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agreed that the pistols should be charged with powder only. A n assurance to this effect was imparted to Synnott, and considerably pacified him, but Griffin was to be kept in the dark. T h e sham battle came off at the Little River, where Griffin put in an appearance, cool and determined, and confident, that for him, at all events, it should be no bloodless or barren victory. Synnott, though having the fullest confidence in the promise given by the seconds, was shaking with apprehension, in fact, almost unmanned by the most dreadful of apprehensions, the shadowy nature of which he could not bring himself to steadily look at. T h e m e n were placed, a bulletless pistol handed to each, and the ominous word " fire" sung out. Griffin did his part, as he thought, with unerring effect; but was perfectly astounded at what he saw before him, viz., his antagonist with his "unmentionables" onfireabout his lower extremities. T h e fact was that the shooting signal so paralysed all muscular action in Synnott that his pistol hand, instead of extending, dropped to his thigh, the piece exploded, and the powder igniting his trousers, the whole affair was simply turned into one of blazes. N o serious injury was, however, suffered, for by prompt aid, the conflagration, which had not time to make m u c h head-way, was fortunately extinguished without trouble or danger. Griffin rubbed his eyes, and could scarcely credit what he beheld before him. There was his foe, not standing, but prancing about, and his o w n aim was taken at such an altitude that it could never have descended to such meanness as to shin the m a n w h o m he was bent on either killing or winging. A light suddenly broke upon his mind and he became convinced that he had been in some way or other (how he did not yet guess) shabbily tricked, and he made up his mind to have the mystery quickly solved. Confronting the two seconds he declared he should forthwith challenge and shoot them both unless they told " the whole truth, and nothing but the truth," and as there was nothing for it but an open confession, the circumstances attending the concoction of the humane, and in every sense, harmless hoax, were frankly detailed. Griffin was in an awful pelter for a while, and could not be mollified, but at length, whatever sense of the ludicrous was in him, broke out, and the whole affair was so irresistibly funny, that it could end in no other way than good humour, the effects of which swept all the bitterness of the poultry away, and the incident was only remembered to be heartily laughed at whenever mentioned, not only for many a year after, but even by old colonists in the present day. About 10 a.m. on 27th June, 1846, two gentlemen, blankly known as A and C , rode up to the Pier Hotel at Sandridge, and asked for a cup of tea. T h e harmless beverage was given and drank, after which the strangers intimated that they were only out for an airing, and cantered away as if bound for St. Kilda. They were not long gone when a M r . H appeared in a stanhope, and started off after the others, w h o joined him at a short distance in the bush. A suspicious-looking individual, n a m e not known, next showed, and stated that he was on the look-out for one of Liardet's boats, and lounged up and d o w n on the sand. T h e H o n . Gilbert Kennedy next galloped up, and passing on, the whole group assembled in the scrub near the head of the lagoon, where it became so evident to the few Sandridge-ites then in existence that mischief was brewing, that a courier was forthwith despatched to town to inform the police of the harm that was in the wind. Meanwhile a hostile meeting was hastily gone through at the lagoon, Kennedy and C • being the principals, and A and H the seconds. Shots were exchanged without any harm, an explanation ensued, all was over, and the ground was speedily cleared. T h e engagement originated in a quarrel over a game of cards at a Melbourne hotel, on the previous night. In an hour or so after Chief-Constable Sugden and Sergeant Rose of the Mounted Police came tearing down from town, but only in time to learn some exaggerated intelligence of the shindy they were in such a hurry to prevent. In 1846, Messrs. Alexander Sprot and William Campbell (not the so long well-known " Honourable" of that ilk), two settlers in the Western District, had some verbal altercation, in the course of which Campbell accused Sprot of having slandered him, and Sprot challenged the other in return. Sprat's friend was a Captain A d a m s , Campbell's a Mr. R. Crawford, and it was arranged that the fight should take place in the neighbourhood of Belfast, but it got bruited abroad, and the authorities had initiated measures to prevent it. T h e parties then agreed to outwit the police by going out of the colony, and cross the border into South Australia, and this was done without