This was constant, and without any other variation than this; that on shivering and tempestuous nights, when Bridget untuck’d the feet of the bed, &c., to do this——she consulted no thermometer but that of her own passions; and so performed it 402 standing—kneeling—or squatting, according to the different degrees of faith, hope, and charity, she was in, and bore towards her mistress that night. In every other respect, the etiquette was sacred, and might have vied with the most mechanical one of the most inflexible bed-chamber in Christendom.
The first night, as soon as the corporal had conducted my uncle Toby upstairs, which was about ten——Mrs. Wadman threw herself into her arm-chair, and crossing her left knee with her right, which formed a resting-place for her elbow, she reclin’d her cheek upon the palm of her hand, and leaning forwards ruminated till midnight upon both sides of the question.
The second night she went to her bureau, and having ordered Bridget to bring her up a couple of fresh candles and leave them upon the table, she took out her marriage-settlement, and read it over with great devotion: and the third night (which was the last of my uncle Toby’s stay) when Bridget had pull’d down the night-shift, and was assaying to stick in the corking pin——
——With a kick of both heels at once, but at the same time the most natural kick that could be kick’d in her situation——for supposing * * * * * * * * * to be the sun in its meridian, it was a north-east kick——she kick’d the pin out of her fingers——the etiquette which hung upon it, down——down it fell to the ground, and was shiver’d into a thousand atoms.
From all which it was plain that widow Wadman was in love with my uncle Toby.
CHAPTER X
My uncle Toby’s head at that time was full of other matters, so that it was not till the demolition of Dunkirk, when all the other civilities of Europe were settled, that he found leisure to return this.
This made an armistice (that is, speaking with regard to my uncle Toby—but with respect to Mrs. Wadman, a vacancy)—of almost eleven years. But in all cases of this nature, as it is the second blow, happen at what distance of time it will, which makes the fray——I chuse for that reason to call these the amours of my uncle Toby with Mrs. Wadman, rather than the amours of Mrs. Wadman with my uncle Toby.
This is not a distinction without a difference. 403
It is not like the affair of an old hat cock’d——and a cock’d old hat, about which your reverences have so often been at odds with one another——but there is a difference here in the nature of things——
And let me tell you, gentry, a wide one too.
CHAPTER XI
Now as widow Wadman did love my uncle Toby——and my uncle Toby did not love widow Wadman, there was nothing for widow Wadman to do, but to go on and love my uncle Toby——or let it alone.
Widow Wadman would do neither the one or the other.
——Gracious heaven!——but I forget I am a little of her temper myself; for whenever it so falls out, which it sometimes does about the equinoxes, that an earthly goddess is so much this, and that, and t’other, that I cannot eat my breakfast for her——and that she careth not three halfpence whether I eat my breakfast or no——
——Curse on her! and so I send her to Tartary, and from Tartary to Terra del Fuogo, and so on to the deviclass="underline" in short, there is not an infernal nitch where I do not take her divinityship and stick it.
But as the heart is tender, and the passions in these tides ebb and flow ten times in a minute, I instantly bring her back again; and as I do all things in extremes, I place her in the very centre of the milky-way——
Brightest of stars! thou wilt shed thy influence upon some one———
——The duce take her and her influence too——for at that word I lose all patience——much good may it do him!——By all that is hirsute and gashly! I cry, taking off my furr’d cap, and twisting it round my finger——I would not give sixpence for a dozen such!
——But ’tis an excellent cap too (putting it upon my head, and pressing it close to my ears)—and warm—and soft; especially if you stroke it the right way—but alas! that will never be my luck——(so here my philosophy is shipwreck’d again).
——No; I shall never have a finger in the pye (so here I break my metaphor)——
Crust and Crumb
Inside and out 404
Top and bottom——I detest it, I hate it, I repudiate it——I’m sick at the sight of it——
’Tis all pepper,
garlick,
staragen,
salt, and
devil’s dung——by the great arch-cook of cooks, who does nothing, I think, from morning to night, but sit down by the fire-side and invent inflammatory dishes for us, I would not touch it for the world——
——O Tristram! Tristram! cried Jenny.
O Jenny! Jenny! replied I, and so went on with the twelfth chapter.
CHAPTER XII
——“Not touch it for the world,” did I say——
Lord, how I have heated my imagination with this metaphor!
CHAPTER XIII
Which shows, let your reverences and worships say what you will of it (for as for thinking——all who do think—think pretty much alike both upon it and other matters)——Love is certainly, at least alphabetically speaking, one of the most Agitating Bewitching Confounded Devilish affairs of life—the most Extravagant Futilitous Galligaskinish Handy-dandyish Iracundulous (there is no K to it) and Lyrical of all human passions: at the same time, the most M isgiving Ninnyhammering Obstipating Pragmatical Stridulous
R idiculous—though by the bye the R should have gone 405 first—But in short ’tis of such a nature, as my father once told my uncle Toby upon the close of a long dissertation upon the subject——“You can scarce,” said he, “combine two ideas together upon it, brother Toby, without an hypallage”——What’s that? cried my uncle Toby.
The cart before the horse, replied my father——
——And what is he to do there? cried my uncle Toby——
Nothing, quoth my father, but to get in——or let it alone.
Now widow Wadman, as I told you before, would do neither the one or the other.
She stood however ready harnessed and caparisoned at all points, to watch accidents.
CHAPTER XIV
The Fates, who certainly all foreknew of these amours of widow Wadman and my uncle Toby, had, from the first creation of matter and motion (and with more courtesy than they usually do things of this kind), established such a chain of causes and effects hanging so fast to one another, that it was scarce possible for my uncle Toby to have dwelt in any other house in the world, or to have occupied any other garden in Christendom, but the very house and garden which join’d and laid parallel to Mrs. Wadman’s; this, with the advantage of a thickset arbour in Mrs. Wadman’s garden, but planted in the hedge-row of my uncle Toby’s, put all the occasions into her hands which Love-militancy wanted; she could observe my uncle Toby’s motions, and was mistress likewise of his councils of war; and as his unsuspecting heart had given leave to the corporal, through the mediation of Bridget, to make her a wicker-gate of communication to enlarge her walks, it enabled her to carry on her approaches to the very door of the sentry-box; and sometimes out of gratitude, to make an attack, and endeavour to blow my uncle Toby up in the very sentry-box itself.