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Grecian Coffee-house, June 18.

In my dissertation against the custom of single combat,[311] it has been objected, that there is not learning, or much reading, shown therein, which is the very life and soul of all treatises; for which reason, being always easy to receive admonitions, and reform my errors, I thought fit to consult this learned board on the subject.  Upon proposing some doubts, and desiring their assistance, a very hopeful young gentleman, my relation, who is to be called to the bar within a year and a half at farthest, told me, that he had ever since I first mentioned duelling turned his head that way; and that he was principally moved thereto, by reason that he thought to follow the circuits in the North of England and South of Scotland, and to reside mostly at his own estate at Landbadernawz[312] in Cardiganshire.  The northern Britons and southern Scots are a warm people, and the Welsh a nation of gentlemen; so that it behoved him to understand well the science of quarrelling.  The young gentleman proceeded admirably well, and gave the board an account, that he had read Fitzherbert’s “Grand Abridgment,"[313] and had found, that duelling is a very ancient part of the law:  for when a man is sued, be it for his life or his land, the person that joins the issue, whether plaintiff or defendant, may put the trial upon the duel.  Further he argued, under favour of the court, that when the issue is joined by the duel in treason or other capital crimes, the parties accused and accuser must fight in their own proper persons:  but if the dispute be for lands, you may hire a champion at Hockley-in-the-Hole,[314] for anywhere else.  This part of the law we had from the Saxons; and they had it, as also the trial by ordeal, from the Laplanders.[315] “It is indeed agreed,” said he, “the Southern and Eastern nations never knew anything of it; for though the ancient Romans would scold, and call names filthily, yet there is not an example of a challenge that ever passed amongst them.”  His quoting the Eastern nations, put another gentleman in mind of an account he had from a boatswain of an East Indiaman; which was, that a Chinese had tricked and bubbled him, and that when he came to demand satisfaction the next morning, and like a true tar of honour called him “Son of a whore,” “Liar,” “Dog,” and other rough appellatives used by persons conversant with winds and waves; the Chinese, with great tranquillity, desired him not to come aboard fasting, nor put himself in a heat, for it would prejudice his health.  Thus the East knows nothing of this gallantry.  There sat at the left of the table a person of a venerable aspect, who asserted, that half the impositions which are put upon these ages, have been transmitted by writers who have given too great pomp and magnificence to the exploits of the ancient Bear Garden, and made their gladiators, by fabulous tradition, greater than Gorman[316] and others