we met at Glass's Inn, where, in the presence of many gentlemen,
occurred our unfortunate dissension.

We encountered betimes next morning, on a secluded spot of the
sands hard by the town, at the Eden-mouth. {24} The weapons were
pistols, Sir Hew, by a slight passing infirmity, being disabled
from the use of the sword. Inchgrabbit was my second, and
Strathtyrum did the same office for my kinsman, Sir Hew. The
pistols being charged and primed, and we aligned forenent each
other at the convenient distance of twelve paces, the word was
given to fire, and both weapons having been discharged, and the
smoke having cleared away, Sir Hew was discovered fallen to the
ground, procumbus humi, and exanimate. The blood was flowing
freely from a face-wound, and my unhappy kinsman was senseless. At
this moment we heard a voice, as of one clamantis in eremo, cry
"Fore!" to which paying no heed in the natural agitation of our
spirits, we hurried to lift my fallen opponent and examine his
wound. Upon a closer search it proved to be no shot-wound, but a
mere clour, or bruise, whereof the reason was now apparent, he
having been struck by the ball of a golfer (from us concealed by
the dunes, or bunkers, of sand) and not by the discharge of my
weapon. At this moment a plebeian fellow appeared with his arma
campestria, or clubs, cleeks, irons, and the like, under his arm,
who, without paying any attention to our situation, struck the ball
wherewith he had felled my kinsman in the direction of the hole.
Reflection directed us to the conclusion that both pistols had
missed their aim, and that Sir Hew had fallen beneath a chance blow
from this fellow's golf-ball. But as my kinsman was still hors de
combat, and incapable of further action, being unwitting, too, of
the real cause of his disaster, Inchgrabbit and Strathtyrum, in