Chapter C: H a P. XXXVIII

THE Fates, who certainly all fore-knew of these amours of widow _Wadman_ and my uncle _Toby_, had, from the first creation of matter and motion (and with more courtesy than they usually do things of this kind), established such a chain of causes and effects hanging so fast to one another, that it was scarce possible for my uncle _Toby_ to have dwelt in any other house in the world, or to have occupied any other garden in _Christendom_, but the very house and garden which join’d and laid parallel to Mrs. _Wadman_’s; this, with the advantage of a thickset arbour in Mrs. _Wadman_’s garden, but planted in the hedge-row of my uncle _Toby_’s, put all the occasions into her hands which Love-militancy wanted; she could observe my uncle _Toby_’s motions, and was mistress likewise of his councils of war; and as his unsuspecting heart had given leave to the corporal, through the mediation of _Bridget_, to make her a wicker-gate of communication to enlarge her walks, it enabled her to carry on her approaches to the very door of the sentry-box; and sometimes out of gratitude, to make an attack, and endeavour to blow my uncle _Toby_ up in the very sentry-box itself.