This practice has prevailed to a greater or less extent at different periods of our medical-military history; and it is gratifying to learn, from authentic sources, that in the present period of highly improved discipline in the British army, there are not probably two malingerers for ten who were found in the military hospitals thirty or forty years since. It also occurs more or less according to the manner of forming a regiment. In some of the cavalry regiments, and some of the Highland and other distinguished infantry battalions, in which, along with a mild but exact discipline, there is a strong attachment to the service, and remarkable _esprit du corps_, there is scarcely an instance of any of those disgraceful attempts to deceive the surgeon; while in regiments which have been hastily recruited, and under circumstances unfavourable to progressive and complete discipline, the system of imposition is perfectly understood. Among those who counterfeit diseases, it has been observed that the Irish are the most numerous, the Scotsmen less so, but malingering seems least of all the vice of English soldiers. There appears to be a species of free-masonry among soldiers, and thus these methods of imposture have been systematized, and handed down for the common benefit. A case occurred of a man having a rupture, which on inspection was found to be artificially formed from some written directions, “How to make a rupture,” which were produced. The man was discharged by his commanding officer, but the discharge not being backed by the surgeon’s recommendatory certificate, he lost his pension; the commanding officer after his return from Corunna met this man perfectly well, following the laborious occupation of a porter. In the year 1804, the great increase of ophthalmia in the 50th regiment, and the reported detection of frauds in other regiments, led to a suspicion in the mind of the surgeon of that corps, and a consequent investigation, by which a regular correspondence was detected between the men under medical treatment and their parents or friends. Those suffering from ophthalmia, within the walls of the hospital, requested that those without would forward to them corrosive sublimate, lime, and blue-stone; and by the application of these acrid substances to their eyes, they hoped to get them into such a state of disease, as would enable them to procure their discharge, with a pension. And they mentioned the names of men who had been successful by similar means. Proofs of guilt having been established, the delinquents were tried by a court-martial, convicted, and punished.