Tell me then, my dear brother _Shandy_, upon which of them it is, that when I condemned the peace of _Utrecht_, and grieved the war was not carried on with vigour a little longer, you should think your brother did it upon unworthy views; or that in wishing for war, he should be bad enough to wish more of his fellow-creatures slain,—more slaves made, and more families driven from their peaceful habitations, merely for his own pleasure:——Tell me, brother _Shandy_, upon what one deed of mine do you ground it? [_The devil a deed do I know of, dear_ Toby, _but one for a hundred pounds, which I lent thee to carry on these cursed sieges._] If, when I was a school-boy, I could not hear a drum beat, but my heart beat with it—was it my fault?——Did I plant the propensity there?——Did I sound the alarm within, or Nature? When _Guy_, Earl of _Warwick_, and _Parismus_ and _Parismenus_, and _Valentine_ and _Orson_, and the _Seven Champions of England_, were handed around the school,—were they not all purchased with my own pocket-money? Was that selfish, brother _Shandy_? When we read over the siege of _Troy_, which lasted ten years and eight months,——though with such a train of artillery as we had at _Namur_, the town might have been carried in a week—was I not as much concerned for the destruction of the _Greeks_ and _Trojans_ as any boy of the whole school? Had I not three strokes of a ferula given me, two on my right hand, and one on my left, for calling _Helena_ a bitch for it? Did any one of you shed more tears for _Hector?_ And when king _Priam_ came to the camp to beg his body, and returned weeping back to _Troy_ without it,—you know, brother, I could not eat my dinner.—— ——Did that bespeak me cruel? Or because, brother _Shandy_, my blood flew out into the camp, and my heart panted for war,—was it a proof it could not ache for the distresses of war too? O brother! ’tis one thing for a soldier to gather laurels,—and ’tis another to scatter cypress.——[_Who told thee, my dear Toby, that cypress was used by the antients on mournful occasions?_ ] ——’Tis one thing, brother _Shandy_, for a soldier to hazard his own life—to leap first down into the trench, where he is sure to be cut in pieces:——’Tis one thing, from public spirit and a thirst of glory, to enter the breach the first man,—to stand in the foremost rank, and march bravely on with drums and trumpets, and colours flying about his ears:——’Tis one thing, I say, brother _Shandy_, to do this,—and ’tis another thing to reflect on the miseries of war;—to view the desolations of whole countries, and consider the intolerable fatigues and hardships which the soldier himself, the instrument who works them, is forced (for sixpence a day, if he can get it) to undergo.