THE DUEL 43 



was inevitable that a man should accept a challenge in order to 

 keep his station. He had me very carefully trained, saying that 

 if you were a well-known expert with the pistol, rifle, and sword, 

 ordinary decent behavior would keep you out of such trouble. 

 I cannot remember when I began to shoot, but I recall, when 

 not more than seven years old, a weekly exercise of some hours, 

 partly because the light rifle used by its recoil made my shoul- 

 der very sore. By the time I was fifteen I was an expert rifle- 

 shot, including the varieties of "snap shooting" at bottles 

 thrown in the air, flying birds, and the like. There were many 

 who could beat me at the ancient tests of "candle snuffing," 

 "nail driving," or other deliberate work, but I led in all such 

 exercises when quickness was needed. 



Fencing was not a common exercise among the youths of that 

 time and place, but my father had me begin in Cincinnati with 

 a fencing-master by the name of Scherer, a Frenchman, when I 

 was about twelve years of age. Scherer, who claimed to be an 

 exiled officer, but was most likely of the drill-master grade, was 

 a great master, and having much aptitude for the work I was in 

 five years reckoned very good in small- and broad-sword, sword 

 and dagger, and French cane exercises, and I became passion- 

 ately fond of them. The master claimed that I was the best 

 amateur rapier fencer in this country and could hold my own 

 with any one in France or Italy. I kept up this training assidu- 

 ously until I went to Harvard, somewhat later indeed, until 

 the Civil War completed my distaste for arms and all that 

 related thereto. 



To keep together the story of Scherer, a character who de- 

 serves record, because he was most noteworthy of his kind, I 

 shall here tell more of my relations with him, which were in a 

 way intimate until my eighteenth year and continued until the 

 beginning of the Civil War. He was a small man of the most 

 intense Gallic quality, the human equivalent of a game-cock 

 even to his tread. His eager little soul had but one idea, that of 

 combat, an idea which shone from his livid face, which had a 



