The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman - Laurence Sterne [124]
Alas! alas! cries Slawkenbergius, making an exclamation—it is not the first—and I fear will not be the last fortress that has been either won——or lost by NOSES.
The END of
Slawkenbergius’s TALE.
*As Hafen Slawkenbergius de Nasis is extremely scarce, 1 it may not be unacceptable to the learned reader to see the specimen of a few pages of his original; I will make no reflection upon it, but that his story-telling Latin is much more concise than his philosophic—and, I think, has more of Latinity in it.
*Hafen Slawkenbergius means the Benedictine nuns of Cluny, founded in the year 940, by Odo, abbé de Cluny.
†Mr. Shandy’s compliments to orators—is very sensible that Slawkenbergius has here changed his metaphor—which he is very guilty of;—that as a translator, Mr. Shandy has all along done what he could to make him stick to it—but that here ’twas impossible.
*Nonnulli ex nostratibus eadem loquendi formulâ utun. Quinimo et Logistæ & Canonistæ—Vid. Parce Bar & Jas in d. L. Provincial.Constitut. de conjec. vid. Vol. Lib. 4. Titul. 1. N. 7. quà etiam in re conspir. Om. de Promontorio Nas. Tichmak. ff. d. tit. 3. fol. 189. passim. Vid. Glos. de contrahend. empt. &c. nec non J. Scrudr. in cap. §. refut. ff. per totum. cum his cons. Rever. J. Tubal, Sentent. & Prov. cap. 9. ff. 11, 12. obiter. V. et Librum, cui Tit. de Terris & Phras. Belg. ad finem, cum Comment. N. Bardy Belg. Vid. Scrip. Argentoratens. de Antiq. Ecc. in Episc. Archiv. fid. coll. per Von Jacobum Koinshoven Folio Argent. 1583, præcip. ad finem. Quibus add. Rebuff in L. obvenire de Signif. Nom. ff. fol. & de Jure, Gent. & Civil. de prohib. aliena feud. per federa, test. Joha. Luxius in prolegom. quem velim videas, de Analy. Cap. 1, 2, 3. Vid. Idea.
*Hæc mira, satisque horrenda. 5 Planetarum coitio sub Scorpio Asterismo in nonâ cœli statione, quam Arabes religioni deputabant effecit Martinum Lutherum sacrilegum hereticum, christianæ religionis hostem acerrimum atque prophanum, ex horoscopi directione ad Martis coitum, religiosissimus obiit, ejus Anima scelestissima ad infernos navigavit—ab Alecto, Tisiphone et Megera flagellis igneis cruciata perenniter.
—Lucas Gauricus in Tractatu astrologico de præteritis multorum hominum accidentibus per genituras examinatis.41
CHAP. I
With all this learning upon Noses running perpetually in my father’s fancy—with so many family prejudices—and ten decads of such tales running on for ever along with them—how was it possible with such exquisite—was it a true nose?—That a man with such exquisite feelings as my father had, could bear the shock at all below stairs—or indeed above stairs, in any other posture, but the very posture I have described.
—Throw yourself down upon the bed, a dozen times—taking care only to place a looking-glass first in a chair on one side of it, before you do it——But was the stranger’s nose a true nose—or was it a false one?
To tell that before-hand, madam, would be to do injury to one of the best tales in the christian world; and that is the tenth of the tenth decad which immediately follows this.
This tale, crieth Slawkenbergius somewhat exultingly, has been reserved by me for the concluding tale of my whole work; knowing right well, that when I shall have told it, and my reader shall have read it thro’—’twould be even high time for both of us to shut up the book; inasmuch, continues Slawkenbergius, as I know of no tale which could possibly ever go down after it.
—’tis a tale indeed!
This sets out with the first interview in the inn at Lyons, when Fernandez left the courteous stranger and his sister Julia alone in her chamber, and is overwritten,
The INTRICACIES
of
Diego and Julia.
Heavens! thou art a strange creature Slawkenbergius! what a whimsical view of the involutions of the heart of woman hast thou opened! how this can ever be translated, and yet if this specimen of Slawkenbergius