every year of that
century, from the first creation of the world down to Noah's flood; and
from Noah's flood to the birth of Abraham; through all the pilgrimages
of the patriarchs, to the departure of the Israelites out of Egypt--and
throughout all the Dynasties, Olympiads, Urbeconditas, and other
memorable epochas of the different nations of the world, down to the
coming of Christ, and from thence to the very moment in which the
corporal was telling his story--had my uncle Toby subjected this vast
empire of time and all its abysses at his feet; but as Modesty scarce
touches with a finger what Liberality offers her with both hands
open--the corporal contented himself with the very worst year of the
whole bunch; which, to prevent your honours of the Majority and Minority
from tearing the very flesh off your bones in contestation, 'Whether
that year is not always the last cast-year of the last cast-almanack'--I
tell you plainly it was; but from a different reason than you wot of--

--It was the year next him--which being the year of our Lord seventeen
hundred and twelve, when the Duke of Ormond was playing the devil
in Flanders--the corporal took it, and set out with it afresh on his
expedition to Bohemia.

The Story of the King of Bohemia and His Seven Castles, Continued.

In the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and twelve, there
was, an' please your honour--

--To tell thee truly, Trim, quoth my uncle Toby, any other date would
have pleased me much better, not only on account of the sad stain upon
our history that year, in marching off our troops, and refusing to cover
the siege of Quesnoi, though Fagel was carrying on the works with such
incredible vigour--but likewise on the score, Trim, of thy own story;
because if there are--and which, from what thou hast dropt, I partly
suspect to be the fact--if there are giants in it--

There is but one, an' please your honour--

--'Tis as bad as twenty, replied my uncle Toby--thou should'st have
carried him back some seven or eight hundred years out of harm's way,
both of critics and other people: and therefore I would advise thee, if
ever thou tellest it again--

--If I live, an' please your honour, but once to get through it, I
will never tell it again, quoth Trim, either to man, woman, or
child--Poo--poo! said my uncle Toby--but with accents of such sweet
encouragement did he utter it, that the corporal went on with his story
with more alacrity than ever.