The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman/Volume 3/Chapter 26
CHAP. XXVI.
When Trim came in and told my father, that Dr. Slop was in the kitchen, and busy in making a bridge,—my uncle Toby,—the affair of the jack-boots having just then raised a train of military ideas in his brain,—took it in- stantly for granted that Dr. Slop was making a model of the marquis d'Hôpital's bridge.—'Tis very obliging in him, quoth my uncle Toby;—pray give my humble service to Dr. Slop, Trim, and tell him I thank him heartily.
Had my uncle Toby's head been a Savoyard's box, and my father peeping in all the time at one end of it,—it could not have given him a more distinct conception of the operations in my uncle Toby's imagination, than what he had; so notwithstanding the catapulta and battering-ram, and his bitter imprecation about them, he was just beginning to triumph.———
When Trim's answer, in an instant, tore the laurel from his brows, and twisted it to pieces.