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 hornworks. --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 bedsteads; --tho', I know _Du Cange_ says, "That bed-curtains, in all probability, have taken their name from them;" --nor have the hornworks he speaks of, anything 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 foss 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 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 _Liter 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 anything 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.
'Your sudden and unexpected arrival,' quoth my uncle Toby to Dr. Slop (all three of them sitting down to the fire together,) - 'instantly brought the great Stevinus into my head, who, you must know, is a favourite author with me.'
My father said, 'I will lay twenty guineas that this Stevinus was some engineer or other, or has wrote 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 connection there can be betwixt Dr. Slop's sudden coming, and fortification; - yet I feared it. No matter how unfit for the subject, you are sure to bring it in. I declare, my brother Toby, I would not have my head so full of curtins and hornworks.'
'I dare say you would not,' quoth Dr. Slop, interrupting him, and laughing greatly at his pun.
No critic could detest a pun more than my father; it annoyed him at any time; - but to be broke in upon by one, in a serious discussion, was as bad, he would say, as a fillip upon the nose.
'Sir,' quoth my uncle Toby to Dr. Slop, 'the curtins my brother Shandy mentions have nothing to do with bedsteads; - though, I know Du Cange says that bed-curtains, in all probability, have taken their name from them. - Nor have the hornworks he speaks of, anything to do with the horn-works of cuckoldom. The Curtin, Sir, is the word we use in fortification, for that part of the rampart which lies between two bastions. Besiegers seldom attack the curtins directly, 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 place ravelins before them, taking care only to extend them beyond the foss or ditch. - Men who know little of fortification, confound the ravelin and the half-moon, though they are very different things; - not in their construction, for we make them exactly alike; for they always consist of two faces, making a salient angle with the gorges, not straight, but in a crescent.'
'Where then lies the difference?' quoth my father, a little testily.
'In their situations,' answered my uncle. 'For when a ravelin, brother, stands before the curtin, it is a ravelin; and when it stands before a bastion, then it is not a ravelin; - it is a half-moon; a half-moon likewise is a half-moon so long as it stands before its bastion; - but was it to get before the curtin, 'twould be no more than a ravelin.'
'I think,' quoth my father, 'that the noble science of defence has its weak sides.'
'As for the hornworks-' ('High! ho!' sighed my father) 'which,' continued my uncle Toby, 'my brother was speaking of, they are part of an outwork; they are called by French engineers, Ouvrage corne, and we 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 show you one well worth your trouble. I admit 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-'
'By the mother who bore us! brother Toby,' quoth my father, not able to hold out any longer, 'you would provoke a saint. Here you have got us, I know not how, into the middle of the old subject again. So full is your head of these confounded works, that though my wife is this moment in labour, and you hear her cry out, yet you want to carry off the man-midwife.'
'Accoucheur, if you please,' quoth Dr. Slop.
'Certainly,' replied my father. 'I don't care what they call you, - but I wish the whole science of fortification at the devil; it will be the death of me. I would not, brother Toby, have my brains so full of saps, mines, blinds, pallisadoes, ravelins, half-moons, and such trumpery, if it made me owner of all the towns in Flanders.'
My uncle Toby was a man of courage: and I know no man under whose arm I would have sooner taken shelter. He felt this insult of my father's as feelingly as a man could do; - but he was of a peaceful, placid nature, with scarce a heart to retaliate upon a fly.
'Go,' says he, one day at dinner, to one which had buzzed about his nose, and tormented him all dinner-time, and which, after infinite attempts, he had caught at last; - 'I'll not hurt thee,' says my uncle Toby, going across the room, with the fly in his hand, - 'Go,' says he, lifting up the sash, and letting it escape; 'poor devil, get thee gone, why should I hurt thee? This world is wide enough to hold both thee and me.'
I was but ten years old when this happened: but this action instantly set my whole frame into one vibration of most pleasurable sensation; how far the manner and expression of it, or a tone of voice 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 by my uncle Toby, has never since been worn out of my mind. And though I would not depreciate what university study has done for me, or discredit the other helps of an expensive education; - yet I often think that I owe half of my philanthropy to that one accidental impression.
[This is to serve for parents instead of a whole volume upon the subject.]
I could not draw this stroke in my uncle Toby's picture, by the instrument with which I drew the other parts of it, that mere Hobby-Horsical likeness: - this is a part of his moral character.
My father was very different in his endurance of wrongs; he had a much more acute sensibility, and a little soreness of temper; though this never extended to malignancy: - yet in the small vexations of life, 'twas apt to show itself in a witty kind of peevishness. He was, however, frank and generous; and in the little bubblings-up of this acid humour towards others, but particularly towards my uncle Toby, whom he truly loved, he would feel more ten times more pain than he ever gave (except in the affair of my aunt Dinah, or where an hypothesis was concerned).
The characters of the two brothers appeared with great advantage in this affair of Stevinus.
I need not tell the reader that a man's Hobby-Horse is the tenderest part he has; and these unprovoked blows at my uncle Toby's Hobby-Horse were felt by him.
- Pray, Sir, what said he? How did he behave?
- O, Sir! - it was great. For when my father had finished insulting his Hobby-Horse, my uncle turned his head, and looked into my father's face with so much good-nature; so placid - so fraternal - so inexpressibly tender, it penetrated my father to his heart. He rose up hastily from his chair, seizing my uncle Toby's hands.
'Brother Toby,' said he, 'I beg thy pardon; forgive me.'
'My dear, dear brother,' answered my uncle, 'say no more about it; you are heartily welcome, brother.'
'But 'tis ungenerous,' replied my father, 'to hurt any man; - a brother worse; but to hurt a brother of such gentle manners, - 'tis base: 'tis cowardly. Besides, what have I to do, my dear Toby, with your pleasures, unless it was in my power (which it is not) to increase them?'
'Brother Shandy,' answered my uncle Toby, looking wistfully in his face, 'you do increase my pleasure very much, in begetting children for the Shandy family at your time of life.'
'By that, Sir,' quoth Dr. Slop, 'Mr. Shandy increases his own pleasure.'
'Not a jot,' quoth my father.
Book 2 - Chapter 12