Doctors and duellists

The object of the duello is said to be the healing of wounded honour. To try to cure a wound of the spirit, or rather the temper, by a scratch on the skin savours of homoeopathy, but may perhaps be justified by the surgical principle of relieving tension by incision. Owing possibly to climatic influences, honour is more vulnerable in some countries than in others; hence there is more frequent need of curative scarification. It is one of those contradictions in human nature which puzzle the philosopher, that honour of the most morbidly …