Such were the reckless feelings of the time, that a certain Marquis de Tenteniac, from Britanny, actually challenged the pit of a theatre. Being behind the scenes, he had appeared so forward in one of the wings, that the public rebuked him; when he immediately stepped forward to the footlights, and, addressing the audience, said, “Ladies and gentlemen, with your permission a piece will be performed to-morrow, called ‘The Insolence of the Pit chastised,’ in as many acts as may be desired, by the Marquis de Tenteniac!” This impudent address was received with great applause, and no one individual thought proper to resent a general insult. While duels were thus discountenanced amongst civilians, it was also endeavoured to check them in the army. The ill-fated Marshal Ney, Duke of Elchingen, judicially assassinated in Paris at the period of the Restoration, was an example of the severe measures resorted to, to punish offenders. Ney, who was born at Sarrelouis in 1769, enlisted, in the year 1787, in the regiment “de Colonel Général,” afterwards the Fourth Hussars. He was remarkable for his soldier-like appearance, his dexterity in his exercises, and his skilful horsemanship, in which he frequently broke in horses that the rough-riders could not manage. He was also considered the best swordsman in the corps; and on him frequently devolved the perilous task of fighting the regimental battles. The fencing-master of the Chasseurs de Vintimille, then in the same garrison with his regiment,--a desperate duellist, who had wounded the fencing-master of Ney’s regiment,--having insulted the corps, it was decided that the bravest and the most dexterous dragoon should be selected to chastise him. The choice fell upon Ney. The parties met, sabres were drawn, when Ney felt himself dragged back by the tail: it was his colonel who had thus seized him, and had him immediately thrown into the black-hole. Duelling was at this period punished with death. Ney’s life was perilled, but, beloved both by officers and men, the corps insisted upon his liberation; and the times were such, that their application could not well have been rejected. Ney was liberated, but the first use he made of his freedom was to seek his antagonist and renew the interrupted contest. The parties met secretly, and the bragging fencing-master received a sabre-wound in the sword-arm that crippled him for life. When Ney subsequently rose in rank and fortune, he sought his former antagonist, and settled on him a handsome annuity.