The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman (Penguin Classics)

by Laurence Sterne

  The excellency of the figure and mien of the young Sieur de Croix, was at that time beginning to draw the attention of the maids of honour towards the terras before the palace gate, where the guard was mounted. The Lady de Baussiere fell deeply in love with him,— La Battarelle did the same—it was the finest weather for it, that ever was remembered in Navarre—La Guyol, La Maronette, La Sabatiere, fell in love with the Sieur de Croix also—La Rebours and La Fosseuse knew better—De Croix had failed in an attempt to recommend himself to La Rebours; and La Rebours and La Fosseuse were inseparable.

  The queen of Navarre was sitting with her ladies in the painted bow-window, facing the gate of the second court, as De Croix passed through it—He is handsome, said the Lady Baussiere.—He has a good mien, said La Battarelle.—He is finely shaped, said La Guyol.—I never saw an officer of the horse-guards in my life, said La Maronette, with two such legs—Or who stood so well upon them, said La Sabatiere——But he has no whiskers, cried La Fosseuse—Not a pile, said La Rebours.

  The queen went directly to her oratory, musing all the way, as she walked through the gallery, upon the subject; turning it this way and that way in her fancy—— Ave Maria —what can La Fosseuse mean? said she, kneeling down upon the cushion.

  La Guyol, La Battarelle, La Maronette, La Sabatiere, retired instantly to their chambers—Whiskers! said all four of them to themselves, as they bolted their doors on the inside.

  The Lady Carnavallette was counting her beads with both hands, unsuspected under her farthingal—from St.Antony down to St.Ursula inclusive, not a saint passed through her fingers without whiskers; St.Francis, St.Dominick, St.Bennet, St.Basil, St.Bridget,10 had all whiskers.

  The Lady Baussiere had got into a wilderness of conceits, with moralizing too intricately upon La Fosseuse’s text—She mounted her palfry, her page followed her—the host passed by—the lady Baussiere rode on.11

  One denier, cried the order of mercy12—one single denier, in behalf of a thousand patient captives, whose eyes look towards heaven and you for their redemption.

  —The Lady Baussiere rode on.

  Pity the unhappy, said a devout, venerable, hoary-headed man, meekly holding up a box, begirt with iron, in his withered hands——I beg for the unfortunate—good, my lady,’tis for a prison—for an hospital—’tis for an old man—a poor man undone by shipwreck, by suretyship, by fire——I call God and all his angels to witness—’tis to cloath the naked—to feed the hungry—’tis to comfort the sick and the broken hearted.

  —The Lady Baussiere rode on.

  A decayed kinsman bowed himself to the ground.

  —The Lady Baussiere rode on.

  He ran begging bare-headed on one side of her palfry, conjuring her by the former bonds of friendship, alliance, consanguinity, &c.——Cousin, aunt, sister, mother—for virtue’s sake, for your own, for mine, for Christ’s sake remember me—pity me.

  —The Lady Baussiere rode on.

  Take hold of my whiskers, said the Lady Baussiere——The page took hold of her palfry. She dismounted at the end of the terrace.

  There are some trains of certain ideas which leave prints of themselves about our eyes and eye-brows; and there is a consciousness of it, somewhere about the heart, which serves but to make these etchings the stronger—we see, spell, and put them together without a dictionary.

  Ha, ha! hee, hee! cried La Guyol and La Sabatiere, looking close at each others prints——Ho, ho! cried La Battarelle and Maronette, doing the same:—Whist! cried one–st, st,—said a second,—hush, quoth a third——poo, poo, replied a fourth—gramercy! cried the Lady Carnavallette;—’twas she who bewhisker’d St.Bridget.

  La Fosseuse drew her bodkin from the knot of her hair, and having traced the outline of a small whisker, with the blunt end of it, upon one side of her upper lip, put it into La Rebours’s hand—La Rebours shook her head.

  The Lady Baussiere cough’d thrice into the inside of her muff—La Guyol smiled—Fy, said the Lady Baussiere. The queen of Navarre touched her eye with the tip of her fore finger—as much as to say, I understand you all.

  ’Twas plain to the whole court the word was ruined: La Fosseuse had given it a wound, and it was not the better for passing through all these defiles——It made a faint stand, however, for a few months; by the expiration of which, the Sieur de Croix, finding it high time to leave Navarre for want of whiskers—the word in course became indecent, and (after a few efforts) absolutely unfit for use.

  The best word, in the best language of the best world, must have suffered under such combinations.13—The curate of d’Estella14 wrote a book against them, setting forth the dangers of accessory ideas, and warning the Navarois against them.

  Does not all the world know, said the curate d’Estella at the conclusion of his work, that Noses ran the same fate some centuries ago in most parts of Europe, which Whiskers have now done in the kingdom of Navarre—The evil indeed spread no further then—, but have not beds and bolsters, and nightcaps and chamber-pots stood upon the brink of destruction ever since? Are not trouse,15 and placket-holes, and pump-handles—and spigots and faucets, in danger still, from the same association?—Chastity, by nature the gentlest of all affections—give it but its head—’tis like a ramping and a roaring lion.

  The drift of the curate d’Estella’s argument was not understood.—They ran the scent the wrong way.—The world bridled his ass at the tail.—And when the extreams of DELICACY, and the beginnings of CONCUPISCENCE, hold their next provincial chapter together, they may decree that bawdy also.

  CHAP. II.

  WHEN my father received the letter which brought him the melancholy account of my brother Bobby’s death, he was busy calculating the expence of his riding post from Calais to Paris, and so on to Lyons.

  ’Twas a most inauspicious journey; my father having had every foot of it to travel over again, and his calculation to begin afresh, when he had almost got to the end of it, by Obadiah’s opening the door to acquaint him the family was out of yeast—and to ask whether he might not take the great coach-horse early in the morning, and ride in search of some.—With all my heart, Obadiah, said my father, (pursuing his journey)—take the coach-horse, and welcome.—But he wants a shoe, poor creature! said Obadiah.—Poor creature! said my uncle Toby, vibrating the note back again, like a string in unison. Then ride the Scotch horse, quoth my father hastily.—He cannot bear a saddle upon his back, quoth Obadiah, for the whole world.——The devil’s in that horse; then take PATRIOT,1 cried my father, and shut the door.——PATRIOT is sold, said Obadiah.—Here’s for you! cried my father, making a pause, and looking in my uncle Toby’s face, as if the thing had not been a matter of fact.—Your worship ordered me to sell him last April, said Obadiah.—Then go on foot for your pains, cried my father.—I had much rather walk than ride, said Obadiah, shutting the door.

  What plagues! cried my father, going on with his calculation.—But the waters are out, said Obadiah,—opening the door again.

  Till that moment, my father, who had a map of Sanson’s,2 and a book of the post roads before him, had kept his hand upon the head of his compasses, with one foot of them fixed upon Nevers,3 the last stage he had paid for—purposing to go on from that point with his journey and calculation, as soon as Obadiah quitted the room; but this second attack of Obadiah’s, in opening the door and laying the whole country under water, was too much.—He let go his compasses—or rather with a mixed motion betwixt accident and anger, he threw them upon the table; and then there was nothing for him to do, but to return back to Calais (like many others) as wise as he had set out.

  When the letter was brought into the parlour, which contained the news of my brother’s death, my father had got forwards again upon his journey to within a stride of the compasses of the very same stage of Nevers.—By your leave, Mons. Sanson, cried my father, striking the point of his compasses through Nevers into the table,—and nodding to my uncle Toby, to see what was in the letter,—twice of one night is too mu
ch for an English gentleman and his son, Mons. Sanson, to be turned back from so lousy a town as Nevers,—what think’st thou, Toby, added my father in a sprightly tone.—Unless it be a garrison town, said my uncle Toby,—for then—I shall be a fool, said my father, smiling to himself, as long as I live.—So giving a second nod—and keeping his compasses still upon Nevers with one hand, and holding his book of the post-roads in the other—half calculating and half listening, he leaned forwards upon the table with both elbows, as my uncle Toby hummed over the letter.

  — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — he’s gone! said my uncle Toby.—Where—Who? cried my father.— My nephew, said my uncle Toby.——What—without leave—without money——without governor? cried my father in amazement. No:—he is dead, my dear brother, quoth my uncle Toby.—Without being ill? cried my father again.—I dare say not, said my uncle Toby, in a low voice, and fetching a deep sigh from the bottom of his heart, he has been ill enough, poor lad! I’ll answer for him—for he is dead.

  When Agrippina was told of her son’s death, Tacitus informs us, that not being able to moderate the violence of her passions, she abruptly broke off her work4—My father stuck his compasses in to Nevers, but so much the faster.—What contrarieties! his, indeed, was matter of calculation—Agrippina’s must have been quite a different affair; who else could pretend to reason from history?

  How my father went on, in my opinion, deserves a chapter to itself.—

  CHAP. III.

  —— ——And a chapter it shall have, and a devil of a one too—so look to yourselves.

  ’Tis either Plato, or Plutarch, or Seneca, or Xenophon, or Epictetus, or Theophrastus, or Lucian—or some one perhaps of later date—either Cardan, or Budæus, or Petrarch, or Stella—or possibly it may be some divine or father of the church, St.Austin, or St.Cyprian, or Barnard,1 who affirms that it is an irresistable and natural passion to weep for the loss of our friends or children2—and Seneca (I’m positive) tells us somewhere, that such griefs evacuate themselves best by that particular channel.3—And accordingly we find, that David wept for his son Absolom—Adrian for his Antinous—Niobe for her children, and that Apollodorus and Crito both shed tears for Socrates before his death.4

  My father managed his affliction otherwise; and indeed differently from most men either ancient or modern; for he neither wept it away, as the Hebrews and the Romans—or slept it off, as the Laplanders—or hang’d it, as the English, or drowned it, as the Germans5—nor did he curse it, or damn it, or excommunicate it, or rhyme it, or lillabullero it.——

  ——He got rid of it, however.

  Will your worships give me leave to squeeze in a story between these two pages?

  When Tully was bereft of his dear daughter Tullia, at first he laid it to his heart,—he listened to the voice of nature, and modulated his own unto it.—O my Tullia! my daughter! my child!—still, still, still,—’twas O my Tullia!——my Tullia! Methinks I see my Tullia, I hear my Tullia, I talk with my Tullia.—But as soon as he began to look into the stores of philosophy, and consider how many excellent things might be said upon the occasion—no body upon earth can conceive, says the great orator, how happy, how joyful it made me.6

  My father was as proud of his eloquence as MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO could be for his life, and for aught I am convinced of to the contrary at present, with as much reason: it was indeed his strength—and his weakness too.——His strength—for he was by nature eloquent,—and his weakness—for he was hourly a dupe to it; and provided an occasion in life would but permit him to shew his talents, or say either a wise thing, a witty, or a shrewd one—(bating the case of a systematick misfortune)—he had all he wanted.—A blessing which tied up my father’s tongue, and a misfortune which set it loose with a good grace, were pretty equal: sometimes, indeed, the misfortune was the better of the two; for instance, where the pleasure of the harangue was as ten, and the pain of the misfortune but as five—my father gained half in half, and consequently was as well again off, as it never had befallen him.7

  This clue will unravel, what otherwise would seem very inconsistent in my father’s domestick character; and it is this, that in the provocations arising from the neglects and blunders of servants, or other mishaps unavoidable in a family, his anger, or rather the duration of it, eternally ran counter to all conjecture.

  My father had a favourite little mare, which he had consigned over to a most beautiful Arabian horse, in order to have a pad out of her for his own riding: he was sanguine in all his projects; so talked about his pad every day with as absolute a security, as if it had been reared, broke,—and bridled and saddled at his door ready for mounting. By some neglect or other in Obadiah, it so fell out, that my father’s expectations were answered with nothing better than a mule, and as ugly a beast of the kind as ever was produced.

  My mother and my uncle Toby expected my father would be the death of Obadiah—and that there never would be an end of the disaster.——See here! you rascal, cried my father, pointing to the mule, what you have done!—It was not me, said Obadiah.—How do I know that? replied my father.

  Triumph swam in my father’s eyes, at the repartee—the Attic salt8 brought water into them—and so Obadiah heard no more about it.

  Now let us go back to my brother’s death.

  Philosophy has a fine saying for every thing.—For Death it has an entire set; the misery was, they all at once rushed into my father’s head, that ’twas difficult to string them together, so as to make any thing of a consistent show out of them.—He took them as they came.

  “’tis an inevitable chance—the first statute in Magnâ Chartâ—it is an everlasting act of parliament, my dear brother,—All must die.9

  “If my son could not have died, it had been matter of wonder,—not that he is dead.”

  “Monarchs and princes dance in the same ring with us.”10

  “—To die, is the great debt and tribute due unto nature: tombs and monuments, which should perpetuate our memories, pay it themselves; and the proudest pyramid of them all, which wealth and science have erected, has lost its apex, and stands obtruncated in the traveller’s horizon.”11 (My father found he got great ease, and went on)—“Kingdoms and provinces, and towns and cities, have they not their periods? and when those principles and powers, which at first cemented and put them together, have performed their several evolutions, they fall back.”—Brother Shandy, said my uncle Toby, laying down his pipe at the word evolutions12—Revolutions, I meant, quoth my father,—by heaven! I meant revolutions, brother Toby—evolutions is nonsense.—’tis not nonsense—said my uncle Toby.——But is it not nonsense to break the thread of such a discourse, upon such an occasion? cried my father—do not—dear Toby, continued he, taking him by the hand, do not—do not, I beseech thee, interrupt me at this crisis.—My uncle Toby put his pipe into his mouth.

  “Where is Troy and Mycenæ, and Thebes and Delos, and Persepolis, and Agrigentum”—continued my father, taking up his book of post-roads, which he had laid down.—“What is become, brother Toby, of Nineveh and Babylon, of Cizicum and Mitylenaœ?13 The fairest towns that ever the sun rose upon, are now no more: the names only are left, and those (for many of them are wrong spelt) are falling themselves by piecemeals to decay, and in length of time will be forgotten, and involved with every thing in a perpetual night: the world itself, brother Toby, must—must come to an end.

  “Returning out of Asia, when I sailed from Ægina towards Megara,” (when can this have been? thought my uncle Toby) “I began to view the country round about. Ægina was behind me, Megara was before, Pyrœus on the right hand, Corinth on the left.—What flourishing towns now prostrate upon the earth! Alas! alas! said I to myself, that man should disturb his soul for the loss of a child, when so much as this lies awfully buried in his presence——Remember, said I to myself again—remember thou art a man.”——

  Now my uncle Toby knew not that this last paragraph was an extract
of Servius Sulpicius’s consolatory letter to Tully.—He had as little skill, honest man, in the fragments, as he had in the whole pieces of antiquity.—And as my father, whilst he was concerned in the Turky trade, had been three or four different times in the Levant, in one of which he had staid a whole year and a half at Zant,14 my uncle Toby naturally concluded, that in some one of these periods he had taken a trip across the Archipelago into Asia; and that all this sailing affair with Ægina behind, and Megara before, and Pyræus on the right hand, &c. &c. was nothing more than the true course of my father’s voyage and reflections.—’twas certainly in his manner, and many an undertaking critick would have built two stories higher upon worse foundations.—And pray, brother, quoth my uncle Toby, laying the end of his pipe upon my father’s hand in a kindly way of interruption—but waiting till he finished the account—what year of our Lord was this?—’twas no year of our Lord, replied my father.—That’s impossible, cried my uncle Toby.—Simpleton! said my father,—’twas forty years before Christ was born.

  My uncle Toby had but two things for it; either to suppose his brother to be the wandering Jew,15 or that his misfortunes had disordered his brain.—“May the Lord God of heaven and earth protect him and restore him,” said my uncle Toby, praying silently for my father, and with tears in his eyes.

  —My father placed the tears to a proper account, and went on with his harangue with great spirit.

  “There is not such great odds, brother Toby, betwixt good and evil, as the world imagines”——(this way of setting off, by the bye, was not likely to cure my uncle Toby’s suspicions).— “Labour, sorrow, grief, sickness, want, and woe, are the sauces of life.”16—Much good may it do them—said my uncle Toby to himself.——