parallel with the allies, who pressed theirs on so vigorously, that they scarcely allowed him time to get his dinner, that nevertheless he gave up Dendermond, though he had already made a lodgment upon the counterscarp; and bent his whole thoughts towards the distresses at the inn; and, except that he ordered the garden gate to be bolted up, by which he might be said to have turned the siege of Dendermond into a blockade, he left Dendermond to itself, to be relieved or not by the French king, as the French king thought good; and only considered how he himself should relieve the poor lieutenant and his son.

That kind Being, who is a friend to the friendless, shall recompense thee for this.

“Thou hast left this matter short,” said my uncle Toby to the corporal as he was putting him to bed, “and I will tell thee in what, Trim. In the first place, when thou madest an offer of my services to Le Fevre, as sickness and travelling are both expensive, and thou knowest he was but a poor lieutenant, with a son to subsist as well as himself out of his pay, that thou didst not make an offer to him of my purse; because, had he stood in need, thou knowest, Trim, he had been as welcome to it as myself.” “Your honour knows,” said the corporal, “I had no orders.” “True,” quoth my uncle Toby, “thou didst very right, Trim, as a soldier, but certainly very wrong as a man.

“In the second place, for which indeed thou hast the same excuse,” continued my uncle Toby, “when thou offeredest him whatever was in my house, thou shouldst have the offered him my house too: a sick brother officer should have the best quarters, Trim, and if we had him with us, we could tend and look to him: thou art an excellent nurse thyself, Trim, and what with thy care of him, and the old woman’s, and his boy’s, and mine together, we might recruit him again at once, and set him upon his legs.

“In a fortnight or three weeks,” added my uncle Toby, smiling, “he might march.” “He will never march, an’ please your honour, in this world,” said the corporal. “He will march,” said my uncle Toby, rising up from the side of the bed, with one shoe off. “An’ please your honour,” said the corporal, “he will never march but to his grave.” “He shall march,” cred my uncle Toby, marching the foot which had a shoe on, though without advancing an inch, “he shall march to his regiment.” “He cannot stand it,” said the corporal. “He shall be supported,” said my uncle Toby. “He’ll drop at last,” said the corporal, “and what will become of his boy?” “He shall not drop,” said my uncle Toby, firmly. “A-well-a-day, do what we can for him,” said Trim, maintaining his point, “the poor soul will die.” “He shall not die, by God!” cried my uncle Toby.

The accusing Spirit, which flew up to heaven’s chancery with the oath, blushed as he gave it in; and the Recording Angel, as he wrote it down, dropped a tear upon the word, and blotted it out for ever.

My uncle Toby went to his bureau, put his purse into his breeches pocket, and having ordered the corporal to go early in the morning for a physician, he went to bed, and fell fast asleep.

The sun looked bright the morning after, to every eye in the village but Le Fevre’s and his afflicted son’s; the hand of death pressed heavy upon his eyelids, and hardly could the wheel at the cistern turn round its circle, when my uncle Toby, who had risen an hour before his wonted time, entered the lieutenant’s room, and without preface or apology, sat himself down upon the chair by the beside, and independently of all modes and customs, opened the curtain in the manner an old friend and brother officer would have done it, and asked him how he did—how he had rested in the night—w hat was his complaint—w here was his pain—and what he could do to help him—and without giving him time to answer any one of the enquiries, went on and told him of the little plan which he had been concerting with the corporal the night before for him.

“You shall go home directly, Le Fevre,” said my uncle Toby, “to my house—and we’ll send for a doctor to see what’s the matter—and we’ll have an apothecary—and the corporal shall be your nurse—and I’ll be your servant, Le Fevre.”

There was a frankness in my uncle Toby, not the effect of familiarity, but the cause of it, which let you at once into his soul, and showed you the goodness of his nature; to this there was something in his