Evening Republican, Volume 22, Number 271, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 November 1919 — The Return of the Sword. [ARTICLE]

The Return of the Sword.

The British army order requiring all “field marshals, generals and colonels, when dismounted,” to wear the sword on ceremonial parades and at official ceremonies, has provided material for the humorists. The sword, having been superseded by other weapons for those who actually come in contact with the enemy, and being therefore doubly useless to officers of exalted rank who must remain at a considerable distance from the hand-to-hand engagements, had-been discarded during the war. But now it returns with all its faded glory for times of peace and its formidable“clank” will once more accompany Its wearer’s martial stride. However ludicrous this may seem, it is apparently to some extent unavoidable owing to the forbidding ugliness of modern engines of war —bombs, trench periscopes, portable machine guns and the like, which are obviously less desirable as emblems of authority than the graceful lines of the sword, the scimitar and the halberd of other