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Chapter 2.XIV. Every day for at least ten years together did my father resolve to have it mended--'tis not mended yet;--no family but ours would have borne with it an hour--and what is most astonishing, there was not a subject in the world upon which my father was so eloquent, as upon that of door-hinges.--And yet at the same time, he was certainly one of the greatest bubbles to them, I think, that history can produce: his rhetorick and conduct were at perpetual handy-cuffs.--Never did the parlour-door open--but his philosophy or his principles fell a victim to it;--three drops of oil with a feather, and a smart stroke of a hammer, had saved his honour for ever. --Inconsistent soul that man is!--languishing under wounds, which he has the power to heal!--his whole life a contradiction to his knowledge!--his reason, that precious gift of God to him--(instead of pouring in oil) serving but to sharpen his sensibilities--to multiply his pains, and render him more melancholy and uneasy under them!--Poor unhappy creature, that he should do so!--Are not the necessary causes of misery in this life enow, but he must add voluntary ones to his stock of sorrow;--struggle against evils which cannot be avoided, and submit to others, which a tenth part of the trouble they create him would remove from his heart for ever? By all that is good and virtuous, if there are three drops of oil to be got, and a hammer to be found within ten miles of Shandy Hall--the parlour door hinge shall be mended this reign. Chapter 2.XV. When Corporal Trim had brought his two mortars to bear, he was delighted with his handy-work above measure; and knowing what a pleasure it would be to his master to see them, he was not able to resist the desire he had of carrying them directly into his parlour. Now next to the moral lesson I had in view in mentioning the affair of hinges, I had a speculative consideration arising out of it, and it is this. Had the parlour door opened and turn'd upon its hinges, as a door should do-- Or for example, as cleverly as our government has been turning upon its hinges--(that is, in case things have all along gone well with your worship,--otherwise I give up my simile)--in this case, I say, there had been no danger either to master or man, in corporal Trim's peeping in: the moment he had beheld my father and my uncle Toby fast asleep--the respectfulness of his carriage was such, he would have retired as silent as death, and left them both in their arm-chairs, dreaming as happy as he had found them: but the thing was, morally speaking, so very impracticable, that for the many years in which this hinge was suffered to be out of order, and amongst the hourly grievances my father submitted to upon its account--this was one; that he never folded his arms to take his nap after dinner, but the thoughts of being unavoidably awakened by the first person who should open the door, was always uppermost in his imagination, and so incessantly stepp'd in betwixt him and the first balmy presage of his repose, as to rob him, as he often declared, of the whole sweets of it. 'When things move upon bad hinges, an' please your lordships, how can it be otherwise?' Pray what's the matter? Who is there? cried my father, waking, the moment the door began to creak.--I wish the smith would give a peep at that confounded hinge.--'Tis nothing, an please your honour, said Trim, but two mortars I am bringing in.--They shan't make a clatter with them here, cried my father hastily.--If Dr. Slop has any drugs to pound, let him do it in the kitchen.--May it please your honour, cried Trim, they are two mortar- pieces for a siege next summer, which I have been making out of a pair of jack-boots, which Obadiah told me your honour had left off wearing.--By Heaven! cried my father, springing out of his chair, as he swore--I have not one appointment belonging to me, which I set so much store by as I do by these jack-boots--they were our great grandfather's brother Toby--they were hereditary. Then I fear, quoth my uncle Toby, Trim has cut off the entail.--I have only cut off the tops, an' please your honour, cried Trim-- I hate perpetuities as much as any man alive, cried my father--but these jack-boots, continued he (smiling, though very angry at the same time) have been in the family, brother, ever since the civil wars;--Sir Roger Shandy wore them at the battle of Marston-Moor.--I declare I would not have taken ten pounds for them.--I'll pay you the money, brother Shandy, quoth my uncle Toby, looking at the two mortars with infinite pleasure, and putting his hand into his breeches pocket as he viewed them--I'll pay you the ten pounds this moment with all my heart and soul.-- Brother Toby, replied my father, altering his tone, you care not what money you dissipate and throw away, provided, continued he, 'tis but upon a Siege.--Have I not one hundred and twenty pounds a year, besides my half pay? cried my uncle Toby.--What is that--replied my father hastily--to ten pounds for a pair of jack-boots?--twelve guineas for your pontoons?--half as much for your Dutch draw-bridge?--to say nothing of the train of little brass artillery you bespoke last week, with twenty other preparations for the siege of Messina: believe me, dear brother Toby, continued my father, taking him kindly by the hand--these military operations of yours are above your strength;--you mean well brother--but they carry you into greater expences than you were first aware of;--and take my word, dear Toby, they will in the end quite ruin your fortune, and make a beggar of you.--What signifies it if they do, brother, replied my uncle Toby, so long as we know 'tis for the good of the nation?-- My father could not help smiling for his soul--his anger at the worst was never more than a spark;--and the zeal and simplicity of Trim--and the generous (though hobby-horsical) gallantry of my uncle Toby, brought him into perfect good humour with them in an instant. Generous souls!--God prosper you both, and your mortar-pieces too! quoth my father to himself. Chapter 2.XVI. All is quiet and hush, cried my father, at least above stairs--I hear not one foot stirring.--Prithee Trim, who's in the kitchen? There is no one soul in the kitchen, answered Trim, making a low bow as he spoke, except Dr. Slop.--Confusion! cried my father (getting upon his legs a second time)--not one single thing has gone right this day! had I faith in astrology, brother, (which, by the bye, my father had) I would have sworn some retrograde planet was hanging over this unfortunate house of mine, and turning every individual thing in it out of its place.--Why, I thought Dr. Slop had been above stairs with my wife, and so said you.--What can the fellow be puzzling about in the kitchen!--He is busy, an' please your honour, replied Trim, in making a bridge.--'Tis very obliging in him, quoth my uncle Toby:--pray, give my humble service to Dr. Slop, Trim, and tell him I thank him heartily. You must know, my uncle Toby mistook the bridge--as widely as my father mistook the mortars:--but to understand how my uncle Toby could mistake the bridge--I fear I must give you an exact account of the road which led to it;--or to drop my metaphor (for there is nothing more dishonest in an historian than the use of one)--in order to conceive the probability of this error in my uncle Toby aright, I must give you some account of an adventure of Trim's, though much against my will, I say much against my will, only because the story, in one sense, is certainly out of its place here; for by right it should come in, either amongst the anecdotes of my uncle Toby's amours with widow Wadman, in which corporal Trim was no mean actor--or else in the middle of his and my uncle Toby's campaigns on the bowling-green--for it will do very well in either place;--but then if I reserve it for either of those parts of my story--I ruin the story I'm upon;--and if I tell it here--I anticipate matters, and ruin it there. --What would your worship have me to do in this case? --Tell it, Mr. Shandy, by all means.--You are a fool, Tristram, if you do. O ye powers! (for powers ye are, and great ones too)--which enable mortal man to tell a story worth the hearing--that kindly shew him, where he is to begin it--and where he is to end it--what he is to put into it--and what he is to leave out--how much of it he is to cast into a shade--and whereabouts he is to throw his light!--Ye, who preside over this vast empire of biographical freebooters, and see how many scrapes and plunges your subjects hourly fall into;--will you do one thing? I beg and beseech you (in case you will do nothing better for us) that wherever in any part of your dominions it so falls out, that three several roads meet in one point, as they have done just here--that at least you set up a guide-post in the centre of them, in mere charity, to direct an uncertain devil which of the three he is to take.Prev Next All
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