Or whether the corporal began to be suspicious, he had got into the doctor’s quarters, and was talking more like the chaplain than himself------ Or whether - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Or whether----for in all such cases a man of invention and parts may with pleasure fill a couple of pages with suppositions----which of all these was the cause, let the curious physiologist, or the curious anybody determine----’tis certain, at least, the corporal went on thus with his harangue. For my own part, I declare it, that out of doors, I value not death at all: --not this ... added the corporal, snapping his fingers, --but with an air which no one but the corporal could have given to the sentiment. --In battle, I value death not this . . . and let him not take me cowardly, like poor _Joe Gibbins_, in scouring his gun --What is he? A pull of a trigger--a push of a bayonet an inch this way or that--makes the difference. --Look along the line--to the right--see! _Jack’s_ down! well, --’tis worth a regiment of horse to him. --No--’tis _Dick_. Then _Jack’s_ no worse. --Never mind which, --we pass on, --in hot pursuit the wound itself which brings him is not felt, --the best way is to stand up to him, --the man who flies, is in ten times more danger than the man who marches up into his jaws. --I’ve look’d him, added the corporal, an hundred times in the face, --and know what he is. --He’s nothing, _Obadiah_, at all in the field. --But he’s very frightful in a house, quoth _Obadiah_. ----I never mind it myself, said _Jonathan_, upon a coach-box. --It must, in my opinion, be most natural in bed, replied _Susannah_. --And could I escape him by creeping into the worst calf’s skin that ever was made into a knapsack, I would do it there--said _Trim_--but that is nature. ----Nature is nature, said _Jonathan_. --And that is the reason, cried _Susannah_, I so much pity my mistress. --She will never get the better of it. --Now I pity the captain the most of any one in the family, answered _Trim_. ----Madam will get ease of heart in weeping, --and the Squire in talking about it, --but my poor master will keep it all in silence to himself, --I shall hear him sigh in his bed for a whole month together, as he did for lieutenant _Le Fever_. --An’ please your honour, do not sigh so piteously, I would say to him as I laid besides him. I cannot help it, _Trim_, my master would say, ----’tis so melancholy an accident --I cannot get it off my heart. --Your honour fears not death yourself. --I hope, _Trim_, I fear nothing, he would say, but the doing a wrong thing. ----Well, he would add, whatever betides, I will take care of _Le Fever’s_ boy. --And with that, like a quieting draught, his honour would fall asleep.