A great number of historic duels were over politics.  Such a one was the fight which took place in 1843, between Mr. Hueston, editor of the Baton Rouge “Gazette” and Mr. Alcee La Branche, a Creole gentleman who had been speaker of the Louisiana House of Representatives, and was running for Congress.  Mr. La Branche was one of the few public men in the State who had never fought a duel, and in the course of a violent political campaign, Hueston twitted him on this subject in the columns of the “Gazette,” trying to make him out a coward.  Soon after the insulting article appeared, the two men met in the billiard room of the old St. Charles Hotel, and when La Branche demanded an apology, and was refused, he struck Hueston with a cane, or a cue, and knocked him down.  A duel was, of course, arranged, the weapons selected being double-barreled shotguns loaded with ball.  At the first discharge Hueston’s hat and coat were punctured by bullets.  He demanded a second exchange of shots, which resulted about as before—­his own shots going wild, while those of his opponent narrowly missed him.  Hueston, however, obstinately insisted that the duel be continued, and the guns were loaded for the third time.  In the next discharge the editor received a scalp wound.  It was now agreed by all present that matters had gone far enough, but Hueston remained obdurate in his intention to kill or be killed, and in the face of violent protests, demanded that the guns again be loaded.  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.  He arose and, speaking with the utmost gravity, addressed the jury.