The next
exchange of shots proved to be the last. Hueston let both barrels go
without effect, and fell to the ground shot through the lungs. Taken to
the Maison de Sante, he was in such agony that he begged a friend to
finish the work by shooting him through the head. Within a few hours he
was dead.
The old guide book from which I gather these items cites, also, cases in
which duels were fought over trivial matters, such, for instance, as a
mildly hostile newspaper criticism of an operatic performance, and an
argument between a Creole and a Frenchman over the greatness of the
Mississippi River.
Professor Brander Matthews tells me of an episode in which the wit
exhibited by a Creole lawyer, in the course of a case in a New Orleans
court, caused him to be challenged. The opposing counsel, likewise a
Creole, was a great dandy. He appeared in an immaculate white suit and
boiled shirt, but the weather was warm, and after he had spoken for
perhaps half an hour his shirt was wilted, and he asked an adjournment.
The adjournment over, he reappeared in a fresh shirt, but this too
wilted presently, whereupon another adjournment was taken. At the end of
this he again reappeared wearing a third fresh shirt, and in it managed
to complete his plea.
It now became the other lawyer's turn.
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