nineteenth century a good deal of life left in it--more
shame to us! It is high time for the principle to be driven out bag
and baggage. Now-a-days no one is allowed to set dogs or cocks to
fight each other,--at any rate, in England it is a penal offence,--but
men are plunged into deadly strife, against their will, by the
operation of this ridiculous, superstitious and absurd principle,
which imposes upon us the obligation, as its narrow-minded supporters
and advocates declare, of fighting with one another like gladiators,
for any little trifle. Let me recommend our purists to adopt the
expression _baiting_[1] instead of _duel_, which probably comes to us,
not from the Latin _duellum_, but from the Spanish _duelo_,--meaning
suffering, nuisance, annoyance.

[Footnote 1: _Ritterhetze_]

In any case, we may well laugh at the pedantic excess to which this
foolish system has been carried. It is really revolting that this
principle, with its absurd code, can form a power within the
State--_imperium in imperio_--a power too easily put in motion, which,
recognizing no right but might, tyrannizes over the classes which come
within its range, by keeping up a sort of inquisition, before which
any one may be haled on the most flimsy pretext, and there and then be
tried on an issue of life and death between himself and his opponent.
This is the lurking place from which every rascal, if he only belongs
to the classes in question, may menace and even exterminate the
noblest and best of men, who, as such, must of course be an object of
hatred to him. Our system of justice and police-protection has made it
impossible in these days for any scoundrel in the street to attack us
with--_Your money or your life_! An end should be put to the burden
which weighs upon the higher classes--the burden, I mean, of having to
be ready every moment to expose life and limb to the mercy of anyone
who takes it into his rascally head to be coarse, rude, foolish or
malicious. It is perfectly atrocious that a pair of silly, passionate
boys should be wounded, maimed or even killed, simply because they
have had a few words.

The strength of this tyrannical power within the State, and the force
of the superstition, may be measured by the fact that people who are
prevented from restoring their knightly honor by the superior or
inferior rank of their aggressor, or anything else that puts the
persons on a different level, often come to a tragic-comic end by
c