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 LeFevre, as sickness and traveling are both expensive, and thou knewest 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 honor knows,” said the corporal, “I had no orders.”  “True,” quoth my uncle Toby, “thou did’st 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 offeredst him whatever was in my house, thou shouldst have 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 honor, in this world,” said the corporal.  “He will march,” said my uncle Toby, rising from the side of the bed with one shoe off.  “An’, please your honor,” said the corporal, “he will never march, but to his grave.”  “He shall march,” cried my uncle Toby, marching the foot which had a shoe on, though without advancing an inch, “he shall march to his regiment.”  “He can not 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.  “Ah, welladay, do what we can for him,” said Trim, maintaining his point, “the poor soul will die.”  “He shall not die, by G—­d,” 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 forever.

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 asleep.

The sun looked bright the morning after to every eye in the village but LeFevre’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 rose up an hour before his wonted time, entered the lieutenant’s room, and, without preface or apology, set himself down upon the chair by the bedside, and