Wine and politics brought several men to grief. Inspired by the first, an Ensign Dolben spoke disrespectfully of the king’s Government, and was cashiered for his recklessness. Some indiscreet wagging of tongues led to Captain Nicholls and Mr. Isaac Hancocke drawing their swords, and the Captain passing _his_, up to the hilt, through Hancocke’s body. As the dead man lay on the ground, someone remarked, he was worth 300_l._ a year; and for killing so well-furnished a gentleman, the Captain got off with a slight punishment under a verdict of manslaughter. Other ‘bloody duels’ are recorded, and the pugnacity of the gentlemen took a savage character in some of the rank and file. It was by no means rare to hear of a hackney-coach full of officers returning at night, through Piccadilly to the camp, being attacked, brutally used, and plundered by men in disguise, who were at least suspected of being soldiers. Never were so many footpads northward, in the direction of Harrow and of Hampstead (which latter place yielded victims laden with gold on their road from the ‘tables’ at Belsize), as during the time of the encampment. A Lieutenant, who was entrusted with 10_l._ subsistence-money, to pay to some men of his (the second) regiment of Guards, hired a hackney-coach, rather early in the morning, put the coachman inside, and took the reins himself. He thought by this means to carry his money safely. The coach, however, was stopped by a single mounted highwayman in Piccadilly, who bade the inside gentleman deliver his money or his life. ‘I am only a poor man,’ said the rascal, ‘but the gentleman on the box has 10_l._ in his pocket, a gold watch in his fob, and a silver-hilted sword under his coat,’――and the highwayman stripped the young hero of his property, and rode contentedly away, by Hay Hill. [Sidenote: _DISCIPLINE._]