of glowing heat—it might, notwithstanding that, be a bite as well as a burn; and if so, that possibly a Newt or an Asker , or some such detested reptile, had crept up, and was fastening his teeth⸺the horrid idea of which, with a fresh glow of pain arising that instant from the chesnut, seized Phutatorius with a sudden panick, and in the first terrifying disorder of the passion, it threw him, as it has done the best generals upon earth, quite off his guard:⸺the effect of which was this, that he leapt incontinently up, uttering as he rose that interjection of surprise so much descanted upon, with the aposiopestic break after it, marked thus, Z⸺ds—which, though not strictly canonical, was still as little as any man could have said upon the occasion;⸻and which, by the by, whether canonical or not, Phutatorius could no more help than he could the cause of it.
Though this has taken up some time in the narrative, it took up little more time in the transaction, than just to allow for Phutatorius to draw forth the chesnut, and throw it down with violence upon the floor—and for Yorick to rise from his chair, and pick the chesnut up.
It is curious to observe the triumph of slight incidents over the mind:⸺What incredible weight they have in forming and governing our opinions, both of men and things⸺that trifles, light as air, shall waft a belief into the soul, and plant it so immoveably within it⸺that Euclid’s demonstrations, could they be brought to batter it in breach, should not all have power to overthrow it.
Yorick , I said, picked up the chesnut which Phutatorius’s wrath had flung down⸺the action was trifling⸺I am ashamed to account for it—he did it, for no reason, but that he thought the chesnut not a jot worse for the adventure—and that he held a good chesnut worth stooping for.⸻But this incident, trifling as it was, wrought differently in Phutatorius’s head: He considered this act of Yorick’s in getting off his chair and picking up the chesnut, as a plain