CHAPTER XXVI
It is natural for a perfect stranger who is going from _London_ to _Edinburgh_, to enquire before he sets out, how many miles to _York_; which is about the half way----nor does anybody wonder, if he goes on and asks about the corporation, &c.--
It was just as natural for Mrs. _Wadman_, whose first husband was all his time afflicted with a Sciatica, to wish to know how far from the hip to the groin; and how far she was likely to suffer more or less in her feelings, in the one case than in the other.
She had accordingly read _Drake’s_ anatomy from one end to the other. She had peeped into _Wharton_ upon the brain, and borrowed[9.2] _Graaf_ upon the bones and muscles; but could make nothing of it.
She had reason’d likewise from her own powers----laid down theorems----drawn consequences, and come to no conclusion.
To clear up all, she had twice asked Doctor _Slop_, “if poor captain _Shandy_ was ever likely to recover of his wound----?”
----He is recovered, Doctor _Slop_ would say----
What! quite?
Quite: madam----
But what do you mean by a recovery? Mrs. _Wadman_ would say.
Doctor _Slop_ was the worst man alive at definitions; and so Mrs. _Wadman_ could get no knowledge: in short, there was no way to extract it, but from my uncle _Toby_ himself.
There is an accent of humanity in an enquiry of this kind which lulls SUSPICION to rest----and I am half persuaded the serpent got pretty near it, in his discourse with Eve; for the propensity in the sex to be deceived could not be so great, that she should have boldness to hold chat with the devil, without it ----But there is an accent of humanity----how shall I describe it? --’tis an accent which covers the part with a garment, and gives the enquirer a right to be as particular with it, as your body-surgeon.
“----Was it without remission?--
“----Was it more tolerable in bed?
“----Could he lie on both sides alike with it?
“--Was he able to mount a horse?
“--Was motion bad for it?” _et cætera_, were so tenderly spoke to, and so directed towards my uncle _Toby’s_ heart, that every item of them sunk ten times deeper into it than the evils themselves----but when Mrs. _Wadman_ went round about by _Namur_ to get at my uncle _Toby’s_ groin; and engaged him to attack the point of the advanced counterscarp, and _pêle mêle_ with the _Dutch_ to take the counterguard of St. _Roch_ sword in hand--and then with tender notes playing upon his ear, led him all bleeding by the hand out of the trench, wiping her eye, as he was carried to his tent ----Heaven! Earth! Sea! --all was lifted up--the springs of nature rose above their levels--an angel of mercy sat besides him on the sopha--his heart glow’d with fire--and had he been worth a thousand, he had lost every heart of them to Mrs. _Wadman_.
--And whereabouts, dear Sir, quoth Mrs. _Wadman_, a little categorically, did you receive this sad blow? ----In asking this question, Mrs. _Wadman_ gave a slight glance towards the waistband of my uncle _Toby’s_ red plush breeches, expecting naturally, as the shortest reply to it, that my uncle _Toby_ would lay his forefinger upon the place ----It fell out otherwise----for my uncle _Toby_ having got his wound before the gate of St. _Nicolas_, in one of the traverses of the trench opposite to the salient angle of the demibastion of St. _Roch_; he could at any time stick a pin upon the identical spot of ground where he was standing when the stone struck him: this struck instantly upon my uncle _Toby’s_ sensorium----and with it, struck his large map of the town and citadel of _Namur_ and its environs, which he had purchased and pasted down upon a board, by the corporal’s aid, during his long illness----it had lain with other military lumber in the garret ever since, and accordingly the corporal was detached into the garret to fetch it.
My uncle _Toby_ measured off thirty toises, with Mrs. _Wadman’s_ scissars, from the returning angle before the gate of St. _Nicolas_; and with such a virgin modesty laid her finger upon the place, that the goddess of Decency, if then in being--if not, ’twas her shade--shook her head, and with a finger wavering across her eyes--forbid her to explain the mistake.
Unhappy Mrs. _Wadman!_
----For nothing can make this chapter go off with spirit but an apostrophe to thee----but my heart tells me, that in such a crisis an apostrophe is but an insult in disguise, and ere I would offer one to a woman in distress--let the chapter go to the devil; provided any damn’d critic _in keeping_ will be but at the trouble to take it with him.
[Footnote 9.2: This must be a mistake in Mr. _Shandy_; for _Graaf_ wrote upon the pancreatick juice, and the parts of generation.]
## CHAPTER XXVII My uncle _Toby’s_ Map is carried down into the kitchen.
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