The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman by Laurence Sterne (pdf e book reader txt) 📕

My mother was then conjugally swinging with her left arm twisted under his right, in such wise, that the inside of her hand rested upon the back of his⁠—she raised her fingers, and let them fall⁠—it could scarce be call’d a tap; or if it was a tap⁠⸺’twould have puzzled a casuist to say, whether ’twas a tap of remonstrance, or a tap of confession: my father, who was all sensibilities from head to foot, class’d it right⁠—Conscience redoubled her blow⁠—he turn’d his face suddenly the other way, and my mother supposing his body was about to turn with it in order to move homewards, by a cross movement of her right leg, keeping her left as its centre, brought herself so far in front, that as he turned his head, he met her eye⁠⸻Confusion again! he saw a thousand reasons to wipe out the reproach, and as many to reproach himself⁠⸺⁠a thin, blue, chill, pellucid chrystal with all its humours so at rest, the least mote or speck of desire might have been seen, at the bottom of it, had it existed⁠⸺⁠it did not⁠⸺⁠and how I happen to be so lewd myself, particularly a little before the vernal and autumnal equinoxes⁠⸺⁠Heaven above knows⁠⸺⁠My mother⁠⸺⁠madam⁠⸺⁠was so at no time, either by nature, by institution, or example.

A temperate current of blood ran orderly through her veins in all months of the year, and in all critical moments both of the day and night alike; nor did she superinduce the least heat into her humours from the manual effervescencies of devotional tracts, which having little or no meaning in them, nature is ofttimes obliged to find one⁠⸺⁠And as for my father’s example! ’twas so far from being either aiding or abetting thereunto, that ’twas the whole business of his life to keep all fancies of that kind out of her head⁠⸺⁠Nature had done her part, to have spared him this trouble; and what was not a little inconsistent, my father knew it⁠⸺⁠And here am I sitting, this 12th day of August 1766, in a purple jerkin and yellow pair of slippers, without either wig or cap on, a most tragicomical completion of his prediction, “That I should neither think, nor act like any other man’s child, upon that very account.”

The mistake in my father, was in attacking my mother’s motive, instead of the act itself; for certainly keyholes were made for other purposes; and considering the act, as an act which interfered with a true proposition, and denied a keyhole to be what it was⁠⸻it became a violation of nature; and was so far, you see, criminal.

It is for this reason, an’ please your Reverences, That keyholes are the occasions of more sin and wickedness, than all other holes in this world put together.

⸻which leads me to my uncle Toby’s amours.

Though the corporal had been as good as his word in putting my uncle Toby’s great ramallie-wig into pipes, yet the time was too short to produce any great effects from it: it had lain many years squeezed up in the corner of his old campaign trunk; and as bad forms are not so easy to be got the better of, and the use of candle-ends not so well understood, it was not so pliable a business as one would have wished. The corporal with cheary eye and both arms extended, had fallen back perpendicular from it a score times, to inspire it, if possible, with a better air⁠⸺⁠had spleen given a look at it, ’twould have cost her ladyship a smile⁠⸺⁠it curl’d everywhere but where the corporal would have it; and where a buckle or two, in his opinion, would have done it honour, he could as soon have raised the dead.

Such it was⁠⸺⁠or rather such would it have seem’d upon any other brow; but the sweet look of goodness which sat upon my uncle Toby’s, assimilated everything around it so sovereignly to itself, and Nature had moreover wrote Gentleman with so fair a hand in every line of his countenance, that even his tarnish’d gold-laced hat and huge cockade of flimsy taffeta became him; and though not worth a button in themselves, yet the moment my uncle Toby put them on, they became serious objects, and altogether seem’d to have been picked up by the hand of Science to set him off to advantage.

Nothing in this world could have cooperated more powerfully towards this, than my uncle Toby’s blue and gold⁠⸺⁠had not Quantity in some measure been necessary to Grace: in a period of fifteen or sixteen years since they had been made, by a total inactivity in my uncle Toby’s life, for he seldom went further than the bowling-green⁠—his blue and gold had become so miserably too strait for him, that it was with the utmost difficulty the corporal was able to get him into them; the taking them up at the sleeves, was of no advantage.⁠⸺⁠They were laced however down the back, and at the seams of the sides, etc., in the mode of King William’s reign; and to shorten all description, they shone so bright against the sun that morning, and had so metallick and doughty an air with them, that had my uncle Toby thought of attacking in armour, nothing could have so well imposed upon his imagination.

As for the thin scarlet breeches, they had been unripp’d by the tailor between the legs, and left at sixes and sevens⁠⸺⁠

⸺⁠Yes, Madam,⁠⸺⁠but let us govern our fancies. It is enough they were held impracticable the night before, and as there was no alternative in my uncle Toby’s wardrobe, he sallied forth in the red plush.

The corporal had array’d himself in poor Le Fever’s regimental coat; and with his hair tuck’d up under his Montero-cap, which he had furbish’d up for the occasion, march’d three paces distant from his master: a whiff of military pride had puff’d out his shirt at the wrist; and upon that in a black leather thong clipp’d