CHAPTER XL

The city of _Limerick_, the siege of which was begun under his majesty king _William_ himself, the year after I went into the army--lies, an’ please your honours, in the middle of a devilish wet, swampy country. --’Tis quite surrounded, said my uncle _Toby_, with the _Shannon_, and is, by its situation, one of the strongest fortified places in _Ireland_.----

I think this is a new fashion, quoth Dr. _Slop_, of beginning a medical lecture. --’Tis all true, answered _Trim_. --Then I wish the faculty would follow the cut of it, said _Yorick_. --’Tis all cut through, an’ please your reverence, said the corporal, with drains and bogs; and besides, there was such a quantity of rain fell during the siege, the whole country was like a puddle, --’twas that, and nothing else, which brought on the flux, and which had like to have killed both his honour and myself; now there was no such thing, after the first ten days, continued the corporal, for a soldier to lie dry in his tent, without cutting a ditch round it, to draw off the water; --nor was that enough, for those who could afford it, as his honour could, without setting fire every night to a pewter dish full of brandy, which took off the damp of the air, and made the inside of the tent as warm as a stove.------

And what conclusion dost thou draw, corporal _Trim_, cried my father, from all these premises?

I infer, an’ please your worship, replied _Trim_, that the radical moisture is nothing in the world but ditch-water--and that the radical heat, of those who can go to the expence of it, is burnt brandy, --the radical heat and moisture of a private man, an’ please your honour, is nothing but ditch-water--and a dram of geneva----and give us but enough of it, with a pipe of tobacco, to give us spirits, and drive away the vapours--we know not what it is to fear death.

I am at a loss, Captain _Shandy_, quoth Dr. _Slop_, to determine in which branch of learning your servant shines most, whether in physiology or divinity. --_Slop_ had not forgot _Trim’s_ comment upon the sermon.--

It is but an hour ago, replied _Yorick_, since the corporal was examined in the latter, and pass’d muster with great honour.----

The radical heat and moisture, quoth Dr. _Slop_, turning to my father, you must know, is the basis and foundation of our being--as the root of a tree is the source and principle of its vegetation. --It is inherent in the seeds of all animals, and may be preserved sundry ways, but principally in my opinion by _consubstantials_, _impriments_, and _occludents_. ----Now this poor fellow, continued Dr. _Slop_, pointing to the corporal, has had the misfortune to have heard some superficial empiric discourse upon this nice point. ----That he has, --said my father. ----Very likely, said my uncle. --I’m sure of it--quoth _Yorick_.----

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