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Though he was a 'sportman, a gambler, a Don Juan, a duel list, nothing was ever said against his honour. "I remember one instance of his generosity in this respect; for it was much talked of at the time. One of your countrymen, who had never handled a fencing-foil nor fired a pistol, took offence at something M. de Mauleon had said in disparagement of the Duke of Wellington, and called him out.
He would save Corona from annoyance, and her name from the scandal-mongers; and if any one ever dared to mention the story Giovanni rose to his feet and mechanically took a fencing-foil from the wall, as he often did for practice. If any one mentioned the story, he thought, he had the means to silence them, quickly and for ever.
With Colonel Pendleton for master, he was initiated into exercises with dirk and fencing-foil, for not yet was the boxing-glove considered meet, by that still old-fashioned courtier, for the hand of a gentleman.
Stray joints of clumsy fishing-rods; artificial baits; a pair of worn-out top-boots, in which one of the urchins, whooping and shouting, buried himself up to the middle; moth-eaten, stained, and ragged, the collegian's gown-relic of the dead man's palmy time; a bag of carpenter's tools, chiefly broken; a cricket-bat; an odd boxing-glove; a fencing-foil, snapped in the middle; and, more than all, some half-finished attempts at rude toys: a boat, a cart, a doll's house, in which the good-natured Caleb had busied himself for the younger ones of that family in which he had found the fatal ideal of his trite life.
Though he was a 'sportman, a gambler, a Don Juan, a duel list, nothing was ever said against his honour. "I remember one instance of his generosity in this respect; for it was much talked of at the time. One of your countrymen, who had never handled a fencing-foil nor fired a pistol, took offence at something M. de Mauleon had said in disparagement of the Duke of Wellington, and called him out.
These wretched apologies for swords are to outward appearance ordinary straight canes usually of Malacca cane. On pulling the handle of one of these weapons, however, a nasty piece of steel is revealed, and then you draw forth a blade something between a fencing-foil and a skewer. They are poor things as regards length and strength, and "not in it" with a good solid stick.
Do you suppose that Wordsworth has given us a complete portrait of the boy that he was, in 'The Prelude'? He says not a word about the picture of his grandmother that he broke with his whip because the other children gave him a 'dare, nor about the day when he went up into the attic with an old fencing-foil to commit suicide, nor about the girl with whom he fell in love while he was in France.
To most German students, a sword, or Schläger, was as necessary as pipe or beer-mug; not a slender fencing-foil, with a button on the point, and slight enough to snap with a vigorous thrust, but a stout blade of tempered steel, ground sharp. With these weapons the students perpetrated savageries, almost unrebuked, which struck an American with horror.
Occasionally a fencing-foil lay among these evidences of study, while the small aquaria, the cases of stuffed animals with fancy backgrounds and the numerous bird-cages had been thrust aside to give fair elbow-room. "Perhaps," said Mrs. Trelyon to herself with much satisfaction "perhaps, after all, that good little girl has given him a hint about Parliament, and he is preparing himself."
Stray joints of clumsy fishing-rods; artificial baits; a pair of worn-out top-boots, in which one of the urchins, whooping and shouting, buried himself up to the middle; moth-eaten, stained, and ragged, the collegian's gown-relic of the dead man's palmy time; a bag of carpenter's tools, chiefly broken; a cricket-bat; an odd boxing-glove; a fencing-foil, snapped in the middle; and, more than all, some half-finished attempts at rude toys: a boat, a cart, a doll's house, in which the good-natured Caleb had busied himself for the younger ones of that family in which he had found the fatal ideal of his trite life.
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