The sun looked bright the morning after, to every eye in the village but Le Fever's and his afflicted son's; the hand of death pressed heavy upon his eye-lids,—and hardly could the wheel at the cistern turn round its circle,—when my uncle Toby, who had rose up an hour before his wonted time, entered the lieutenant's room, and without preface or apology, sat himself down upon the chair by the bed-side, and, independently of all modes and customs, opened the curtain in the manner an old friend and brother officer would have done it, and asked him how he did,—how he had rested in the night,—what was his complaint,—where was his pain,—and what he could do to help him:—and without giving him time to answer any one of the enquiries, went on, and told him of the little plan which he had been concerting with the corporal the night before for him.—
—You shall go home directly, Le Fever, said my uncle Toby, to my house,—and we'll send for a doctor to see what's the matter,—and we'll have an apothecary,—and the corporal shall be your nurse;—and I'll be your servant, Le Fever.
There was a frankness in my uncle Toby,—not the effect of familiarity,—but the cause of it,—which let you at once into his soul, and shewed you the goodness of his nature; to this there was something in his looks, and voice, and manner, superadded, which eternally beckoned to the unfortunate to come and take shelter under him, so that before my uncle Toby had half finished the kind offers he was making to the father, had the son insensibly pressed up close to his knees, and had taken hold of the breast of his coat, and was pulling it towards him.—The blood and spirits of Le Fever, which were waxing cold and slow within him, and were retreating to their last citadel, the heart—rallied back,—the film forsook his eyes for a moment,—he looked up wishfully in my uncle Toby's face,—then cast a look upon his boy,—and that ligament, fine as it was,—was never broken.—
Nature instantly ebb'd again,—the film returned to its place,—the pulse fluttered—stopp'd—went on—throbb'd—stopp'd again—moved—stopp'd—shall I go on?—No.
I am so impatient to return to my own story, that what remains of young Le Fever's, that is, from this turn of his fortune, to the time my uncle Toby recommended him for my preceptor, shall be told in a very few words in the next chapter.—All that is necessary to be added to this chapter is as follows.—
That my uncle Toby, with young Le Fever in his hand, attended the poor lieutenant, as chief mourners, to his grave.
That the governor of Dendermond paid his obsequies all military honours,—and that Yorick, not to be behind-hand—paid him all ecclesiastic—for he buried him in his chancel:—And it appears likewise, he preached a funeral sermon over him—I say it appears,—for it was Yorick's custom, which I suppose a general one with those of his profession, on the first leaf of every sermon which he composed, to chronicle down the time, the place, and the occasion of its being preached: to this, he was ever wont to add some short comment or stricture upon the sermon itself, seldom, indeed, much to its credit:—For instance, This sermon upon the Jewish dispensation—I don't like it at all;—Though I own there is a world of Water-Landish knowledge in it;—but 'tis all tritical, and most tritically put together.—This is but a flimsy kind of a composition; what was in my head when I made it?
—N.B. The excellency of this text is, that it will suit any sermon,—and of this sermon,—that it will suit any text.—
—For this sermon I shall be hanged,—for I have stolen the greatest part of it. Doctor Paidagunes found me out. > Set a thief to catch a thief.—
On the back of half a dozen I find written, So, so, and no more—and upon a couple Moderato; by which, as far as one may gather from Altieri's Italian dictionary,—but mostly from the authority of a piece of green whipcord, which seemed to have been the unravelling of Yorick's whip-lash, with which he has left us the two sermons marked Moderato, and the half dozen of So, so, tied fast together in one bundle by themselves,—one may safely suppose he meant pretty near the same thing.
There is but one difficulty in the way of this conjecture, which is this, that the moderato's are five times better than the so, so's;—show ten times more knowledge of the human heart;—have seventy times more wit and spirit in them;—(and, to rise properly in my climax)—discovered a thousand times more genius;—and to crown all, are infinitely more entertaining than those tied up with them:—for which reason, whene'er Yorick's dramatic sermons are offered to the world, though I shall admit but one out of the whole number of the so, so's, I shall, nevertheless, adventure to print the two moderato's without any sort of scruple.
What Yorick could mean by the words lentamente,—tenute,—grave,—and sometimes adagio,—as applied to theological compositions, and with which he has characterised some of these sermons, I dare not venture to guess.—I am more puzzled still upon finding a l'octava alta! upon one;—Con strepito upon the back of another;—Scicilliana upon a third;—Alla capella upon a fourth;—Con l'arco upon this;—Senza l'arco upon that.—All I know is, that they are musical terms, and have a meaning;—and as he was a musical man, I will make no doubt, but that by some quaint application of such metaphors to the compositions in hand, they impressed very distinct ideas of their several characters upon his fancy,—whatever they may do upon that of others.
Amongst these, there is that particular sermon which has unaccountably led me into this digression—The funeral sermon upon poor Le Fever, wrote out very fairly, as if from a hasty copy.—I take notice of it the more, because it seems to have been his favourite composition—It is upon mortality; and is tied length-ways and cross-ways with a yarn thrum, and then rolled up and twisted round with a half-sheet of dirty blue paper, which seems to have been once the cast cover of a general review, which to this day smells horribly of horse drugs.—Whether these marks of humiliation were designed,—I something doubt;—because at the end of the sermon (and not at the beginning of it)—very different from his way of treating the rest, he had wrote—Bravo!
—Though not very offensively,—for it is at two inches, at least, and a half's distance from, and below the concluding line of the sermon, at the very extremity of the page, and in that right hand corner of it, which, you know, is generally covered with your thumb; and, to do it justice, it is wrote besides with a crow's quill so faintly in a small Italian hand, as scarce to solicit the eye towards the place, whether your thumb is there or not,—so that from the manner of it, it stands half excused; and being wrote moreover with very pale ink, diluted almost to nothing,—'tis more like a ritratto of the shadow of vanity, than of Vanity herself—of the two; resembling rather a faint thought of transient applause, secretly stirring up in the heart of the composer; than a gross mark of it, coarsely obtruded upon the world.
With all these extenuations, I am aware, that in publishing this, I do no service to Yorick's character as a modest man;—but all men have their failings! and what lessens this still farther, and almost wipes it away, is this; that the word was struck through sometime afterwards (as appears from a different tint of the ink) with a line quite across it in this manner, BRAVO (crossed out)—as if he had retracted, or was ashamed of the opinion he had once entertained of it.
These short characters of his sermons were always written, excepting in this one instance, upon the first leaf of his sermon, which served as a cover to it; and usually upon the inside of it, which was turned towards the text;—but at the end of his discourse, where, perhaps, he had five or six pages, and sometimes, perhaps, a whole score to turn himself in,—he took a large circuit, and, indeed, a much more mettlesome one;—as if he had snatched the occasion of unlacing himself with a few more frolicksome strokes at vice, than the straitness of the pulpit allowed.—These, though hussar-like, they skirmish lightly and out of all order, are still auxiliaries on the side of virtue;—tell me then, Mynheer Vander Blonederdondergewdenstronke, why they should not be printed together?
When my uncle Toby had turned every thing into money, and settled all accounts betwixt the agent of the regiment and Le Fever, and betwixt Le Fever and all mankind,—there remained nothing more in my uncle Toby's hands, than an old regimental coat and a sword; so that my uncle Toby found little or no opposition from the world in taking administration. The coat my uncle Toby gave the corporal;—Wear it, Trim, said my uncle Toby, as long as it will hold together, for the sake of the poor lieutenant—And this,—said my uncle Toby, taking up the sword in his hand, and drawing it out of the scabbard as he spoke—and this, Le Fever, I'll save for thee,—'tis all the fortune, continued my uncle Toby, hanging it up upon a crook, and pointing to it,—'tis all the fortune, my dear Le Fever, which God has left thee; but if he has given thee a heart to fight thy way with it in the world,—and thou doest it like a man of honour,—'tis enough for us.
As soon as my uncle Toby had laid a foundation, and taught him to inscribe a regular polygon in a circle, he sent him to a public school, where, excepting Whitsontide and Christmas, at which times the corporal was punctually dispatched for him,—he remained to the spring of the year, seventeen; when the stories of the emperor's sending his army into Hungary against the Turks, kindling a spark of fire in his bosom, he left his Greek and Latin without leave, and throwing himself upon his knees before my uncle Toby, begged his father's sword, and my uncle Toby's leave along with it, to go and try his fortune under Eugene.—Twice did my uncle Toby forget his wound and cry out, Le Fever! I will go with thee, and thou shalt fight beside me—And twice he laid his hand upon his groin, and hung down his head in sorrow and disconsolation.—
My uncle Toby took down the sword from the crook, where it had hung untouched ever since the lieutenant's death, and delivered it to the corporal to brighten up;—and having detained Le Fever a single fortnight to equip him, and contract for his passage to Leghorn,—he put the sword into his hand.—If thou art brave, Le Fever, said my uncle Toby, this will not fail thee,—but Fortune, said he (musing a little),—Fortune may—And if she does,—added my uncle Toby, embracing him, come back again to me, Le Fever, and we will shape thee another course.
The greatest injury could not have oppressed the heart of Le Fever more than my uncle Toby's paternal kindness;—he parted from my uncle Toby, as the best of sons from the best of fathers—both dropped tears—and as my uncle Toby gave him his last kiss, he slipped sixty guineas, tied up in an old purse of his father's, in which was his mother's ring, into his hand,—and bid God bless him.
Le Fever got up to the Imperial army just time enough to try what metal his sword was made of, at the defeat of the Turks before Belgrade; but a series of unmerited mischances had pursued him from that moment, and trod close upon his heels for four years together after; he had withstood these buffetings to the last, till sickness overtook him at Marseilles, from whence he wrote my uncle Toby word, he had lost his time, his services, his health, and, in short, every thing but his sword;—and was waiting for the first ship to return back to him.
As this letter came to hand about six weeks before Susannah's accident, Le Fever was hourly expected; and was uppermost in my uncle Toby's mind all the time my father was giving him and Yorick a description of what kind of a person he would chuse for a preceptor to me: but as my uncle Toby thought my father at first somewhat fanciful in the accomplishments he required, he forbore mentioning Le Fever's name,—till the character, by Yorick's inter-position, ending unexpectedly, in one, who should be gentle-tempered, and generous, and good, it impressed the image of Le Fever, and his interest, upon my uncle Toby so forcibly, he rose instantly off his chair; and laying down his pipe, in order to take hold of both my father's hands—I beg, brother Shandy, said my uncle Toby, I may recommend poor Le Fever's son to you—I beseech you do, added Yorick—He has a good heart, said my uncle Toby—And a brave one too, an' please your honour, said the corporal.
—The best hearts, Trim, are ever the bravest, replied my uncle Toby.—And the greatest cowards, an' please your honour, in our regiment, were the greatest rascals in it.—There was serjeant Kumber, and ensign—
—We'll talk of them, said my father, another time.
What a jovial and a merry world would this be, may it please your worships, but for that inextricable labyrinth of debts, cares, woes, want, grief, discontent, melancholy, large jointures, impositions, and lies!
Doctor Slop, like a son of a w..., as my father called him for it,—to exalt himself,—debased me to death,—and made ten thousand times more of Susannah's accident, than there was any grounds for; so that in a week's time, or less, it was in every body's mouth, That poor Master Shandy...entirely.—And Fame, who loves to double every thing,—in three days more, had sworn, positively she saw it,—and all the world, as usual, gave credit to her evidence—'That the nursery window had not only...;—but that.. .'s also.'
Could the world have been sued like a Body-Corporate,—my father had brought an action upon the case, and trounced it sufficiently; but to fall foul of individuals about it—as every soul who had mentioned the affair, did it with the greatest pity imaginable;—'twas like flying in the very face of his best friends:—And yet to acquiesce under the report, in silence—was to acknowledge it openly,—at least in the opinion of one half of the world; and to make a bustle again, in contradicting it,—was to confirm it as strongly in the opinion of the other half.—
—Was ever poor devil of a country gentleman so hampered? said my father.
I would shew him publickly, said my uncle Toby, at the market cross.
—'Twill have no effect, said my father.
—I'll put him, however, into breeches, said my father,—let the world say what it will.
There are a thousand resolutions, Sir, both in church and state, as well as in matters, Madam, of a more private concern;—which, though they have carried all the appearance in the world of being taken, and entered upon in a hasty, hare-brained, and unadvised manner, were, notwithstanding this, (and could you or I have got into the cabinet, or stood behind the curtain, we should have found it was so) weighed, poized, and perpended—argued upon—canvassed through—entered into, and examined on all sides with so much coolness, that the Goddess of Coolness herself (I do not take upon me to prove her existence) could neither have wished it, or done it better.
Of the number of these was my father's resolution of putting me into breeches; which, though determined at once,—in a kind of huff, and a defiance of all mankind, had, nevertheless, been pro'd and conn'd, and judicially talked over betwixt him and my mother about a month before, in two several beds of justice, which my father had held for that purpose. I shall explain the nature of these beds of justice in my next chapter; and in the chapter following that, you shall step with me, Madam, behind the curtain, only to hear in what kind of manner my father and my mother debated between themselves, this affair of the breeches,—from which you may form an idea, how they debated all lesser matters.
The ancient Goths of Germany, who (the learned Cluverius is positive) were first seated in the country between the Vistula and the Oder, and who afterwards incorporated the Herculi, the Bugians, and some other Vandallick clans to 'em—had all of them a wise custom of debating every thing of importance to their state, twice, that is,—once drunk, and once sober:—Drunk—that their councils might not want vigour;—and sober—that they might not want discretion.
Now my father being entirely a water-drinker,—was a long time gravelled almost to death, in turning this as much to his advantage, as he did every other thing which the ancients did or said; and it was not till the seventh year of his marriage, after a thousand fruitless experiments and devices, that he hit upon an expedient which answered the purpose;—and that was, when any difficult and momentous point was to be settled in the family, which required great sobriety, and great spirit too, in its determination,—he fixed and set apart the first Sunday night in the month, and the Saturday night which immediately preceded it, to argue it over, in bed with my mother: By which contrivance, if you consider, Sir, with yourself,.. ..
These my father, humorously enough, called his beds of justice;—for from the two different counsels taken in these two different humours, a middle one was generally found out which touched the point of wisdom as well, as if he had got drunk and sober a hundred times.
I must not be made a secret of to the world, that this answers full as well in literary discussions, as either in military or conjugal; but it is not every author that can try the experiment as the Goths and Vandals did it—or, if he can, may it be always for his body's health; and to do it, as my father did it,—am I sure it would be always for his soul's.
My way is this:—
In all nice and ticklish discussions,—(of which, heaven knows, there are but too many in my book)—where I find I cannot take a step without the danger of having either their worships or their reverences upon my back—I write one-half full,—and t'other fasting;—or write it all full,—and correct it fasting;—or write it fasting,—and correct it full, for they all come to the same thing:—So that with a less variation from my father's plan, than my father's from the Gothick—I feel myself upon a par with him in his first bed of justice,—and no way inferior to him in his second.—These different and almost irreconcileable effects, flow uniformly from the wise and wonderful mechanism of nature,—of which,—be her's the honour.—All that we can do, is to turn and work the machine to the improvement and better manufactory of the arts and sciences.—
Now, when I write full,—I write as if I was never to write fasting again as long as I live;—that is, I write free from the cares as well as the terrors of the world.—I count not the number of my scars,—nor does my fancy go forth into dark entries and bye-corners to ante-date my stabs.—In a word, my pen takes its course; and I write on as much from the fulness of my heart, as my stomach.—
But when, an' please your honours, I indite fasting, 'tis a different history.—I pay the world all possible attention and respect,—and have as great a share (whilst it lasts) of that under strapping virtue of discretion as the best of you.—So that betwixt both, I write a careless kind of a civil, nonsensical, good-humoured Shandean book, which will do all your hearts good—
—And all your heads too,—provided you understand it.
We should begin, said my father, turning himself half round in bed, and shifting his pillow a little towards my mother's, as he opened the debate—We should begin to think, Mrs. Shandy, of putting this boy into breeches.—
We should so,—said my mother.—We defer it, my dear, quoth my father, shamefully.—
I think we do, Mr. Shandy,—said my mother.
—Not but the child looks extremely well, said my father, in his vests and tunicks.—
—He does look very well in them,—replied my mother.—
—And for that reason it would be almost a sin, added my father, to take him out of 'em.—
—It would so,—said my mother:—But indeed he is growing a very tall lad,—rejoined my father.
—He is very tall for his age, indeed,—said my mother.—
—I can not (making two syllables of it) imagine, quoth my father, who the deuce he takes after.—
I cannot conceive, for my life, said my mother.—
Humph!—said my father.
(The dialogue ceased for a moment.)
—I am very short myself,—continued my father gravely.
You are very short, Mr. Shandy,—said my mother.
Humph! quoth my father to himself, a second time: in muttering which, he plucked his pillow a little further from my mother's,—and turning about again, there was an end of the debate for three minutes and a half.
—When he gets these breeches made, cried my father in a higher tone, he'll look like a beast in 'em.
He will be very awkward in them at first, replied my mother.
—And 'twill be lucky, if that's the worst on't, added my father.
It will be very lucky, answered my mother.
I suppose, replied my father,—making some pause first,—he'll be exactly like other people's children.—
Exactly, said my mother.—
—Though I shall be sorry for that, added my father: and so the debate stopp'd again.—
—They should be of leather, said my father, turning him about again.—
They will last him, said my mother, the longest.
But he can have no linings to 'em, replied my father.—
He cannot, said my mother.
'Twere better to have them of fustian, quoth my father.
Nothing can be better, quoth my mother.—
—Except dimity,—replied my father:—'Tis best of all,—replied my mother.
—One must not give him his death, however,—interrupted my father.
By no means, said my mother:—and so the dialogue stood still again.
I am resolved, however, quoth my father, breaking silence the fourth time, he shall have no pockets in them.—
—There is no occasion for any, said my mother.—
I mean in his coat and waistcoat,—cried my father.
—I mean so too,—replied my mother.
—Though if he gets a gig or top—Poor souls! it is a crown and a sceptre to them,—they should have where to secure it.—
Order it as you please, Mr. Shandy, replied my mother.—
—But don't you think it right? added my father, pressing the point home to her.
Perfectly, said my mother, if it pleases you, Mr. Shandy.—
—There's for you! cried my father, losing his temper—Pleases me!—You never will distinguish, Mrs. Shandy, nor shall I ever teach you to do it, betwixt a point of pleasure and a point of convenience.—This was on the Sunday night:—and further this chapter sayeth not.
After my father had debated the affair of the breeches with my mother,—he consulted Albertus Rubenius upon it; and Albertus Rubenius used my father ten times worse in the consultation (if possible) than even my father had used my mother: For as Rubenius had wrote a quarto express, De re Vestiaria Veterum,—it was Rubenius's business to have given my father some lights.—On the contrary, my father might as well have thought of extracting the seven cardinal virtues out of a long beard,—as of extracting a single word out of Rubenius upon the subject.
Upon every other article of ancient dress, Rubenius was very communicative to my father;—gave him a full satisfactory account of The Toga, or loose gown. The Chlamys. The Ephod. The Tunica, or Jacket. The Synthesis. The Paenula. The Lacema, with its Cucullus. The Paludamentum. The Praetexta. The Sagum, or soldier's jerkin. The Trabea: of which, according to Suetonius, there was three kinds.—
—But what are all these to the breeches? said my father.
Rubenius threw him down upon the counter all kinds of shoes which had been in fashion with the Romans.—
There was, The open shoe. The close shoe. The slip shoe. The wooden shoe. The soc. The buskin. And The military shoe with hobnails in it, which Juvenal takes notice of.
There were, The clogs. The pattins. The pantoufles. The brogues. The sandals, with latchets to them.
There was, The felt shoe. The linen shoe. The laced shoe. The braided shoe. The calceus incisus. And The calceus rostratus.
Rubenius shewed my father how well they all fitted,—in what manner they laced on,—with what points, straps, thongs, latchets, ribbands, jaggs, and ends.—
—But I want to be informed about the breeches, said my father.
Albertus Rubenius informed my father that the Romans manufactured stuffs of various fabrics,—some plain,—some striped,—others diapered throughout the whole contexture of the wool, with silk and gold—That linen did not begin to be in common use till towards the declension of the empire, when the Egyptians coming to settle amongst them, brought it into vogue.
—That persons of quality and fortune distinguished themselves by the fineness and whiteness of their clothes; which colour (next to purple, which was appropriated to the great offices) they most affected, and wore on their birth-days and public rejoicings.—That it appeared from the best historians of those times, that they frequently sent their clothes to the fuller, to be clean'd and whitened:—but that the inferior people, to avoid that expence, generally wore brown clothes, and of a something coarser texture,—till towards the beginning of Augustus's reign, when the slave dressed like his master, and almost every distinction of habiliment was lost, but the Latus Clavus.
And what was the Latus Clavus? said my father.
Rubenius told him, that the point was still litigating amongst the learned:—That Egnatius, Sigonius, Bossius Ticinensis, Bayfius Budaeus, Salmasius, Lipsius, Lazius, Isaac Casaubon, and Joseph Scaliger, all differed from each other,—and he from them: That some took it to be the button,—some the coat itself,—others only the colour of it;—That the great Bayfuis in his Wardrobe of the Ancients, chap. 12—honestly said, he knew not what it was,—whether a tibula,—a stud,—a button,—a loop,—a buckle,—or clasps and keepers.—
—My father lost the horse, but not the saddle—They are hooks and eyes, said my father—and with hooks and eyes he ordered my breeches to be made.