The Duel

by Anton Chekhov

  The martial and independent spirit of Rome was extinct. Sybarite luxury had succeeded its days of iron; and civilization, degraded by over refinement into effeminacy, had built palaces, but overthrown the barriers against invasion. This weakness was felt, tried, and overwhelmed. Swarms of barbarians overran that once great dominion,—the torrent swept all before it, and famine and pestilence marched in the train of the savage invaders; every institution that policy had laboured to establish was overthrown; and, for centuries, scarcely a vestige was to be traced of law, justice, or reason. The right of the sword was the only authority recognized; and a feudal system divided mankind into lords and slaves. Turbulence, oppression, and rapine were called government. The Deity was supposed to be propitiated by deeds of blood; while religion became a useful mask for the hypocrite, and was confined to the observance of external ceremonies.

  It was during this dark period that the practice of trials by ordeal,10 duelling, and single combat reigned paramount; and, when we consider the state of society into which mankind were brutalized, we cannot wonder at this mode of deciding differences being considered the wisest and most just. This epoch cannot be better described than in the fitting passage of Robertson:

  “To repel injuries and to revenge wrongs, is no less natural to man, than to cultivate friendships; and, while society remains in its most simple state, the former is considered as a personal right no less inalienable than the latter. Nor do men in this situation deem that they have a title to redress their own wrongs alone; they are touched with the injuries done to those with whom they are connected, or in whose honour they are interested, and are no less prompt to avenge them. The savage, how imperfectly soever he may comprehend the principle of political union, feels warmly the sentiments arising from the ties of blood. On the appearance of an injury or an affront offered to his family or tribe, he kindles into rage, and pursues the author of it with the keenest resentment. He considers it with the keenest resentment. He considers it as cowardly to expect redress from any arm but his own, and as infamous to give up to another the right of determining what reparation he should accept, or with what vengeance he should be satisfied.”

  Here we find the groundwork of duelling,—and it is to be lamented, that man, even in a progressive state of civilization, differs little from the savage in his thirst for gratifying the degrading indulgence of revenge.

  Let us strip the romantic days of chivalry of their fantastic and glittering panoply,—the hall of wassail of its pomp and beauty,—the troubadour’s fond theme of its florid attractions,—and the feats of knighthood in the cause of the ladies loved par amours of their Quixotic devotion,—and what shall we behold? Treachery and ferocity of the blackest dye,—profligacy and debauchery of the most revolting nature,—vice clad by morbid imagination in the most fascinating garb of virtue,—and a murderer’s brow laurelled by beauty’s hand, instead of falling under the headsman’s axe!

  —from The History of Duelling by J.G. Millingen. John Gideon Millingen (1782–1862) was a Paris educated surgeon in the British army, as well as a prolific writer. His two-volume history of dueling is one of the most comprehensive works on the subject.

  Two More Selections from Sabine

  Reflections On The Eve Of A Duel

  I have somewhere read that Moreau made, and Wellington assented to, the remark, that commanders of large armies, however brave, weighed down by moral anxiety and reasonings upon the uncertainties of the result, hesitate, after all their combinations and arrangements have been completed, to make the final movement to bring on a battle. How similar the condition of statesman and military men of distinction, when on the eve of private battle,—the parting line to the unconscious wife scaled; the will executed and concealed from curious eyes; the thought of the dread event of the morrow and its issues; the resolution taken to reserve fire, or not to wound in a mortal part; and the last conversation for the night with the only friends entrusted with the momentous secret! What were the emotions of Thurlow, rapidly advancing the bar, and with the vision of the Great Seal and the Wool-sack before him! Of Canning, struggling for the premiership, but scorned by the aristocracy for the lowly position in life of his true-hearted and exemplary mother! Of Pitt, whose ambitious policy grasped at bounding and balancing the kingdoms of all Europe! Of Hamilton, the pride and hope of a hemisphere, and the “disciple on whose bosom” Washington had “leaned!” of Clay, as chivalrous as the ancient Bayard himself, and taunted to madness by the ferocity and malignity of party calumny! Of Decatur, gallant and generous to knight-errantry, yet pushed by malign influences to wrong a professional brother already crushed by an administration to conceal its own indolence and remissness!

  Sin and Absurdity Of Duelling

  An elaborate argument to prove the Wickedness of the custom is unnecessary, for that is admitted everywhere, and quite as often and as frankly among its unfortunate victims as among others. Nor, in omitting a discussion on the point thus generally conceded, shall I so far yield to the popular voice in some sections of the country, as to say that, as a class, “duellists are murderers”; since it were as just, in my judgment, to pronounce the sentence of self-murder against those of the other sex who, by their course of live, produce consumtion and premature desease. Both are the victims of FASHION. Society in the former case loads, presents, and fires pistols, to shoot husbands and fathers and brothers; and in the latter, by its imperative laws to regulate the form and materials of dress, the hours of visiting, the articles of food or entertainment, and the manner of employing time, commits wives and daughters and sisters to untimely graves. Is it not so?

  The unconditional ABSURDITY of duelling, as a means of redress, may be shown in a passing word. If, under the commercial code, a rich but unprincipled merchant owes me a debt which he refuses to pay, and I propose to give him an acquittance on his consenting that, attended by our clerks, we meet and shoot at one another, or if, under the criminal code, I should agree not to arrest the man who had entered my dwelling, and robbed me of my family plate and pictures, on condition that he would fight me, everybody would see and exclaim against the foolishness of my conduct. Yet I should act on the precise rule of the code of honor.

  Without dwelling on the minor offences, we will take for an illustration the crime of female seduction, which wounds the frinds of the victim to madness, and which is sometimes comitted under circumstances that almost justify the most summary punishment. But how is it possible to efface the family stigma, in a combat with the seducer? Could the fallen daughter or sister be resorted, or were it certain that the aggressor would be shot, then something might be gained; but as it is, and in the nature of things ever must be, a male protector, if he send a challenge which is accepted, not only places himself on an equality with a scoundrel, but may himself be slain, and thus cause fresh anguish at the fireside already polluted by lust.

  Again, if the father or chief protector of a single family is bound to “demand satisfaction” of the betrayer of his hearthstone, why may not the father or chief protector of all the families of a nation be held to challenge the betrayer of his country? And why, hence, ought not Washington to have risked the most valuable life of the last century against Benedict Arnold, one of the most worthless lives of all centuries? The principle in the two cases is the same, beyond all denial; for the question is not whether the infamous betrayer of confiding woman or the infamous political traitor shall escape from the “deep damnation” of mankind, but whether, after the wrong be perpetrated, a mode of punishment shall be selected which gives no redress to the sufferers, and which puts the innocent and the guilty on an equal footing.

  —from Notes On Duels and Duelling by Lorenzo Sabine (1803–1877).

  Shame the Duel

  It might be imagined that enactments so severe all over the civilised world would finally eradicate a custom, the prevalence of which every wise and good man must deplore. But the frowns of the law never yet have taught, and never will teach, men to desist from th
is practice, as long as it is felt that the lawgiver sympathises with it in his heart. The stern judge upon the bench may say to the unfortunate wight who has been called a liar by some unmannerly opponent, “If you challenge him, you meditate murder, and are guilty of murder!” but the same judge, divested of his robes of state, and mixing in the world with other men, would say, “If you do not challenge him, if you do not run the risk of making yourself a murderer, you will be looked upon as a mean-spirited wretch, unfit to associate with your fellows, and deserving nothing but their scorn and their contempt!” It is society, and not the duellist, who is to blame. Female influence too, which is so powerful in leading men either to good or to evil, takes in this case the evil part. Mere animal bravery has, unfortunately, such charms in the female eye, that a successful duellist is but too often regarded as a sort of hero; and the man who refuses to fight, though of truer courage, is thought a poltroon, who may be trampled on. Mr. Graves, a member of the American legislature, who, early in 1838, killed a Mr. Cilley in a duel, truly and eloquently said, on the floor of the House of Representatives, when lamenting the unfortunate issue of that encounter, that society was more to blame than he was. “Public opinion,” said the repentant orator, “is practically the paramount law of the land. Every other law, both human and divine, ceases to be observed; yea, withers and perishes in contact with it. It was this paramount law of this nation and of this House that forced me, under the penalty of dishonour, to subject myself to the code, which impelled me unwillingly into this tragical affair. Upon the heads of this nation, and at the doors of this House, rests the blood with which my unfortunate hands have been stained!”

  As long as society is in this mood; as long as it thinks that the man who refuses to resent an insult, deserved that insult, and should be scouted accordingly; so long, it is to be feared, will duelling exist, however severe the laws may be. Men must have redress for injuries inflicted; and when those injuries are of such a nature that no tribunal will take cognisance of them, the injured will take the law into their own hands, and right themselves in the opinion of their fellows, at the hazard of their lives. Much as the sage may affect to despise the opinion of the world, there are few who would not rather expose their lives a hundred times than be condemned to live on, in society, but not of it—a by-word of reproach to all who know their history, and a mark for scorn to point his finger at.

  The only practicable means for diminishing the force of a custom which is the disgrace of civilisation, seems to be the establishment of a court of honour, which should take cognisance of all those delicate and almost intangible offences which yet wound so deeply. The court established by Louis XIV. might be taken as a model. No man now fights a duel when a fit apology has been offered; and it should be the duty of this court to weigh dispassionately the complaint of every man injured in his honour, either by word or deed, and to force the offender to make a public apology. If he refused the apology, he would be the breaker of a second law; an offender against a high court, as well as against the man he had injured, and might be punished with fine and imprisonment, the latter to last until he saw the error of his conduct, and made the concession which the court demanded.

  If, after the establishment of this tribunal, men should be found of a nature so bloodthirsty as not to be satisfied with its peaceful decisions, and should resort to the old and barbarous mode of an appeal to the pistol, some means might be found of dealing with them. To hang them as murderers would be of no avail; for to such men death would have few terrors. Shame alone would bring them to reason. Transportation, the tread-wheel, or a public whipping, would perhaps be sufficient.

  —from Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds by Charles McKay (1814–1889). McKay was a celebrated historian, poet and scholar whose works were widely read in his time. It was this history of popular folly that would give him lasting fame. Academics, historians and above all, contrarians admire it to this day. Other than dueling, McKay trained his cutting wit on subjects like economic bubbles, witchcraft, and religious relics.

  10 In the following pages I shall describe these several ordeals; for although they may not be considered as coming within the legitimate sphere of duelling, yet both practices were equally barbarous in their origin and absurd in their application. Duels actually formed part of the system of ordeals, in which the judgment of God was appealed to in behalf of the innocent.

  Reading IV

  Dueling

  by Thomas Paine

  A comment on the pamphlet: “Cursory Reflections on the Single Combat or Modern Duel. Addressed to Gentlemen in every Class of Life.”11

  Gothic and absurd as the custom of duelling is generally allowed to be, there are advocates for it on principle; reasoners, who coolly argue for the necessity and even convenience, of this mode of accommodating certain kinds of personal differences, and of redressing certain species of injuries, for which the laws have not provided proper or adequate remedies: they conclude, therefore, that an appeal to the sword is a requisite supplement to the law, and that this sort of satisfaction for extra judicial offences, must take place, till some other mode shall be devised and established. The learned Dr. Robertson has observed, in favour of this practice—even while he condemns it—that its influence on modern manners, has been found, in some respects, beneficial to mankind.

  “To this absurd custom,” says he, “we must ascribe, in some degree, the extraordinary gentleness and complaisance of modern manners, and that respectful attention of one man to another, which, at present, render the social intercourses of life far more agreeable and decent than amongst the most civilized nations of antiquity.”12

  The author of these considerations [“Cursory Reflections”] reduces the arguments which have been offered in behalf of the private combat to these two.

  I. That the duel is the only expedient to obtain satisfaction for those injuries of which the laws take no cognizance.

  II. That a man of honour is bound on pain of infamy to resent every indignity that may be offered to him with the point of his sword or with a pistol.

  These positions our sensible author undertakes to refute; and we shall give a specimen of his reasoning: but, first, it will not be improper to lay before our readers part of what he has said on the origin of the single combat, or duel.

  “The ancient states,” says he, “of Greece and Rome, from whence we derive the noblest models of heroism, supported private honour, without delivering down to us any evidences of this baneful custom of demanding so severe a decision of private affronts; which, considering the military spirit of these nations, must, if it obtained at all, have proved more destructive to them at home, than the united swords of their enemies abroad. The practice is in fact of later and more ignoble birth; the judicial combat, the parent of modern duels, springing from monkish superstition, grafted on feudal barbarism. Whoever reads Hurd’s entertaining and ingenious “Letters on Chivalry and Romance,” with Robertson’s elaborate “History of the Emperor Charles V.,” will no longer hesitate concerning the clear fact.

  “The judicial combat obtained in ignorant ages, on a conclusion that in this appeal to Providence, innocence and right would be pointed out by victory, and guilt stigmatized and punished by defeat. But alas! experience at length taught us not to expect a miraculous interposition, whenever superior strength, superior skill, and superior bravery or ferocity, either or all of them, happened to appear on the side of injustice.”

  Dr. Robertson, above quoted, denies the fashion (as the writer of these reflections has observed) of terminating private differences by the sword, or pistol, by the illustrious example of the challenge sent by Francis I. of France to the Emperor Charles V. This was not, indeed, the first instance of such challenges, among princes; but, as our author remarks, the dignity of the parties, in the present case, afforded a sufficient sanction for extending this mode of deciding differences; to which we may add, that the spirit of chivalry and romantic knighthood still prevailing in th
ose fighting times, was continually exciting the heroes of the age to this mode of proving their personal prowess and valour.

  We now return to our author’s manner of reasoning upon the postulata before stated:

  “With respect to the first argument,” says he, “if we annex any determined ideas to our words, by satisfaction we are to understand redress, compensation, amends or atonement. Now, Gentlemen! for the sake of all that is valuable in life, condescend for a minute to bring down your refined notions to the sure standard of common sense, and then weigh the satisfaction to be obtained in a duel.

  “Is satisfaction to be enforced from an adversary by putting a weapon into his hand, and standing a contention with him, life for life, upon an equal chance?

  “Is an offender against the rules of gentility, or against the obligations of morality, a man presumptively destitute of honour himself, fairly entitled to this equal chance of extending an injury already committed, to the irreparable degree of taking the life also from an innocent man?

  “If a gentleman is infatuated enough to meet a person who has degraded himself from the character of a gentleman, upon these equal terms, and loses a limb, or his life, what species of satisfaction can that be called?—But it is better to suffer death than indignity. What, from the injurious hand? Correct your ideas, and you will esteem life too valuable to be complimented away for a mistaken notion.

  “If the aggressor falls, the full purpose of the injured person is thus answered, but what is the satisfaction? The survivor becomes a refugee, like a felon; or if he should be cleared by the equivocal tenderness of a court of justice, must he not be a barbarian instead of a gentleman, who can feed upon this inhuman bloody satisfaction, without experiencing the pangs of self-reproach, for having sacrificed the life of a fellow creature to a mere punctilio; and perhaps involved the ruin of an innocent family by the brutal deed? If, on the other hand, he is really a mistaken man of humanity, what has he obtained? The satisfaction of imbittering all the remainder of his life with the keenest sorrow; of having forfeited all his future peace of mind by a consciousness of guilt, from which his notions of honour can never release him, till the load drags him down to the grave!