of "Honour" to give satisfaction to all such as are aggrieved on that point; a point of a nature so nice and delicate that its wrongs and injuries escape the notice of the Common Law.' The modern work of Sir William Russell, Crimes and Misdemeanours,' speaks of deliberately engaging in a duel as not only an open defiance of the law,' but a direct contempt of the justice of the nation, putting men under the necessity of righting themselves.' So much for the law. As for the morality of duelling, it is to be feared that many, both in England and the United States, do not fight duels to-day, not because they think them foolish, or wicked, or even dangerous, but mainly because they are not customary. If they were, quite sober-minded people would run the risk of severe penalties rather than be out of the fashion. The best reputation a duellist can have is the one Macaulay gives to Thomas Wharton, in other respects a thoroughly bad man. 'He had never given a challenge. He had never refused one. He had never taken a life, and yet never fought without having his antagonist's life at his mercy.'

The best books on the subject of English duels are Millingen's 'History of Duelling,' 'Duelling Days in the Army' (Captain W. Douglas), 'The History of Ordeals' (Gilchrist), 'Reminiscences of Duelling in Ireland' (Doctor Cobb), The Romance of Duelling' (Steinmetz), and the recently published Bibliography of Fencing and Duelling,' by Mr. Carl Thimm. There are, besides, many chapters devoted to English duels in the excellent American work of Major Ben C. Trumann, and in the Allgemeine Cyclopädie' of Professors Esach and Grubes is an exhaustive article on duelling in England and Ireland. There are, besides, many plays, satires, poems, and essays on the subject; and in the 'Gentleman's Magazine' and 'Annual Register' full accounts of every memorable duel fought in this country during the last one hundred and fifty years. JAMES PEMBERTON GRUND.

389

A PARROT STORY

THE circumstances did not happen to me personally, but to another lady in Africa. That is to say, a lady I have been told about down in the kingdom of the great unburied king, Kacongo, while I was engaged in hunting up the reasons why you must not eat this, that, or the other-keecheelas, as we call them thereand I may remark that one of the charms of studying in West Africa is the keen human interest that comes off every mortal subject there like the scent off a flower. It is my firm belief that if you were to go down there to study quaternions, or cell division, or the mechanical equivalent of heat, you would find yourself up to your neck in family stories, two-thirds of which would be quite unprintable, before you had been at your work a month. Of course, this story is not one of those, or it would not be in these pages. The lady, black, and I'll answer for it, comely, for it is a way they have down there, had a bit of a tiff with her husband-that's a way they have down there too-and she said, 'that if he went on like that she would go home to her mother.' He had heard this sort of thing before from several wives, and so did not take much notice, but our lady was made of sterner stuff than the others, and so set off one morning before he was about, taking with her her two children, one a mere toddler, the other a baby in arms. When she had got well away from her husband's village, and away from its plantations into the forest, a punia (a highway robber and professional murderer) stopped her.

'Are you,' said he, with the true caution of an African, 'travelling alone, or do you happen to have a man with you?' She had not, you understand, but still she said, 'Oh yes; there are two of my relations coming on behind.'

Call them,' said he; 'I don't believe it;' and the lady, having nothing better to do, called them loudly, and the parrot heard her cry and answered her.

'That was only one voice,' said the Punia; 'you have only one man with you.' Then she called again, and another bird answered her, and the Punia, with true African caution, ran away.

1 By Mr. R. E. Dennett and natives.

She went on for some miles undisturbed; but that Punia had still doubts, and so he again stopped her, asking how it was she had not those men with her by now. Again she called out lustily, and again the birds answered her, and the Punia got fairly scared and bolted. Every few hours, however, the Punia's doubts kept on coming to a head, and, as is usual with African stories, the same thing kept on happening over and over again, the birds always answering her call. And thus she travelled on, through the great wild forest, with her two little children, alone and unaided by all things save those birds. It was at nightfall that she at last reached her mother's village, and to her horror found it deserted. There was of it all only one hut remaining, the rest were but charred ruins. Weary and worried beyond description, there was nothing for her but to sleep in that one small hut; so she cleared it out, and put her children to sleep in it, and then lay down to rest beside them, like the good brave black mother she was. Rest there was little for her that night, for she was soon roused by a witch coming in. She knew he was a witch, and not a ghost (chimbinde), because he was quite naked, and to her horror she recognised that this horror was her mother's own brother; a relation, I may observe, to whom she would feel the love given by a European to a father, for Kacongo is in the realm of mutterrecht; and she recognised also that she was in one of those dread places, the meeting-grounds of witches.

What to do she did not know, and she said as much to her uncle, who was busy now dressing himself and uttering opinions of the nature of that women who quarrelled with their husbands got themselves into no good, and women had no earthly business to go travelling alone, &c. However, he told her to fear nothing, and he hid the children under his long skirt and the woman hid herself under the mats. No sooner was this done than other witches arrived in squads, and they asked the uncle some very driving questions about his having on clothes. He made a passable excuse for this breach of etiquette, and then the witches started giving cause for great anxiety by declaring they smelt fresh meat,' which, of course, was those children he was sitting over. By-andby, however, the witches went outside the hut, and danced until the dawn came, when they returned to their respective towns to masquerade in daily life as respectable men and women. That they did go at the dawn was providential, for the African witch is not bound to get home at dawn or any other set time; he can