Fig. 32.—The point.
The point may be parried with any of the guards previously described.
It is well to remember that one of the most effective returns which can be made from any guard is a point, and that a point can be made certainly from every hanging guard by merely straightening the arm from the guard, lunging, and coming in under your opponent’s weapon. But perhaps this is a thing to be learnt rather from practical play than from a book.
Now, it is obvious that if any of the foregoing guards are as good as they have been described, it is necessary to induce your adversary to abandon them if you are ever to score a point.
This may be done in a variety of ways, when you have assured yourself that he is invulnerable to a direct attack, not to be flurried by a fierce onslaught, or slow enough to let you score a “remise”—that is, a second hit—the first having been parried, but not returned.
The first ruse to adopt, of course, is the feint—a feint being a false attack, or rather a move as if to attack in a line which you threaten, but in which you do not intend to attack. All feints should be strongly pronounced or clearly shown. A half-hearted feint is worse than useless; it is dangerous. If you have a foeman worthy of your steel facing you, he will detect the fraud at once, and use the time wasted by you over a feeble feint to put in a time thrust.
The ordinary feint is made by an extension of the arm as if to cut without moving the foot to lunge, the lunge being made the moment you have drawn off your enemy’s guard and laid bare the real object of your attack.
Sometimes, however, if you cannot succeed otherwise, a half or short lunge for your feint, to be turned into a full lunge as you see your opening, may be found a very useful variation of the ordinary feint. If you find feints useless, you may try to compass your adversary’s downfall by “a draw.” All the time that you are playing you should try to be using your head, to be thinking out your plans and trying to discover his. In nine cases out of ten he has some favourite form of attack. If you discover what it is, and know how to stop it, indulge him, and invite him even to make it, having previously formed some little scheme of attack of your own upon this opening. Let me illustrate my meaning by examples. If you notice a hungry eye fixed yearningly on your tender calf, let your calf stray ever so little from under the protection of the hanging guard. If this bait takes your friend in, and he comes with a reckless lunge at it, throwing all his heart into the cut, spring up to your full height, heels together, and leg well out of danger, and gently let your avenging rod fall along his spine. This, by the way, is the only occasion, except when you are acknowledging a hit, on which you may be allowed to desert the first position for legs and feet.