Richard Francis Burton

“ In a rapier duel there are two important points to be learned. The first is the adversary's style and knowledge of the sword; the second is the nature of his moral organisation upon the field. It is evident without argument how much you gain by knowing whether the man before you is impetuous and fiery or calm and cold; if he will stand upon the defensive or resolutely proceed to the attack; whether his plan is to parry the pass, to retire, or to extend the sword in fine, if he is energetic or "dawdling," skilful or unskilled, "difficult" and dangerous or tame and phlegmatic. ”

“ The man who stands before you, who threatens you with his weapon, may be a consummate swordsman, fighting perhaps for the fifth or sixth time with all the advantages which an old campaigner must have accumulated; or he may never have taken a sword in hand, and rely solely upon his energy and upon his sang-froid, or even upon good luck, to serve and save him. ”

“ The duel is one of those provisional arrangements which, like cannibalism, slavery, polygamy, and many others, belong to certain stages of society, and which drop off as decayed and dead matter when, no longer necessary, they become injurious excrescences upon the body social. Those who look only at the surface of things consider these temporary institutions as unmixed evils, forgetting the immense amount of good which they did in their own day. ”

“ By the mere act of being present at a first rencontre you know all that as though you had fenced with your adversary a dozen times. Your confidence increases with your knowledge, your energy redoubles; your presence of mind, untrammelled by doubt, preoccupation, or the necessity of study, belongs to you in its entirety. You have read the book, you have surveyed the country.
Though you be completely ignorant of arms, and even though a study of the sword, more or less superficial, may not enable you amply to take advantage of the occasion, a* a practised student would do ”

“ Where is the reward of your prudence and husbanding strength if the danger which you have avoided the first time should be forced upon you the second?
" Still," Claude persisted, "one could hardly strike a man with a sword who can hardly hold his own."
Such is the feeling of every gentleman. Yet in the French barriere style of pistol duel a combatant, after receiving the adversary's fire, will not be ashamed of advancing and of dis- charging his own weapon. Here the opponent is even more unprotected; nothing can restore to the pistol the ball which it has discharged. ”

“ Your adversary, on the other hand, ignores all this. He is uncertain whether you are .practised or unpractised; whether ho should attack you or await your attack; if your nature is receptive and impressionable or stolid and aggressive, cool or ttable to be carried away. He walks like one blindfolded; you are the book with uncut leaves, the unexplored region. It remains for him to divine everything, to learn everything. ”

“ All the power and, I may say, the religion of the second lie in the calmness and firmness, in the justice, loyalty, and conciliation which he brings to his most unpleasant duty. It is a task that will always win for him, not praise, but obloquy, and his main consolation will be found in the approval of his own conscience. ”

“ Seaton asked, evidently perplexed.
In my opinion, it is the only thing which exalts, which ennobles fencing in the hour of battle; even the feeblest find unforeseen chances of escape, protecting hazards, strokes of luck, which prevent the combat degenerating into manslaughter. If the science of arms were exact and mathematical, admit- ting rigorous demonstration like a theorem of Laplace, if an unparriable pass could be invented, where is the man who, certain of conquering his opponent without running a shade of risk, would universally and loyally draw upon him? ”

“ Observe narrowly the place where your man is about to stand, and do not trust him to observe for himself. A tree root, imperceptible to a rapid survey, might cause him to stumble and receive a thruet from the opponent before the latter can stay his hand. ”

“ If, however, one side refuse, the other cannot insist upon the glove being accepted, or upon claiming that advantage for itself.
An objection, for instance, might be started that the glove, familiar to the practised fencer, is strange and useless to one who has never worn it. This would rarely be done, because the man whose palm has never touched a sword would feel its roughness more than, his experienced adversary. ”

“ Remember that I am not speaking of the pistol duel. Fatigued as he is, or as ho may be, by the first encounter, the chances of a second would not be equally distributed between him and hie adversary.
If another rencontre be inevitable, and be honourably settled upon by both sides, it can take place only after many hours of rest, or, better still, on the morrow. At the same time, should the " party interested " that is to say, the man who has fought demand an immediate settlement of the question, there is no moral reason for not conceding it. ”

“ But need I say it? the more you avoid fighting, the better for her good name. She will feel that more strongly than you do, unless she belongs to that odious demi-monde which would add to her bad reputation notoriety and, let me term it, infamy, by causing blood to be shed about herself. And one of the difficulties we Englishmen find on the Continent is to avoid being drawn into the complications that are ever arising between our fellow-countrywomen and foreigners. ”

“ The face and those parts of the body whose defence in the assault we unjustifiably neglect have blood which your enemy may cause to flow. Your adversary is not picked out by yourself. The choice of chance, he may be short or tall, strong or weak, your inferior, your equal, or your superior in physique. ”

“ Under no circumstances whatever should the man who is about to become an adversary be .allowed to be present, either as spectator or as second, at the combat which precedes, his own. The primary law, equality of chances, would be thereby utterly violated. The simple act of looking on has given him a real, an incontestable advantage. ”

“ Let us follow it out to its possible consequences; what is called Transatlantically "going th3 whole hog" is no bad test of principle, however opposed to our distaste for extremes. The mortal thrust has been stopped by the second, not parried by the principal. The fight continues and your "friend's" adversary is killed by the sudden change of that chance which at first stood in his favour. What now says your conscience?
The duel is a sad resource, but after you have honestly and honourably done all in your power to prevent it, allow fortune to pronounce between the principals. ”

“ There are men who have ignored the fact that they are guardians at once of another's life as well as of his honour, and who, fantastically to preserve the one, have foolishly or foully risked the other. But such things hardly belong to our times. The professional second, so brave with another man's skin, is all but extinct, except in comedies, and I only hope that we shall never see him again.
The chief muscle of a true man's arm is hie firm belief in the goodness of his cause. ”

“ At twenty- four paces everything is in favour of the practised shot; at twelve a large proportion; at six nothing. "But what about choice of weapons?"
Everywhere the right resides with the challenged. A man, fix- ing a quarrel upon you, insults you; you return it by a blow, pro forma, as it were, with your glove, and when he sends you the cartel you prefer pistols.
Connected with their opinions upon providence and destiny, the duel became part of the national life. ”

“ Why should England be justified in making duel murder, when at most it's manslaughter in France and Italy, in Germany and Austria? It's my opinion that the new law does no good at h->me. Abolish duelling and you intro- duce an extra pacific view of every question, public as well as individual'. And the Englishman is naturally too long suffering. John Bull fights like a man when his blood is heated, but how hard it is becoming to raise the spirit of the British lion up to positive fighting point! ”

“ In my opinion jealousy or rivalry for the affections of a woman is not a subject to fight about. If you want to see who is the "better man," ride stirrup by stirrup at a 6ft. wall, try the most of twelve tigers on foot, or go to the sources of the Congo River, but do not fight for the fair hand after the fashion of all the lower animals; such action simply degrades a man. ”

“ It may be questioned whether we have not been premature in thus striking at the effect before we can reach the cause, in throwing away the empirical remedy before we have found the scientific cure. The duel has been abolished, but the "court of honour" has not become a part of our social system. ”

“ In the Italian school, as I have already explained to you, that form of parrying, or rather of putting aside, the enemy's pass had its raison d'etre; in all others it becomes an imperfect and dangerous parody. ”

“ You will now see how many gifts are required for a second in a duel of swords. The first is that tenacity of look and cer- tainty of coup d'ocil which result only from a long habit of arms. The last is that energy of character which predisposes him to take an active part; the purely passive conception robs it of all its force, all its nobleness, all its dignity.
IX What do you say to the disputed question, " If one of the combatants wants to rest, can he be forced to go on? " asked Seaton. ”

“ It is as bad for the seconds as for the principals. It is difficult, not to say impossible, even where the practised eye is concerned, to appreciate in the rapid rencontre of rapiers, in the lightning-like exchange of passes, parries, and riposts, when the blades, sparkling in the sun, intertwine as though they were things of life, the difference of two movements, one being the result of agreement and the other a chance which suddenl}" changes the duel into manslaughter. ”

“ The stake is far too heavy to be thrown with careless hand and thoughtless head upon the green table of chance. In the first place the health of the combatant is highly important, and all the peculiarities of his eyesight, as well as his wind and training, must be carefully noticed. ”

“ I'd begin with reviving the old militia law, and make every man serve in the second line between the ages of eighteen and twenty-six. At the first war I'd make service in the first line compulsory on gentle or simple. ”

“ One of the principals receives the thrust. The victor, in the heat of action and excited by the natural animation of battle, is often, unconscious that he has disabled hia opponent. Before he sees tho effect upon the latter, or even before he can stop his own impetuous career, he may strike him a second time unless the seconds beat down the swords. ”

“ Usually it is settled beforehand, whether fencing gloves may or may not be used. As a rule they are, because they grasp the grip with greater certainty and render disarming more difficult. Besides, the handle of a foil or rapier is hard enough to tire or blister the delicate naked hand, and the fingers in contact with it suffer from every full-toned parry and from every shock of the swords. ”

“ Yet what shows the ineradicable form of vitality residing in the personal appeal of the offended to the offender is this: almost throughout the civilised world, the duel, which arises about a point of honour pure and simple, which has for object not the death of the antagonist, but a man's self-approbation and self- esteem, and which cannot be traced in connection with anything unworthy or unfit for the ey<-s of the world, that form of obtain- ing satisfaction has outlived every phase of abu?e, both tha punishments! ”

“ Moral coercion, the public opinion of an enlightened nation, Seaton
"Don't," cried that irritable officer, "unless you wish to drive me mad! "
"And I'm certain," said Shughtie, " that the working of the law will do us no good abroad. All the world knows how far it may go with John Bull before he rouses himself thorough!^, dashes his hat to the ground, pulls off his coat, tucks up his sleeves, and roars ' Come on! ' He himself told his fellow creatures that he was about to become a very long-suffering man when, somewhere about 1850, he proposed a pax vobiscntii in creation in general ”

“ Energy serves for nothing; courage becomes a useless weapon, and resolution only teaches a man to stand up like a target, and to await a bullet which he cannot stop. Under these circum- stances, faint heart is equal to stout heart ”

“ The Continental considers it a duty when entering life to faire ses epreuvesin other and very blunt words, to prove that he is not a coward. We English assume every gentleman to be brave and every gentlewoman to be honest until the reverse is established. ”

“ Then each man consults his judgment and his conscience upon what his conduct should be. Some might peremptorily demand that the rencontre cease; others that the combatants return to their places.
" And now let me ask you another question," said Shughtie. ' I've often heard a man say ' If in a duel about a small matter a dead thrust were made at my principal's chest, rny impulse would be to stop it.' Is he right or is. he wrong? ”

“ If after inspection the wound prove of little consequence, and it be resolved to continue the combat, the two adversaries will at any rate have found time to recover their calmness and their self-possession. ”