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in an ambling condition. -- They were not. ------ Imagine to yourself, Obadiah mounted upon a strong monster of a coach-horse, prick'd into a full gallop, and making all practicable speed the ad- verse way. Pray, Sir, let me interest you a mo- ment in this description. Had Dr. Slop beheld Obadiah a mile off, posting in a narrow lane directly to- wards him, at that monstrous rate, ---- splashing and plunging like a devil thro' thick and thin, as he approach'd, would not such a ph2aenomenon, with such a vor- tex of mud and water moving along with it, round its axis, -- have been a subject of juster apprehension to Dr. Slop in his situation, than the worst of Whiston's co- mets ? -- To say nothing of the NUCLEUS ; that |
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that is, of Obadiah and the coach-horse. ------ In my idea, the vortex alone of 'em was enough to have involved and carried, if not the Doctor, at least the Doctor's pony quite away with it. What then do you think must the terror and hydrophobia of Dr. Slop have been, when you read, (which you are just going to do) that he was advancing thus warily along towards Shandy-Hall, and had ap- proach'd to within sixty yards of it, and within five yards of a sudden turn, made by an acute angle of the garden wall, -- and in the dirtiest part of a dirty lane, -- when Obadiah and his coach-horse turn'd the corner, rapid, furious, -- pop, -- full upon him ! -- Nothing, I think, in nature, can be supposed more terrible, than such a Rencounter, -- so imprompt ! so ill prepared to stand the shock of it as Dr. Slop was ! 1 What |
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What could Dr. Slop do ? -- He cross'd himself  -- Pugh ! -- but the Doctor, Sir, was a Papist. -- No matter ; he had better have kept hold of the pummel. -- He had so ; -- nay, as it happen'd, he had better have done nothing at all ; -- for in crossing himself, he let go his whip, -- and in attempting to save his whip be- twixt his knee and his saddle's skirt, as it slipp'd, he lost his stirrup, -- in losing which, he lost his seat ; -- and in the multitude of all these losses, (which, by the bye, shews what little advantage there is in crossing) the unfortunate Doc- tor lost his presence of mind. So that, without waiting for Obadiah's onset, he left his pony to its destiny, tumbling off it diagonally, something in the stile and manner of a pack of wool, and without any other consequence from the fall, save that of being left, (as it would have been) with |
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with the broadest part of him sunk about twelve inches deep in the mire. Obadiah pull'd off his cap twice to Dr. Slop ; ---- once as he was falling, -- and then again when he saw him seated. -- Ill timed complaisance ! ---- had not the fel- low better have stopp'd his horse, and got off and help'd him ? -- Sir, he did all that his situation would allow ; -- but the MOMENTUM of the coach-horse was so great, that Obadiah could not do it all at once ; ---- he rode in a circle three times round Dr. Slop, before he could fully accomplish it any how ; -- and at the last, when he did stop his beast, 'twas done with such an explosion of mud, that Oba- diah had better have been a league off. In short, never was a Dr. Slop so beluted, and so transubstantiated, since that affair came into fashion. VOL. II E C H A P. |
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WHEN Dr. Slop entered the back parlour, where my father and my uncle Toby were discoursing upon the nature of women, -- it was hard to determine whether Dr. Slop's figure, or Dr. Slop's presence, occasioned more sur- prize to them ; for as the accident hap- pened so near the house, as not to make it worth while for Obadiah to remount him, -- Obadiah had led him in as he was, unwiped, unappointed, unanealed, with all his stains and blotches on him. ---- He stood like Hamlet's ghost, motion- less and speechless, for a full minute and a half, at the parlour door, (Obadiah still holding his hand) with all the ma- jesty of mud. His hinder parts, upon which he had received his fall, totally be- |
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besmear'd, -- and in every other part of him, blotched over in such a manner with Obadiah's explosion, that you would have sworn, (without mental reservation) that every grain of it had taken ef- fect. Here was a fair opportunity for my uncle Toby to have triumph'd over my father in his turn ; -- for no mortal, who had beheld Dr. Slop in that pickle, could have dissented from so much, at least, of my uncle Toby's opinion, ``That may- ``hap his sister might not care to let ``such a Dr. Slop come so near her `` * * * *'' But it was the Argu- mentum ad hominem ; and if my uncle Toby was not very expert at it, you may think, he might not care to use it. -- No ; the reason was, -- 'twas not his na- ture to insult. E 2 Dr. |
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Dr. Slop's presence, at that time, was no less problematical than the mode of it ; tho', it is certain, one moment's re- flection in my father might have solved it ; for he had apprized Dr. Slop but the week before, that my mother was at her full reckoning ; and as the Doctor had heard nothing since, 'twas natural and very political too in him, to have taken a ride to Shandy-Hall, as he did, merely to see how matters went on. But my father's mind took unfortu- nately a wrong turn in the investigation ; running, like the hypercritick's, altogether upon the ringing of the bell and the rap upon the door, -- measuring their dis- tance, -- and keeping his mind so intent upon the operation, as to have power to think of nothing else, -- common-place infirmity of the greatest mathematicians ! work- |
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working with might and main at the de- monstration, and so wasting all their strength upon it, that they have none left in them to draw the corollary, to do good with. The ringing of the bell and the rap upon the door, struck likewise strong upon the sensorium of my uncle Toby, -- but it excited a very different train of thoughts ; -- the two irreconcileable pul- sations instantly brought Stevinus, the great engineer, along with them, into my uncle Toby's mind : -- What business Stevinus had in this affair, -- is the greatest problem of all ; -- it shall be solved, -- but not in the next chapter. E 3 C H A P. |
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WRiting, when properly managed, (as you may be sure I think mine is) is but a different name for conversa- tion : As no one, who knows what he is about in good company, would venture to talk all ; -- so no author, who under- stands the just boundaries of decorum and good breeding, would presume to think all : The truest respect which you can pay to the reader's understanding, is to halve this matter amicably, and leave him something to imagine, in his turn, as well as yourself. For my own part, I am eternally pay- ing him compliments of this kind, and do all that lies in my power to keep his imagination as busy as my own. 'Tis |
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'Tis his turn now ; -- I have given an ample description of Dr. Slop's sad over- throw, and of his sad appearance in the back parlour ; ---- his imagination must now go on with it for a while. Let the reader imagine then, that Dr. Slop has told his tale ; -- and in what words, and with what aggravations his fancy chooses : ---- Let him suppose that Obadiah has told his tale also, and with such rueful looks of affected concern, as he thinks will best contrast the two figures as they stand by each other : Let him imagine that my father has stepp'd up stairs to see my mother : -- And, to conclude this work of imagina- tion, -- let him imagine the Doctor wash'd, ---- rubb'd down, ---- condoled with, -- felicitated, -- got into a pair of Obadiah's pumps, stepping forwards towards the E 4 door, |
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door, upon the very point of entering upon action. Truce ! -- truce, good Dr. Slop ! -- stay thy obstetrick hand ; -- return it safe into thy bosom to keep it warm ; -- little do'st thou know what obstacles ; -- little do'st thou think what hidden causes retard its operation ! -- Hast thou, Dr. Slop, -- hast thou been intrusted with the secret ar- ticles of this solemn treaty which has brought thee into this place ? -- Art thou aware that, at this instant, a daughter of Lucina is put obstetrically over thy head ? Alas ! 'tis too true. -- Besides, great son of Pilumnus ! what can'st thou do ? ---- Thou has come forth unarm'd ; -- thou hast left thy tire-tête, -- thy new-invented forceps, -- thy crotchet, -- thy squirt, and all thy instruments of salvation and deli- verance behind thee. ------ By heaven ! at |
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at this moment they are hanging up in a green bays bag, betwixt thy two pistols, at thy bed's head ! -- Ring ; -- call ; -- send Obadiah back upon the coach-horse to bring them with all speed. -- Make great haste, Obadiah, quoth my father, and I'll give thee a crown ; -- and, quoth my uncle Toby, I'll give him another. YOUR sudden and unexpected ar- rival, quoth my uncle Toby, ad- dressing himself to Dr. Slop, (all three of them sitting down to the fire together, as my uncle Toby began to speak) -- in- stantly brought the great Stevinus into my head, who, you must know, is a fa- vourite 3 |
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vourite author with me. ------ Then, added my father, making use of the ar- gument Ad Crumenam, ---- I will lay twenty guineas to a single crown piece, (which will serve to give away to Oba- diah when he gets back) that this same Stevinus was some engineer or other, -- or has wrote something or other, either directly or indirectly, upon the science of fortification. He has so, -- replied my uncle Toby. -- I knew it, said my father ; -- tho', for the soul of me, I cannot see what kind of connection there can be betwixt Dr. Slop's sudden coming, and a discourse upon fortification ; -- yet I fear'd it. -- Talk of what we will, brother, -- or let the occasion be never so foreign or unfit for the subject, -- you are sure to bring it in : I would not, brother Toby, con- tinued |
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tinued my father, -- I declare I would not have my head so full of curtins and horn-works. ---- That, I dare say, you would not, quoth Dr. Slop, interrupting him, and laughing most immoderately at his pun. Dennis the critick could not detest and abhor a pun, or the insinuation of a pun, more cordially than my father ; ---- he would grow testy upon it at any time ; -- but to be broke in upon by one, in a serious discourse, was as bad, he would say, as a fillip upon the nose ; -- he saw no difference. Sir, quoth my uncle Toby, addressing himself to Dr. Slop, ---- the curtins my brother Shandy mentions here have no- thing to do with bed-steads ; -- tho', I know, Du Cange says, ``That bed-cur- ``tains, |
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``tains, in all probability, have taken their ``name from them ;'' -- nor have the horn-works, he speaks of, any thing in the world to do with the horn-works of cuckoldom : -- But the curtin, Sir, is the word we use in fortification, for that part of the wall or rampart which lies between the two bastions and joins them. ---- Be- siegers seldom offer to carry on their at- tacks directly against the curtin, for this reason, because they are so well flanked; ('tis the case of other curtins, quoth Dr. Slop, laughing) however, continued my uncle Toby, to make them sure, we ge- nerally choose to place ravelins before them, taking care only to extend them beyond the fos*sé or ditch : -- The com- mon men, who know very little of for- tification, confound the ravelin and the half-moon together, -- tho' they are very different things ; -- not in their figure or con- |
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construction, for we make them exactly alike in all points ; -- for they always con- sist of two faces, making a salient angle, with the gorges, not straight, but in form of a crescent. -- Where then lies the difference ? (quoth my father, a little testily ) -- In their situations, answered my uncle Toby : -- For when a ravelin, bro- ther, stands before the curtain, it is a ra- velin ; and when a ravelin stands before a bastion, then the ravelin is not a rave- lin ; -- it is a half-moon ; -- a half-moon likewise is a half-moon, and no more, so long as it stands before its bastion ; -- but was it to change place, and get before the curtin, -- 'twould be no longer a half- moon ; a half-moon, in that case, is not a half-moon ; -- 'tis no more than a rave- lin. -- I think, quoth my father, that the noble science of defence has its weak sides, -- as well as others. -- As |
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-- As for the horn-works (high! ho! sigh'd my father) which, continued my uncle Toby, my brother was speaking of, they are a very considerable part of an outwork ; -- they are called by the French engineers Ouvrage á corne, and we gene- rally make them to cover such places as we suspect to be weaker than the rest ; -- 'tis form'd by two epaulments or demi- bastions, -- they are very pretty, and if you will take a walk, I'll engage to shew you one well worth your trouble. ---- I own, continued my uncle Toby, when we crown them, -- they are much stronger, but then they are very expensive, and take up a great deal of ground ; so that, in my opinion, they are most of use to cover or defend the head of a camp ; otherwise the double tenaille ------ By the mother who bore us ! ---- brother Toby |
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Toby, quoth my father, not able to hold out any longer, -- you would provoke a saint ; -- here have you got us, I know not how, not only souse into the middle of the old subject again : -- But so full is your head of these confounded works, that tho' my wife is this moment in the pains of labour, -- and you hear her cry out, -- yet nothing will serve you but to carry off the man-midwife. ---- Accoucheur, -- if you please, quoth Dr. Slop. -- With all my heart, replied my father, I don't care what they call you, ---- but I wish the whole science of fortification, with all its inventors, at the Devil ; -- it has been the death of thousands, -- and it will be mine, in the end. -- I would not, I would not, brother Toby, have my brains so full of saps, mines, blinds, gabions, palisadoes, ravelins, half-moons, and such trum- pery, |
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pery, to be proprietor of Namur, and of all the towns in Flanders with it. My uncle Toby was a man patient of injuries ; -- not from want of courage, -- I have told you in the fifth chapter of this second book, ``That he was a man of courage :'' -- And will add here, that where just occasions presented, or called it forth, -- I know no man under whose arm I would sooner have taken shelter ; nor did this arise from any insensibility or obtuseness of his intellectual parts ; -- for he felt this insult of my father's as feelingly as a man could do ; -- but he was of a peaceful, placid nature, -- no jarring element in it, -- all was mix'd up so kindly within him ; my uncle Toby had scarce a heart to retalliate upon a fly. -- Go |
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-- Go -- says he, one day at dinner, to an over-grown one which had buzz'd about his nose, and tormented him cruelly all dinner-time, -- and which, after infinite attempts, he had caught at last, as it flew by him ; -- I'll not hurt thee, says my uncle Toby, rising from his chair, and going a- cross the room, with the fly in his hand, -- I'll not hurt a hair of thy head : -- Go, says he, lifting up the sash, and opening his hand as he spoke, to let it escape ; -- go poor Devil, get thee gone, why should I hurt thee ? -- This world surely is wide enough to hold both thee and me. I was but ten years old when this hap- pened ; -- but whether it was, that the action itself was more in unison to my nerves at that age of pity, which instant- ly set my whole frame into one vibration of most pleasurable sensation ; -- or how VOL. II F far |
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