"Are you aware," said one of my friends, "that these are the secrets of
the sword that you are revealing to us?"
"Only," I replied, "those secrets which I happen to know. But really
you have hit upon the right word, for the secrets of the sword are
innumerable. It is a Proteus in the hand that orders it, and obeys
the least motion of the will with the quick docility of an attendant
spirit. It can be the insolent and overbearing bully, it can be the
wary and diplomatic courtier. At one moment it is all menace, a keen
attacking point, the next it changes to a protecting shield.
"But alas for our poor faithful servant; to-day the sword and its
secrets are almost forgotten, or at least but little valued. There was
a time, and a time not so very remote, when a knowledge of sword-play
was considered one of the credentials of a gentleman. Apply that test
now; apply it to yourselves. We have here in this room a large number
of gentlemen met together, and I do not doubt that each one of you
could make good his title to gentle birth, and that in more ways than
one; and yet how many of you would be seriously embarrassed if you were
required to manipulate a sword! How many of you, if you will allow me
to say so, would make but a very pitiful exhibition of yourselves!"
I saw by the smile that went round the room that my remarks were only
too well founded.
"Of course," I continued, "I know the usual answer:--'True,' you will
say, 'we may be duffers, but we are not afraid of fighting.' Yes, you
are not afraid of fighting, that is to say you are willing to be killed
by the first bully, who chooses to force a quarrel upon you. Brave
words truly! But after all is it worth while to be the owner of so many
talents, youth and strength, a cultured mind, a healthy body, and yet
not even to know how to defend your life?
"I am reminded of the story told of a certain General. When one of
his officers, who disagreed with him on the policy of some strategic
movement, had said:--'Well, General, when the time comes I will show
you that I know how to die.' 'Don't be a fool, Sir,' replied the
General, 'your duty is not to see that you get killed, but to take care
that you don't'."
"Surely," suggested one of my friends, "the real difficulty is that it
takes years of conscientious and continual application to make even a
moderate fencer."
"Quite a mistake, I assure you."
"Why, only the other day I happened to pick up one or two books about
fencing and glanced through them. I assure you, they really are
appalling."
"There we have it," I exclaimed, "and with that word you go over bag
and baggage to the enemy's camp. You are not the first to be appalled,
merely because the professors have omitted to caution the reader, that
they cannot in the exercise of their craft afford to be otherwise than
omniscient, and that their omniscience must be aired. It is because
they are afraid of being taxed with ignorance, or of being rated as
less men than their predecessors, that they insist on science at any
price; science they must have, interminable and unmitigated science,
and so they produce their laborious treatises, monuments of erudition,
but as you say--appalling.
"For my part, after reading and rereading, with the most scrupulous
attention, everything that has been written on the subject, I remain
convinced of this, that if I were writing a manual of fencing my first
object would be to get rid of the alarming jargon of technical terms,
which are supposed to be indispensable--a formidable array, quite
enough, I freely admit, to give pause to the most resolute, and to
blanch the cheek of the keenest aspirant."
"Ah, you are quite right," said my host with the air of a man who had
made the experiment. "How much the art and the professors too would
have gained, if they had only studied simplicity, and taken the trouble
to make themselves intelligible."