Page:The Lady of the Lake - Scott (1810).djvu/420



The duellists of former times did not always stand upon those punctilios respecting equality of arms, which are now judged essential to fair combat. It is true, that in formal combats in the lists, the parties were, by the judges of the field, put as nearly as possible in the same circumstances. But in private duel it was often otherwise. In that desperate combat which was fought between Quelus, a minion of Henry III. of France, and Antraguet, with two seconds on each side, from which only two persons escaped alive, Quelus complained that his antagonist had over him the advantage of a poniard which he used in parrying, while bis left hand, which he was forced to employ for the same purpose, was cruelly mangled. When he charged Antraguct with this odds, "Thou hast done wrong," answered he, "to forget thy dagger at home. We are here to fight, and not to settle punctilios of arms." In a similar duel, however, a younger brother of the house of Aubayne, in Angoulesme, behaved more generously on the like occasion, and at once threw away his dagger when his enemy challenged it as an undue advantage. But at this time hardly any thing can be conceived more horridly brutal and savage, than the mode in which private quarrels were conducted in France. Those who were most jealous of the point of honour, and acquired the title of Raffinés, did not scruple to