Democratic Sentinel, Volume 19, Number 45, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 November 1895 — An Even Thing. [ARTICLE]

An Even Thing.

It has been said that all men are cowards in the dark, and there is doubtlesssome truth in the statement. A correspondent of the St. Louis Globe-Demo-crat cites an instance in illustration. Two officers of the British army in India had a difficulty which resulted in a duel. The colonel, the challenged party, was an old campaigner who had won his laurels in the Crimea, and was a most gallant soldier. The choice of weapons being his, he named pistols, and. eleeted that the affair should occur in a dark room. We secured a room twenty feet square, says the narrator of the incident, closed every crevice that would admit light, placed our men in corners diagonally opposite, and withdrew. Each man was provided with threecharges, and when these were exhausted we rushed in to gather up themutilated remains. Each man stood erect and soldierlike in bis corner, untouched; but directly behind the officer who had given the challenge were three bullet holes made by the colonel’s pistol. “How is this?” said a grizzled major. “Had you been standing here when those shots were fired, you would have been killed.” The culprit was forced to admit that he had dropped to one knee. “You are a coward, sir, and unfit for the company of soldiers and gentlemen!” cried the major. “Hold on, major!” said the coloneL “It is a stand-off. While he was on his knees in one corner, I was on my stomach in the other.”