Note 18 — Chapter III

“She was in black down to her toes, with her hair concealed under a cambric border, laid close to the forehead: she was one of those kind of nuns, and please your honour, of which there are a good many in Flanders.” “By thy description Trim,” said my uncle Toby, “I dare say she was a young Beguine, of whom there are none to be found any where, except in the Spanish Netherlands, they differ from other nuns in this, that they can quit their cloisters, if they chose to marry—they visit, and take care of the sick by profession, but I had rather, for my own part, they did it out of good nature.”—Sterne.