It is odd that women have not taken up fencing before this, so well are they qualified for it. They would probably have done so, had they not considered it a purely masculine accomplishment. A good many fashions and customs originate in New York that are unworthy of countenance or imitation. Fencing is not one of them, and we hope that the country in general will be eager and energetic to emulate the Metropolis in this particular. A number of Professors of Arms, as they style themselves, advertise to give women public or private lessons, and some of them say that they have found their feminine pupils very apt and skillful.
Married women are as much benefited as, indeed more benefited than, unmarried women by sword play.
It is to be hoped that all women who can afford it will take lessons. When anything appeals to the aesthetic as well as the hygienic in woman it ought to enlist her interest, especially when it is no trouble, and its advantages are palpable. The person using it thrust or hewed into the body of his antagonist whenever he had a chance, and the only defense against it was a stout armor or an interposed shield. But about the time of Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain the science of fencing was invented. This new system of fighting gave an entirely new use to the sword.