_Times_, October 2, 1795. “A curious circumstance occurred here (Brighton) yesterday. Sir JOHN LADE, for a trifling wager, undertook to carry Lord CHOLMONDELEY, on _his back_, from opposite the Pavilion, twice round the Steine. Several ladies attended to be spectators of this extraordinary feat of the dwarf carrying the giant. When his Lordship declared himself ready, Sir John desired him to _strip_. ‘Strip!’ exclaimed the other, ‘why, surely, you promised to carry me in my clothes!’ ‘By no means,’ replied the Baronet, I engaged to carry _you_, but not an inch of clothes. So, therefore, my Lord, make ready, and let us not _disappoint_ the ladies.’ After much laughable altercation, it was, at length, decided that Sir JOHN had won his wager, the Peer declining to exhibit _in puris naturalibus_.” _Times_, September 11, 1797. “A _Mr Marston_, of the Borough, has laid a bet of 2000 guineas, that he will, in the course of the ensuing week, go into one of the great wheels of the water works at London Bridge, while it is in its swiftest motion with an ebb tide, stay there five minutes, and come out again with safety, though not without accident, in a different part from that in which he went in: and, afterwards, walk one mile within an hour, on condition that the lower bucket of the wheel is two feet from the river bottom.” A wager was made, in 1806, in the Castle Yard, York, between Thomas Hodgson and Samuel Whitehead, as to which should succeed in assuming the most singular character. Umpires were selected, whose duty it was to decide upon the comparative absurdity of the costumes in which the two men appeared. On the appointed day, Hodgson came before the umpires, decorated with bank notes of various value on his coat and waistcoat, a row of five guinea notes, and a long netted purse of gold round his hat, whilst a piece of paper, bearing the words “John Bull,” was attached to his back. Whitehead was dressed like a woman on one side; one half of his face was painted, and he wore a silk stocking and a slipper on one leg. The other half of his face was blacked, to resemble a negro: on the corresponding side of his body he wore a gaudy, long-tailed, linen coat; and his leg was cased in half a pair of leather breeches, with a boot and spur. One would fancy that Whitehead must have presented the most singular appearance, by far, but the umpires thought differently, and awarded the stakes to Hodgson.