As he said at the end of the previous chapter, Tristram has coach trouble before he gets to Lyons. He sells the wreck, thinking, as he collects the money, about his ability to salvage something out of every disaster (including a sexual one involving his "dear Jenny").
In Lyons, he intends to see the "great clock of Lippius of Basil," "the thirty volumes of the general history of China, [written] . . .in the Chinese character," "the house where Pontius Pilate lived," and the tomb of the two unfortunate lovers, Amandus and Amanda. (First, he learns that the putative house of Pontius Pilate is in the next town, not in Lyons.) The story of the unfortunate lovers, separated for most of their lives, appeals strongly to him: when they were finally reunited, "they fly into each others arms, and both drop down dead for joy."
On his way to the sights, he is stopped by an ass eating "turnip tops and cabbage-leaves," which is blocking the gate. "Honesty," as he calls the ass, is eating a bitter artichoke stem, and Tristram is moved to feed him a cookie: "Thou hast not a friend perhaps in all this world that will give thee a macaroon." Lest the reader think him sentimental, Tristram confesses that there was more of interest in "seeing how an ass would eat a macaroon — than of benevolence in giving him one." Someone beats the ass and drives it away, and Tristram's breeches are torn by a ragged edge of the pannier.
His trousers fixed, he sets out again; at the same spot he meets the person who had driven off the ass. It is a "commissary" who has come to collect "some six livres odd sons" that Tristram supposedly owes for the coach trips he has canceled. Having decided to continue his journey by boat, Tristram doesn't see why he should also pay for the coach he isn't taking: "Bon Dieu! what, pay for the way I go! and for the way I do not go!" The commissary points out that he may go by coach if he chooses. Seeing that he must finally pay, Tristram decides to get his money's worth; he plays the part of the persecuted foreigner. The commissary patiently explains that if one decides to discontinue his journey by coach, he must give notice two stops before; since Tristram didn't do this, he must pay the fare for two more stops.
