It is customary for adversaries, on coming to the Guard, to Engage, or to join blades, on what is called the inside, that is, the right side; although there are occasions on which it is advisable to engage on the outside, or on the left; otherwise called the Quarte or Tierce sides.
Two men thus opposed to each other will at once perceive that there are two lines of attack open to them, i. e. the line inside and the line outside the blade—these, and no more. But these may be, and in fencing are, subdivided into inside above the hand, and inside under the hand, and the same subdivision for outside. This gives four lines of attack—or, to speak more simply, gives four openings through which an adversary may be assailed. Now, to protect each of these assailable points, are four defensive movements, called
PARADES.
Each opening has its own parade or defence, and each parade will guard its own opening, and, strictly speaking, no other. The opening inside above the hand is defended by two parades.
As its name imports, the first and most natural parade is that of Prime. The action of drawing the sword from its sheath is almost exactly the movement made use of in the parade of Prime.
In this parade, the hand is raised as high as the forehead, so that the fencer can see his opponent’s face under his wrist. The blade of the foil is almost horizontal, but the point is rather lowered towards the ground. As this parade will throw the right side of the body open to the adversary’s sword, it is good play to disengage from left to right, and deliver a rapid thrust at the adversary, in order to anticipate him before he can bring his own sword round for another thrust. His point will be thrown far out of line, so that he is behind-hand in point of time.
This is a very useful parade for fencers of short stature, as they can sometimes get in their blade under their adversary’s arm, after they have parried his thrust.
The other parade is that of