The examples quoted of women joining the army are by no means singular, for in 1761 a lynx-eyed sergeant detected a woman who wished to enlist under the name of Paul Daniel, in the hope that she might be sent to Germany, where her husband was then serving in the army. And in the same year a woman named Hannah Witney was masquerading at Plymouth in man’s attire, and was laid hold of by a press-gang and lodged in Plymouth gaol. She was so disgusted at the treatment she received that she disclosed her sex, at the same time telling the astonished authorities that she had served as a marine for five years. There is a curious little chap-book, now very rare, of the ‘Life and Adventures of Maria Knowles ... by William Fairbank, Sergeant-major of the 66th Regiment of Foot,’ and, as it is very short, it may be as well to give its _ipsissima verba_. ‘The heroine of the following story is the only daughter of Mr. John Knowles, a reputed farmer,[36] of the parish of Bridworth, in the county of Cheshire, where Maria was born, and was her father’s only daughter. At an early age she lost her mother, and was brought up under the care of a mother-in-law, who treated her with more kindness than is usually done to motherless children. Her father having no other child, his house might have proved a comfortable home for one of a more sober disposition. At the age of nineteen she was so very tall that she was styled the ‘Tall Girl.’ She had a very handsome face, which gained her plenty of sweethearts. Many young men felt the weight of her fists for giving her offences. She refused many offers of marriage, and that from persons of fortune. ‘Being one day at the market in Warrington, she saw one Cliff, a sergeant of the Guards on the recruiting service, with whom she fell deeply in love; he in a short time was called to join the regiment, and she, not being able to bear her love-sick passion, eloped from her father’s house, immediately went up to London, disguised in man’s apparel, and enlisted in the same regiment with her sweetheart, in which she made a most martial appearance in her regimentals; her height covered the deception. As a red coat captivates the fair sex, our female soldier made great advances, being a lover of mirth and a smart girl.... ‘A part of the Guards were ordered to Holland, with whom sailed Maria and her sweetheart. The British troops were stationed at Dort, and a party was sent in gunboats to annoy the French, who were then besieging Williamstadt. From Holland they were ordered to French Flanders, where Maria was at several desperate battles and sieges. At Dunkirk she was wounded in three different parts, in her right shoulder, in her right arm, and thigh, which discovered her sex, and, of course, her secret.