The poor fellow had been disabled for the service by a wound on his left
knee by a musket bullet at the Battle of Landen, which was two years
before the affair of Namur; and as the fellow was well-beloved in the
regiment, and a handy fellow into the bargain, my Uncle Toby took him
for his servant, and of excellent use was he, attending my Uncle Toby in
the camp and in his quarters as valet, groom, barber, cook, sempster,
and nurse; and indeed, from first to last, waited upon him and served
him with great fidelity and affection.

My Uncle Toby loved the man in return, and what attached him more to him
still, was the similitude of their knowledge; for Corporal Trim by four
years occasional attention to his master's discourse upon fortified
towns had become no mean proficient in the science, and was thought by
the cook and chambermaid to know as much of the nature of strongholds as
my Uncle Toby himself.

"If I durst presume," said Trim, "to give your honour my advice, and
speak my opinion in this matter"--"Thou art welcome, Trim," quoth my
Uncle Toby. "Why then," replied Trim, pointing with his right hand
towards a map of Dunkirk: "I think with humble submission to your
honour's better judgement, that the ravelins, bastions, and curtains,
make but a poor, contemptible, fiddle-faddle piece of work of it here
upon paper, compared to what your honour and I could make of it were we
out in the country by ourselves, and had but a rood and a half of ground
to do what we pleased with. As summer is coming on," continued Trim,
"your honour might sit out of doors and give me the nography"--(call it
icnography, quoth my uncle)--"of the town or citadel your honour was
pleased to sit down before, and I will be shot by your honour upon the
glacis of it if I did not fortify it to your honour's mind."--"I dare
say thou wouldst, Trim," quoth my uncle. "I would throw out the earth,"