To prevent him from giving you a straight thrust as you advance to
attack, beat his blade either in tierce or quarte.
Should he avoid the beat by disengaging and thrust upon you, make a beat
before you move the feet, then, as you advance, change quickly and beat
on the other side of his blade, and instantly deliver your attack.
The beat will probably draw his disengagement, and the change will parry
it.
To change is to pass your sword under that of your adversary, and rejoin
the blades on the opposite line.
OBSERVATIONS.
ON COUNTERING AND HARD-HITTING.
When you are making an assault with sabres or sticks, remember they are
substitutes for sharp swords, and act as though every hit you would
receive would either kill or disable you. All your movements must be
governed by this idea. You should never attempt to do anything with a
stick that you could or would not do with a sword.
You must remember that in an actual combat the sabres have sharp points
and edges, and that a very light touch would probably place you _hors de
combat_.
Hitting at your adversary when he is attacking you is almost as bad as
cutting your own throat, for you are almost certain to be more or less
seriously wounded; your chances of escape are very small indeed. You
must, therefore, always endeavour to guard the attack and never counter
except when you can avoid the hit by shifting.
You must never hit after you are hit, as it is very doubtful if you
would be able to do so with sharp swords.
The act of countering, so deservedly popular among boxers, is not
admissible here. A blow with the fist will probably only shake you, but
with a sharp sword the effect would be much more serious. There is no
such thing as give and take with that weapon, and I question if there is
much in a serious encounter with sticks, as a well delivered blow on any
part of the head would in all probability cause a cessation of
hostilities.
Rough and heavy hitting should be avoided: it destroys quickness;
greater effect is given to a hit by pace than by force.
A hard hitter has to brace himself together before attacking; he thus
prepares, and while doing so may easily be hit.
If his attack is guarded, he cannot recover and guard a return so
readily as he ought to do.
His returns are not given so quickly as they should be, for after
guarding, he is almost certain to draw his hand back in order to make
them with greater force.
As he hits, so he will guard; heaviness will pervade all his movements;
therefore, if you deceive his guard, he cannot make a second one with
sufficient quickness to stop a good attack, as he will throw too much
force into the first.
Slowness is the natural result of heaviness, quickness that of
lightness; therefore, if you wish to become a _bon tireur_, cultivate
and practise light play.
In trying to play light, you must not get into the habit of making
snatching hits by which you would only scratch your adversary. However
lightly you deliver them, let them be so given that with a sharp sword
they would be effective, and your points fixed so that they would
penetrate.
CUT _versus_ THRUST.
Some writers on the sword, acting on the presumption that the sword must
be elevated in order to gain force before cutting, have asserted that
the point traverses two-thirds less distance when thrusting than when
cutting. If this were correct, the less use made of the cut the better,
as a good swordsman would most certainly give a time cut on the arm or
deliver a thrust on a man while he was thus preparing to cut.
I once saw a sketch drawn to prove this assertion, in which the man
thrusting was depicted with his point lowered to a line with his
adversary’s breast instead of being level with his eye, while the man
who was cutting, and should have had his sword similarly placed, had his
point drawn back and raised about two feet above his head, a distance
greater than I should draw the point of my sword back were I going to
cut the carcase of a sheep in two at one stroke.
The point should not be drawn back or elevated when cutting either in an
attack or in a return.
There is only one direct cut in leading off (that at the head), and that
can be given with quite sufficient force without the slightest elevation
of the point if the sword arm and leg act together.
In all other attacks and returns the feint, or the act of forming the
guard, gives great impetus to the cut.
It has also been asserted that in making a thrust the sword moves in a
straight line, and in making a cut it moves in a circle.
This assertion is erroneous, and having been made without contradiction,
has been generally accepted as a fact, and hence become a popular error.
All straight thrusts and disengagements move in straight lines, but in
the cut over, the point has to be drawn back before the thrust can be
given, and when a cut over is made after a parry, the point traverses as
great if not a greater distance than in any cut.
Compare the following movements, which I think are the longest made
either in thrusting or cutting.
Engage with foils in quarte and parry the disengagement into tierce with
prime, and riposte with a cut over.
Engage with sabres in high seconde, and, guarding an attack at the head
with prime, return at the inside of the leg.
All direct cuts at the right side on any part from head to foot, from
whatever guards they are made, move in as straight lines as any thrusts
that can be given, and are consequently as quick.
In all other cuts the point moves in a circle.
However partial one may be to the thrust, and I acknowledge that I am
one of its partisans, justice should be given to the cut, and although
it may not in every instance be so quick or so fatal in its effect as
the thrust, it has its advantages. Among others, it rarely passes, that
is, goes by the object aimed at, without touching it, as the thrust will
often do, more particularly when aimed at the arm or leg.