Shortly after Waterloo had been fought, one of our English regiments (which had taken a distinguished part in that great victory) stationed in a Mediterranean garrison, gained an unenviable notoriety there by a sudden mania for duelling that broke out amongst its officers, and which threatened to become so chronic in its character as seriously to interfere with the discipline of the corps. Quarrels were literally ‘made to order’ at mess-time for the most trifling affairs, and scarcely a day passed without a hostile meeting taking place, which the colonel—a weak-minded man—expressed himself powerless to prevent. Indeed he had already been sent to ‘Coventry’ by his subordinates, which, as our readers doubtless know, is a kind of social excommunication that, when acted upon in an English regiment, generally ends in the retirement from the corps of the individual on whom it falls. It was so in this instance, for the colonel saw that the vendetta-like conduct of his officers towards him was gradually divesting him of all authority in the eyes of his men; and as he had none but his social inferiors to whom he could turn for counsel and advice, he was compelled to relinquish his command and return to England. On arrival in this country he lost no time in proceeding to the Horse Guards, where he sought and gained an interview with the Duke of Wellington, to whom he gave a graphic account of the state of affairs which existed in the regiment he had just left.
The Iron Duke listened attentively to the narration, and knitted his brow in anger as the colonel related the story of the duelling; and when the latter had finished speaking, he exclaimed in an unmistakably stern and uncompromising tone: ‘It is _your_ fault, sir! You should have brought some of the ringleaders to a court-martial, and cashiered them on the spot. You have sadly neglected your duty, and that is a thing which I never pardon.’
The colonel left the Horse Guards in a very crest-fallen state, and he was hardly surprised when he saw in the next _Gazette_ the announcement that ‘His Majesty had no further need of his services.’
In the meantime the Duke had obtained a special audience of the Prince Regent, to whom he explained the condition of affairs in connection with the regiment in question. The result of the interview was that Colonel A——, a well-known martinet, then on half-pay, was sent for, and the circumstances explained to him; the Prince offering him the command of the regiment on condition that he would undertake to cure the duelling propensities of its officers. Colonel A—— was delighted at the prospect of active service, and he willingly accepted the task assigned to him, it being understood that he was to be granted a royal indemnity for anything serious which might happen to anybody else in his endeavours to put a stop to the duelling. He was a man of high reputation, and had previously held other difficult commands, being known throughout the army as a good soldier but a stern disciplinarian.