[Illustration: Drop-D]uring the summer, the parks had special attractions for the public. The tactics which were supposed to have won Culloden were ordered to be followed in the army. Consequently, the twenty-eight companies forming the First Regiment of Foot Guards were exercised in Hyde Park, by General Folliot, half of idle London looking on. ‘They went through their firing,’ as the papers reported, ‘four deep, with their bayonets fixed, as at the late battle near Culloden House, and performed the exercise, though quite new to them, exceeding well.’ Then, there was a little spectacle in the presentation to General St. Clair of a sword which had been taken from the Earl of Cromartie. When the earl possessed this weapon, the blade bore two inscriptions: ‘God preserve King James VIII. of Scotland!’ and ‘Prosperity to Scotland, and No Union!’ For these were substituted ‘God preserve King George II., King of Great Britain, France and Ireland!’ and ‘Prosperity to England and Scotland!’ [Sidenote: _AT THE WHIPPING POSTS._] All military sights did not go off so pleasantly as the above. There is record of a soldier being shot by an undiscovered comrade in the new Culloden exercise. There is also the chronicling of the sentence of death having been passed on fifty-six deserters, who declined further service under King George. On being reprieved, they were paraded in St. James’s Park, for the public scorn, perhaps for the public sympathy. Thence, the Londoners saw them marched, under a strong guard, on their way to Portsmouth. They arrived there footsore, but the loyal folk refused to give them the refreshment which was generally offered to troops on the march and about to embark for war service abroad. These deserters were destined for Cape Breton, for ‘General Frampton’s regiment,’ a position celebrated for its power of using up all consigned to it. There were worse characters left behind. So disloyal and riotous were parts of the Westminster populace that the magistrates adorned several of the streets with new Whipping Posts. When constables heard a disloyal cry, or fancied they did, or had a loyal spite against a poor devil, they had him up to a Whipping Post, in a trice, dealt with him there in ruffianly fashion, and then took the patient before a magistrate to see if he deserved it. While too outspoken Jacobites and the ruffians of no particular politics were exhibited as patients at the Whipping Posts, the Pugilists took Whiggery by the arm and taught it the noble art of self-defence. Mr. Hodgkins, a great bruiser, fencer, and single-stick player of that day, loyally advertised that he was ‘fully resolved to maintain his school gratis to all well-wishers of King George and Duke William, that they may know how to maintain their cutlass against their enemies.’