YOUR sudden and unexpected arrival, quoth my uncle _Toby_, addressing
himself to Dr. _Slop_, (all three of them sitting down to the fire
together, as my uncle _Toby_ began to speak)—instantly brought the
great _Stevinus_ into my head, who, you must know, is a favourite
author with me.—Then, added my father, making use of the argument _Ad
Crumenam_,—I will lay twenty guineas to a single crown-piece (which
will serve to give away to _Obadiah_ 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, though,
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_, continued 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 critic 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 nothing to do with
beadsteads;—tho’, I know _Du Cange_ says, “That bed-curtains, 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—Besiegers seldom offer to carry on their
attacks directly against the curtin, for this reason, because they are
so well _flanked._ ( ’Tis the case of other curtains, quoth Dr. _Slop_,
laughing.) However, continued my uncle _Toby_, to make them sure, we
generally choose to place ravelins before them, taking care only to
extend them beyond the fossé or ditch:——The common men, who know very
little of fortification, confound the ravelin and the half-moon
together,—tho’ they are very different things;—not in their figure or
construction, for we make them exactly alike, in all points; for they
always consist 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, brother, stands before
the curtin, it is a ravelin; and when a ravelin stands before a
bastion, then the ravelin is not a ravelin;—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 ravelin.——I think, quoth my
father, that the noble science of defence has its weak sides——as well
as others.
—As for the horn-work (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 à corne_, and we generally make them to cover such places as
we suspect to be weaker than the rest;—’tis formed 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_, 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 though 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, pallisadoes,
ravelins, half-moons, and such trumpery, 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 a former chapter, “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 have sooner
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 mixed up so kindly within
him; my uncle _Toby_ had scarce a heart to retaliate upon a fly.
—Go—says he, one day at dinner, to an over-grown one which had buzzed
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
across 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 happened: but whether it was, that
the action itself was more in unison to my nerves at that age of pity,
which instantly set my whole frame into one vibration of most
pleasurable sensation;—or how far the manner and expression of it might
go towards it;—or in what degree, or by what secret magick,—a tone of
voice and harmony of movement, attuned by mercy, might find a passage
to my heart, I know not;—this I know, that the lesson of universal
good-will then taught and imprinted by my uncle _Toby_, has never since
been worn out of my mind: And tho’ I would not depreciate what the
study of the _Literæ humaniores_, at the university, have done for me
in that respect, or discredit the other helps of an expensive education
bestowed upon me, both at home and abroad since;—yet I often think that
I owe one half of my philanthropy to that one accidental impression.
This is to serve for parents and governors instead of a whole volume
upon the subject.
I could not give the reader this stroke in my uncle _Toby_’s picture,
by the instrument with which I drew the other parts of it,—that taking
in no more than the mere HOBBY-HORSICAL likeness:—this is a part of his
moral character. My father, in this patient endurance of wrongs, which
I mention, was very different, as the reader must long ago have noted;
he had a much more acute and quick sensibility of nature, attended with
a little soreness of temper; tho’ this never transported him to any
thing which looked like malignancy:—yet in the little rubs and
vexations of life, ’twas apt to shew itself in a drollish and witty
kind of peevishness:——He was, however, frank and generous in his
nature;——at all times open to conviction; and in the little ebullitions
of this subacid humour towards others, but particularly towards my
uncle _Toby_, whom he truly loved:——he would feel more pain, ten times
told (except in the affair of my aunt _Dinah_, or where an hypothesis
was concerned) than what he ever gave.
The characters of the two brothers, in this view of them, reflected
light upon each other, and appeared with great advantage in this affair
which arose about _Stevinus._
I need not tell the reader, if he keeps a HOBBY-HORSE,—that a man’s
HOBBY-HORSE is as tender a part as he has about him; and that these
unprovoked strokes at my uncle _Toby_’s could not be unfelt by
him.——No:——as I said above, my uncle _Toby_ did feel them, and very
sensibly too.
Pray, Sir, what said he?—How did he behave?—O, Sir!—it was great: For
as soon as my father had done insulting his HOBBY-HORSE,——he turned his
head without the least emotion, from Dr. _Slop_, to whom he was
addressing his discourse, and looking up into my father’s face, with a
countenance spread over with so much good-nature;——so placid;——so
fraternal;——so inexpressibly tender towards him:—it penetrated my
father to his heart: He rose up hastily from his chair, and seizing
hold of both my uncle _Toby_’s hands as he spoke:—Brother _Toby_, said
he:—I beg thy pardon;——forgive, I pray thee, this rash humour which my
mother gave me.——My dear, dear brother, answered my uncle _Toby_,
rising up by my father’s help, say no more about it;—you are heartily
welcome, had it been ten times as much, brother. But ’tis ungenerous,
replied my father, to hurt any man;——a brother worse;——but to hurt a
brother of such gentle manners,—so unprovoking,—and so
unresenting;——’tis base:——By Heaven, ’tis cowardly.—You are heartily
welcome, brother, quoth my uncle _Toby_,——had it been fifty times as
much.——Besides, what have I to do, my dear _Toby_, cried my father,
either with your amusements or your pleasures, unless it was in my
power (which it is not) to increase their measure?
——Brother _Shandy_, answered my uncle _Toby_, looking wistfully in his
face,——you are much mistaken in this point:—for you do increase my
pleasure very much, in begetting children for the _Shandy_ family at
your time of life.—But, by that, Sir, quoth Dr. _Slop_, Mr. _Shandy_
increases his own.—Not a jot, quoth my father.