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[ 120 ]

were hewing down to give to the poor * ;
which said wood being in full view of my
uncle Toby's house, and of singular
service to him in his description of the
battle of Wynnendale -- by trotting on
too hastily to save it ---- upon an uneasy
saddle ---- worse horse, &c. &c. . . it had
so happened, that the serious part of the
blood had got betwixt the two skins, in
the nethermost part of my uncle Toby
---- the first shootings of which (as my
uncle Toby had no experience of love)
he had taken for a part of the passion --
till the blister breaking in the one case ----
and the other remaining --- my uncle
Toby was presently convinced, that his

  * Mr. Shandy must mean the poor in spirit ;
inasmuch as they divided the money amongst
themselves.

                          wound



[ 121 ]

wound was not a skin-deep wound ----
but that it had gone to his heart.


C H A P. XXVII.

THE world is ashamed of being vir-
tuous ---- My uncle Toby knew
little of the world ; and therefore when
he felt he was in love with widow Wad-
man, he had no conception that the
thing was any more to be made a mystery
of, than if Mrs.Wadman, had given
him a cut with a gap'd knife across his
finger : Had it been otherwise ---- yet as
he ever look'd upon Trim as a humble
friend ; and saw fresh reasons every day
of his life, to treat him as such ---- it
would have made no variation in the
manner in which he informed him of the
affair.
                          ``I



[ 122 ]


``I am in love, corporal!'' quoth my
uncle Toby.


C H A P. XXVIII.

IN love! ---- said the corporal -- your
honour was very well the day before
yesterday, when I was telling your ho-
nour the story of the King of Bohemia
-- Bohemia! said my uncleToby - - - -
musing a long time - - - What became
of that story, Trim?

  -- We lost it, an' please your honour,
somehow betwixt us -- but your honour
was as free from love, then, as I am ----
'twas, just whilst thou went'st off with the
wheel-barrow -- with Mrs. Wadman,
quoth my uncle Toby ---- She has left a
                          ball



[ 123 ]

ball here -- added my uncle Toby -- point-
ing to his breast ----

  ---- She can no more, an' please your
honour, stand a seige, than she can fly --
cried the corporal ----

  ---- But as we are neighbours, Trim,
-- the best way I think is to let her know
it civilly first -- quoth my uncle Toby.

  Now if I might presume, said the cor-
poral, to differ from your honour ----

   -- Why else, do I talk to thee Trim :
said my uncle Toby, mildly ----

   -- Then I would begin, an' please your
honour, with making a good thundering
attack upon her, in return -- and telling
her civilly afterwards -- for if she knows
                          any



[ 124 ]

any thing of your honour's being in love,
before hand ---- L--d help her! -- she
knows no more at present of it, Trim,
said my uncleToby -- than the child
unborn ----

  Precious souls! ------

  Mrs. Wadman had told it with all its
circumstances, to Mrs. Bridget twenty-
four hours before ; and was at that very
moment sitting in council with her,
touching some slight misgivings with re-
gard to the issue of the affair, which the
Devil, who never lies dead in a ditch, had
put into her head -- before he would allow
half time, to get quietly through her
te Deum ----

  I am terribly afraid, said widow Wad-
man, in case I should marry him, Bridget
                          -- that



[ 125 ]

-- that the poor captain will not enjoy his
health, with the monstrous wound upon
his groin ----

  It may not, Madam, be so very large,
replied Bridget, as you think ---- and I
believe besides, added she -- that 'tis dried
up ----

  ---- I could like to know -- merely for
his sake, said Mrs. Wadman ----

  -- We'll know the long and the broad
of it, in ten days -- answered Mrs. Bridget,
for whilst the captain is paying his ad-
dresses to you -- I'm confident Mr. Trim
will be for making love to me -- and I'll
let him as much as he will -- added
Bridget -- to get it all out of him ----

  The measures were taken at once ----
and my uncle Toby and the corporal
went on with theirs.
                          Now,



[ 126 ]

  Now, quoth the corporal, setting his
left hand a kimbo, and giving such a
flourish with his right, as just promised
success -- and no more ---- if your honour
will give me leave to lay down the plan
of this attack ----

  ---- Thou wilt please me by it, Trim,
said my uncle Toby, exceedingly -- and as
I foresee thou must act in it as myaide de
camp,
here's a crown, corporal, to begin
with, to steep thy commission.

  Then, an' please your honour, said the
corporal (making a bow first for his com-
mission) -- we will begin with getting your
honour's laced cloaths out of the great
campaign trunk, to be well air'd, and
have the blue and gold taken up at the
sleeves -- and I'll put your white ramillie-
                          wig



[ 127 ]

wig fresh into pipes -- and send for a
taylor, to have your honour's thin
scarlet breeches turn'd ----

  -- I had better take the red plush ones,
quoth my uncleToby ---- They will be
too clumsy -- said the corporal.


C H A P. XXIX.

  ---- Thou wilt get a brush and a little
chalk to my sword ---- 'Twill be only in
your honour's way, replied Trim.


C H A P. XXX.

  ---- But your honour's two razors
shall be new set -- and I will get my Mon-
tero cap furbish'd up, and put on poor
lieutenant Le Fever's regimental coat,
which your honour gave me to


             2             wear



[ 128 ]

wear for his sake -- and as soon as your
honour is clean-shaved -- and has got your
clean shirt on, with your blue and gold,
or your fine scarlet ---- sometimes one
and sometimes t'other -- and every thing
is ready for the attack -- we'll march up
boldly, as if 'twas to the face of a bas-
tion ; and whilst your honour engages
Mrs. Wadman in the parlour, to the
right ---- I'll attack Mrs. Bridget in the
kitchen, to the left ; and having seiz'd
that pass, I'll answer for it, said the cor-
poral, snapping his fingers over his head
-- that the day is our own.

  I wish I may but manage it right ; said
my uncle Toby -- but I declare, corporal
I had rather march up to the very edge of
a trench ----

                          -- A



[ 129 ]

  -- A woman is quite a different thing
-- said the corporal.

  -- I suppose so, quoth my uncle Toby.


C H A P. XXXI.

IF anything in this world, which my
father said, could have provoked my
uncle Toby, during the time he was in
love, it was the perverse use my father
was always making of an expression of
Hilarion the hermit ; who, in speaking
of his abstinence, his watchings, flagel-
lations, and other instrumental parts of
his religion -- would say -- tho' with more
facetiousness than became an hermit --
``That they were the means he used, to
make his ass (meaning his body) leave
off kicking.''

   VOL. VIII        K            It



[ 130 ]

  It pleased my father well ; it was not
only a laconick way of expressing ----
but of libelling, at the same time, the
desires and appetites of the lower part of
us ; so that for many years of my fa-
ther's life, 'twas his constant mode of
expression -- he never used the word pas-
sions
once -- but ass always instead of
them ---- So that he might be said truly,
to have been upon the bones, or the back
of his own ass, or else of some other
man's, during all that time.

  I must here observe to you, the differ-
ence betwixt

      My father's ass
      and my hobby-horse -- in order to
keep characters as separate as may be, in
our fancies as we go along.

             5             For



[ 131 ]

  For my hobby-horse, if you recollect
a little, is no way a vicious beast ; he has
scarce one hair or lineament of the ass
about him ---- 'Tis the sporting little
filly-folly which carries you out for
the present hour -- a maggot, a butterfly,
a picture, a fiddle-stick -- an uncle Toby's
siege -- or an any thing, which a man makes
a shift to get a stride on, to canter it away
from the cares and solicitudes of life --
'Tis as useful a beast as is in the whole
creation -- nor do I really see how the
world could do without it ------

  ---- But for my father's ass ------ oh!
mount him -- mount him -- mount him --
(that's three times, is it not?) -- mount
him not : -- 'tis a beast concupiscent -- and
foul befall the man, who does not hinder
him from kicking.
             K 2             C H A P.



[ 132 ]


C H A P. XXXII.

WELL! dear brother Toby, said
my father, upon his first seeing
him after he fell in love -- and how goes
it with your ASSE?

  Now my uncle Toby thinking more
of the part where he had had the blister,
than of Hilarion's metaphor -- and our
preconceptions having (you know) as
great a power over the sounds of words
as the shapes of things, he had imagined,
that my father, who was not very cere-
monious in his choice of words, had en-
quired after the part by its proper name ;
so notwithstanding my mother, doctor
Slop, and Mr. Yorick, were sitting in
the parlour, he thought it rather civil to
                          conform



[ 133 ]

conform to the term my father had
made use of than not. When a man is
hemm'd in by two indecorums, and must
commit one of 'em -- I always observe --
let him choose which he will, the world
will blame him -- so I should not be asto-
nished if it blames my uncle Toby.

  My A--e , quoth my uncle Toby, is
much better -- brother Shandy ---- My fa-
ther had formed great expectations from
his Asse in this onset ; and would have
brought him on again ; but doctor Slop
setting up an intemperate laugh -- and my
mother crying out L-- bless us! -- it
drove my father's Asse off the field -- and
the laugh then becoming general -- there
was no bringing him back to the charge,
for some time ----

             K 3             And



[ 134 ]

  And so the discourse went on without
him.

  Every body, said my mother, says
you are in love, brother Toby -- and we
hope it is true.

  I am as much in love, sister, I believe,
replied my uncle Toby, as any man usu-
ally is ---- Humph! said my father ----
and when did you know it? quoth my
mother ----

  ---- When the blister broke ; replied
my uncle Toby.

  My uncle Toby's reply put my father
into good temper -- so he charged o' foot.



                          C H A P.



[ 135 ]


C H A P. XXXIII.

AS the ancients agree, brother Toby,
said my father, that there are two
different and distinct kinds of love, ac-
cording to the different parts which are
affected by it -- the Brain or Liver ---- I
think when a man is in love, it behoves
him a little to consider which of the two
he is fallen into.

  What signifies it, brother Shandy, re-
plied my uncle Toby, which of the two
it is, provided it will but make a man
marry, and love his wife, and get a few
children.

  ---- A few children! cried my father,
rising out of his chair, and looking full
             K 4              in



[ 136 ]

in my mother's face, as he forced his
way betwixt her's and doctor Slop's -- a
few children! cried my father, repeating
my uncle Toby's words as he walk'd to
and fro' ----

  ---- Not, my dear brother Toby, cried
my father, recovering himself all at once,
and coming close up to the back of my
uncle Toby's chair -- not that I should be
sorry had'st thou a score -- on the con-
trary I should rejoice -- and be as kind,
Toby, to every one of them as a father --

  My uncle Toby stole his hand unper-
ceived behind his chair, to give my fa-
ther's a squeeze ----

  ---- Nay, moreover, continued he,
keeping hold of my uncle Toby's hand
-- so much do'st thou possess, my dear
                          Toby,



[ 137 ]

Toby, of the milk of human nature,
and so little of its asperities -- 'tis piteous
the world is not peopled by creatures
which resemble thee ; and was I an Asia-
tic monarch, added my father, heating
himself with his new project -- I would
oblige thee, provided it would not impair
thy strength -- or dry up thy radical mois-
ture too fast -- or weaken thy memory or
fancy, brother Toby, which these gym-
nicks inordinately taken are apt to do --
else, dear Toby, I would procure thee
the most beautiful women in my empire,
and I would oblige thee, nolens, volens, to
beget for me one subject every month ----

  As my father pronounced the last
word of the sentence -- my mother took
a pinch of snuff.

                          Now



[ 138 ]

  Now I would not, quoth my uncle
Toby, get a child, nolens, volens, that
is, whether I would or no, to please the
greatest prince upon earth ----

  ---- And 'twould be cruel in me,
brother Toby, to compel thee ; said
my father -- but 'tis a case put to shew
thee, that it is not thy begetting a child
-- in case thou should'st be able -- but the
system of Love and marriage thou goest
upon, which I would set thee right in ----

  There is at least, said Yorick, a great
deal of reason and plain sense in captain
Shandy's opinion of love ; and 'tis
amongst the ill spent hours of my life
which I have to answer for, that I have
read so many flourishing poets and rhe-
toricians in my time, from whom I never
could extract so much ----
                          I wish,



[ 139 ]

  I wish, Yorick, said my father, you
had read Plato ; for there you would
have learnt that there are two LOVES --
I know there were two RELIGIONS, re-
plied Yorick, amongst the ancients ----
one -- for the vulgar, and another for the
learned ; but I think ONE LOVE might
have served both of them very well --

  It could not ; replied my father -- and
for the same reasons : for of these LOVES,
according to Ficinus's comment upon Va-
lesius, the one is rational ----
  ---- the other is natural ----
the first ancient ---- without mother ----
where Venus had nothing to do : the
second, begotten of Jupiter and Dione --

  ---- Pray, brother, quoth my uncle
Toby, what has a man who believes in
God to do with this? My father could
                          not



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