When I went out our two men-at-arms had each of them in hand his straight Wendish Tolleknife, made heavy at the end of the Swedish blade, but light as to the handle, and hafted with cork from Spain.

Ten yards apart, shoulder to shoulder they stood, and, first of all, each of them poising the knife in the hollow of his hand with a peculiar dancing movement, set it writhing across the room at a marked circle on a board.  The two knives sped simultaneously with a vicious whir, and stood quivering, with their blades touching each other, in the centre of the white.  At the next trial, so exactly had they been aimed that the point of the one hit upon the haft of the other and stripped the cork almost to the blade.  But Jorian, to whom the knife belonged, mended it with a piece of string, telling the company philosophically that it was no bad thing to have a string hanging loose to a Tolleknife, for when it went into any one the string would always hang down from the wound in order to pull it out by.

Then they got their knives again and played a more dangerous game.  Jorian stood on guard with his knife, waving the blade slowly before him in the shape of a long-bodied letter S. Boris poised his weapon in the hollow of his hand, and sent it whirring straight at Jorian’s heart.  As it came buzzing like an angry bee, almost too quick for the eye to follow, Jorian flicked it deftly up into the air at exactly the right moment, and, without even taking his eye off it, he caught the knife by the handle as it fell.  Thereafter he bowed and gave it back to the thrower ceremoniously.  Then Boris guarded, and Jorian in his turn threw, with a like result, though, perhaps, a little less featly done on Boris’s part.

All the while there was a clamant and manifold astonishment in the kitchen of the inn, together with prodigal and much-whispering wonder.

Then ensued other plays.  Boris stood with his elbow crooked and his left hand on his hip, with his back also turned to Jorian. Buzz! went the knife!  It flashed like level lightning under the arch of Jorian’s armpit, and lo! it was caught in his right hand, which dropped upon it like a hawk upon a rabbit, as it sped through his elbow port.

Then came shooting with the cross-bow, and I regretted much that I had only learned the six-foot yew, and that there was not one in the company, nor indeed room to display it if there had been.  For I longed to do something to show that I also was no milksop.

Now it chanced that there was in one corner a yearling calf that had been killed that day, and hung up with a bar between its thighs.  I saw an axe leaning in the corner—­an axe with a broad, cutting edge—­and I bethought me that perhaps, after all, I knew something which even Jorian and Boris were ignorant of.  So, mindful of my father’s teaching, I took the axe, and, before any one was aware of my intent, I swept the long-handled axe round my head, and, getting the poise and distance for the slow drawing cut which does not stop for bone nor muscle, I divided the neck through at one blow so that the head dropped on the ground.