have a meaning;

and as he was a musical man, I will make no doubt but that, by some quaint application of such metaphors to the compositions in hand, they impressed very distinct ideas of their several characters upon his fancy,-whatever they may do upon that of others.

Amongst these, there is that particular sermon which has unaccountably led me into this digression.The funeral-sermon upon poor Le Fevre, wrote out very fairly, as if from a hasty copy.-I take notice of it the more, because it seems to have been his favourite composition.—It is upon mortality; and is tied lengthways and cross- ways with a yarn thrum, and then rolled up and twisted round with a half-sheet of dirty blue paper, which seems to have been once the cast cover of a general review, which to this day smells horribly of horse-drugs.—Whether these marks of humiliation were designed, I something doubt;because at the end of the sermon (and not at the beginning of it)-very different from his way of treating the rest, he had wrote

Bravo!

-Though not very offensively, for it was at two inches, at least, and a half's distance from and below the concluding line of the sermon, at the very extremity of the page, and in that right-hand corner of it which, you know, is generally covered with your thumb: and, to do it justice, it is wrote besides with a crow's quill so faintly in a small Italian hand, as scarce to solicit the eye towards the place, whether your thumb is there or not;-so that, from the manner of it, it stands half excused; and being wrote, moreover, with very pale ink, diluted almost to nothing,'tis more like a ritratto of the shadow of Vanity than of Vanity herself, of the two; resembling rather a

faint thought of transient applause, secretly stirring up in the heart of the composer, than a gross mark of it, coarsely obtruded upon the world.

With all these extenuations, I am aware, that, in publishing this, I do no service to Yorick's character as a modest man ;-but all men have their failings! and what lessens this still farther, and almost wipes it away is this, That the word was struck through sometime afterwards (as appears from a different tint of the ink) with a line quite across it, in this manner, Brave, as if he had retracted, or was ashamed of the opinion he had once entertained of it.

These short characters of his sermons were always written, except in this one instance, upon the first leaf of his sermon, which served as a cover to it; and usually upon the inside of it, which was turned towards the text; but at the end of his discourse, where, perhaps, he had five or six pages, and sometimes, perhaps, a whole score to turn himself in,-he took a larger circuit, and, indeed, a much more mettlesome one; as if he had snatched the occasion of unlacing himself with a few more frolick some strokes at vice, than the straitness of the pulpit allowed.—These, though, hussar-like, they skirmish lightly and out of all order, are still auxiliaries on the side of Virtue.— Tell me, then, Mynheer Vander Blonederdondergewdenstronke, why they should not be printed together?

CHAPTER XII.

WHEN my uncle Toby had turned everything into money, and settled all accounts betwixt the agent of the regiment and Le Fevre, and betwixt Le Fevre and all mankind, there remained nothing more in my uncle Toby's hands than an old regimental coat and sword; so that my uncle Toby found little or no opposition from the world in taking administration. The coat, my uncle Toby gave the corporal.-Wear it, Trim, said my uncle Toby, as long as it will hold together, for the sake of the poor Lieutenant.-And this-said my uncle Toby, taking up the sword in his hand, and drawing it out of the scabbard as he spoke,—and this, Le Fevre, I'll save for thee;-'tis all the fortune, continued my uncle Toby, hanging it up upon a crook, and pointing to it, 'tis all the fortune, my dear Le Fevre, which God has left thee; but if he has given thee heart to fight thy way with it in the world,—and thou doest it like a man of honour,-'tis enough for us.

As soon as my uncle Toby had laid a foundation, and taught him to inscribe a regular polygon in a circle, he sent him to a public school, where,-excepting Whitsuntide and Christmas, at which time the Corporal was punctually despatched for him, he remained to the spring of the year seventeen; when the stories of the Emperor's sending his army into Hungary against the Turks, kindling a spark of fire in his bosom, he left his Greek and Latin without leave, and throwing himself upon his knees before my uncle Toby, begged his father's sword, and my uncle Toby's leave along with it, to go and try his fortune under

Eugene. Twice did my uncle Toby forget his wound, and cry out, Le Fevre, I will go with thee, and thou shalt fight beside me!-and twice he laid his hand upon his groin, and hung down his head in sorrow and disconsolation.

My uncle Toby took down the sword from the crook, where it had hung untouched ever since the Lieutenant's death, and delivered it to the Corporal to brighten up;-and having detained Le Fevre a single fortnight to equip him, and contract for his passage to Leghorn, he put the sword into his hand, -If thou art brave, Le Fevre, said my uncle Toby, this will not fail thee;-but Fortune said he (musing a little) Fortune may-and if she does,-added my uncle Toby, embracing him,-come back again to me, Le Fevre, and we will shape thee another

course.

The greatest injury could not have oppressed the heart of Le Fevre more than my uncle Toby's paternal kindness; he parted from my uncle Toby as the best of sons from the best of fathers :-both dropped tears; and, as my uncle Toby gave him his last kiss, he slipped sixty guineas, tied up in an old purse of his father's, in which was his mother's ring, into his hand,—and bid God bless him.

CHAPTER XIII.

LE FEVRE got up to the Imperial army just time enough to try what metal his sword was made of, at the defeat of the Turks before Belgrade; but a series of unmerited mischances had pursued him from that mo

ment, and trod close upon his heels for four years together after. He had withstood these buffetings to the last, till sickness overtook him at Marseilles; from whence he wrote my uncle Toby word, he had lost his time, his services, his health, and, in short, every thing but his sword;—and was waiting for the first ship, to return back to him.

As this letter came to hand about six weeks before Susannah's accident, Le Fevre was hourly expected; and was uppermost in my uncle Toby's mind all the time my father was giving him and Yorick a description of what kind of a person he would choose for a preceptor to me: but as my uncle Toby thought my father at first somewhat fanciful in the accomplishments he required, he forebore mentioning Le Fevre's name, -till the character, by Yorick's interposition, ending, unexpectedly, in one who should be gentle-tempered, and generous, and good, it impressed the image of Le Fevre, and his interest, upon my uncle Toby so forcibly, that he rose instantly off his chair; and laying down. his pipe, in order to take hold of both my father's hands, I beg, brother Shandy, said my uncle Toby, I may recommend poor Le Fevre's son to you. -I beseech you, do! added Yorick.He has a good heart, said my uncle Toby And a brave one too, an' please your Honour, said the Corporal.

-The best hearts, Trim, are ever the bravest replied my uncle Toby. And the greatest cowards, an' please your Honour, in our regiment, were the greatest rascals in it.-There was Serjeant Kumber, and Ensign

We'll talk of them, said my father, another time.