The fair Beguine, said the corporal, continued rubbing with her whole hand under my knee—till I fear’d her zeal would weary her——“I would do a thousand times more,” said she, “for the love of Christ”——In saying which, she pass’d her hand across the flannel, to the part above my knee, which I had equally complain’d of, and rubb’d it also.
I perceived, then, I was beginning to be in love——
As she continued rub-rub-rubbing—I felt it spread from under her hand, an’ please your honour, to every part of my frame.——
The more she rubb’d, and the longer strokes she took——the more the fire kindled in my veins——till at length, by two or three strokes longer than the rest——my passion rose to the highest pitch——I seiz’d her hand——
——And then thou clapped’st it to thy lips, Trim, said my uncle Toby——and madest a speech.
Whether the corporal’s amour terminated precisely in the way my uncle Toby described it, is not material; it is enough that it contained in it the essence of all the love romances which ever have been wrote since the beginning of the world.
[ CHAPTER XXIII]
As soon as the corporal had finished the story of his amour—or rather my uncle Toby for him—Mrs. Wadman silently sallied forth from her arbour, replaced the pin in her mob, pass’d the wicker-gate, and advanced slowly towards my uncle Toby’s sentry-box: the disposition which Trim had made in my uncle Toby’s mind, was too favourable a crisis to be let slipp’d——
——The attack was determin’d upon: it was facilitated still more by my uncle Toby’s having ordered the corporal to wheel off the pioneer’s shovel, the spade, the pick-axe, the picquets, and other military stores which lay scatter’d upon the ground where Dunkirk stood—the corporal had march’d—the field was clear.
Now, consider, sir, what nonsense it is, either in fighting, or writing, or anything else (whether in rhyme to it, or not) which a man has occasion to do—to act by plan: for if ever Plan, independent of all circumstances, deserved registering in letters of gold (I mean in the archives of Gotham)—it was certainly the Plan of Mrs. Wadman’s attack of my uncle Toby in his sentry-box, by Plan——Now the plan hanging up in it at this juncture, being the Plan of Dunkirk—and the tale of Dunkirk a tale of relaxation, it opposed every impression she could make: and besides, could she have gone upon it—the manœuvre of fingers and hands in the attack of the sentry-box, was so outdone by that of the fair Beguine’s, in Trim’s story—that just then, that particular attack, however successful before—became the most heartless attack that could be made——