Part 72

——That she is not a woman of science, my father would say—is her misfortune—but she might ask a question.—

My mother never did.——In short, she went out of the world at last without knowing whether it turned round, or stood still.——My father had officiously told her above a thousand times which way it was,—but she always forgot.

For these reasons, a discourse seldom went on much further betwixt them, than a proposition,—a reply, and a rejoinder; at the end of which, it generally took breath for a few minutes (as in the affair of the breeches), and then went on again.

If he marries, ’twill be the worse for us,—quoth my mother.

Not a cherry-stone, said my father,—he may as well batter away his means upon that, as any thing else,

——To be sure, said my mother: so here ended the proposition—the reply,—and the rejoinder, I told you of.

It will be some amusement to him, too,——said my father.

A very great one, answered my mother, if he should have children.——

——Lord have mercy upon me,—said my father to himself——* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

C H A P. LXXXIII

I AM now beginning to get fairly into my work; and by the help of a vegetable diet, with a few of the cold seeds, I make no doubt but I shall be able to go on with my uncle Toby’s story, and my own, in a tolerable straight line. Now,

four very squiggly lines across the page signed Inv.T.S and Scw.T.S

These were the four lines I moved in through my first, second, third, and fourth volumes——In the fifth volume I have been very good,——the precise line I have described in it being this:

One very squiggly line across the page with loops marked A,B,C,C,C,C,C,D.

By which it appears, that except at the curve, marked A. where I took a trip to Navarre,—and the indented curve B. which is the short airing when I was there with the Lady Baussiere and her page,—I have not taken the least frisk of a digression, till John de la Casse’s devils led me the round you see marked D.—for as for c c c c c they are nothing but parentheses, and the common ins and outs incident to the lives of the greatest ministers of state; and when compared with what men have done,—or with my own transgressions at the letters A B D—they vanish into nothing.

In this last volume I have done better still—for from the end of Le Fever’s episode, to the beginning of my uncle Toby’s campaigns,—I have scarce stepped a yard out of my way.

If I mend at this rate, it is not impossible——by the good leave of his grace of Benevento’s devils——but I may arrive hereafter at the excellency of going on even thus:

which is a line drawn as straight as I could draw it, by a writing-master’s ruler (borrowed for that purpose), turning neither to the right hand or to the left.

This right line,—the path-way for Christians to walk in! say divines——

——The emblem of moral rectitude! says Cicero——

——The best line! say cabbage planters——is the shortest line, says Archimedes, which can be drawn from one given point to another.——

I wish your ladyships would lay this matter to heart, in your next birth- day suits!

——What a journey!

Pray can you tell me,—that is, without anger, before I write my chapter upon straight lines——by what mistake——who told them so——or how it has come to pass, that your men of wit and genius have all along confounded this line, with the line of GRAVITATION?

Alluding to the first edition.

C H A P. LXXXIV

NO——I think, I said, I would write two volumes every year, provided the vile cough which then tormented me, and which to this hour I dread worse than the devil, would but give me leave—and in another place—(but where, I can’t recollect now) speaking of my book as a machine, and laying my pen and ruler down cross-wise upon the table, in order to gain the greater credit to it—I swore it should be kept a going at that rate these forty years, if it pleased but the fountain of life to bless me so long with health and good spirits.

Now as for my spirits, little have I to lay to their charge—nay so very little (unless the mounting me upon a long stick and playing the fool with me nineteen hours out of the twenty-four, be accusations) that on the contrary, I have much—much to thank ’em for: cheerily have ye made me tread the path of life with all the burthens of it (except its cares) upon my back; in no one moment of my existence, that I remember, have ye once deserted me, or tinged the objects which came in my way, either with sable, or with a sickly green; in dangers ye gilded my horizon with hope, and when DEATH himself knocked at my door—ye bad him come again; and in so gay a tone of careless indifference, did ye do it, that he doubted of his commission——