Word: swordplay
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...University of Pavia. No lady of Renaissance Italy so fair and mettlesome as this Valeria but was meshed in intrigue from her dainty toes to her pearl-sewn caul. And no stalwart like lucky Bellarion but would have rejoiced as he to exchange a philosophical career for swordplay in her service. This swordplay, these daggers by night and poisoned wine-goblets; a Milanese tyrant blood-hounding men for sport; a hundred delicate situations saved by Macchiavelian wit or pretty compliments; and Bellarion, "half god, half beast," rising to power and at last claiming the lady-these are swiftest, richest Sabatini...
Hence many are thankful for the sabers which, according to the dispatches, will be drawn in threatening swordplay between two high officials of the Polish government. Were the custom to be followed in the United States, duels, lineally descended from the Burr-Hamilton affair of the early Republic, would settle insurgent politics. A single snick of a rapier in the dawn might prove an effective cloture rule for Senate debate...
...FIREBRAND?Benvenuto Cellini turned into modern bedroom farce, the infidelities of a duchess and general irreverence toward the times of wigs, tights and swordplay...
Cyrano, the play, offers romance trimmed and garnished with all the vast imagination of Edmond Rostand's genius. It makes no pretense of credibility; it is frankly a love story with plenty of swordplay and roses. Cyrano, himself, is an individual whose enormous heart is only exceeded in magnitude by his nose. Such a nose has Cyrano that he simply cannot attract affection from his heart's desire, Roxane. So he fights and laughs and sings his way through the entertaining history to a conclusion which, though well known for a quarter of a century, must remain undivulged in deference...
Hard drinking and brilliant swordplay are the chief requisites for glory at the universities. A German student who does not duel (they all drink) is socially ostracised ; while he who excels in both fencing and drinking becomes at once the idol of his fellow students and the secret admiration of the town maidens. So strong is the passion for fame that the veriest trifles are construed into portentous insults and men have been known to tear open wounds partially healed, that scars might be formed as souvenirs of past encounters...