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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/6689.txt b/6689.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..651ed7a --- /dev/null +++ b/6689.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6531 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Fielding, by Austin Dobson + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: Fielding + (English Men of Letters Series) + +Author: Austin Dobson + +Release Date: October, 2004 [EBook #6689] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on January 13, 2003] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FIELDING *** + + + + +Produced by Tonya Allen, Charles Aldarondo, Charles Franks +and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team + + + + +ENGLISH MEN OF LETTERS + +FIELDING + +BY AUSTIN DOBSON + + + + +PREFATORY NOTE. + + +From a critical point of view, the works of Fielding have received +abundant examination at the hands of a long line of distinguished +writers. Of these, the latest is by no means the least; and as Mr. +Leslie Stephen's brilliant studies, in the recent _edition de luxe_ and +the _Cornhill Magazine_, are now in every one's hands, it is perhaps no +more than a wise discretion which has prompted me to confine my +attention more strictly to the purely biographical side of the subject. +In the present memoir, therefore, I have made it my duty, primarily, to +verify such scattered anecdotes respecting Fielding as have come down to +us; to correct (I hope not obtrusively) a few mis-statements which have +crept into previous accounts; and to add such supplementary details as I +have been able to discover for myself. + +In this task I have made use of the following authorities:-- + +I. Arthur Murphy's _Essay on the Life and Genius of Henry Fielding, +Esq._ This was prefixed to the first collected edition of Fielding's +works published by Andrew Millar in April 1762; and it continued for a +long time to be the recognised authority for Fielding's life. It is +possible that it fairly reproduces his personality, as presented by +contemporary tradition; but it is misleading in its facts, and +needlessly diffuse. Under pretence of respecting "the Manes of the +dead," the writer seems to have found it pleasanter to fill his space +with vagrant discussions on the "Middle Comedy of the Greeks" and the +machinery of the _Rape of the Lock_, than to make the requisite +biographical inquiries. This is the more to be deplored, because, in +1762, Fielding's widow, brother, and sister, as well as his friend +Lyttelton, were still alive, and trustworthy information should have +been procurable. + +II. Watson's _Life of Henry Fielding, Esq_. This is usually to be found +prefixed to a selection of Fielding's works issued at Edinburgh. It also +appeared as a volume in 1807, although there is no copy of it in this +form at the British Museum. It carries Murphy a little farther, and +corrects him in some instances. But its author had clearly never even +seen the _Miscellanies_ of 1743, with their valuable Preface, for he +speaks of them as one volume, and in apparent ignorance of their +contents. + +III. Sir Walter Scott's biographical sketch for Ballantyne's _Novelist's +Library_. This was published in 1821; and is now included in the +writer's _Miscellaneous Prose Works_. Sir Walter made no pretence to +original research, and even spoke slightingly of this particular work; +but it has all the charm of his practised and genial pen. + +IV. Roscoe's Memoir, compiled for the one-volume edition of Fielding, +published by Washbourne and others in 1840. + +V. Thackeray's well-known lecture, in the _English Humourists of the +Eighteenth Century_, 1853. + +VI. _The Life of Henry Fielding; with Notices of his Writings, his +Times, and his Contemporaries_. By Frederick Lawrence. 1855. This is an +exceedingly painstaking book; and constitutes the first serious attempt +at a biography. Its chief defect--as pointed out at the time of its +appearance--is an ill-judged emulation of Forster's _Goldsmith_. The +author attempted to make Fielding a literary centre, which is +impossible; and the attempt has involved him in needless digressions. He +is also not always careful to give chapter and verse for his statements. + +VII. Thomas Keightley's papers _On the Life and Writings of Henry +Fielding_ in _Fraser's Magazine_ for January and February 1858. These, +prompted by Mr. Lawrence's book, are most valuable, if only for the +author's frank distrust of his predecessors. They are the work of an +enthusiast, and a very conscientious examiner. If, as reported, Mr. +Keightley himself meditated a life of Fielding, it is much to be +regretted that he never carried out his intention. + +Upon the two last-mentioned works I have chiefly relied in the +preparation of this study. I have freely availed myself of the material +that both authors collected, verifying it always, and extending it +wherever I could. Of my other sources of information--pamphlets, +reviews, memoirs, and newspapers of the day--the list would be too long; +and sufficient references to them are generally given in the body of the +text. I will only add that I think there is scarcely a quotation of +importance in these pages which has not been compared with the original; +and, except where otherwise stated, all extracts from Fielding himself +are taken from the first editions. + +At this distance of time, new facts respecting a man of whom so little +has been recorded require to be announced with considerable caution. +Some definite additions to Fielding lore I have, however, been enabled +to make. Thanks to the late Colonel J. L. Chester, who was engaged, only +a few weeks before his death, in friendly investigations on my behalf, I +am able to give, for the first time, the date and place of Fielding's +second marriage, and the baptismal dates of all the children by that +marriage, except the eldest. I am also able to fix approximately the +true period of his love-affair with Miss Sarah Andrew. From the original +assignment at South Kensington I have ascertained the exact sum paid by +Millar for _Joseph Andrews_; and in chapter v. will be found a series of +extracts from a very interesting correspondence, which does not appear +to have been hitherto published, between Aaron Hill, his daughters, and +Richardson, respecting _Tom Jones_. Although I cannot claim credit for +the discovery, I believe the present is also the first biography of +Fielding which entirely discredits the unlikely story of his having been +a stroller at Bartholomew Fair; and I may also, I think, claim to have +thrown some additional light on Fielding's relations with the Cibbers, +seeing that the last critical essay upon the author of the _Apology_ +which I have met with, contains no reference to Fielding at all. For +such minor novelties as the passage from the _Universal Spectator_, and +the account of the projected translation of Lucian, etc., the reader is +referred to the book itself, where these, and other waifs and strays, +are duly indicated. If, in my endeavour to secure what is freshest, I +have at the same time neglected a few stereotyped quotations, which have +hitherto seemed indispensable in writing of Fielding, I trust I may be +forgiven. + +Brief as it is, the book has not been without its obligations. To Mr. B. +F. Sketchley, Keeper of the Dyce and Forster Collections at South +Kensington, I am indebted for reference to the Hill correspondence, and +for other kindly offices; to Mr. Frederick Locker for permission to +collate Fielding's last letter with the original in his possession. My +thanks are also due to Mr. R. Arthur Kinglake, J.P., of Taunton; to the +Rev. Edward Hale of Eton College, the Rev. G. C. Green of Modbury, +Devon, the Rev. W. S. Shaw of Twerton-on-Avon, and Mr. Richard Garnett +of the British Museum. Without some expression of gratitude to the last +mentioned, it would indeed be almost impossible to conclude any modern +preface of this kind. If I have omitted the names of others who have +been good enough to assist me, I must ask them to accept my +acknowledgments although they are not specifically expressed. + +EALING, _March_ 1883. + + + + +I have taken advantage of the present issue to add, in the form of +Appendices, some supplementary particulars which have come to my +knowledge since the book was first published. The most material of these +is the curious confirmation and extension of Fielding's love affair with +Sarah Andrew. Besides these additions, a few necessary rectifications +have been made in the text. + +A. D. + +EALING, _April_ 1889. + + + + +The approaching bi-centenary (April 22, 1907) of Fielding's birth +affords a pretext for bringing together, in a fourth Appendix, some +additional particulars which have been discovered or established since +the issue of the last edition of this Memoir. These particulars relate +to his pedigree, his residence at Leyden as a student, his marriage to +his first wife Charlotte Cradock, his Will, his library, his family and +some other minor matters. + +A. D. + +EALING. _March_ 1907. + + + + +CONTENTS. + + +CHAPTER I. + +EARLY YEARS--FIRST PLAYS + +CHAPTER II. + +MORE PLAYS--MARRIAGE--THE LICENSING ACT + +CHAPTER III. + +THE CHAMPION--JOSEPH ANDREWS + +CHAPTER IV. + +THE MISCELLANIES--JONATHAN WILD + +CHAPTER V. + +TOM JONES + +CHAPTER VI. + +JUSTICE LIFE--AMELIA + +CHAPTER VII. + +THE JOURNAL OF A VOYAGE TO LISBON + +POSTSCRIPT + +APPENDIX No. I. + +FIELDING AND SARAH ANDREW + +APPENDIX No. II. + +FIELDING AND MRS. HUSSEY + +APPENDIX No. III. + +AMELIA'S ACCIDENT + +APPENDIX No. IV. + +FlELDINGIANA + +INDEX + + + + +CHAPTER I. + +EARLY YEARS--FIRST PLAYS. + + +Like his contemporary Smollett, Henry Fielding came of an ancient +family, and might, in his Horatian moods, have traced his origin to +Inachus. The lineage of the house of Denbigh, as given in Burke, fully +justifies the splendid but sufficiently quoted eulogy of Gibbon. From +that first Jeffrey of Hapsburgh, who came to England, _temp._ Henry +III., and assumed the name of Fieldeng, or Filding, "from his father's +pretensions to the dominions of Lauffenbourg and Rinfilding," the future +novelist could boast a long line of illustrious ancestors. There was a +Sir William Feilding killed at Tewkesbury, and a Sir Everard who +commanded at Stoke. Another Sir William, a staunch Royalist, was created +Earl of Denbigh, and died in fighting King Charles's battles. Of his two +sons, the elder, Basil, who succeeded to the title, was a +Parliamentarian, and served at Edgehill under Essex. George, his second +son, was raised to the peerage of Ireland as Viscount Callan, with +succession to the earldom of Desmond; and from this, the younger branch +of the Denbigh family, Henry Fielding directly descended. The Earl of +Desmond's fifth son, John, entered the Church, becoming Canon of +Salisbury and Chaplain to William III. By his wife Bridget, daughter of +Scipio Cockain, Esq., of Somerset, he had three sons and three +daughters. Edmund, the third son, was a soldier, who fought with +distinction under Marlborough. When about the age of thirty, he married +Sarah, daughter of Sir Henry Gould, Knt., of Sharpham Park, near +Glastonbury, in Somerset, and one of the Judges of the King's Bench. +These last were the parents of the novelist, who was born at Sharpham +Park on the 22d of April 1707. One of Dr. John Fielding's nieces, it may +here be added, married the first Duke of Kingston, becoming the mother +of Lady Mary Pierrepont, afterwards Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, who was +thus Henry Fielding's second cousin. She had, however, been born in +1689, and was consequently some years his senior. + +According to a pedigree given in Nichols (_History and Antiquities of +the County of Leicester_), Edmund Fielding was only a lieutenant when he +married; and it is even not improbable (as Mr. Keightley conjectures +from the nearly secret union of _Lieutenant_ Booth and Amelia in the +later novel) that the match may have been a stolen one. At all events, +the bride continued to reside at her father's house; and the fact that +Sir Henry Gould, by his will made in March 1706, left his daughter +L3000, which was to be invested "in the purchase either of a Church or +Colledge lease, or of lands of Inheritance," for her sole use, her +husband having "nothing to doe with it," would seem (as Mr. Keightley +suggests) to indicate a distrust of his military, and possibly +impecunious, son-in-law. This money, it is also important to remember, +was to come to her children at her death. Sir Henry Gould did not long +survive the making of his will, and died in March 1710. [Footnote: Mr. +Keightley, who seems to have seen the will, dates it--doubtless by a +slip of the pen--May 1708. Reference to the original, however, now at +Somerset House, shows the correct date to be March 8, 1706, before which +time the marriage of Fielding's parents must therefore be placed.] The +Fieldings must then have removed to a small house at East Stour (now +Stower), in Dorsetshire, where Sarah Fielding was born in the following +November. It may be that this property was purchased with Mrs. +Fielding's money; but information is wanting upon the subject. At East +Stour, according to the extracts from the parish register given in +Hutchins's _History of Dorset_, four children were born,--namely, Sarah, +above mentioned, afterwards the authoress of _David Simple_, Anne, +Beatrice, and another son, Edmund. Edmund, says Arthur Murphy, "was an +officer in the marine service," and (adds Mr. Lawrence) "died young." +Anne died at East Stour in August 1716. Of Beatrice nothing further is +known. These would appear to have been all the children of Edmund +Fielding by his first wife, although, as Sarah Fielding is styled on her +monument at Bath the _second_ daughter of General Fielding, it is not +impossible that another daughter may have been born at Sharpham Park. + +At East Stour the Fieldings certainly resided until April 1718, when +Mrs. Fielding died, leaving her elder son a boy of not quite eleven +years of age. How much longer the family remained there is unrecorded; +but it is clear that a great part of Henry Fielding's childhood must +have been spent by the "pleasant Banks of sweetly-winding Stour" which +passes through it, and to which he subsequently refers in _Tom Jones_. +His education during this time was confided to a certain Mr. Oliver, +whom Lawrence designates the "family chaplain." Keightley supposes that +he was the curate of East Stour; but Hutchins, a better authority than +either, says that he was the clergyman of Motcombe, a neighbouring +village. Of this gentleman, according to Murphy, Parson Trulliber in +_Joseph Andrews_ is a "very humorous and striking portrait." It is +certainly more humorous than complimentary. + +From Mr. Oliver's fostering care--and the result shows that, whatever +may have been the pig-dealing propensities of Parson Trulliber, it was +not entirely profitless--Fielding was transferred to Eton. When this +took place is not known; but at that time boys entered the school much +earlier than they do now, and it was probably not long after his +mother's death. The Eton boys were then, as at present, divided into +collegers and oppidans. There are no registers of oppidans before the +end of the last century; but the Provost of Eton has been good enough to +search the college lists from 1715 to 1735, and there is no record of +any Henry Fielding, nor indeed of any Fielding at all. It may therefore +be concluded that he was an oppidan. No particulars of his stay at Eton +have come down to us; but it is to be presumed Murphy's statement that, +"when he left the place, he was said to be uncommonly versed in the +Greek authors, and an early master of the Latin classics," is not made +without foundation. [Footnote: Fielding's own words in the verses to +Walpole some years later scarcely go so far:-- + +"_Tuscan_ and _French_ are in my Head; _Latin_ I write, and _Greek_ I-- +read."] We have also his own authority (in _Tom_ _Jones_) for supposing +that he occasionally, if not frequently, sacrificed "with true Spartan +devotion" at the "birchen Altar," of which a representation is to be +found in Mr. Maxwell Lyte's history of the College. And it may fairly be +inferred that he took part in the different sports and pastimes of the +day, such as Conquering Lobs, Steal baggage, Chuck, Starecaps, and so +forth. Nor does it need any strong effort of imagination to conclude +that he bathed in "Sandy hole" or "Cuckow ware," attended the cock- +fights in Bedford's Yard and the bull-baiting in Bachelor's Acre, drank +mild punch at the "Christopher," and, no doubt, was occasionally brought +back by Jack Cutler, "Pursuivant of Runaways," to make his explanations +to Dr. Bland the Head-Master, or Francis Goode the Usher. Among his +school-fellows were some who subsequently attained to high dignities in +the State, and still remained his friends. Foremost of these was George +Lyttelton, later the statesman and orator, who had already commenced +poet as an Eton boy with his "Soliloquy of a Beauty in the Country." +Another was the future Sir Charles Hanbury Williams, the wit and squib- +writer, then known as Charles Hanbury only. A third was Thomas +Winnington, for whom, in after years, Fielding fought hard with brain +and pen when Tory scribblers assailed his memory. Of those who must be +regarded as contemporaries merely, were William Pitt, the "Great +Commoner," and yet greater Earl of Chatham; Henry Fox, Lord Holland; and +Charles Pratt, Earl Camden. Gilbert West, the translator of Pindar, may +also have been at Eton in Fielding's time, as he was only a year older, +and was intimate with Lyttelton. Thomas Augustine Arne, again, famous in +days to come as Dr. Arne, was doubtless also at this date practising +sedulously upon that "miserable cracked common flute," with which +tradition avers he was wont to torment his school-fellows. Gray and +Horace Walpole belong to a later period. + +During his stay at Eton, Fielding had been rapidly developing from a boy +into a young man. When he left school it is impossible to say; but he +was probably seventeen or eighteen years of age, and it is at this stage +of his career that must be fixed an occurrence which one of his +biographers places much farther on. This is his earliest recorded love- +affair. At Lyme Regis there resided a young lady, who, in addition to +great personal charms, had the advantage of being the only daughter and +heiress of one Solomon Andrew, deceased, a merchant of considerable +local reputation. Lawrence says that she was Fielding's cousin. This may +be so; but the statement is unsupported by any authority. It is certain, +however, that her father was dead, and that she was living "in maiden +meditation" at Lyme with one of her guardians, Mr. Andrew Tucker. In his +chance visits to that place, young Fielding appears to have become +desperately enamoured of her, and to have sadly fluttered the Dorset +dovecotes by his pertinacious and undesirable attentions. At one time he +seems to have actually meditated the abduction of his "flame," for an +entry in the town archives, discovered by Mr. George Roberts, sometime +Mayor of Lyme, who tells the story, declares that Andrew Tucker, Esq., +went in fear of his life "owing to the behaviour of Henry Fielding and +his attendant, or man." Such a state of things (especially when +guardians have sons of their own) is clearly not to be endured; and Miss +Andrew was prudently transferred to the care of another guardian, Mr. +Rhodes of Modbury, in South Devon, to whose son, a young gentleman of +Oxford, she was promptly married. Burke (_Landed Gentry_, 1858) dates +the marriage in 1726, a date which is practically confirmed by the +baptism of a child at Modbury in April of the following year. Burke +further describes the husband as Mr. Ambrose Rhodes of Buckland House, +Buckland-Tout-Saints. His son, Mr. Rhodes of Bellair, near Exeter, was +gentleman of the Privy Chamber to George III.; and one of his +descendants possessed a picture which passed for the portrait of Sophia +Western. The tradition of the Tucker family pointed to Miss Andrew as +the original of Fielding's heroine; but though such a supposition is +intelligible, it is untenable, since he says distinctly (Book XIII. +chap. i. of _Tom Jones_) that his model was his first wife, whose +likeness he moreover draws very specifically in another place, by +declaring that she resembled Margaret Cecil, Lady Ranelagh, and, more +nearly, "the famous Dutchess of _Mazarine_." [Footnote: See Appendix No. +I.: Fielding and Sarah Andrew.] + +With this early escapade is perhaps to be connected what seems to have +been one of Fielding's earliest literary efforts. This is a +modernisation in burlesque octosyllabic verse of part of Juvenal's sixth +satire. In the "Preface" to the later published _Miscellanies_, it is +said to have been "originally sketched out before he was Twenty," and to +have constituted "all the Revenge taken by an injured Lover." But it +must have been largely revised subsequent to that date, for it contains +references to Mrs. Clive, Mrs. Woffington, Cibber the younger, and even +to Richardson's _Pamela_. It has no special merit, although some of the +couplets have the true Swiftian turn. If Murphy's statement be correct, +that the author "went from Eton to Leyden," it must have been planned at +the latter place, where, he tells us in the preface to _Don Quixote in +England_, he also began that comedy. Notwithstanding these literary +distractions, he is nevertheless reported to have studied the civilians +"with a remarkable application for about two years." At the expiration +of this time, remittances from home failing, he was obliged to forego +the lectures of the "learned Vitriarius" (then Professor of Civil Law at +Leyden University), and return to London, which he did at the beginning +of 1728 or the end of 1727. + +The fact was that his father, never a rich man, had married again. His +second wife was a widow named Eleanor Rasa; and by this time he was fast +acquiring a second family. Under the pressure of his growing cares, he +found himself, however willing, as unable to maintain his eldest son in +London as he had previously been to discharge his expenses at Leyden. +Nominally, he made him an allowance of two hundred a year; but this, as +Fielding himself explained, "any body might pay that would." The +consequence was, that not long after the arrival of the latter in the +Metropolis he had given up all idea of pursuing the law, to which his +mother's legal connections had perhaps first attracted him, and had +determined to adopt the more seductive occupation of living by his wits. +At this date he was in the prime of youth. From the portrait by Hogarth +representing him at a time when he was broken in health and had lost his +teeth, it is difficult to reconstruct his likeness at twenty. But we may +fairly assume the "high-arched Roman nose" with which his enemies +reproached him, the dark eyes, the prominent chin, and the humorous +expression; and it is clear that he must have been tall and vigorous, +for he was over six feet when he died, and had been remarkably strong +and active. Add to this that he inherited a splendid constitution, with +an unlimited capacity for enjoyment, and we have a fair idea of Henry +Fielding at that moment of his career, when with passions "tremblingly +alive all o'er"--as Murphy says--he stood, + + "This way and that dividing the swift mind," + +between the professions of hackney-writer and hackney-coachman. His +natural bias was towards literature, and his opportunities, if not his +inclinations, directed him to dramatic writing. + +It is not necessary to attempt any detailed account of the state of the +stage at this epoch. Nevertheless, if only to avoid confusion in the +future, it will be well to enumerate the several London theatres in +1728, the more especially as the list is by no means lengthy. First and +foremost there was the old Opera House in the Haymarket, built by +Vanbrugh, as far back as 1705, upon the site now occupied by Her +Majesty's Theatre. This was the home of that popular Italian song which +so excited the anger of thorough-going Britons; and here, at the +beginning of 1728, they were performing Handel's opera of _Siroe_, and +delighting the _cognoscenti_ by _Dite che fa_, the echo-air in the same +composer's _Tolomeo_. Opposite the Opera House, and, in position, only +"a few feet distant" from the existing Haymarket Theatre, was the New, +or Little Theatre in the Haymarket, which, from the fact that it had +been opened eight years before by "the French Comedians," was also +sometimes styled the French House. Next comes the no-longer-existent +theatre in Lincoln's Inn Fields, which Christopher Rich had rebuilt in +1714, and which his son John had made notorious for pantomimes. Here the +_Beggar's Opera_, precursor of a long line of similar productions, had +just been successfully produced. Finally, most ancient of them all, +there was the Theatre-Royal in Drury Lane, otherwise the King's Play +House, or Old House. The virtual patentees at this time were the actors +Colley Cibber, Robert Wilks, and Barton Booth. The two former were just +playing the _Provok'd Husband_, in which the famous Mrs. Oldfield +(Pope's "Narcissa") had created a _furore_ by her assumption of Lady +Townley. These, in February 1728, were the four principal London +theatres. Goodman's Fields, where Garrick made his debut, was not opened +until the following year, and Covent Garden belongs to a still later +date. + +Fielding's first dramatic essay--or, to speak more precisely, the first +of his dramatic essays that was produced upon the stage--was a five-act +comedy entitled _Love in Several Masques_. It was played at Drury Lane +in February 1728, succeeding the _Provok'd Husband_. In his "Preface" +the young author refers to the disadvantage under which he laboured in +following close upon that comedy, and also in being "contemporary with +an Entertainment which engrosses the whole Talk and Admiration of the +Town,"--i.e. the _Beggar's Opera_. He also acknowledges the kindness of +Wilks and Cibber "previous to its Representation," and the fact that he +had thus acquired their suffrages makes it doubtful whether his stay at +Leyden was not really briefer than is generally supposed, or that he +left Eton much earlier. In either case he must have been in London some +months before _Love in Several Masques_ appeared, for a first play by an +untried youth of twenty, however promising, is not easily brought upon +the boards in any era; and from his own utterances in _Pasquin_, ten +years later, it is clear that it was no easier then than now. The +sentiments of the Fustian of that piece in the following protest +probably give an accurate picture of the average dramatic experiences of +Henry Fielding:-- + +"These little things, Mr. _Sneerwell_, will sometimes happen. Indeed a +Poet undergoes a great deal before he comes to his Third Night; first +with the Muses, who are humorous Ladies, and must be attended; for if +they take it into their Head at any time to go abroad and leave you, you +will pump your Brain in vain: Then, Sir, with the Master of a +_Playhouse_ to get it acted, _whom you generally follow a quarter of a +Year before you know whether he will receive it or no_; and then perhaps +he tells you it won't do, and returns it you again, reserving the +Subject, and perhaps the Name, which he brings out in his next +_Pantomime_; but if he should receive the Play, then you must attend +again to get it writ out into Parts, and Rehears'd. Well, Sir, at last +the Rehearsals begin; then, Sir, begins another Scene of Trouble with +the Actors, some of whom don't like their Parts, and all are continually +plaguing you with Alterations: At length, after having waded thro' all +these Difficulties, his [the?] Play appears on the Stage, where one Man +Hisses out of Resentment to the Author; a Second out of Dislike to the +House; a Third out of Dislike to the Actor; a Fourth out of Dislike to +the Play; a Fifth for the Joke sake; a Sixth to keep all the rest in +Company. Enemies abuse him, Friends give him up, the Play is damn'd, and +the Author goes to the Devil, so ends the Farce." + +To which Sneerwell replies, with much promptitude: + +"The Tragedy rather, I think, Mr. _Fustian_." But whatever may have been +its preliminary difficulties, Fielding's first play was not exposed to +so untoward a fate. It was well received. As might be expected in a +beginner, and as indeed the references in the Preface to Wycherley and +Congreve would lead us to expect, it was an obvious attempt in the +manner of those then all-popular writers. The dialogue is ready and +witty. But the characters have that obvious defect which Lord +Beaconsfield recognised when he spoke in later life of his own earliest +efforts. "Books written by boys," he says, "which pretend to give a +picture of manners and to deal in knowledge of human nature must +necessarily be founded on affectation." To this rule the personages of +_Love in Several Masques_ are no exception. They are drawn rather from +the stage than from life, and there is little constructive skill in the +plot. A certain booby squire, Sir Positive Trap, seems like a first +indication of some of the later successes in the novels; but the rest of +the _dramatis personae_ are puppets. The success of the piece was +probably owing to the acting of Mrs. Oldfield, who took the part of Lady +Matchless, a character closely related to the Lady Townleys and Lady +Betty Modishes, in which she won her triumphs. She seems, indeed, to +have been unusually interested in this comedy, for she consented to play +in it notwithstanding a "slight Indisposition" contracted "by her +violent Fatigue in the Part of Lady Townly," and she assisted the author +with her corrections and advice--perhaps with her influence as an +actress. Fielding's distinguished kinswoman Lady Mary Wortley Montagu +also read the MS. Looking to certain scenes in it, the protestation in +the Prologue-- + + "Nought shall offend the Fair Ones Ears to-day, + Which they might blush to hear, or blush to say"-- + +has an air of insincerity, although, contrasted with some of the +writer's later productions, _Love in Several Masques_ is comparatively +pure. But he might honestly think that the work which had received the +_imprimatur_ of a stage-queen and a lady of quality should fairly be +regarded as morally blameless, and it is not necessary to bring any bulk +of evidence to prove that the morality of 1728 differed from the +morality of to-day. + +To the last-mentioned year is ascribed a poem entitled the +"_Masquerade_. Inscribed to C--t H--d--g--r. By Lemuel Gulliver, Poet +Laureate to the King of Lilliput." In this Fielding made his satirical +contribution to the attacks on those impure gatherings organised by the +notorious Heidegger, which Hogarth had not long before stigmatised +pictorially in the plate known to collectors as the "large Masquerade +Ticket." As verse this performance is worthless, and it is not very +forcibly on the side of good manners; but the ironic dedication has a +certain touch of Fielding's later fashion. Two other poetical pieces, +afterwards included in the _Miscellanies_ of 1743, also bear the date of +1728. One is _A Description of U--n G--_ (alias _New Hog's Norton_) _in +Com. Hants_, which Mr. Keightley has identified with Upton Grey, near +Odiham, in Hampshire. It is a burlesque description of a tumbledown +country-house in which the writer was staying, and is addressed to +Rosalinda. The other is entitled _To Euthalia_, from which it must be +concluded that, in 1728, Sarah Andrew had found more than one successor. +But in spite of some biographers, and of the apparent encouragement +given to his first comedy, Fielding does not seem to have followed up +dramatic authorship with equal vigour, or at all events with equal +success. His real connection with the stage does not begin until January +1730, when the _Temple Beau_ was produced by Giffard the actor at the +theatre in Goodman's Fields, which had then just been opened by Thomas +Odell; and it may be presumed that his incentive was rather want of +funds than desire of fame. _The Temple Beau_ certainly shows an advance +upon its predecessor; but it is an advance in the same direction, +imitation of Congreve; and although Geneste ranks it among the best of +Fielding's plays, it is doubtful whether modern criticism would sustain +his verdict. It ran for a short time, and was then withdrawn. The +Prologue was the work of James Ralph, afterwards Fielding's colleague in +the _Champion_, and it thus refers to the prevailing taste. The +_Beggar's Opera_ had killed Italian song, but now a new danger had +arisen,-- + + "Humour and Wit, in each politer Age, + Triumphant, rear'd the Trophies of the Stage: + But only Farce, and Shew, will now go down, + And Harlequin's the Darling of the Town." + +As if to confirm his friend's opinion, Fielding's next piece combined +the popular ingredients above referred to. In March following he +produced at the Haymarket, under the pseudonym of Scriblerus Secundus, +_The Author's Farce_, with a "Puppet Show" called _The Pleasures of the +Town_. In the Puppet Show, Henley, the Clare-Market Orator, and Samuel +Johnson, the quack author of the popular _Hurlothrumbo_, were smartly +satirised, as also was the fashionable craze for Opera and Pantomime. +But the most enduring part of this odd medley is the farce which +occupies the two first acts, and under thin disguises no doubt depicts +much which was within the writer's experience. At all events, Luckless, +the author in the play, has more than one of the characteristics which +distinguish the traditional portrait of Fielding himself in his early +years. He wears a laced coat, is in love, writes plays, and cannot pay +his landlady, who declares, with some show of justice, that she "would +no more depend on a Benefit-Night of an un-acted Play, than she wou'd on +a Benefit-Ticket in an un-drawn Lottery." "Her Floor (she laments) is +all spoil'd with Ink--her Windows with Verses, and her Door has been +almost beat down with Duns." But the most humorous scenes in the play-- +scenes really admirable in their ironic delineation of the seamy side of +authorship in 1730--are those in which Mr. Bookweight, the publisher-- +the Curll or Osborne of the period--is shown surrounded by the obedient +hacks, who feed at his table on "good Milk-porridge, very often twice a +Day," and manufacture the murders, ghost-stories, political pamphlets, +and translations from Virgil (out of Dryden) with which he supplies his +customers. Here is one of them as good as any:-- + +"_Bookweight._ So, Mr. _Index_, what News with you? + +_Index._ I have brought my Bill, Sir. + +_Book._ What's here?--for fitting the Motto of _Risum teneatis Amici_ to +a dozen Pamphlets at Sixpence per each, Six Shillings--For _Omnia vincit +Amor, & nos cedamus Amori_, Sixpence--For _Difficile est Satyram non +scribere_, Sixpence--Hum! hum! hum! Sum total, for Thirty-six _Latin_ +Motto's, Eighteen Shillings; ditto _English_, One Shilling and Nine- +pence; ditto _Greek_, Four, Four Shillings. These _Greek_ Motto's are +excessively dear. + +_Ind._ If you have them cheaper at either of the Universities, I will +give you mine for nothing. + +_Book._ You shall have your Money immediately, and pray remember that I +must have two _Latin_ Seditious Motto's and one _Greek_ Moral Motto for +Pamphlets by to-morrow Morning.... + +_Ind._ Sir, I shall provide them. Be pleas'd to look on that, Sir, and +print me Five hundred Proposals, and as many Receipts. + +_Book._ Proposals for printing by Subscription a new Translation of +Cicero, _Of the Nature of the Gods and his Tusculan Questions_, by +_Jeremy Index_, Esq.; I am sorry you have undertaken this, for it +prevents a Design of mine. + +_Ind._ Indeed, Sir, it does not, for you see all of the Book that I ever +intend to publish. It is only a handsome Way of asking one's Friends for +a Guinea. + +_Book._ Then you have not translated a Word of it, perhaps. + +_Ind._ Not a single Syllable. + +_Book._ Well, you shall have your Proposals forthwith; but I desire you +wou'd be a little more reasonable in your Bills for the future, or I +shall deal with you no longer; for I have a certain Fellow of a College, +who offers to furnish me with Second-hand Motto's out of the _Spectator_ +for Two-pence each. + +_Ind._ Sir, I only desire to live by my Goods, and I hope you will be +pleas'd to allow some difference between a neat fresh Piece, piping hot +out of the Classicks, and old thread-bare worn-out Stuff that has past +thro' ev'ry Pedant's Mouth...." + +The latter part of this amusing dialogue, referring to Mr. Index's +translation from Cicero, was added in an amended version of the +_Author's Farce_, which appeared some years later, and in which Fielding +depicts the portrait of another all-powerful personage in the literary +life,--the actor-manager. This, however, will be more conveniently +treated under its proper date, and it is only necessary to say here that +the slight sketches of Marplay and Sparkish given in the first edition, +were presumably intended for Cibber and Wilks, with whom, +notwithstanding the "civil and kind Behaviour" for which he had thanked +them in the "Preface" to _Love in Several Masques_, the young dramatist +was now, it seems, at war. In the introduction to the Miscellanies, he +refers to "a slight Pique" with Wilks; and it is not impossible that the +key to the difference may be found in the following passage:-- + +"_Sparkish._ What dost think of the Play? + +_Marplay._ It may be a very good one, for ought I know; _but I know the +Author has no Interest_. + +_Spark._ Give me Interest, and rat the Play. + +_Mar._ Rather rat the Play which has no Interest. Interest sways as much +in the Theatre as at Court.--And you know it is not always the Companion +of Merit in either." + +The handsome student from Leyden--the potential Congreve who wrote _Love +in Several Masques_, and had Lady Mary Wortley Montagu for patroness, +might fairly be supposed to have expectations which warranted the +civilities of Messrs. Wilks and Cibber; but the "Luckless" of two years +later had probably convinced them that his dramatic performances did not +involve their _sine qua non_ of success. Under these circumstances +nothing perhaps could be more natural than that they should play their +parts in his little satire. + +We have dwelt at some length upon the _Author's Farce_, because it is +the first of Fielding's plays in which, leaving the "wit-traps" of +Wycherley and Congreve, he deals with the direct censure of contemporary +folly, and because, apart from translation and adaptation, it is in this +field that his most brilliant theatrical successes were won. For the +next few years he continued to produce comedies and farces with great +rapidity, both under his own name, and under the pseudonym of Scriblerus +Secundus. Most of these show manifest signs of haste, and some are +recklessly immodest. We shall confine ourselves to one or two of the +best, and do little more than enumerate the others. Of these latter, the +_Coffee-House Politician; or, The Justice caught in his own Trap,_ 1730, +succeeded the _Author's Farce_. The leading idea, that of a tradesman +who neglects his shop for "foreign affairs," appears to be derived from +Addison's excellent character-sketch in the _Tatler_ of the "Political +Upholsterer." This is the more likely, in that Arne the musician, whose +father is generally supposed to have been Addison's original, was +Fielding's contemporary at Eton. Justice Squeezum, another character +contained in this play, is a kind of first draft of the later Justice +Thrasher in _Amelia_. The representation of the trading justice on the +stage, however, was by no means new, since Justice Quorum in Coffey's +_Beggar's Wedding_ (with whom, as will appear presently, Fielding's name +has been erroneously associated) exhibits similar characteristics. +Omitting for the moment the burlesque of _Tom Thumb_, the _Coffee-House +Politician_ was followed by the _Letter Writers; or, A new Way to Keep a +Wife at Home_, 1731, a brisk little farce, with one vigorously drawn +character, that of Jack Commons, a young university rake; the _Grub- +Street Opera_, 1731; the farce of the _Lottery_, 1731, in which the +famous Mrs. Clive, then Miss Raftor, appeared; the _Modern Husband_, +1732; the _Covent Garden Tragedy_, 1732, a broad and rather riotous +burlesque of Ambrose Philips' _Distrest Mother_; and the _Debauchees; +or, The Jesuit Caught_, 1732--which was based upon the then debated +story of Father Girard and Catherine Cadiere. + +Neither of the two last-named pieces is worthy of the author, and their +strongest condemnation in our day is that they were condemned in their +own for their unbridled license, the _Grub Street Journal_ going so far +as to say that they had "met with the universal detestation of the +Town." The _Modern Husband_, which turns on that most loathsome of all +commercial pursuits, the traffic of a husband in his wife's dishonour, +appears, oddly enough, to have been regarded by its author with especial +complacency. Its prologue lays stress upon the moral purpose; it was +dedicated to Sir Robert Walpole; and from a couple of letters printed in +Lady Mary Wortley Montagu's _Correspondence_, it is clear that it had +been submitted to her perusal. It had, however, no great success upon +the stage, and the chief thing worth remembering about it is that it +afforded his last character to Wilks, who played the part of Bellamant. +That "slight Pique," of which mention has been made, was no doubt by +this time a thing of the past. + +But if most of the works in the foregoing list can hardly be regarded as +creditable to Fielding's artistic or moral sense, one of them at least +deserves to be excepted, and that is the burlesque of _Tom Thumb_. This +was first brought out in 1730 at the little theatre in the Hay-market, +where it met with a favourable reception. In the following year it was +enlarged to three acts (in the first version there had been but two), +and reproduced at the same theatre as the _Tragedy of Tragedies; or, The +Life and Death of Tom Thumb the Great_, "with the Annotations of H. +Scriblerus Secundus." It is certainly one of the best burlesques ever +written. As Baker observes in his _Biographia Dramatica_, it may fairly +be ranked as a sequel to Buckingham's _Rehearsal_, since it includes the +absurdities of nearly all the writers of tragedies from the period when +that piece stops to 1730. Among the authors satirised are Nat. Lee, +Thomson (whose famous + +"O Sophonisba, Sophonisba, O!" + +is parodied by + +"O Huncamunca, Huncamunca, O!"), + +Banks's _Earl of Essex_, a favourite play at Bartholomew Fair, the +_Busiris_ of Young, and the _Aurengzebe_ of Dryden, etc. The +annotations, which abound in transparent references to Dr. B[_entle_]y, +Mr. T[_heobal_]d, Mr. D[_enni_]s, are excellent imitations of +contemporary pedantry. One example, elicited in Act 1 by a reference to +"giants," must stand for many:-- + +"That learned Historian Mr. S--n in the third Number of his Criticism +on our Author, takes great Pains to explode this Passage. It is, says +he, difficult to guess what Giants are here meant, unless the Giant +_Despair_ in the _Pilgrim's Progress_, or the giant _Greatness_ in the +_Royal Villain_; for I have heard of no other sort of Giants in the +Reign of King _Arthur_. _Petnis Burmanus_ makes three _Tom Thumbs_, one +whereof he supposes to have been the same Person whom the _Greeks_ +called _Hercules_, and that by these Giants are to be understood the +_Centaurs_ slain by that Heroe. Another _Tom Thumb_ he contends to have +been no other than the _Hermes Trismegistus_ of the Antients. The third +_Tom Thumb_ he places under the Reign of King _Arthur_; to which third +_Tom Thumb_, says he, the Actions of the other two were attributed. Now, +tho' I know that this Opinion is supported by an Assertion of _Justus +Lipsius, Thomam ilium Thumbum non alium quam Herculem fuisse satis +constat_; yet shall I venture to oppose one Line of Mr. _Midwinter_, +against them all, + + _In_ Arthurs' Court Tom Thumb _did live_. + +"But then, says Dr. _B-----y_, if we place _Tom Thumb_ in the Court of +King _Arthur_, it will he proper to place that Court out of _Britain_, +where no Giants were ever heard of. _Spencer_, in his _Fairy Queen_, is +of another Opinion, where describing Albion, he says, + + Far within, a salvage Nation dwelt + Of hideous Giants. + +And in the same canto: + + Then _Elfar_ with two Brethren Giants had + The one of which had two Heads,-- + The other three. + Risum teneatis, Amici." + +Of the play itself it is difficult to give an idea by extract, as nearly +every line travesties some tragic passage once familiar to play-goers, +and now utterly forgotten. But the following lines from one of the +speeches of Lord Grizzle--a part admirably acted by Liston in later +years [Footnote: Compare Hazlitt, _On the Comic Writers of the Last +Century._]--are a fair specimen of its ludicrous use (or rather abuse) +of simile:-- + + "Yet think not long, I will my Rival bear, + Or unreveng'd the slighted Willow wear; + The gloomy, brooding Tempest now confin'd, + Within the hollow Caverns of my Mind, + In dreadful Whirl, shall rowl along the Coasts, + Shall thin the Land of all the Men it boasts, + And cram up ev'ry Chink of Hell with Ghosts. + So have I seen, in some dark Winter's Day, + A sudden Storm rush down the Sky's High-Way, + Sweep thro' the Streets with terrible ding-dong, + Gush thro' the Spouts, and wash whole Crowds along. + The crowded Shops, the thronging Vermin skreen, + Together cram the Dirty and the Clean, + And not one Shoe-Boy in the Street is seen." + +In the modern version of Kane O'Hara, to which songs were added, the +_Tragedy of Tragedies_ still keeps, or kept the stage. But its crowning +glory is its traditional connection with Swift, who told Mrs. Pilkington +that he "had not laugh'd above twice" in his life, once at the tricks of +a merry-andrew, and again when (in Fielding's burlesque) Tom Thumb +killed the ghost. This is an incident of the earlier versions, omitted +in deference to the critics, for which the reader will seek vainly in +the play as now printed; and he will, moreover, discover that Mrs. +Pilkington's memory served her imperfectly, since it is not Tom Thumb +who kills the ghost, but the ghost of Tom Thumb which is killed by his +jealous rival, Lord Grizzle. A trifling inaccuracy of this sort, +however, is rather in favour of the truth of the story than against it, +for a pure fiction would in all probability have been more precise. +Another point of interest in connection with this burlesque is the +frontispiece which Hogarth supplied to the edition of 1731. It has no +special value as a design, but it constitutes the earliest reference to +that friendship with the painter, of which so many traces are to be +found in Fielding's works. + +Hitherto Fielding had succeeded best in burlesque. But, in 1732, the +same year in which he produced the _Modern Husband_, the _Debauchees_, +and the _Covent Garden Tragedy_, he made an adaptation of Moliere's +_Medecin malgre lui_, which had already been imitated in English by Mrs. +Centlivre and others. This little piece, to which he gave the title of +the _Mock-Doctor_; or, _The Dumb Lady cur'd_, was well received. The +French original was rendered with tolerable closeness; but here and +there Fielding has introduced little touches of his own, as, for +instance, where Gregory (Sganarelle) tells his wife Dorcas (Martino), +whom he has just been beating, that as they are but one, whenever he +beats her he beats half of himself. To this she replies by requesting +that for the future he will beat the other half. An entire scene (the +thirteenth) was also added at the desire of Miss Raftor, who played +Dorcas, and thought her part too short. This is apparently intended as a +burlesque of the notorious quack Misaubin, to whom the _Mock-Doctor_ was +ironically dedicated. He was the proprietor of a famous pill, and was +introduced by Hogarth into the _Harlot's Progress_. Gregory was played +by Theophilus Cibber, and the preface contains a complimentary reference +to his acting, and the expected retirement of his father from the stage. +Neither Genest nor Lawrence gives the date when the piece was first +produced, but if the "April" on the dubious author's benefit ticket +attributed to Hogarth be correct, it must have been in the first months +of 1732. + +The cordial reception of the _Mock-Doctor_ seems to have encouraged +Fielding to make further levies upon Moliere, and he speaks of his hope +to do so in the "Preface." As a matter of fact, he produced a version of +_L'Avare_ at Drury Lane in the following year, which entirely outshone +the older versions of Shadwell and Ozell, and gained from Voltaire the +praise of having added to the original "_quelques beautes de dialogue +particulieres a sa_ (Fielding's) _nation_." Lovegold, its leading +_role_, became a stock part. It was well played by its first actor +Griffin, and was a favourite exercise with Macklin, Shuter, and (in our +own days) Phelps. + +In February 1733, when the _Miser_ was first acted, Fielding was five +and twenty. His means at this time were, in all probability, exceedingly +uncertain. The small proportion of money due to him at his mother's +death had doubtless been long since exhausted, and he must have been +almost wholly dependent upon the precarious profits of his pen. That he +was assisted by rich and noble friends to any material extent appears, +in spite of Murphy, to be unlikely. At all events, an occasional +dedication to the Duke of Richmond or the Earl of Chesterfield cannot be +regarded as proof positive. Lyttelton, who certainly befriended him in +later life, was for a great part of this period absent on the Grand +Tour, and Ralph Allen had not yet come forward. In default of the always +deferred allowance, his father's house at Salisbury (?) was no doubt +open to him; and it is plain, from indications in his minor poems, that +he occasionally escaped into the country. But in London he lived for the +most part, and probably not very worshipfully. What, even now, would be +the life of a young man of Fielding's age, fond of pleasure, careless of +the future, very liberally equipped with high spirits, and straightway +exposed to the perilous seductions of the stage? Fielding had the +defects of his qualities, and was no better than the rest of those about +him. He was manly, and frank, and generous; but these characteristics +could scarcely protect him from the terrors of the tip-staff, and the +sequels of "t'other bottle." Indeed, he very honestly and unfeignedly +confesses to the lapses of his youth in the _Journey from this World to +the Next_, adding that he pretended "to very little Virtue more than +general Philanthropy and private Friendship." It is therefore but +reasonable to infer that his daily life must have been more than usually +characterised by the vicissitudes of the eighteenth-century prodigal,-- +alternations from the "Rose" to a Clare-Market ordinary, from gold-lace +to fustian, from champagne to "British Burgundy." In a rhymed petition +to Walpole, dated 1730, he makes pleasant mirth of what no doubt was +sometimes sober truth--his debts, his duns, and his dinnerless +condition. He (the verses tell us) + + "--from his Garret can look down + On the whole Street of _Arlington_." [Footnote: Where Sir Robert lived] + +Again-- + + "The Family that dines the latest + Is in our Street esteem'd the greatest; + But latest Hours must surely fall + Before him who ne'er dines at all;" + +and + + "This too doth in my Favour speak, + Your Levee is but twice a Week; + From mine I can exclude but one Day, + My Door is quiet on a _Sunday_." + +When he can admit so much even jestingly of himself, it is but +legitimate to presume that there is no great exaggeration in the +portrait of him in 1735, by the anonymous satirist of _Seasonable +Reproof_:-- + + "_F------g_, who _yesterday_ appear'd so rough, + Clad in _coarse Frize_, and plaister'd down with _Snuff_, + See how his _Instant_ gaudy Trappings shine; + What _Play-house_ Bard was ever seen so fine! + But this, not from his _Humour_ flows, you'll say, + But mere _Necessity_;--for last Night lay + In _Pawn_, the _Velvet_ which he wears to Day." + +His work bears traces of the inequalities and irregularities of his mode +of living. Although in certain cases (e.g. the revised edition of _Tom +Thumb_) the artist and scholar seems to have spasmodically asserted +himself, the majority of his plays were hasty and ill-considered +performances, most of which (as Lady Mary said) he would have thrown +into the fire "if meat could have been got without money, and money +without scribbling." "When he had contracted to bring on a play, or a +farce," says Murphy, "it is well known, by many of his friends now +living, that he would go home rather late from a tavern, and would, the +next morning, deliver a scene to the players, written upon the papers +which had wrapped the tobacco, in which he so much delighted." It is not +easy to conceive, unless Fielding's capacities as a smoker were unusual, +that any large contribution to dramatic literature could have been made +upon the wrappings of Virginia or Freeman's Best; but that his +reputation for careless production was established among his +contemporaries is manifest from the following passage in a burlesque +_Author's Will_ published in the _Universal Spectator_ of Oldys:-- + +"_Item_, I give and bequeath to my very _negligent_ Friend _Henry +Drama_, Esq., all my INDUSTRY. And whereas the World may think this an +unnecessary Legacy, forasmuch as the said _Henry Drama_, Esq., brings on +the Stage _four Pieces_ every Season; yet as such Pieces are always +wrote with uncommon _Rapidity_, and during such fatal Intervals only as +the _Stocks_ have been on the _Fall_, this Legacy will be of use to him +to revise and correct his Works. Furthermore, for fear the said _Henry +Drama_ should make an ill Use of the said _Industry_, and expend it all +on a _Ballad Farce_, it's my Will the said Legacy should be paid him by +equal Portions, and as his Necessities may require." + +There can be little doubt that the above quotation, which is reprinted +in the _Gentleman's_ for July 1734, and seems to have hitherto escaped +inquiry, refers to none other than the "very negligent" Author of the +_Modern Husband_ and the _Old Debauchees_--in other words, to Henry +Fielding. + + + + +CHAPTER II. + +MORE PLAYS--MARRIAGE--THE LICENSING ACT. + + +The very subordinate part in the _Miser_ of "Furnish, an Upholsterer," +was taken by a third-rate actor, whose surname has been productive of no +little misconception among Henry Fielding's biographers. This was +Timothy Fielding, sometime member of the Haymarket and Drury Lane +companies, and proprietor, for several successive years, of a booth at +Bartholomew, Southwark, and other fairs. In the absence of any Christian +name, Mr. Lawrence seems to have rather rashly concluded that the +Fielding mentioned by Genest as having a booth at Bartholomew Fair in +1733 with Hippisley (the original Peachum of the _Beggar's Opera_), was +Fielding the dramatist; and the mistake thus originated at once began +that prosperous course which usually awaits any slip of the kind. It +misled one notoriously careful inquirer, who, in his interesting +chronicles of Bartholomew Fair, minutely investigated the actor's +history, giving precise details of his doings at "Bartlemy" from 1728 to +1736; but, although the theory involved obvious inconsistencies, +apparently without any suspicion that the proprietor of the booth which +stood, season after season, in the yard of the George Inn at Smithfield, +was an entirely different person from his greater namesake. The late Dr. +Rimbault carried the story farther still, and attempted to show, in +_Notes and Queries_ for May 1859, that Henry Fielding had a booth at +Tottenham Court in 1738, "subsequent to his admission into the Middle +Temple;" and he also promised to supply additional particulars to the +effect that even 1738 was not the "_last_ year of Fielding's career as a +booth-proprietor." At this stage (probably for good reasons) inquiry +seems to have slumbered, although, with the fatal vitality of error, the +statement continued (and still continues) to be repeated in various +quarters. In 1875, however, Mr. Frederick Latreille published a short +article in _Notes and Queries_, proving conclusively, by extracts from +contemporary newspapers and other sources, that the Timothy Fielding +above referred to was the real Fielding of the fairs; that he became +landlord of the Buffalo Tavern "at the corner of Bloomsbury Square" in +1733; and that he died in August 1738, his christian name, so often +suppressed, being duly recorded in the register of the neighbouring +church of St. George's, where he was buried. The admirers of our great +novelist owe Mr. Latreille a debt of gratitude for this opportune +discovery. It is true that a certain element of Bohemian picturesqueness +is lost to Henry Fielding's life, already not very rich in recorded +incident; and it would certainly have been curious if he, who ended his +days in trying to dignify the judicial office, should have begun life by +acting the part of a "trading justice," namely that of Quorum in +Coffey's _Beggar's Wedding_, which Timothy Fielding had played at Drury +Lane. But, on the whole, it is satisfactory to know that his early +experiences did not, of necessity, include those of a strolling player. +Some obscure and temporary connection with Bartholomew Fair he may have +had, as Smollett, in the scurrilous pamphlet issued in 1742, makes him +say that he blew a trumpet there in quality of herald to a collection of +wild beasts; but this is probably no more than an earlier and uglier +form of the apparition laid by Mr. Latreille. The only positive evidence +of any connection between Henry Fielding and the Smithfield carnival is, +that Theophilus Cibber's company played the _Miser_ at their booth in +August 1733. + +With the exception of the _Miser_ and an afterpiece, never printed, +entitled _Deborah; or, A Wife for you all_, which was acted for Miss +Raftor's benefit in April 1733, nothing important was brought upon the +stage by Fielding until January of the following year, when he produced +the _Intriguing Chambermaid_, and a revised version of the _Author's +Farce_. By a succession of changes, which it is impossible here to +describe in detail, considerable alterations had taken place in the +management of Drury Lane. In the first place, Wilks was dead, and his +share in the Patent was represented by his widow. Booth also was dead, +and Mrs. Booth had sold her share to Giffard of Goodman's Fields, while +the elder Cibber had retired. At the beginning of the season of 1733-34 +the leading patentee was an amateur called Highmore, who had purchased +Cibber's share. He had also purchased part of Booth's share before his +death in May 1733. The only other shareholder of importance was Mrs. +Wilks. Shortly after the opening of the theatre in September, the +greater part of the Drury Lane Company, led by the younger Cibber, +revolted from Highmore and Mrs. Wilks, and set up for themselves. +Matters were farther complicated by the fact that John Rich had not long +opened a new theatre in Covent Garden, which constituted a fresh +attraction; and that what Fielding called the "wanton affected Fondness +for foreign Musick," was making the Italian opera a dangerous rival--the +more so as it was patronised by the nobility. Without actors, the +patentees were in serious case. Miss Raftor, who about this time became +Mrs. Clive, appears, however, to have remained faithful to them, as also +did Henry Fielding. The lively little comedy of the _Intriguing +Chambermaid_ was adapted from Regnard especially for her; and in its +published form was preceded by an epistle in which the dramatist dwells +upon the "Factions and Divisions among the Players," and compliments her +upon her compassionate adherence to Mr. Highmore and Mrs. Wilks in their +time of need. The epistle is also valuable for its warm and generous +testimony to the private character of this accomplished actress, whose +part in real life, says Fielding, was that of "the best Wife, the best +Daughter, the best Sister, and the best Friend." The words are more than +mere compliment; they appear to have been true. Madcap and humourist as +she was, no breath of slander seems ever to have tarnished the +reputation of Kitty Clive, whom Johnson--a fine judge, when his +prejudices were not actively aroused--called in addition "the best +player that he ever saw." + +The _Intriguing Chambermaid_ was produced on the 15th of January 1734. +Lettice, from whom the piece was named, was well personated by Mrs. +Clive, and Colonel Bluff by Macklin, the only actor of any promise that +Highmore had been able to secure. With the new comedy the _Author's +Farce_ was revived. It would be unnecessary to refer to this again, but +for the additions that were made to it. These consisted chiefly in the +substitution of Marplay Junior for Sparkish, the actor-manager of the +first version. The death of Wilks may have been a reason for this +alteration; but a stronger was no doubt the desire to throw ridicule +upon Theophilus Cibber, whose behaviour in deserting Drury Lane +immediately after his father had sold his share to Highmore had not +passed without censure, nor had his father's action escaped sarcastic +comment. Theophilus Cibber--whose best part was Beaumont and Fletcher's +Copper Captain, and who carried the impersonation into private life, had +played in several of Fielding's pieces; but Fielding had linked his +fortunes to those of the patentees, and was consequently against the +players in this quarrel. The following scene was accordingly added to +the farce for the exclusive benefit of "Young Marplay":-- + +"_Marplay junior._ Mr. _Luckless_, I kiss your Hands--Sir, I am your +most obedient humble Servant; you see, Mr. _Luckless_, what Power you +have over me. I attend your Commands, tho' several Persons of Quality +have staid at Court for me above this Hour. + +_Luckless._ I am obliged to you--I have a Tragedy for your House, Mr. +_Marplay_. + +_Mar. jun._ Ha! if you will send it me, I will give you my Opinion of +it; and if I can make any Alterations in it that will be for its +Advantage, I will do it freely. + +_Witmore._ Alterations, Sir? + +_Mar. jun._ Yes, Sir, Alterations--I will maintain it, let a Play be +never so good, without Alteration it will do nothing. + +_Wit._ Very odd indeed. + +_Mar. jun._ Did you ever write, Sir? + +_Wit._ No, Sir, I thank Heav'n. + +_Mar. jun._ Oh! your humble Servant--your very humble Servant, Sir. When +you write yourself you will find the Necessity of Alterations. Why, Sir, +wou'd you guess that I had alter'd _Shakespear_? + +_Wit._ Yes, faith, Sir, no one sooner. + +_Mar. jun._ Alack-a-day! Was you to see the Plays when they are brought +to us--a Parcel of crude, undigested Stuff. We are the Persons, Sir, who +lick them into Form, that mould them into Shape--The Poet make the Play +indeed! The Colour-man might be as well said to make the Picture, or the +Weaver the Coat: My Father and I, Sir, are a Couple of poetical Tailors; +when a Play is brought us, we consider it as a Tailor does his Coat, we +cut it, Sir, we cut it: And let me tell you, we have the exact Measure +of the Town, we know how to fit their Taste. The Poets, between you and +me, are a Pack of ignorant-- + +_Wit._ Hold, hold, sir. This is not quite so civil to Mr. _Luckless_: +Besides, as I take it, you have done the Town the Honour of writing +yourself. + +_Mar. jun._ Sir, you are a Man of Sense; and express yourself well. I +did, as you say, once make a small Sally into _Parnassus_, took a sort +of flying Leap over _Helicon_: But if ever they catch me there again-- +Sir, the Town have a Prejudice to my Family; for if any Play you'd have +made them ashamed to damn it, mine must. It was all over Plot. It wou'd +have made half a dozen Novels: Nor was it cram'd with a pack of Wit- +traps, like _Congreve_ and _Wycherly_, where every one knows when the +Joke was coming. I defy the sharpest Critick of 'em all to know when any +Jokes of mine were coming. The Dialogue was plain, easy, and natural, +and not one single Joke in it from the Beginning to the End: Besides, +Sir, there was one Scene of tender melancholy Conversation, enough to +have melted a Heart of Stone; and yet they damn'd it: And they damn'd +themselves; for they shall have no more of mine. + +_Wit._ Take pity on the Town, Sir. + +_Mar. jun._ I! No, Sir, no. I'll write no more. No more; unless I am +forc'd to it. + +_Luckless._ That's no easy thing, _Marplay_. + +_Mar. jun._ Yes, Sir. Odes, Odes, a Man may be oblig'd to write those +you know." These concluding lines plainly refer to the elder Cibber's +appointment as Laureate in 1730, and to those "annual Birth-day +Strains," with which he so long delighted the irreverent; while the +alteration of Shakespeare and the cobbling of plays generally, satirised +again in a later scene, are strictly in accordance with contemporary +accounts of the manners and customs of the two dictators of Drury Lane. +The piece indicated by Marplay Junior was probably Theophilus Cibber's +_Lover_, which had been produced in January 1731 with very moderate +success. + +After the _Intriguing Chambermaid_ and the revived _Author's Farce_, +Fielding seems to have made farther exertions for "the distressed Actors +in Drury Lane." He had always been an admirer of Cervantes, frequent +references to whose master-work are to be found scattered through his +plays; and he now busied himself with completing and expanding the loose +scenes of the comedy of _Don Quixote in England_, which (as before +stated) he had sketched at Leyden for his own diversion. He had already +thought of bringing it upon the stage, but had been dissuaded from doing +so by Cibber and Booth, who regarded it as wanting in novelty. Now, +however, he strengthened it by the addition of some election scenes, in +which--he tells Lord Chesterfield in the dedication--he designed to give +a lively representation of "the Calamities brought on a Country by +general Corruption;" and it was duly rehearsed. But unexpected delays +took place in its production; the revolted players returned to Drury +Lane; and, lest the actors' benefits should further retard its +appearance by postponing it until the winter season, Fielding +transferred it to the Haymarket, where, according to Geneste, it was +acted in April 1734. As a play, _Don Quixote in England_ has few stage +qualities and no plot to speak of. But the Don with his whimsies, and +Sancho with his appetite and string of proverbs, are conceived in +something of the spirit of Cervantes. Squire Badger, too, a rudimentary +Squire Western, well represented by Macklin, is vigorously drawn; and +the song of his huntsman Scut, beginning with the fine line "The dusky +Night rides down the Sky," has a verse that recalls a practice of which +Addison accuses Sir Roger de Coverley:-- + + _"A brushing Fox in yonder Wood, + Secure to find we seek; + For why, I carry'd sound and good, + A Cartload there last Week._ + And a Hunting we will go." + +The election scenes, though but slightly attached to the main story, are +keenly satirical, and considering that Hogarth's famous series of +kindred prints belongs to a much later date, must certainly have been +novel, as may be gathered from the following little colloquy between Mr. +Mayor and Messrs. Guzzle and Retail:-- + +"_Mayor_ (_to Retail_) ....I like an Opposition, because otherwise a Man +may be oblig'd to vote against his Party; therefore when we invite a +Gentleman to stand, we invite him to spend his Money for the Honour of +his Party; and when both Parties have spent as much as they are able, +every honest Man will vote according to his Conscience. + +_Guz._ Mr. Mayor talks like a Man of Sense and Honour, and it does me +good to hear him. + +_May._ Ay, ay, Mr. _Guzzle_, I never gave a Vote contrary to my +Conscience. I have very earnestly recommended the Country-Interest to +all my Brethren: But before that, I recommended the Town-Interest, that +is, the interest of this Corporation; and first of all I recommended to +every particular Man to take a particular Care of himself. And it is +with a certain way of Reasoning, That he who serves me best, will serve +the Town best; and he that serves the Town best, will serve the Country +best." + +In the January and February of 1735 Fielding produced two more pieces at +Drury Lane, a farce and a five-act comedy. The farce--a lively trifle +enough--was _An Old Man taught Wisdom_, a title subsequently changed to +the _Virgin Unmasked_. It was obviously written to display the talents +of Mrs. Clive, who played in it her favourite character of a hoyden, +and, after "interviewing" a number of suitors chosen by her father, +finally ran away with Thomas the footman--a course in those days not +without its parallel in high life, above stairs as well as below. It +appears to have succeeded, though Bookish, one of the characters, was +entirely withdrawn in deference to some disapprobation on the part of +the audience; while the part of Wormwood, a lawyer, which is found in +the latest editions, is said to have been "omitted in representation." +The comedy, entitled _The Universal Gallant_; or, _The different +Husbands_, was scarcely so fortunate. Notwithstanding that Quin, who, +after an absence of many years, had returned to Drury Lane, played a +leading part, and that Theophilus Cibber in the hero, Captain Smart, +seems to have been fitted with a character exactly suited to his talents +and idiosyncrasy, the play ran no more than three nights. Till the third +act was almost over, "the _Audience_," says the _Prompter_ (as quoted by +"Sylvanus Urban"), "sat quiet, in hopes it would mend, till finding it +grew _worse_ and _worse_, they lost all Patience, and not an +_Expression_ or _Sentiment_ afterwards pass'd without its deserved +_Censure_." Perhaps it is not to be wondered at that the author--"the +prolifick _Mr. Fielding_," as the _Prompter_ calls him, attributed its +condemnation to causes other than its lack of interest. In his +_Advertisement_ he openly complains of the "cruel Usage" his "poor Play" +had met with, and of the barbarity of the young men about town who made +"a Jest of damning Plays"--a pastime which, whether it prevailed in this +case or not, no doubt existed, as Sarah Fielding afterwards refers to it +in _David Simple_. If an author--he goes on to say--"be so unfortunate +[_as_] to depend on the success of his Labours for his Bread, he must be +an inhuman Creature indeed, who would out of sport and wantonness +prevent a Man from getting a Livelihood in an honest and inoffensive +Way, and make a jest of starving him and his Family." The plea is a good +one if the play is good; but if not, it is worthless. In this respect +the public are like the French Cardinal in the story; and when the +famished writer's work fails to entertain them, they are fully justified +in doubting his _raison d'etre_. There is no reason for supposing that +the _Universal Gallant_ deserved a better fate than it met with. + +Judging from the time which elapsed between the production of this play +and that of _Pasquin_ (Fielding's next theatrical venture), it has been +conjectured that the interval was occupied by his marriage, and brief +experience as a Dorsetshire country gentleman. The exact date of his +marriage is not known, though it is generally assumed to have taken +place in the beginning of 1735. But it may well have been earlier, for +it will be observed that in the above quotation from the Preface to the +_Universal Gallant_, which is dated from "Buckingham Street, Feb. 12," +he indirectly speaks of "his family." This, it is true, may be no more +than the pious fraud of a bachelor; but if it be taken literally, we +must conclude that his marriage was already so far a thing of the past +that he was already a father. This supposition would account for the +absence of any record of the birth of a child during his forthcoming +residence at East Stour, by the explanation that it had already happened +in London; and it is not impossible that the entry of the marriage, too, +may be hidden away in some obscure Metropolitan parish register, since +those of Salisbury have been fruitlessly searched. At this distance of +time, however, speculation is fruitless; and, in default of more +definite information, the "spring of 1735," which Keightley gives, must +be accepted as the probable date of the marriage. + +Concerning the lady, the particulars are more precise. She was a Miss +Charlotte Cradock, one of three sisters living upon their own means at +Salisbury, or--as it was then styled--New Sarum. Mr. Keightley's +personal inquiries, _circa_ 1858, elicited the information that the +family, now extinct, was highly respectable, but not of New Sarum's best +society. Richardson, in one of his malevolent outbursts, asserted that +the sisters were illegitimate; but, says the writer above referred to, +"of this circumstance we have no other proof, and I am able to add that +the tradition of Salisbury knows nothing of it." + +They were, however, celebrated for their personal attractions; and if +the picture given in chap. ii. book iv. of _Tom Jones_ accurately +represents the first Mrs. Fielding, she must have been a most charming +brunette. Something of the stereotyped characteristics of a novelist's +heroine obviously enter into the description; but the luxuriant black +hair, which, cut "to comply with the modern Fashion," "curled so +gracefully in her Neck," the lustrous eyes, the dimple in the right +cheek, the chin rather full than small, and the complexion having "more +of the Lilly than of the Rose," but flushing with exercise or modesty, +are, doubtless, accurately set down. In speaking of the nose as "exactly +regular," Fielding appears to have deviated slightly from the truth; for +we learn from Lady Louisa Stuart that, in this respect, Miss Cradock's +appearance had "suffered a little" from an accident mentioned in book +ii. of _Amelia_, the overturning of a chaise. Whether she also possessed +the mental qualities and accomplishments which fell to the lot of Sophia +Western, we have no means of determining; but Lady Stuart is again our +authority for saying that she was as amiable as she was handsome. + +From the love-poems in the first volume of the _Miscellanies_ of 1743-- +poems which their author declares to have been "Productions of the Heart +rather than of the Head"--it is clear that Fielding had been attached to +his future wife for several years previous to 1735. One of them, _Advice +to the Nymphs of New S----m_, celebrates the charms of Celia--the +poetical equivalent for Charlotte--as early as 1730; another, containing +a reference to the player Anthony Boheme, who died in 1731, was probably +written at the same time; while a third, in which, upon the special +intervention of Jove himself, the prize of beauty is decreed by Venus to +the Salisbury sisters, may be of an earlier date than any. The year 1730 +was the year of his third piece, the _Author's Farce_, and he must +therefore have been paying his addresses to Miss Cradock not very long +after his arrival in London. This is a fact to be borne in mind. So +early an attachment to a good and beautiful girl, living no farther off +than Salisbury, where his own father probably resided, is scarcely +consistent with the reckless dissipation which has been laid to his +charge, although, on his own showing, he was by no means faultless. But +it is a part of natures like his to exaggerate their errors in the +moment of repentance; and it may well be that Henry Fielding, too, was +not so black as he painted himself. Of his love-verses he says--"this +Branch of Writing is what I very little pretend to;" and it would be +misleading to rate them highly, for, unlike his literary descendant, Mr. +Thackeray, he never attained to any special quality of note. But some of +his octosyllabics, if they cannot be called equal to Prior's, fall +little below Swift's. "I hate"--cries he in one of the pieces, + + "I hate the Town, and all its Ways; + Ridotto's, Opera's, and Plays; + The Ball, the King, the Mall, the Court; + Wherever the Beau-Monde resort.... + All Coffee-Houses, and their Praters; + All Courts of Justice, and Debaters; + All Taverns, and the Sots within 'em; + All Bubbles, and the Rogues that skin 'em," + +--and so forth, the natural anti-climax being that he loves nothing but +his "Charmer" at Salisbury. In another, which is headed _To Celia-- +Occasioned by her apprehending her House would be broke open, and having +an old Fellow to guard it, who sat up all Night, with a Gun without any +Ammunition_, and from which it has been concluded that the Miss Cradocks +were their own landlords, Venus chides Cupid for neglecting to guard her +favourite:-- + + "'Come tell me, Urchin, tell no lies; + Where was you hid, in _Vince's_ eyes? + Did you fair _Bennet's_ Breast importune? + (I know you dearly love a Fortune.)' + Poor _Cupid_ now began to whine; + 'Mamma, it was no Fault of mine. + I in a Dimple lay _perdue_, + That little Guard-Room chose by you. + A hundred Loves (all arm'd) did grace + The Beauties of her Neck and Face; + Thence, by a Sigh I dispossest, + Was blown to _Harry Fielding's_ Breast; + Where I was forc'd all Night to stay, + Because I could not find my Way. + But did Mamma know there what Work + I've made, how acted like a Turk; + What Pains, what Torment he endures, + Which no Physician ever cures, + She would forgive.' The Goddess smil'd, + And gently chuck'd her wicked Child, + Bid him go back, and take more Care, + And give her Service to the Fair." + +Swift, in his _Rhapsody on Poetry_, 1733, coupled Fielding with Leonard +Welsted as an instance of sinking in verse. But the foregoing, which he +could not have seen, is scarcely, if at all, inferior to his own +_Birthday Poems to Stella_. [Footnote: Swift afterwards substituted "the +laureate [Cibber]" for "Fielding," and appears to have changed his mind +as to the latter's merits. "I can assure Mr. _Fielding_," says Mrs. +Pilkington in the third and last volume of her _Memoirs_ (1754), "the +Dean had a high opinion of his Wit, which must be a Pleasure to him, as +no Man was ever better qualified to judge, possessing it so eminently +himself."] + +The history of Fielding's marriage rests so exclusively upon the +statements of Arthur Murphy that it will be well to quote his words in +full:-- + +"Mr. Fielding had not been long a writer for the stage, when he married +Miss Craddock [_sic_], a beauty from Salisbury. About that time, his +mother dying, a moderate estate, at Stower in Dorsetshire, devolved to +him. To that place he retired with his wife, on whom he doated, with a +resolution to bid adieu to all the follies and intemperances to which he +had addicted himself in the career of a town-life. But unfortunately a +kind of family-pride here gained an ascendant over him; and he began +immediately to vie in splendour with the neighbouring country 'squires. +With an estate not much above two hundred pounds a-year, and his wife's +fortune, which did not exceed fifteen hundred pounds, he encumbered +himself with a large retinue of servants, all clad in costly yellow +liveries. For their master's honour, these people could not descend so +low as to be careful in their apparel, but, in a month or two, were +unfit to be seen; the 'squire's dignity required that they should be +new-equipped; and his chief pleasure consisting in society and convivial +mirth, hospitality threw open his doors, and, in less than three years, +entertainments, hounds, and horses, entirely devoured a little +patrimony, which, had it been managed with oeconomy, might have secured +to him a state of independence for the rest of his life, etc." + +This passage, which has played a conspicuous part in all biographies of +Fielding, was very carefully sifted by Mr. Keightley, who came to the +conclusion that it was a "mere tissue of error and inconsistency." +[Footnote: Some of Mr. Keightley's criticisms were anticipated by +Watson.] Without going to this length, we must admit that it is +manifestly incorrect in many respects. If Fielding married in 1735 +(though, as already pointed out, he may have married earlier, and +retired to the country upon the failure of the _Universal Gallant_), he +is certainly inaccurately described as "not having been long a _writer_ +for the stage," since writing for the stage had been his chief +occupation for seven years. Then again his mother had died as far back +as April 10, 1718, when he was a boy of eleven; and if he had inherited +anything from her, he had probably been in the enjoyment of it ever +since he came of age. Furthermore, the statement as to "three years" is +at variance with the fact that, according to the dedication to the +_Universal Gallant_, he was still in London in February 1735, and was +back again managing the Haymarket in the first months of 1736. Murphy, +however, may only mean that the "estate" at East Stour was in his +possession for three years. Mr. Keightley's other points--namely, that +the "tolerably respectable farm-house," in which he is supposed to have +lived, was scarcely adapted to "splendid entertainments," or "a large +retinue of servants;" and that, to be in strict accordance with the +family arms, the liveries should have been not "yellow," but white and +blue--must be taken for what they are worth. On the whole, the +probability is, that Murphy's words were only the careless repetition of +local tittle-tattle, of much of which, as Captain Booth says pertinently +in _Amelia_, "the only basis is lying." The squires of the neighbourhood +would naturally regard the dashing young gentleman from London with the +same distrustful hostility that Addison's "Tory Foxhunter" exhibited to +those who differed with him in politics. It would be remembered, +besides, that the new-comer was the son of another and an earlier +Fielding of less pretensions, and no real cordiality could ever have +existed between them. Indeed, it may be assumed that this was the case, +for Booth's account of the opposition and ridicule which he--"a poor +renter!"--encountered when he enlarged his farm and set up his coach has +a distinct personal accent. That he was lavish, and lived beyond his +means, is quite in accordance with his character. The man who, as a Bow +Street magistrate, kept open house on a pittance, was not likely to be +less lavish as a country gentleman, with L1500 in his pocket, and newly +married to a young and handsome wife. "He would have wanted money," said +Lady Mary, "if his hereditary lands had been as extensive as his +imagination;" and there can be little doubt that the rafters of the old +farm by the Stour, with the great locust tree at the back, which is +figured in Hutchins's _History of Dorset_, rang often to hunting +choruses, and that not seldom the "dusky Night rode down the Sky" over +the prostrate forms of Harry Fielding's guests. [Footnote: An +interesting relic of the East Stour residence has recently been +presented by Mr. Merthyr Guest (through Mr. R. A. Kinglake) to the +Somersetshire Archaeological Society. It is an oak table of solid +proportions, and bears on a brass plate the following inscription, +emanating from a former owner:--"This table belonged to Henry Fielding, +Esq., novelist. He hunted from East Stour Farm, 1718, and in three years +dissipated his fortune keeping hounds." In 1718, it may be observed, +Fielding was a boy of eleven. Probably the whole of the latter sentence +is nothing more than a distortion of Murphy.] But even L1500, and (in +spite of Murphy) it is by no means clear that he had anything more, +could scarcely last for ever. Whether his footmen wore yellow or not, a +few brief months found him again in town. That he was able to rent a +theatre may perhaps be accepted as proof that his profuse hospitalities +had not completely exhausted his means. + +The moment was a favourable one for a fresh theatrical experiment. The +stage-world was split up into factions, the players were disorganised, +and everything seemed in confusion. Whether Fielding himself conceived +the idea of making capital out of this state of things, or whether it +was suggested to him by some of the company who had acted _Don Quixote +in England_, it is impossible to say. In the first months of 1736, +however, he took the little French Theatre in the Haymarket, and opened +it with a company which he christened the "Great Mogul's Company of +Comedians," who were further described as "having dropped from the +Clouds." The "Great Mogul" was a name sometimes given by playwrights to +the elder Cibber; but there is no reason for supposing that any allusion +to him was intended on this occasion. The company, with the exception of +Macklin, who was playing at Drury Lane, consisted chiefly of the actors +in _Don Quixote in England_; and the first piece was entitled _Pasquin: +a Dramatick Satire on the Times: being the Rehearsal of Two Plays, viz. +a Comedy call'd the Election, and a Tragedy call'd the Life and Death of +Common-Sense_. The form of this work, which belongs to the same class as +Sheridan's _Critic_ and Buckingham's _Rehearsal_, was probably +determined by Fielding's past experience of the public taste. His latest +comedy had failed, and its predecessors had not been very successful. +But his burlesques had met with a better reception, while the election +episodes in _Don Quixote_ had seemed to disclose a fresh field for the +satire of contemporary manners. And in the satire of contemporary +manners he felt his strength lay. The success of _Pasquin_ proved he had +not miscalculated, for it ran more than forty nights, drawing, if we may +believe the unknown author of the life of Theophilus Cibber, numerous +and enthusiastic audiences "from _Grosvenor, Cavendish, Hanover_, and +all the other fashionable Squares, as also from _Pall Mall_, and the +_Inns of Court_." + +In regard to plot, the comedy which _Pasquin_ contains scarcely deserves +the name. It consists of a string of loosely-connected scenes, which +depict the shameless political corruption of the Walpole era with a good +deal of boldness and humour. The sole difference between the "Court +party," represented by two Candidates with the Bunyan-like names of Lord +Place and Colonel Promise, and the "Country party," whose nominees are +Sir Harry Fox-Chace and Squire Tankard, is that the former bribe openly, +the latter indirectly. The Mayor, whose sympathies are with the "Country +party" is finally induced by his wife to vote for and return the other +side, although they are in a minority; and the play is concluded by the +precipitate marriage of his daughter with Colonel Promise. Mr. Fustian, +the Tragic Author, who, with Mr. Sneerwell the Critic, is one of the +spectators of the rehearsal, demurs to the abruptness with which this +ingenious catastrophe is brought about, and inquires where the +preliminary action, of which there is not the slightest evidence in the +piece itself, has taken place. Thereupon Trapwit, the Comic Author, +replies as follows, in one of those passages which show that, whatever +Fielding's dramatic limitations may have been, he was at least a keen +critic of stage practice:-- + +"_Trapwit._ Why, behind the Scenes, Sir. What, would you have every +Thing brought upon the Stage? I intend to bring ours to the Dignity of +the _French_ Stage; and I have _Horace's_ Advice of my Side; we have +many Things both said and done in our Comedies, which might be better +perform'd behind the Scenes: The _French_, you know, banish all Cruelty +from their Stage; and I don't see why we should bring on a Lady in ours, +practising all manner of Cruelty upon her Lover: beside, Sir, we do not +only produce it, but encourage it; for I could name you some Comedies, +if I would, where a Woman is brought in for four Acts together, behaving +to a worthy Man in a Manner for which she almost deserves to be hang'd; +and in the Fifth, forsooth, she is rewarded with him for a Husband: Now, +Sir, as I know this hits some Tastes, and am willing to oblige all, I +have given every Lady a Latitude of thinking mine has behaved in +whatever Manner she would have her." + +The part of Lord Place in the _Election_, after the first few nights, +was taken by Cibber's daughter, the notorious Mrs. Charlotte Charke, +whose extraordinary Memoirs are among the curiosities of eighteenth- +century literature, and whose experiences were as varied as those of any +character in fiction. She does not seem to have acted in the _Life and +Death of Common-Sense_, the rehearsal of which followed that of the +_Election_. This is a burlesque of the _Tom Thumb_ type, much of which +is written in vigorous blank verse. Queen Common-Sense is conspired +against by Firebrand, Priest of the Sun, by Law, and by Physic. Law is +incensed because she has endeavoured to make his piebald jargon +intelligible; Physic because she has preferred Water Gruel to all his +drugs; and Firebrand because she would restrain the power of Priests. +Some of the strokes must have gone home to those receptive hearers who, +as one contemporary account informs us, "were dull enough not only to +think they contain'd Wit and Humour, but Truth also":-- + + "_Queen Common-Sense._ My Lord of _Law_, I sent for you + this Morning; + + I have a strange Petition given to me; + Two Men, it seems, have lately been at Law + For an Estate, which both of them have lost, + And their Attorneys now divide between them. + _Law._ Madam, these things will happen in the Law. + _Q. C. S._ Will they, my Lord? then better we had none: + But I have also heard a sweet Bird sing, + That Men, unable to discharge their Debts + At a short Warning, being sued for them, + Have, with both Power and Will their Debts to pay + Lain all their Lives in Prison for their Costs. + _Law._ That may perhaps be some poor Person's Case, + Too mean to entertain your Royal Ear. + _Q. C. S._ My Lord, while I am Queen I shall not think + One Man too mean, or poor, to be redress'd; + Moreover, Lord, I am inform'd your Laws + Are grown so large, and daily yet encrease, + That the great Age of old _Methusalem_ + Would scarce suffice to read your Statutes out." + +There is also much more than merely transitory satire in the speech of +"Firebrand" to the Queen:-- + + "_Firebrand._ Ha! do you doubt it? nay, if you doubt + that, + I will prove nothing--But my zeal inspires me, + And I will tell you, Madam, you yourself + Are a most deadly Enemy to the Sun, + And all his Priests have greatest Cause to wish + You had been never born. + _Q. C. S._ Ha! say'st thou, Priest? + Then know I honour and adore the Sun! + And when I see his Light, and feel his Warmth, + I glow with naming Gratitude toward him; + But know, I never will adore a Priest, + Who wears Pride's Face beneath Religion's Mask. + And makes a Pick-Lock of his Piety, + To steal away the Liberty of Mankind. + But while I live, I'll never give thee Power. + _Firebrand._ Madam, our Power is not deriv'd from you, + Nor any one: 'Twas sent us in a Box + From the great Sun himself, and Carriage paid; + _Phaeton_ brought it when he overturn'd + The Chariot of the Sun into the Sea. + _Q. C. S._ Shew me the Instrument, and let me read it. + _Fireb._ Madam, you cannot read it, for being thrown + Into the Sea, the Water has so damag'd it, + That none but Priests could ever read it since." + +In the end, Firebrand stabs Common-Sense, but her Ghost frightens +Ignorance off the Stage, upon which Sneerwell says--"I am glad you make +_Common-Sense_ get the better at last; I was under terrible +Apprehensions for your Moral." "Faith, Sir," says Fustian, "this is +almost the only Play where she has got the better lately." And so the +piece closes. But it would be wrong to quit it without some reference to +the numberless little touches by which, throughout the whole, the +humours of dramatic life behind the scenes are ironically depicted. The +Comic Poet is arrested on his way from "_King's Coffee-House,_" and the +claim being "for upwards of Four Pound," it is at first supposed that +"he will hardly get Bail." He is subsequently inquired after by a +Gentlewoman in a Riding-Hood, whom he passes off as a Lady of Quality, +but who, in reality, is bringing him a clean shirt. There are +difficulties with one of the Ghosts, who has a "Church-yard Cough," and +"is so Lame he can hardly walk the Stage;" while another comes to +rehearsal without being properly floured, because the stage barber has +gone to Drury Lane "to shave the Sultan in the New Entertainment." On +the other hand, the Ghost of Queen Common-Sense appears before she is +killed, and is with some difficulty persuaded that her action is +premature. Part of "the Mob" play truant to see a show in the park; Law, +straying without the playhouse passage is snapped up by a Lord Chief- +Justice's Warrant; and a Jew carries off one of the Maids of Honour. +These little incidents, together with the unblushing realism of the Pots +of Porter that are made to do duty for wine, and the extra two-penny +worth of Lightning that is ordered against the first night, are all in +the spirit of that inimitable picture of the _Strolling Actresses +dressing in a Barn_, which Hogarth gave to the world two years later, +and which, very possibly, may have borrowed some of its inspiration from +Fielding's "dramatic satire." + +There is every reason to suppose that the profits of _Pasquin_ were far +greater than those of any of its author's previous efforts. In a rare +contemporary caricature, preserved in the British Museum, [Footnote: +Political and Personal Satires, No. 2287.] the "Queen of Common-Sense" +is shown presenting "Henry Fielding, Esq.," with a well-filled purse, +while to "Harlequin" (John Rich of Covent Garden) she extends a halter; +and in some doggerel lines underneath, reference is made to the "show'rs +of Gold" resulting from the piece. This, of course, might be no more +than a poetical fiction; but Fielding himself attests the pecuniary +success of _Pasquin_ in the Dedication to _Tumble-Down Dick_, and Mrs. +Charke's statement in her Memoirs that her salary for acting the small +part of Lord Place was four guineas a week, "with an Indulgence in Point +of Charges at her Benefit" by which she cleared sixty guineas, certainly +points to a prosperous exchequer. Fielding's own benefit, as appears +from the curious ticket attributed to Hogarth and facsimiled by A. M. +Ireland, took place on April 25, but we have no record of the amount of +his gains. Mrs. Charke farther says that "soon after _Pasquin_ began to +droop," Fielding produced Lillo's _Fatal Curiosity_ in which she acted +Agnes. This tragedy, founded on a Cornish story, is one of remarkable +power and passion; but upon its first appearance it made little +impression, although in the succeeding year it was acted to greater +advantage in combination with another satirical medley by Fielding, the +_Historical Register for the Year_ 1736. + +Like most sequels, the _Historical Register_ had neither the vogue nor +the wit of its predecessor. It was only half as long, and it was even +more disconnected in character. "Harmonious Cibber," as Swift calls him, +whose "preposterous Odes" had already been ridiculed in _Pasquin_ and +the _Author's Farce_, was once more brought on the stage as Ground-Ivy, +for his alterations of Shakespeare; and under the name of Pistol, +Theophilus Cibber is made to refer to the contention between his second +wife, Arne's sister, and Mrs. Clive, for the honour of playing "Polly" +in the _Beggar's Opera_, a play-house feud which at the latter end of +1736 had engaged "the Town" almost as seriously as the earlier rivalry +of Faustina and Cuzzoni. This continued raillery of the Cibbers is, as +Fielding himself seems to have felt, a "Jest a little overacted;" but +there is one scene in the piece of undeniable freshness and humour, to +wit, that in which Cock, the famous salesman of the Piazzas--the George +Robins of his day--is brought on the stage as Mr. Auctioneer Hen (a part +taken by Mrs. Charke). His wares, "collected by the indefatigable Pains +of that celebrated Virtuoso, _Peter Humdrum_, Esq.," include such +desirable items as "curious Remnants of Political Honesty," "delicate +Pieces of Patriotism," Modesty (which does not obtain a bid), Courage, +Wit, and "a very neat clear Conscience" of great capacity, "which has +been worn by a Judge, and a Bishop." The "Cardinal Virtues" are then put +up, and eighteen-pence is bid for them. But after they have been knocked +down at this extravagant sum, the buyer complains that he had understood +the auctioneer to say "a Cardinal's Virtues," and that the lot he has +purchased includes "Temperance and Chastity, and a Pack of Stuff that he +would not give three Farthings for." The whole of this scene is +"admirable fooling;" and it was afterwards impudently stolen by +Theophilus Cibber for his farce of the _Auction_. The _Historical +Register_ concludes with a dialogue between Quidam, in whom the audience +recognised Sir Robert Walpole, and four patriots, to whom he gives a +purse which has an instantaneous effect upon their opinions. All five +then go off dancing to Quidam's fiddle; and it is explained that they +have holes in their pockets through which the money will fall as they +dance, enabling the donor to pick it all up again, "and so not lose one +Half-penny by his Generosity." + +The frank effrontery of satire like the foregoing had by this time begun +to attract the attention of the Ministry, whose withers had already been +sharply wrung by _Pasquin_; and it has been conjectured that the ballet +of Quidam and the Patriots played no small part in precipitating the +famous "Licensing Act," which was passed a few weeks afterwards. Like +the marriage which succeeded the funeral of Hamlet's father, it +certainly "followed hard upon." But the reformation of the stage had +already been contemplated by the Legislature; and two years before, Sir +John Barnard had brought in a bill "to restrain the number of houses for +playing of Interludes, and for the better regulating of common Players +of Interludes." This, however, had been abandoned, because it was +proposed to add a clause enlarging the power of the Lord Chamberlain in +licensing plays, an addition to which the introducer of the measure made +strong objection. He thought the power of the Lord Chamberlain already +too great, and in support of his argument he instanced its wanton +exercise in the case of _Gay's Polly_, the representation of which had +been suddenly prohibited a few years earlier. But _Pasquin_ and the +_Register_ brought the question of dramatic lawlessness again to the +front, and a bill was hurriedly drawn, one effect of which was to revive +the very provision that Sir John Barnard had opposed. The history of +this affair is exceedingly obscure, and in all probability it has never +been completely revealed. The received or authorised version is to be +found in Coxe's _Life of Walpole_. After dwelling on the offence given +to the Government by _Pasquin_, the writer goes on to say that Giffard, +the manager of Goodman's Fields, brought Walpole a farce called _The +Golden Rump_, which had been proposed for exhibition. Whether he did +this to extort money, or to ask advice, is not clear. In either case, +Walpole is said to have "paid the profits which might have accrued from +the performance, and detained the copy." He then made a compendious +selection of the treasonable and profane passages it contained. These he +submitted to independent members of both parties, and afterwards read +them in the House itself. The result was that by way of amendment to the +"Vagrant Act" of Anne's reign, a bill was prepared limiting the number +of theatres, and compelling all dramatic writers to obtain a license +from the Lord Chamberlain. Such is Coxe's account; but notwithstanding +its circumstantial character, it has been insinuated in the sham memoirs +of the younger Cibber, and it is plainly asserted in the _Rambler's +Magazine_ for 1787, that certain preliminary details have been +conveniently suppressed. It is alleged that Walpole himself caused the +farce in question to be written, and to be offered to Giffard, for the +purpose of introducing his scheme of reform; and the suggestion is not +without a certain remote plausibility. As may be guessed, however, _The +Golden Rump_ cannot be appealed to. It was never printed, although its +title is identical with that of a caricature published in March 1737, +and fully described in the Gentleman's Magazine for that month. If the +play at all resembled the design, it must have been obscene and +scurrilous in the extreme. [Footnote: Horace Walpole, in his _Memoires +of the Last Ten Years of the Reign of George II._, says (vol. i. p. 12), +"I have in my possession the imperfect copy of this piece as I found it +among my father's papers after his death." He calls it Fielding's; but +no importance can be attached to the statement. There is a copy of the +caricature in the British Museum Print Room (Political and Personal +Satires, No. 2327).] + +Meanwhile the new bill, to which it had given rise, passed rapidly +through both Houses. Report speaks of animated discussions and warm +opposition. But there are no traces of any divisions, or petitions +against it, and the only speech which has survived is the very elaborate +and careful oration delivered in the Upper House by Lord Chesterfield. +The "second Cicero"--as Sylvanus Urban styles him--opposed the bill upon +the ground that it would affect the liberty of the press; and that it +was practically a tax upon the chief property of men of letters, their +wit--a "precarious dependence"--which (he thanked God) my Lords were +not obliged to rely upon. He dwelt also upon the value of the stage as a +fearless censor of vice and folly; and he quoted with excellent effect +but doubtful accuracy the famous answer of the Prince of Conti [Conde] +to Moliere [Louis XIV.] when _Tartuffe_ was interdicted at the instance +of M. de Lamoignon:--"It is true, Moliere, Harlequin ridicules Heaven, +and exposes religion; but you have done much worse--you have ridiculed +the first minister of religion." This, although not directly advanced +for the purpose, really indicated the head and front of Fielding's +offending in _Pasquin_ and the _Historical Register_, and although in +Lord Chesterfield's speech the former is ironically condemned, it may +well be that Fielding, whose _Don Quixote_ had been dedicated to his +Lordship, was the wire-puller in this case, and supplied this very +illustration. At all events it is entirely in the spirit of Firebrand's +words in _Pasquin_:-- + + "Speak boldly; by the Powers I serve, I swear + You speak in Safety, even tho' you speak + Against the Gods, provided that you speak + Not against Priests." + +But the feeling of Parliament in favour of drastic legislation was even +stronger than the persuasive periods of Chesterfield, and on the 21st of +June 1737 the bill received the royal assent. + +With its passing Fielding's career as a dramatic author practically +closed. In his dedication of the _Historical Register_ to "the Publick," +he had spoken of his desire to beautify and enlarge his little theatre, +and to procure a better company of actors; and he had added--"If Nature +hath given me any Talents at ridiculing Vice and Imposture, I shall not +be indolent, nor afraid of exerting them, while the Liberty of the Press +and Stage subsists, that is to say, while we have any Liberty left among +us." To all these projects the "Licensing Act" effectively put an end; +and the only other plays from his pen which were produced subsequently +to this date were the "Wedding Day," 1743, and the posthumous _Good- +Natured Man_, 1779, both of which, as is plain from the Preface to the +_Miscellanies_, were among his earliest attempts. In the little farce of +_Miss Lucy in Town_, 1742, he had, he says, but "a very small Share." +Besides these, there are three hasty and flimsy pieces which belong to +the early part of 1737. The first of these, _Tumble-Down Dick_; or, +_Phaeton in the Suds_, was a dramatic sketch in ridicule of the +unmeaning Entertainments and Harlequinades of John Rich at Covent +Garden. This was ironically dedicated to Rich, under his stage name of +"John Lun," and from the dedication it appears that Rich had brought out +an unsuccessful satire on _Pasquin_ called _Marforio_. The other two +were _Eurydice_, a profane and pointless farce, afterwards printed by +its author (in anticipation of Beaumarchais) "as it was d--mned at the +Theatre-Royal in Drury-Lane;" and a few detached scenes in which, under +the title of _Eurydice Hiss'd; or, a Word to the Wise_, its untoward +fate was attributed to the "frail Promise of uncertain Friends." But +even in these careless and half-considered productions there are happy +strokes; and one scarcely looks to find such nervous and sensible lines +in a mere _a propos_ as these from _Eurydice Hiss'd_:-- + + "Yet grant it shou'd succeed, grant that by Chance, + Or by the Whim and Madness of the Town, + A Farce without Contrivance, without Sense + Should run to the Astonishment of Mankind; + Think how you will be read in After-times, + When Friends are not, and the impartial Judge + Shall with the meanest Scribbler rank your Name; + Who would not rather wish a _Butler's_ fame, + Distress'd, and poor in every thing but Merit, + Than be the blundering Laureat to a Court?" + +Self-accusatory passages such as this--and there are others like it-- +indicate a higher ideal of dramatic writing than Fielding is held to +have attained, and probably the key to them is to be found in that +reaction of better judgment which seems invariably to have followed his +most reckless efforts. It was a part of his sanguine and impulsive +nature to be as easily persuaded that his work was worthless as that it +was excellent. "When," says Murphy, "he was not under the immediate +urgency of want, they, who were intimate with him, are ready to aver +that he had a mind greatly superior to anything mean or little; when his +finances were exhausted, he was not the most elegant in his choice of +the means to redress himself, and he would instantly exhibit a farce or +a puppet-shew in the Haymarket theatre, which was wholly inconsistent +with the profession he had embarked in." The quotation displays all +Murphy's loose and negligent way of dealing with his facts; for, with +the exception of _Miss Lucy in Town_, which can scarcely be ranked among +his works at all, there is absolutely no trace of Fielding's having +exhibited either "puppet-show" or "farce" after seriously adopting the +law as a profession, nor does there appear to have been much acting at +the Haymarket for some time after his management had closed in 1737. +Still, his superficial characteristics, which do not depend so much upon +Murphy as upon those "who were intimate with him," are probably +accurately described, and they sufficiently account for many of the +obvious discordances of his work and life. That he was fully conscious +of something higher than his actual achievement as a dramatist is clear +from his own observation in later life, "that he left off writing for +the stage, when he ought to have begun;"--an utterance which (we +shrewdly suspect) has prompted not a little profitless speculation as to +whether, if he had continued to write plays, they would have been equal +to, or worse than, his novels. The discussion would be highly +interesting, if there were the slightest chance that it could be +attended with any satisfactory result. But the truth is, that the very +materials are wanting. Fielding "left off writing for the stage" when he +was under thirty; _Tom Jones_ was published in 1749, when he was more +than forty. His plays were written in haste; his novels at leisure, and +when, for the most part, he was relieved from that "immediate urgency of +want," which, according to Murphy, characterised his younger days. If-- +as has been suggested--we could compare a novel written at thirty with a +play of the same date, or a play written at forty with _Tom Jones_, the +comparison might be instructive, although even then considerable +allowances would have to be made for the essential difference between +plays and novels. But, as we cannot make such a comparison, further +inquiry is simply waste of time. All we can safely affirm is, that the +plays of Fielding's youth did not equal the fictions of his maturity; +and that, of those plays, the comedies were less successful than the +farces and burlesques. Among other reasons for this latter difference +one chiefly may be given:--that in the comedies he sought to reproduce +the artificial world of Congreve and Wycherley, while in the burlesques +and farces he depicted the world in which he lived. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + +THE CHAMPION--JOSEPH ANDREWS. + + +The _Historical Register_ and _Eurydice Hiss'd_ were published together +in June 1737. By this time the "Licensing Act" was passed, and the +"Grand Mogul's Company" dispersed for ever. Fielding was now in his +thirty-first year, with a wife and probably a daughter depending on him +for support. In the absence of any prospect that he would be able to +secure a maintenance as a dramatic writer, he seems to have decided, in +spite of his comparatively advanced age, to revert to the profession for +which he had originally been intended, and to qualify himself for the +Bar. Accordingly, at the close of the year, he became a student of the +Middle Temple, and the books of that society contain the following +record of his admission: [Footnote: This differs slightly from previous +transcripts, having been verified at the Middle Temple.]-- + +[574 G] 1 Nov 1737. + +_Henricus Fielding, de East Stour in Com Dorset Ar, filius et haeres +apparens Brig: Genlis: Edmundi Fielding admissus est in Societatem Medii +Templi Lond specialiter et obligator una cum etc. + +Et dat pro fine 4. 0. 0._ + +It may be noted, as Mr. Keightley has already observed, that Fielding is +described in this entry as of East Stour, "which would seem to indicate +that he still retained his property at that place;" and further, that +his father is spoken of as a "brigadier-general," whereas (according to +the _Gentleman's Magazine_) he had been made a major-general in December +1735. Of discrepancies like these it is idle to attempt any explanation. +But, if Murphy is to be believed, Fielding devoted himself henceforth +with remarkable assiduity to the study of law. The old irregularity of +life, it is alleged, occasionally asserted itself, though without +checking the energy of his application. "This," says his first +biographer, "prevailed in him to such a degree, that he has been +frequently known, by his intimates, to retire late at night from a +tavern to his chambers, and there read, and make extracts from, the most +abstruse authors, for several hours before he went to bed; so powerful +were the vigour of his constitution and the activity of his mind." It is +to this passage, no doubt, that we owe the picturesque wet towel and +inked ruffles with which Mr. Thackeray has decorated him in _Pendennis_; +and, in all probability, a good deal of graphic writing from less able +pens respecting his _modus vivendi_ as a Templar. In point of fact, +nothing is known with certainty respecting his life at this period; and +what it would really concern us to learn--namely, whether by "chambers" +it is to be understood that he was living alone, and, if so, where Mrs. +Fielding was at the time of these protracted vigils--Murphy has not told +us. Perhaps she was safe all the while at East Stour, or with her +sisters at Salisbury. Having no precise information, however, it can +only be recorded, that, in spite of the fitful outbreaks above referred +to, Fielding applied himself to the study of his profession with all the +vigour of a man who has to make up for lost time; and that, when on the +20th of June 1740 the day came for his being "called," he was very +fairly equipped with legal knowledge. That he had also made many friends +among his colleagues of Westminster Hall is manifest from the number of +lawyers who figure in the subscription list of the _Miscellanies_. + +To what extent he was occupied by literary work during his probationary +period it is difficult to say. Murphy speaks vaguely of "a large number +of fugitive political tracts;" but unless the _Essay on Conversation_, +advertised by Lawton Gilliver in 1737, be the same as that afterwards +reprinted in the _Miscellanies_, there is no positive record of anything +until the issue of True Greatness, an epistle to George Dodington, in +January 1741, though he may, of course, have written much anonymously. +Among newspapers, the one Murphy had in mind was probably the +_Champion_, the first number of which is dated November 15, 1739, two +years after his admission to the Middle Temple as a student. On the +whole, it seems most likely, as Mr. Keightley conjectures, that his +chief occupation in the interval was studying law, and that he must have +been living upon the residue of his wife's fortune or his own means, in +which case the establishment of the above periodical may mark the +exhaustion of his resources. + +The _Champion_ is a paper on the model of the elder essayists. It was +issued, like the _Tatler_, on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. Murphy +says that Fielding's part in it cannot now be ascertained; but as the +"Advertisement" to the edition in two volumes of 1741 states expressly +that the papers signed C. and L. are the "Work of one Hand," and as a +number of those signed C. are unmistakably Fielding's, it is hard to +discover where the difficulty lay. The papers signed C. and L. are by +far the most numerous, the majority of the remainder being distinguished +by two stars, or the signature "Lilbourne." These are understood to have +been from the pen of James Ralph, whose poem of _Night_ gave rise to a +stinging couplet in the _Dunciad_, but who was nevertheless a man of +parts, and an industrious writer. As will be remembered, he had +contributed a prologue to the _Temple Beau_, so that his association +with Fielding must have been of some standing. Besides Ralph's essays in +the _Champion_, he was mainly responsible for the _Index to the Times_ +which accompanied each number, and consisted of a series of brief +paragraphs on current topics, or the last new book. In this way Glover's +_London_, Boyse's _Deity_, Somervile's _Hobbinol_, Lillo's _Elmeric_, +Dyer's _Ruins of Rome_, and other of the very minor _poetae minores_ of +the day, were commented upon. These notes and notices, however, were +only a subordinate feature of the _Champion_, which, like its +predecessors, consisted chiefly of essays and allegories, social, moral, +and political, the writers of which were supposed to be members of an +imaginary "Vinegar family," described in the initial paper. Of these the +most prominent was Captain Hercules Vinegar, who took all questions +relating to the Army, Militia, Trained-Bands, and "fighting Part of the +Kingdom." His father, Nehemiah Vinegar, presided over history and +politics; his uncle, Counsellor Vinegar, over law and judicature; and +Dr. John Vinegar his cousin, over medicine and natural philosophy. To +others of the family--including Mrs. Joan Vinegar, who was charged with +domestic affairs--were allotted classic literature, poetry and the +Drama, and fashion. This elaborate scheme was not very strictly adhered +to, and the chief writer of the group is Captain Hercules. + +Shorn of the contemporary interest which formed the chief element of its +success when it was first published, it must be admitted that, in the +present year of grace, the _Champion_ is hard reading. A kind of +lassitude--a sense of uncongenial task-work--broods heavily over +Fielding's contributions, except the one or two in which he is quickened +into animation by his antagonism to Cibber; and although, with our +knowledge of his after achievements, it is possible to trace some +indications of his yet unrevealed powers, in the absence of such +knowledge it would be difficult to distinguish the _Champion_ from the +hundred-and-one forgotten imitators of the _Spectator_ and _Tatler_, +whose names have been so patiently chronicled by Dr. Nathan Drake. There +is, indeed, a certain obvious humour in the account of Captain Vinegar's +famous club, which he had inherited from Hercules, and which had the +enviable property of falling of itself upon any knave in company, and +there is a dash of the _Tom Jones_ manner in the noisy activity of that +excellent housewife Mrs. Joan. Some of the lighter papers, such as the +one upon the "Art of Puffing," are amusing enough; and of the visions, +that which is based upon Lucian, and represents Charon as stripping his +freight of all their superfluous incumbrances in order to lighten his +boat, has a double interest, since it contains references not only to +Cibber, but also (though this appears to have been hitherto overlooked) +to Fielding himself. The "tall Man," who at Mercury's request strips off +his "old Grey Coat with great Readiness," but refuses to part with "half +his Chin," which the shepherd of souls regards as false, is clearly +intended for the writer of the paper, even without the confirmation +afforded by the subsequent allusions to his connection with the stage. +His "length of chin and nose," sufficiently apparent in his portrait, +was a favourite theme for contemporary personalities. Of the moral +essays, the most remarkable are a set of four papers, entitled _An +Apology for the Clergy_, which may perhaps be regarded as a set-off +against the sarcasms of _Pasquin_ on priestcraft. They depict, with a +great deal of knowledge and discrimination, the pattern priest as +Fielding conceived him. To these may be linked an earlier picture, taken +from life, of a country parson who, in his simple and dignified +surroundings, even more closely resembles the Vicar of Wakefield than +Mr. Abraham Adams. Some of the more general articles contain happy +passages. In one there is an admirable parody of the Norman-French +jargon, which in those days added superfluous obscurity to legal +utterances; while another, on "Charity," contains a forcible exposition +of the inexpediency, as well as inhumanity, of imprisonment for debt. +References to contemporaries, the inevitable Cibber excepted, are few, +and these seem mostly from the pen of Ralph. The following, from that of +Fielding, is notable as being one of the earliest authoritative +testimonies to the merits of Hogarth: "I esteem (says he) the ingenious +_Mr. Hogarth_ as one of the most useful Satyrists any Age hath produced. +In his excellent Works you see the delusive Scene exposed with all the +Force of Humour, and, on casting your Eyes on another Picture, you +behold the dreadful and fatal Consequence. I almost dare affirm that +those two Works of his, which he calls the _Rake's_ and the _Harlot's +Progress_, are calculated more to serve the Cause of Virtue, and for the +Preservation of Mankind, than all the _Folio's_ of Morality which have +been ever written; and a sober Family should no more be without them, +than without the _Whole Duty of Man_ in their House." He returned to the +same theme in the Preface to _Joseph Andrews_ with a still apter phrase +of appreciation:--"It hath been thought a vast Commendation of a +Painter, to say his Figures seem to breathe; but surely, it is a much +greater and nobler Applause, that they appear to think." [Footnote: +Fielding occasionally refers to Hogarth for the pictorial types of his +characters. Bridget Allworthy, he tells us, resembled the starched prude +in _Morning_; and Mrs. Partridge and Parson Thwackum have their +originals in the _Harlot's Progress_. It was Fielding, too, who said +that the _Enraged Musician_ was "enough to make a man deaf to look at" +(_Voyage to Lisbon_, 1755, p. 50).] + +When the _Champion_ was rather more than a year old, Colley Cibber +published his famous _Apology_. To the attacks made upon him by Fielding +at different times he had hitherto printed no reply--perhaps he had no +opportunity of doing so. But in his eighth chapter, when speaking of the +causes which led to the Licensing Act, he takes occasion to refer to his +assailant in terms which Fielding must have found exceedingly galling. +He carefully abstained from mentioning his name, on the ground that it +could do him no good, and was of no importance; but he described him as +"a broken Wit," who had sought notoriety "by raking the Channel" (i.e. +Kennel), and "pelting his Superiors." He accused him, with a scandalised +gravity that is as edifying as Chesterfield's irony, of attacking +"Religion, Laws, Government, Priests, Judges, and Ministers." He called +him, either in allusion to his stature, or his pseudonym in the +_Champion_, a "_Herculean_ Satyrist," a "_Drawcansir_ in Wit"--"who, to +make his Poetical Fame immortal, like another _Erostratus_, set Fire to +his Stage, by writing up to an Act of Parliament to demolish it. I shall +not," he continues, "give the particular Strokes of his Ingenuity a +Chance to be remembered, by reciting them; it may be enough to say, in +general Terms, they were so openly flagrant, that the Wisdom of the +Legislature thought it high time, to take a proper Notice of them." + +Fielding was not the man to leave such a challenge unanswered. In the +_Champion_ for April 22, 1740, and two subsequent papers, he replied +with a slashing criticism of the _Apology_, in which, after +demonstrating that it must be written in English because it was written +in no other language, he gravely proceeds to point out examples of the +author's superiority to grammar and learning--and in general, subjects +its pretentious and slip-shod style to a minute and highly detrimental +examination. In a further paper he returns to the charge by a mock trial +of one "Col. _Apol._" (i.e. Colley-_Apology_), arraigning him for that, +"not having the Fear of Grammar before his Eyes," he had committed an +unpardonable assault upon his mother-tongue. Fielding's knowledge of +legal forms and phraseology enabled him to make a happy parody of court +procedure, and Mr. Lawrence says that this particular "_jeu d'esprit_ +obtained great celebrity." But the happiest stroke in the controversy-- +as it seems to us--is one which escaped Mr. Lawrence, and occurs in the +paper already referred to, where Charon and Mercury are shown denuding +the luckless passengers by the Styx of their surplus _impedimenta_. +Among the rest, approaches "an elderly Gentleman with a Piece of +wither'd Laurel on his head." From a little book, which he is discovered +(when stripped) to have bound close to his heart, and which bears the +title of _Love in a Riddle_--an unsuccessful pastoral produced by Cibber +at Drury Lane in 1729--it is clear that this personage is intended for +none other than the Apologist, who, after many entreaties, is finally +compelled to part with his treasure. "I was surprized," continues +Fielding, "to see him pass Examination with his Laurel on, and was +assured by the Standers by, that _Mercury_ would have taken it off, if +he had seen it." + +These attacks in the _Champion_ do not appear to have received any +direct response from Cibber. But they were reprinted in a rambling +production issued from "Curll's chaste press" in 1740, and entitled the +_Tryal of Colley Cibber, Comedian, &c._ At the end of this there is a +short address to "the _Self-dubb'd Captain_ Hercules Vinegar, _alias_ +Buffoon," to the effect that "the malevolent Flings exhibited by him and +his Man _Ralph_," have been faithfully reproduced. Then comes the +following curious and not very intelligible "Advertisement:"-- + +"If the Ingenious _Henry Fielding_ Esq.; (Son of the Hon. Lieut. General +_Fielding_, who upon his Return from his Travels entered himself of the +_Temple_ in order to study the Law, and married one of the pretty Miss +_Cradocks of Salisbury_) will _own_ himself the AUTHOR of 18 strange +Things called Tragical _Comedies_ and Comical _Tragedies_, lately +advertised by _J. Watts_, of _Wild-Court_, Printer, he shall be +_mentioned_ in Capitals in the _Third_ Edition of Mr. CIBBER'S _Life_, +and likewise be placed _among_ the _Poetae minores Dramatici_ of the +Present Age: Then will both his _Name and Writings be remembered on +Record_, in the immortal _Poetical Register_ written by Mr. GILES +JACOB." + +The "poetical register" indicated was the book of that name, containing +the _Lives and Characteristics of the English Dramatic Poets_, which Mr. +Giles Jacob, an industrious literary hack, had issued in 1723. Mr. +Lawrence is probably right in his supposition, based upon the foregoing +advertisement, that Fielding "had openly expressed resentment at being +described by Cibber as 'a broken wit,' without being mentioned by name." +He never seems to have wholly forgotten his animosity to the actor, to +whom there are frequent references in _Joseph Andrews_; and, as late as +1749, he is still found harping on "the withered laurel" in a letter to +Lyttelton. Even in his last work, the _Voyage to Lisbon_, Cibber's name +is mentioned. The origin of this protracted feud is obscure; but, apart +from want of sympathy, it must probably be sought for in some early +misunderstanding between the two in their capacities of manager and +author. As regards Theophilus Cibber, his desertion of Highmore was +sufficient reason for the ridicule cast upon him in the _Author's Farce_ +and elsewhere. With Mrs. Charke, the Laureate's intractable and +eccentric daughter, Fielding was naturally on better terms. She was, as +already stated, a member of the Great Mogul's Company, and it is worth +noting that some of the sarcasms in _Pasquin_ against her father were +put into the mouth of Lord Place, whose part was taken by this undutiful +child. All things considered, both in this controversy and the later one +with Pope, Cibber did not come off worst. His few hits were personal and +unscrupulous, and they were probably far more deadly in their effects +than any of the ironical attacks which his adversaries, on their part, +directed against his poetical ineptitude or halting "parts of speech." +Despite his superlative coxcombry and egotism, he was, moreover, a man +of no mean abilities. His _Careless Husband_ is a far better acting play +than any of Fielding's, and his _Apology_, which even Johnson allowed to +be "well-done," is valuable in many respects, especially for its account +of the contemporary stage. In describing an actor or actress he had few +equals--witness his skilful portrait of Nokes, and his admirably graphic +vignette of Mrs. Verbruggen as that "finish'd Impertinent," Melantha, in +Dryden's _Marriage a-la-Mode_. + +The concluding paper in the collected edition of the _Champion_, +published in 1741, is dated June 19, 1740. On the day following Fielding +was called to the Bar by the benchers of the Middle Temple, and (says +Mr. Lawrence) "chambers were assigned him in Pump Court." Simultaneously +with this, his regular connection with journalism appears to have +ceased, although from his statement in the Preface to the +_Miscellanies_,--that "as long as from _June_ 1741," he had "desisted +from writing one Syllable in the _Champion_, or any other public Paper," +--it may perhaps be inferred that up to that date he continued to +contribute now and then. This, nevertheless, is by no means clear. His +last utterance in the published volumes is certainly in a sense +valedictory, as it refers to the position acquired by the _Champion_, +and the difficulty experienced in establishing it. Incidentally, it pays +a high compliment to Pope, by speaking of "the divine Translation of the +_Iliad_, which he [Fielding] has lately with _no Disadvantage to the +Translator_ COMPARED with the Original," the point of the sentence so +impressed by its typography, being apparently directed against those +critics who had condemned Pope's work without the requisite knowledge of +Greek. From the tenor of the rest of the essay it may, however, be +concluded that the writer was taking leave of his enterprise; and, +according to a note by Boswell, in his _Life of Johnson_, it seems that +Mr. Reed of Staple Inn possessed documents which showed that Fielding at +this juncture, probably in anticipation of more lucrative legal duties, +surrendered the reins to Ralph. The _Champion_ continued to exist for +some time longer; indeed, it must be regarded as long-lived among the +essayists, since the issue which contained its well-known criticism on +Garrick is No. 455, and appeared late in 1742. But as far as can be +ascertained, it never again obtained the honours of a reprint. + +Although, after he was called to the Bar, Fielding practically +relinquished periodical literature, he does not seem to have entirely +desisted from writing. In Sylvanus Urban's Register of Books, published +during January 1741, is advertised the poem _Of True Greatness_ +afterwards included in the _Miscellanies_; and the same authority +announces the _Vernoniad_, an anonymous burlesque Epic prompted by +Admiral Vernon's popular expedition against Porto Bello in 1739, "with +six Ships only." That Fielding was the author of the latter is +sufficiently proved by his order to Mr. Nourse (printed in Roscoe's +edition), to deliver fifty copies to Mr. Chappel. Another sixpenny +pamphlet, entitled _The Opposition, a Vision_, issued in December of the +same year, is enumerated by him, in the Preface to the _Miscellanies_, +among the few works he had published "since the End of _June_ 1741;" +and, provided it can be placed before this date, he may be credited with +a political sermon called the _Crisis_ (1741), which is ascribed to him +upon the authority of a writer in Nichols's _Anecdotes_. He may also, +before "the End of _June_ 1741," have written other things; but it is +clear from his _Caveat_ in the above-mentioned "Preface," together with +his complaint that "he had been very unjustly censured, as well on +account of what he had not writ, as for what he had," that much more has +been laid to his charge than he ever deserved. Among ascriptions of this +kind may be mentioned the curious _Apology for the Life of Mr. The' +Cibber, Comedian_, 1740, which is described on its title-page as a +proper sequel to the autobiography of the Laureate, in whose "style and +manner" it is said to be written. But, although this performance is +evidently the work of some one well acquainted with the dramatic annals +of the day, it is more than doubtful whether Fielding had any hand or +part in it. Indeed, his own statement that "he never was, nor would be +the Author of _anonymous_ Scandal [the italics are ours] on the private +History or Family of any Person whatever," should be regarded as +conclusive. + +During all this time he seems to have been steadily applying himself to +the practice of his profession, if, indeed, that weary hope deferred +which forms the usual probation of legal preferment can properly be so +described. As might be anticipated from his Salisbury connections, he +travelled the Western Circuit; and, according to Hutchins's _Dorset_, he +assiduously attended the Wiltshire sessions. He had many friends among +his brethren of the Bar. His cousin, Henry Gould, who had been called in +1734, and who, like his grandfather, ultimately became a Judge, was also +a member of the Middle Temple; and he was familiar with Charles Pratt, +afterwards Lord Camden, whom he may have known at Eton, but whom he +certainly knew in his barrister days. It is probable, too, that he was +acquainted with Lord Northington, then Robert Henley, whose name appears +as a subscriber to the _Miscellanies_, and who was once supposed to +contend with Kettleby (another subscriber) for the honour of being the +original of the drunken barrister in Hogarth's _Midnight Modern +Conversation_, a picture which no doubt accurately represents a good +many of the festivals by which Henry Fielding relieved the tedium of +composing those MS. _folio_ volumes on Crown or Criminal Law, which, +after his death, reverted to his half-brother, Sir John. But towards the +close of 1741 he was engaged upon another work which has outweighed all +his most laborious forensic efforts, and which will long remain an +English classic. This was _The History of the Adventures of Joseph +Andrews, and of his Friend Mr. Abraham Adams_, published by Andrew +Millar in February 1742. + +In the same number, and at the same page of the _Gentleman's Magazine_ +which contains the advertisement of the _Vernoniad_, there is a +reference to a famous novel which had appeared in November 1740, two +months earlier, and had already attained an extraordinary popularity. +"Several Encomiums (says Mr. Urban) on a Series of _Familiar Letters_, +publish'd but last month, entitled PAMELA or _Virtue rewarded_, came too +late for this Magazine, and we believe there will be little Occasion for +inserting them in our next; because a Second Edition will then come out +to supply the Demands in the Country, it being judged in Town as great a +Sign of Want of Curiosity not to have read _Pamela_, as not to have seen +the _French_ and _Italian_ Dancers." A second edition was in fact +published in the following month (February), to be speedily succeeded by +a third in March and a fourth in May. Dr. Sherlock (oddly misprinted by +Mrs. Barbauld as "Dr. Slocock") extolled it from the pulpit; and the +great Mr. Pope was reported to have gone farther and declared that it +would "do more good than many volumes of sermons." Other admirers ranked +it next to the Bible; clergymen dedicated theological treatises to the +author; and "even at Ranelagh"--says Richardson's biographer--"those who +remember the publication say, that it was usual for ladies to hold up +the volumes of Pamela to one another, to shew that they had got the book +that every one was talking of." It is perhaps hypercritical to observe +that Ranelagh Gardens were not opened until eighteen months after Mr. +Rivington's _duodecimos_ first made their appearance; but it will be +gathered from the tone of some of the foregoing commendations that its +morality was a strong point with the new candidate for literary fame; +and its voluminous title-page did indeed proclaim at large that it was +"Published in order to cultivate the Principles of Virtue and Religion +in the Minds of the Youth of Both Sexes." Its author, Samuel Richardson, +was a middle-aged London printer, a vegetarian and water-drinker, a +worthy, domesticated, fussy, and highly-nervous little man. Delighting +in female society, and accustomed to act as confidant and amanuensis for +the young women of his acquaintance, it had been suggested to him by +some bookseller friends that he should prepare a "little volume of +Letters, in a common style, on such subjects as might be of use to those +country readers, who were unable to indite for themselves." As Hogarth's +Conversation Pieces grew into his Progresses, so this project seems to +have developed into _Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded_. The necessity for some +connecting link between the letters suggested a story, and the story +chosen was founded upon the actual experiences of a young servant girl, +who, after victoriously resisting all the attempts made by her master to +seduce her, ultimately obliged him to marry her. It is needless to give +any account here of the minute and deliberate way in which Richardson +filled in this outline. As one of his critics, D'Alembert, has +unanswerably said--_"La, nature est bonne a imiter, mais non pas +jusgu'a l'ennui"_--and the author of _Pamela_ has plainly disregarded +this useful law. On the other hand, the tedium and elaboration of his +style have tended, in these less leisurely days, to condemn his work to +a neglect which it does not deserve. Few writers--it is a truism to say +so--have excelled him in minute analysis of motive, and knowledge of the +human heart. About the final morality of his heroine's long-drawn +defence of her chastity it may, however, be permitted to doubt; and, in +contrasting the book with Fielding's work, it should not be forgotten +that, irreproachable though it seemed to the author's admirers, good Dr. +Watts complained (and with reason) of the indelicacy of some of the +scenes. + +But, for the moment, we are more concerned with the effect which +_Pamela_ produced upon Henry Fielding, struggling with the "eternal want +of pence, which vexes public men," and vaguely hoping for some +profitable opening for powers which had not yet been satisfactorily +exercised. To his robust and masculine genius, never very delicately +sensitive where the relations of the sexes are concerned, the strange +conjunction of purity and precaution in Richardson's heroine was a thing +unnatural, and a theme for inextinguishable Homeric laughter. That +Pamela, through all her trials, could really have cherished any +affection for her unscrupulous admirer would seem to him a sentimental +absurdity, and the unprecedented success of the book would sharpen his +sense of its assailable side. Possibly, too, his acquaintance with +Richardson, whom he knew personally, but with whom he could have had no +kind of sympathy, disposed him against his work. In any case, the idea +presently occurred to Fielding of depicting a young man in circumstances +of similar importunity at the hands of a dissolute woman of fashion. He +took for his hero Pamela's brother, and by a malicious stroke of the pen +turned the Mr. B. of _Pamela_ into Squire Booby. But the process of +invention rapidly carried him into paths far beyond the mere parody of +Richardson, and it is only in the first portion of the book that he +really remembers his intention. After chapter x. the story follows its +natural course, and there is little or nothing of Lady Booby, or her +frustrate amours. Indeed, the author does not even pretend to preserve +congruity as regards his hero, for, in chapter v., he makes him tell his +mistress that he has never been in love, while in chapter xi. we are +informed that he had long been attached to the charming Fanny. Moreover, +in the intervening letters which Joseph writes to his sister Pamela, he +makes no reference to this long-existent attachment, with which, one +would think, she must have been perfectly familiar. These discrepancies +all point, not so much to negligence on the part of the author, as to an +unconscious transformation of his plan. He no doubt speedily found that +mere ridicule of Richardson was insufficient to sustain the interest of +any serious effort, and, besides, must have been secretly conscious that +the "Pamela" characteristics of his hero were artistically +irreconcilable with the personal bravery and cudgel-playing attributes +with which he had endowed him. Add to this that the immortal Mrs. +Slipslop and Parson Adams--the latter especially--had begun to acquire +an importance with their creator for which the initial scheme had by no +means provided; and he finally seems to have disregarded his design, +only returning to it in his last chapters in order to close his work +with some appearance of consistency. The _History of Joseph Andrews_, it +has been said, might well have dispensed with Lady Booby altogether, and +yet, without her, not only this book, but _Tom Jones_ and _Amelia_ also, +would probably have been lost to us. The accident which prompted three +such masterpieces cannot be honestly regretted. + +It was not without reason that Fielding added prominently to his title- +page the name of Mr. Abraham Adams. If he is not the real hero of the +book, he is undoubtedly the character whose fortunes the reader follows +with the closest interest. Whether he is smoking his black and +consolatory pipe in the gallery of the inn, or losing his way while he +meditates a passage of Greek, or groaning over the fatuities of the man- +of-fashion in Leonora's story, or brandishing his famous crabstick in +defence of Fanny, he is always the same delightful mixture of +benevolence and simplicity, of pedantry and credulity and ignorance of +the world. He is "compact," to use Shakespeare's word, of the oddest +contradictions,--the most diverting eccentricities. He has Aristotle's +_Politics_ at his fingers' ends, but he knows nothing of the daily +_Gazetteers_; he is perfectly familiar with the Pillars of Hercules, but +he has never even heard of the Levant. He travels to London to sell a +collection of sermons which he has forgotten to carry with him, and in a +moment of excitement he tosses into the fire the copy of _AEschylus_ +which it has cost him years to transcribe. He gives irreproachable +advice to Joseph on fortitude and resignation, but he is overwhelmed +with grief when his child is reported to be drowned. When he speaks upon +faith and works, on marriage, on school discipline, he is weighty and +sensible; but he falls an easy victim to the plausible professions of +every rogue he meets, and is willing to believe in the principles of Mr. +Peter Pounce, or the humanity of Parson Trulliber. Not all the +discipline of hog's blood and cudgels and cold water to which he is +subjected can deprive him of his native dignity; and as he stands before +us in the short great-coat under which his ragged cassock is continually +making its appearance, with his old wig and battered hat, a clergyman +whose social position is scarcely above that of a footman, and who +supports a wife and six children upon a cure of twenty-three pounds a +year, which his outspoken honesty is continually jeopardising, he is a +far finer figure than Pamela in her coach-and-six, or Bellarmine in his +cinnamon velvet. If not, as Mr. Lawrence says, with exaggerated +enthusiasm, "the grandest delineation of a pattern-priest which the +world has yet seen," he is assuredly a noble example of primitive +goodness and practical Christianity. It is certain--as Mr. Forster and +Mr. Keightley have pointed out--that Goldsmith borrowed some of his +characteristics for Dr. Primrose, and it has been suggested that Sterne +remembered him in more than one page of _Tristram Shandy_. + +Next to Parson Adams, perhaps the best character in _Joseph Andrews_-- +though of an entirely different type--is Lady Booby's "Waiting- +Gentlewoman," the excellent Mrs. Slipslop. Her sensitive dignity, her +easy changes from servility to insolence, her sensuality, her inimitably +distorted vocabulary, which Sheridan borrowed for Mrs. Malaprop, and +Dickens modified for Mrs. Gamp, are all peculiarities which make up a +personification of the richest humour and the most life-like reality. +Mr. Peter Pounce, too, with his "scoundrel maxims," as disclosed in that +remarkable dialogue which is said to be "better worth reading than all +the Works of _Colley Cibber_," and in which charity is defined as +consisting rather in a disposition to relieve distress than in an actual +act of relief; Parson Trulliber with his hogs, his greediness, and his +willingness to prove his Christianity by fisticuffs; shrewish Mrs. Tow- +wouse with her scold's tongue, and her erring but perfectly subjugated +husband,--these again are portraits finished with admirable spirit and +fidelity. Andrews himself, and his blushing sweetheart, do not lend +themselves so readily to humorous art. Nevertheless the former, when +freed from the wiles of Lady Booby, is by no means a despicable hero, +and Fanny is a sufficiently fresh and blooming heroine. The characters +of Pamela and Mr. Booby are fairly preserved from the pages of their +original inventor. But when Fielding makes Parson Adams rebuke the pair +for laughing in church at Joseph's wedding, and puts into the lady's +mouth a sententious little speech upon her altered position in life, he +is adding some ironical touches which Richardson would certainly have +omitted. + +No selection of personages, however, even of the most detailed and +particular description, can convey any real impression of the mingled +irony and insight, the wit and satire, the genial but perfectly +remorseless revelation of human springs of action, which distinguish +scene after scene of the book. Nothing, for example, can be more +admirable than the different manifestations of meanness which take place +among the travellers of the stage-coach, in the oft-quoted chapter where +Joseph, having been robbed of everything, lies naked and bleeding in the +ditch. There is Miss Grave-airs, who protests against the indecency of +his entering the vehicle, but like a certain lady in the _Rake's +Progress_, holds the sticks of her fan before her face while he does so, +and who is afterwards found to be carrying Nantes under the guise of +Hungary-water; there is the lawyer who advises that the wounded man +shall be taken in, not from any humane motive, but because he is afraid +of being involved in legal proceedings if they leave him to his fate; +there is the wit who seizes the occasion for a burst of facetious +double-meanings, chiefly designed for the discomfiture of the prude; +and, lastly, there is the coachman, whose only concern is the shilling +for his fare, and who refuses to lend either of the useless greatcoats +he is sitting upon, lest "they should be made bloody," leaving the +shivering suppliant to be clothed by the generosity of the postilion ("a +Lad," says Fielding with a fine touch of satire, "who hath been since +transported for robbing a Hen-roost"). This worthy fellow accordingly +strips off his only outer garment, "at the same time swearing a great +Oath," for which he is duly rebuked by the passengers, "that he would +rather ride in his Shirt all his Life, than suffer a Fellow-Creature to +lie in so miserable a Condition." Then there are the admirable scenes +which succeed Joseph's admission into the inn; the discussion between +the bookseller and the two parsons as to the publication of Adams's +sermons, which the "Clergy would be certain to cry down," because they +inculcate good works against faith; the debate before the justice as to +the manuscript of AEschylus, which is mistaken for one of the Fathers; +and the pleasant discourse between the poet and the player which, +beginning by compliments, bids fair to end in blows. Nor are the stories +of Leonora and Mr. Wilson without their interest. They interrupt the +straggling narrative far less than the Man of the Hill interrupts _Tom +Jones_, and they afford an opportunity for varying the epic of the +highway by pictures of polite society which could not otherwise be +introduced. There can be little doubt, too, that some of Mr. Wilson's +town experiences were the reflection of the author's own career; while +the characteristics of Leonora's lover Horatio,--who was "a young +Gentleman of a good Family, bred to the Law," and recently called to the +Bar, whose "Face and Person were such as the Generality allowed +handsome: but he had a Dignity in his Air very rarely to be seen," and +who "had Wit and Humour, with an Inclination to Satire, which he +indulged rather too much"--read almost like a complimentary description +of Fielding himself. + +Like Hogarth, in that famous drinking scene to which reference has +already been made, Fielding was careful to disclaim any personal +portraiture in _Joseph Andrews_. In the opening chapter of Book iii. he +declares "once for all that he describes not Men, but Manners; not an +Individual, but a Species," although he admits that his characters are +"taken from Life." In his "Preface," he reiterates this profession, +adding that in copying from nature, he has "used the utmost Care to +obscure the Persons by such different Circumstances, Degrees, and +Colours, that it will be impossible to guess at them with any degree of +certainty." Nevertheless--as in Hogarth's case--neither his protests +nor his skill have prevented some of those identifications which are so +seductive to the curious; and it is generally believed,--indeed, it was +expressly stated by Richardson and others,--that the prototype of Parson +Adams was a friend of Fielding, the Reverend William Young. Like Adams, +he was a scholar and devoted to AEschylus; he resembled him, too, in his +trick of snapping his fingers, and his habitual absence of mind. Of this +latter peculiarity it is related that on one occasion, when a chaplain +in Marlborough's wars, he strolled abstractedly into the enemy's lines +with his beloved _AEschylus_ in his hand. His peaceable intentions were +so unmistakable that he was instantly released, and politely directed to +his regiment. Once, too, it is said, on being charged by a gentleman +with sitting for the portrait of Adams, he offered to knock the speaker +down, thereby supplying additional proof of the truth of the allegation. +He died in August 1757, and is buried in the Chapel of Chelsea Hospital. +The obituary notice in the _Gentleman's Magazine_ describes him as "late +of Gillingham, Dorsetshire," which would make him a neighbour of the +novelist. [Footnote: Lord Thurlow was accustomed to find a later +likeness to Fielding's hero in his _protege_, the poet Crabbe.] Another +tradition connects Mr. Peter Pounce with the scrivener and usurer Peter +Walter, whom Pope had satirised, and whom Hogarth is thought to have +introduced into Plate i. of Marriage _a-la-Mode_. His sister lived at +Salisbury; and he himself had an estate at Stalbridge Park, which was +close to East Stour. From references to Walter in the _Champion_ for May +31, 1740, as well as in the _Essay on Conversation_, it is clear that +Fielding knew him personally, and disliked him. He may, indeed, have +been among those county magnates whose criticism was so objectionable to +Captain Booth during his brief residence in Dorsetshire. Parson +Trulliber, also, according to Murphy, was Fielding's first tutor--Mr. +Oliver of Motcombe. But his widow denied the resemblance; and it is hard +to believe that this portrait is not overcharged. In all these cases, +however, there is no reason for supposing that Fielding may not have +thoroughly believed in the sincerity of his attempts to avoid the exact +reproduction of actual persons, although, rightly or wrongly, his +presentments were speedily identified. With ordinary people it is by +salient characteristics that a likeness is established; and no variation +of detail, however skilful, greatly affects this result. In our own days +we have seen that, in spite of both authors, the public declined to +believe that the Harold Skimpole of Charles Dickens, and George Eliot's +Dinah Morris, were not perfectly recognisable copies of living +originals. + +Upon its title-page, _Joseph Andrews_ is declared to be "written in +Imitation of the Manner of Cervantes," and there is no doubt that, in +addition to being subjected to an unreasonable amount of ill-usage, +Parson Adams has manifest affinities with Don Quixote. Scott, however, +seems to have thought that Scarron's _Roman Comique_ was the real model, +so far as mock-heroic was concerned; but he must have forgotten that +Fielding was already the author of _Tom Thumb_, and that Swift had +written the _Battle of the Books_. Resemblances--not of much moment-- +have also been traced to the _Paysan Parvenu_ and the _Histoire de +Marianne_ of Marivaux. With both these books Fielding was familiar; in +fact, he expressly mentions them, as well as the _Roman Comique_, in the +course of his story, and they doubtless exercised more or less influence +upon his plan. But in the Preface, from which we have already quoted, he +describes that plan; and this, because it is something definite, is more +interesting than any speculation as to his determining models. After +marking the division of the Epic, like the Drama, into Tragedy and +Comedy, he points out that it may exist in prose as well as verse, and +he proceeds to explain that what he has attempted in _Joseph Andrews_ is +"a comic Epic-Poem in Prose," differing from serious romance in its +substitution of a "light and ridiculous" fable for a "grave and solemn" +one, of inferior characters for those of superior rank, and of ludicrous +for sublime sentiments. Sometimes in the diction he has admitted +burlesque, but never in the sentiments and characters, where, he +contends, it would be out of place. He further defines the only source +of the ridiculous to be affectation, of which the chief causes are +vanity and hypocrisy. Whether this scheme was an after-thought it is +difficult to say; but it is certainly necessary to a proper +understanding of the author's method--a method which was to find so many +imitators. Another passage in the Preface is worthy of remark. With +reference to the pictures of vice which the book contains, he observes: +"First, That it is very difficult to pursue a Series of human Actions, +and keep clear from them. Secondly, That the Vices to be found here +[i.e. in _Joseph Andrews_] are rather the accidental Consequences of +some human Frailty, or Foible, than Causes habitually existing in the +Mind. Thirdly, That they are never set forth as the Objects of Ridicule +but Detestation. Fourthly, That they are never the principal Figure at +the Time on the Scene; and, lastly, they never produce the intended +Evil." In reading some pages of Fielding it is not always easy to see +that he has strictly adhered to these principles; but it is well to +recall them occasionally, as constituting at all events the code that he +desired to follow. + +Although the popularity of Fielding's first novel was considerable, it +did not, to judge by the number of editions, at once equal the +popularity of the book by which it was suggested. _Pamela_, as we have +seen, speedily ran through four editions; but it was six months before +Millar published the second and revised edition of _Joseph Andrews;_ and +the third did not appear until more than a year after the date of first +publication. With Richardson, as might be expected, it was never popular +at all, and to a great extent it is possible to sympathise with his +annoyance. The daughter of his brain, whom he had piloted through so +many troubles, had grown to him more real than the daughters of his +body, and to see her at the height of her fame made contemptible by what +in one of his letters he terms "a lewd and ungenerous engraftment," must +have been a sore trial to his absorbed and self-conscious nature, and +one which not all the consolations of his consistory of feminine +flatterers--"my ladies," as the little man called them--could wholly +alleviate. But it must be admitted that his subsequent attitude was +neither judicious nor dignified. He pursued Fielding henceforth with +steady depreciation, caught eagerly at any scandal respecting him, +professed himself unable to perceive his genius, deplored his "lowness," +and comforted himself by reflecting that, if he pleased at all, it was +because he had learned the art from _Pamela_. Of Fielding's other +contemporary critics, one only need be mentioned here, more on account +of his literary eminence than of the special felicity of his judgment. +"I have myself," writes Gray to West, "upon your recommendation, been +reading Joseph Andrews. The incidents are ill laid and without +invention; but the characters have a great deal of nature, which always +pleases even in her lowest shapes. Parson Adams is perfectly well; so is +Mrs. Slipslop, and the story of Wilson; and throughout he [_the author_] +shews himself well read in Stage-Coaches, Country Squires, Inns, and +Inns of Court. His reflections upon high people and low people, and +misses and masters, are very good. However the exaltedness of some minds +(or rather as I shrewdly suspect their insipidity and want of feeling or +observation) may make them insensible to these light things, (I mean +such as characterise and paint nature) yet surely they are as weighty +and much more useful than your grave discourses upon the mind, the +passions, and what not." And thereupon follows that fantastic utterance +concerning the romances of MM. Marivaux and Crebillon _fils_, which has +disconcerted so many of Gray's admirers. We suspect that any reader who +should nowadays contrast the sickly and sordid intrigue of the _Paysan +Parvenu_ with the healthy animalism of _Joseph Andrews_ would greatly +prefer the latter. Yet Gray's verdict, though cold, is not +undiscriminating, and is perhaps as much as one could expect from his +cloistered and fastidious taste. + +Various anecdotes, all more or less apocryphal, have been related +respecting the first appearance of _Joseph Andrews_, and the sum paid to +the author for the copyright. A reference to the original assignment, +now in the Forster Library at South Kensington, definitely settles the +latter point. The amount in "lawful Money of Great Britain," received by +"Henry Fielding, Esq." from "Andrew Millar of St. Clement's Danes in the +Strand," was L183 11s. In this document, as in the order to Nourse of +which a _facsimile_ is given by Roscoe, both the author's name and +signature are written with the old-fashioned double f, and he calls +himself "Fielding" and not "Feilding," like the rest of the Denbigh +family. If we may trust an anecdote given by Kippis, Lord Denbigh once +asked his kinsman the reason of this difference. "I cannot tell, my +lord," returned the novelist, "unless it be that my branch of the family +was the first that learned to spell." In connection with this +assignment, however, what is perhaps even more interesting than these +discrepancies is the fact that one of the witnesses was William Young. +Thus we have Parson Adams acting as witness to the sale of the very book +which he had helped to immortalise. + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + +THE MISCELLANIES--JONATHAN WILD. + + +In March 1742, according to an article in the _Gentleman's Magazine_, +attributed to Samuel Johnson, "the most popular Topic of Conversation" +was the _Account of the Conduct of the Dowager Dutchess of Marlborough, +from her first coming to Court, to the Year 1710_, which, with the help +of Hooke of the _Roman History_, the "terrible old Sarah" had just put +forth. Among the little cloud of _Sarah-Ads_ and _Old Wives' Tales_ +evoked by this production, was a _Vindication_ of her Grace by Fielding, +specially prompted, as appears from the title-page, by the "late +_scurrilous_ Pamphlet" of a "noble Author." If this were not +acknowledged to be from Fielding's pen in the Preface to the +_Miscellanies_ (in which collection, however, it is not reprinted), its +authorship would be sufficiently proved by its being included with _Miss +Lucy in Town_ in the assignment to Andrew Millar referred to at the +close of the preceding chapter. The price Millar paid for it was L5 5s, +or exactly half that of the farce. But it is only reasonable to assume +that the Duchess herself (who is said to have given Hooke L5000 for his +help) also rewarded her champion. Whether Fielding's admiration for the +"glorious Woman" in whose cause he had drawn his pen was genuine, or +whether--to use Johnson's convenient euphemism concerning Hooke--"he +was acting only ministerially," are matters for speculation. His father, +however, had served under the Duke, and there may have been a +traditional attachment to the Churchills on the part of his family. It +has even been ingeniously suggested that Sarah Fielding was her Grace's +god-child; [Footnote: _Memoirs of Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough_, etc., +by Mrs. A. T. Thomson, 1839.] but as her mother's name was also Sarah, +no importance can be attached to the suggestion. + +_Miss Lucy in Town_, as its sub-title explains, was a sequel to the +_Virgin Unmask'd_, and was produced at Drury Lane in May 1742. As +already stated in chapter ii., Fielding's part in it was small. It is a +lively but not very creditable trifle, which turns upon certain +equivocal London experiences of the Miss Lucy of the earlier piece; and +it seems to have been chiefly intended to afford an opportunity for some +clever imitation of the reigning Italian singers by Mrs. Clive and the +famous tenor Beard. Horace Walpole, who refers to it in a letter to +Mann, between an account of the opening of Ranelagh and an anecdote of +Mrs. Bracegirdle, calls it "a little simple farce," and says that "Mrs. +Clive mimics the Muscovita admirably, and Beard Amorevoli tolerably." +Mr. Walpole detested the Muscovita, and adored Amorevoli, which perhaps +accounts for the nice discrimination shown in his praise. One of the +other characters, Mr. Zorobabel, a Jew, was taken by Macklin, and from +another, Mrs. Haycock (afterwards changed to Mrs. Midnight), Foote is +supposed to have borrowed Mother Cole in _The Minor_. A third character, +Lord Bawble, was considered to reflect upon "a particular person of +quality," and the piece was speedily forbidden by the Lord Chamberlain, +although it appears to have been acted a few months later without +opposition. One of the results of the prohibition, according to Mr. +Lawrence, was a _Letter to a Noble Lord_ (the Lord Chamberlain) ... +_occasioned by a Representation ... of a Farce called "Miss Lucy in +Town."_ This, in spite of the Caveat in the Preface to the +_Miscellanies_, he ascribes to Fielding, and styles it "a sharp +expostulation ... in which he [Fielding] disavowed any idea of a +personal attack." But Mr. Lawrence must plainly have been misinformed on +the subject, for the pamphlet bears little sign of Fielding's hand. As +far as it is intelligible, it is rather against Miss Lucy than for her, +and it makes no reference to Lord Bawble's original. The name of this +injured patrician seems indeed never to have transpired; but he could +scarcely have been in any sense an exceptional member of the Georgian +aristocracy. + +In the same month that _Miss Lucy in Town_ appeared at Drury Lane, +Millar published it in book form. In the following June, T. Waller of +the Temple-Cloisters issued the first of a contemplated series of +translations from Aristophanes by Henry Fielding, Esq., and the Rev. +William Young who sat for Parson Adams. The play chosen was _Plutus, the +God of Riches_, and a notice upon the original cover stated that, +according to the reception it met with from the public, it would be +followed by the others. It must be presumed that "the distressed, and at +present, declining State of Learning" to which the authors referred in +their dedication to Lord Talbot, was not a mere form of speech, for the +enterprise does not seem to have met with sufficient encouragement to +justify its continuance, and this special rendering has long since been +supplanted by the more modern versions of Mitchell, Frere, and others. +Whether Fielding took any large share in it is not now discernible. It +is most likely, however, that the bulk of the work was Young's, and that +his colleague did little more than furnish the Preface, which is partly +written in the first person, and betrays its origin by a sudden and not +very relevant attack upon the "pretty, dapper, brisk, smart, pert +Dialogue" of Modern Comedy into which the "infinite Wit" of Wycherley +had degenerated under Cibber. It also contains a compliment to the +numbers of the "inimitable Author" of the _Essay on Man_. + +This is the second compliment which Fielding had paid to Pope within a +brief period, the first having been that in the _Champion_ respecting +the translation of the _Iliad_. What his exact relations with the author +of the _Dunciad_ were, has never been divulged. At first they seem to +have been rather hostile than friendly. Fielding had ridiculed the +Romish Church in the _Old Debauchees_, a course which Pope could +scarcely have approved; and he was, moreover, the cousin of Lady Mary, +now no longer throned in the Twickenham Temple. Pope had commented upon +a passage in _Tom Thumb_, and Fielding had indirectly referred to Pope +in the _Covent Garden Tragedy_. When it had been reported that Pope had +gone to see _Pasquin_, the statement had been at once contradicted. But +Fielding was now, like Pope, against Walpole; and _Joseph Andrews_ had +been published. It may therefore be that the compliments in _Plutus_ and +the _Champion_ were the result of some _rapprochement_ between the two. +It is, nevertheless, curious that, at this very time, an attempt appears +to have been made to connect the novelist with the controversy which +presently arose out of Cibber's well-known letter to Pope. In August +1742, the month following its publication, among the pamphlets to which +it gave rise, was announced _The Cudgel; or, a Crab-tree Lecture, To the +Author of the Dunciad_. "By Hercules Vinegar, Esq." This very mediocre +satire in verse is still to be found at the British Museum; but even if +it were not included in Fielding's general disclaimer as to unsigned +work, it would be difficult to connect it with him. To give but one +reason, it would make him the ally and adherent of Cibber,--which is +absurd. In all probability, like another Grub Street squib under the +same pseudonym, it was by Ralph, who had already attacked Pope, and +continued to maintain the Captain's character in the _Champion_ long +after Fielding had ceased to write for it. It is even possible that +Ralph had some share in originating the Vinegar family, for it is +noticeable that the paper in which they are first introduced bears no +initials. In this case he would consider himself free to adopt the name, +however disadvantageous that course might be to Fielding's reputation. +And it is clear that, whatever their relations had been in the past, +they were for the time on opposite sides in politics, since while +Fielding had been vindicating the Duchess of Marlborough, Ralph had been +writing against her. + +These, however, are minor questions, the discussion of which would lead +too far from the main narrative of Fielding's life. In the same letter +in which Walpole had referred to _Miss Lucy in Town_, he had spoken of +the success of a new player at Goodman's Fields, after whom all the +town, in Gray's phrase, was "horn-mad;" but in whose acting Mr. Walpole, +with a critical distrust of novelty, saw nothing particularly wonderful. +This was David Garrick. He had been admitted a student of Lincoln's Inn +a year before Fielding entered the Middle Temple, had afterwards turned +wine-merchant, and was now delighting London by his versatility in +comedy, tragedy, and farce. One of his earliest theatrical exploits, +according to Sir John Hawkins, had been a private representation of +Fielding's _Mock-Doctor_, in a room over the St. John's Gate, +Clerkenwell, so long familiar to subscribers of the _Gentleman's +Magazine_; his fellow-actors being Cave's journeymen printers, and his +audience Cave, Johnson, and a few friends. After this he appears to have +made the acquaintance of Fielding; and late in 1742, applied to him to +know if he had "any Play by him," as "he was desirous of appearing in a +new Part." As a matter of fact Fielding had two plays by him--the _Good- +natured Man_ (a title subsequently used by Goldsmith), and a piece +called _The Wedding Day_. The former was almost finished: the latter was +an early work, being indeed "the third Dramatic Performance he ever +attempted." The necessary arrangements having been made with Mr. +Fleetwood, the manager of Drury Lane, Fielding set to work to complete +the _Good-natured Man_, which he considered the better of the two. When +he had done so, he came to the conclusion that it required more +attention than he could give it; and moreover, that the part allotted to +Garrick, although it satisfied the actor, was scarcely important enough. +He accordingly reverted to the _Wedding Day_, the central character of +which had been intended for Wilks. It had many faults which none saw +more clearly than the author himself, but he hoped that Garrick's energy +and _prestige_ would triumphantly surmount all obstacles. He hoped, as +well, to improve it by revision. The dangerous illness of his wife, +however, made it impossible for him to execute his task; and, as he was +pressed for money, the _Wedding Day_ was produced on the 17th of +February 1743, apparently much as it had been first written some dozen +years before. As might be anticipated, it was not a success. The +character of Millamour is one which it is hard to believe that even +Garrick could have made attractive, and though others of the parts were +entrusted to Mrs. Woffington, Mrs. Pritchard, and Macklin, it was acted +but six nights. The author's gains were under L50. In the Preface to the +_Miscellanies_, from which most of the foregoing account is taken, +Fielding, as usual, refers its failure to other causes than its inherent +defects. Rumours, he says, had been circulated as to its indecency (and +in truth some of the scenes are more than hazardous); but it had passed +the licenser, and must be supposed to have been up to the moral standard +of the time. Its unfavourable reception, as Fielding must have known in +his heart, was due to its artistic shortcomings, and also to the fact +that a change was taking place in the public taste. It is in connection +with the _Wedding Day_ that one of the best-known anecdotes of the +author is related. + +Garrick had begged him to retrench a certain objectionable passage. This +Fielding, either from indolence or unwillingness, declined to do, +asserting that if it was not good, the audience might find it out. The +passage was promptly hissed, and Garrick returned to the green-room, +where the author was solacing himself with a bottle of champagne. "What +is the matter, Garrick?" said he to the flustered actor; "what are they +hissing now?" He was informed with some heat that they had been hissing +the very scene he had been asked to withdraw, "and," added Garrick, +"they have so frightened me, that I shall not be able to collect myself +again the whole night"--"Oh!" answered the author, with an oath, "they +HAVE found it out, have they?" This rejoinder is usually quoted as an +instance of Fielding's contempt for the intelligence of his audience; +but nine men in ten, it may be observed, would have said something of +the same sort. + +The only other thing which need be referred to in connection with this +comedy--the last of his own dramatic works which Fielding ever witnessed +upon the stage--is Macklin's doggerel Prologue. Mr. Lawrence attributes +this to Fielding; but he seems to have overlooked the fact that in the +_Miscellanies_ it is headed, "_Writ_ and Spoken by Mr. Macklin," which +gives it more interest as the work of an outsider than if it had been a +mere laugh by the author at himself. Garrick is represented as too busy +to speak the prologue; and Fielding, who has been "drinking to raise his +Spirits," has begged Macklin with his "long, dismal, Mercy-begging +Face," to go on and apologise. Macklin then pretends to recognise him +among the audience, and pokes fun at his anxieties, telling him that he +had better have stuck to "honest _Abram Adams_," who, "in spight of +Critics, can make his Readers laugh." The words "in spite of critics" +indicate another distinction between Fielding's novels and plays, which +should have its weight in any comparison of them. The censors of the +pit, in the eighteenth century, seem to have exercised an unusual +influence in deciding whether a play should succeed or not; [Footnote: +Miller's _Coffee-House_, 1737, for example, was damned by the Templars +because it was supposed to reflect on the keepers of "Dick's."--(_Biog. +Dramatica_.)] and, from Fielding's frequent references to friends and +enemies, it would almost seem as if he believed their suffrages to be +more important than a good plot and a witty dialogue. On the other hand, +no coterie of Wits and Templars could kill a book like _Joseph Andrews_. +To say nothing of the opportunities afforded by the novel for more +leisurely character-drawing, and greater by-play of reflection and +description--its reader was an isolated and independent judge; and in +the long run the difference told wonderfully in favour of the author. +Macklin was obviously right in recommending Fielding, even in jest, to +stick to Parson Adams, and from the familiar publicity of the advice it +may also be inferred, not only that the opinion was one commonly +current, but that the novel was unusually popular. + +The _Wedding Day_ was issued separately in February 1743. It must +therefore be assumed that the three volumes of _Miscellanies_, by Henry +Fielding, Esq., in which it was reprinted, and to which reference has so +often been made in these pages, did not appear until later. [Footnote: +By advertisement in the _London Daily Post and General Advertiser_, they +would seem to have been published early in April 1743.] They were +published by subscription; and the list, in addition to a large number +of aristocratic and legal names, contains some of more permanent +interest. Side by side with the Chesterfields and Marlboroughs and +Burlingtons and Denbighs, come William Pitt and Henry Fox, Esqs., with +Dodington and Winnington and Hanbury Williams. The theatrical world is +well represented by Garrick and Mrs. Woffington and Mrs. Clive. +Literature has no names of any eminence except that of Young; for Savage +and Whitehead, Mallet and Benjamin Hoadly, are certainly _ignes +minores_. Pope is conspicuous for his absence; so also are Horace +Walpole and Gray, while Richardson, of course, is wanting. Johnson, as +yet only the author of _London_, and journeyman to Cave, could scarcely +be expected in the roll; and, in any case, his friendship for the author +of _Pamela_ would probably have kept him away. Among some other well- +known eighteenth century names are those of Dodsley and Millar the +booksellers, and the famous Vauxhall _impresario_ Jonathan Tyers. + +The first volume of the _Miscellanies_, besides a lengthy Preface, +includes the author's poems, essays _On Conversation_, _On the Knowledge +of the Characters of Men_, _On Nothing_, a squib upon the transactions +of the Royal Society, a translation from Demosthenes, and one or two +minor pieces. Much of the biographical material contained in the Preface +has already been made use of, as well as those verses which can be +definitely dated, or which relate to the author's love-affairs. The +hitherto unnoticed portions of the volume consist chiefly of Epistles, +in the orthodox eighteenth century fashion. One--already referred to--is +headed _Of True Greatness_; another, inscribed to the Duke of Richmond, +_Of Good-nature_; while a third is addressed to a friend _On the Choice +of a Wife_. This last contains some sensible lines, but although Roscoe +has managed to extract two quotable passages, it is needless to imitate +him here. These productions show no trace of the authentic Fielding. The +essays are more remarkable, although, like Montaigne's, they are +scarcely described by their titles. That on _Conversation_ is really a +little treatise on good breeding; that on the _Characters of Men_, a lay +sermon against Fielding's pet antipathy--hypocrisy. Nothing can well be +wiser, even now, than some of the counsels in the former of these papers +on such themes as the limits of raillery, the duties of hospitality, and +the choice of subject in general conversation. Nor, however threadbare +they may look to-day, can the final conclusions be reasonably objected +to:--"First, That every Person who indulges his Ill-nature or Vanity, at +the Expense of others; and in introducing Uneasiness, Vexation, and +Confusion into Society, however exalted or high-titled he may be, is +thoroughly ill-bred;" and "Secondly, That whoever, from the Goodness of +his Disposition or Understanding, endeavours to his utmost to cultivate +the Good-humour and Happiness of others, and to contribute to the Ease +and Comfort of all his Acquaintance, however low in Rank Fortune may +have placed him, or however clumsy he may be in his Figure or Demeanour, +hath, in the truest sense of the Word, a Claim to Good-Breeding." One +fancies that this essay must have been a favourite with the historian of +the _Book of Snobs_ and the creator of Major Dobbin. + +The _Characters of Men_ is not equal to the _Conversation._ The theme is +a wider one; and the end proposed,--that of supplying rules for +detecting the real disposition through all the social disguises which +cloak and envelop it,--can scarcely be said to be attained. But there +are happy touches even in this; and when the author says--"I will +venture to affirm, that I have known some of _the best sort of Men in +the World_ (to use the vulgar Phrase,) who would not have scrupled +cutting a Friend's Throat; and _a Fellow whom no Man should be seen to +speak to_, capable of the highest Acts of Friendship and Benevolence," +one recognises the hand that made the sole good Samaritan in Joseph +Andrews "a Lad who hath since been transported for robbing a Hen-roost." +The account of the Terrestrial Chrysipus or Guinea, a burlesque on a +paper read before the Royal Society on the Fresh Water Polypus, is +chiefly interesting from the fact that it is supposed to be written by +Petrus Gualterus (Peter Walter), who had an "extraordinary Collection" +of them. He died, in fact, worth L300,000. The only other paper in the +volume of any value is a short one _Of the Remedy of Affliction for the +Loss of our Friends_, to which we shall presently return. + +The farce of _Eurydice_, and the _Wedding Day_, which, with _A Journey +from this World to the Next_, etc., make up the contents of the second +volume of the _Miscellanies_, have been already sufficiently discussed. +But the _Journey_ deserves some further notice. It has been suggested +that this curious Lucianic production may have been prompted by the +vision of Mercury and Charon in the _Champion_, though the kind of +allegory of which it consists is common enough with the elder essayists; +and it is notable that another book was published in April 1743, under +the title of _Cardinal Fleury's Journey to the other World_, which is +manifestly suggested by Quevedo. Fielding's _Journey_, however, is a +fragment which the author feigns to have found in the garret of a +stationer in the Strand. Sixteen out of five-and-twenty chapters in Book +i. are occupied with the transmigrations of Julian the Apostate, which +are not concluded. Then follows another chapter from Book xix., which +contains the history of Anna Boleyn, and the whole breaks off abruptly. +Its best portion is undoubtedly the first ten chapters, which relate the +writer's progress to Elysium, and afford opportunity for many strokes of +satire. Such are the whimsical terror of the spiritual traveller in the +stagecoach, who hears suddenly that his neighbour has died of smallpox, +a disease he had been dreading all his life; and the punishment of Lord +Scrape, the miser, who is doomed to dole out money to all comers, and +who, after "being purified in the Body of a Hog," is ultimately to +return to earth again. Nor is the delight of some of those who profit by +his enforced assistance less keenly realised:--"I remarked a poetical +Spirit in particular, who swore he would have a hearty Gripe at him: +'For, says he, the Rascal not only refused to subscribe to my Works; but +sent back my Letter unanswered, tho' I'm a better Gentleman than +himself.'" The descriptions of the City of Diseases, the Palace of +Death, and the Wheel of Fortune from which men draw their chequered +lots, are all unrivalled in their way. But here, as always, it is in his +pictures of human nature that Fielding shines, and it is this that makes +the chapters in which Minos is shown adjudicating upon the separate +claims of the claimants to enter Elysium the most piquant of all. The +virtuoso and butterfly hunter, who is repulsed "with great Scorn;" the +dramatic author who is admitted (to his disgust), not on account of his +works, but because he has once lent "the whole Profits of a Benefit +Night to a Friend;" the parson who is turned back, while his poor +parishioners are admitted; and the trembling wretch who has been hanged +for a robbery of eighteen-pence, to which he had been driven by poverty, +but whom the judge welcomes cordially because he had been a kind father, +husband, and son; all these are conceived in that humane and generous +spirit which is Fielding's most engaging characteristic. The chapter +immediately following, which describes the literary and other +inhabitants of Elysium, is even better. Here is Leonidas, who appears to +be only moderately gratified with the honour recently done him by Mr. +Glover the poet; here is Homer, toying with Madam Dacier, and profoundly +indifferent as to his birthplace and the continuity of his poems; here, +too, is Shakespeare, who, foreseeing future commentators and the "New +Shakespere Society," declines to enlighten Betterton and Booth as to a +disputed passage in his works, adding, "I marvel nothing so much as that +Men will gird themselves at discovering obscure Beauties in an Author. +Certes the greatest and most pregnant Beauties are ever the plainest and +most evidently striking; and when two Meanings of a Passage can in the +least ballance our Judgements which to prefer, I hold it matter of +unquestionable Certainty that neither is worth a farthing." Then, again, +there are Addison and Steele, who are described with so pleasant a +knowledge of their personalities that, although the passage has been +often quoted, there seems to be no reason why it should not be quoted +once more:-- + +"_Virgil_ then came up to me, with Mr. _Addison_ under his Arm. Well, +Sir, said he, how many Translations have these few last Years produced +of my _AEneid_? I told him, I believed several, but I could not possibly +remember; for I had never read any but Dr. _Trapp's_. [Footnote: Dr. +Trapp's translation of the AEneid was published in 1718.]--Ay, said he, +that is a curious Piece indeed! I then acquainted him with the Discovery +made by Mr. _Warburton_ of the _Eleusinian_ Mysteries couched in his 6th +book. What Mysteries? said Mr. _Addison_. The _Eleusinian_, answered +_Virgil_, which I have disclosed in my 6th Book. How! replied _Addison_. +You never mentioned a word of any such Mysteries to me in all our +Acquaintance. I thought it was unnecessary, cried the other, to a Man of +your infinite Learning: besides, you always told me, you perfectly +understood my meaning. Upon this I thought the Critic looked a little +out of countenance, and turned aside to a very merry Spirit, one _Dick +Steele_, who embraced him, and told him, He had been the greatest Man +upon Earth; that he readily resigned up all the Merit of his own Works +to him. Upon which, _Addison_ gave him a gracious Smile, and clapping +him on the Back with much Solemnity, cried out, _Well said, Dick._" + +After encountering these and other notabilities, including Tom Thumb and +Livy, the latter of whom takes occasion to commend the ingenious +performances of Lady Marlborough's assistant, Mr. Hooke, the author +meets with Julian the Apostate, and from this point the narrative grows +languid. Its unfinished condition may perhaps be accepted as a proof +that Fielding himself had wearied of his scheme. + +The third volume of the _Miscellanies_ is wholly occupied with the +remarkable work entitled the _History of the Life of the late Mr. +Jonathan Wild the Great_. As in the case of the _Journey from this World +to the Next_, it is not unlikely that the first germ of this may be +found in the pages of the _Champion_. "Reputation"--says Fielding in one +of the essays in that periodical--"often courts those most who regard +her the least. Actions have sometimes been attended with Fame, which +were undertaken in Defiance of it. _Jonathan Wyld_ himself had for many +years no small Share of it in this Kingdom." The book now under +consideration is the elaboration of the idea thus casually thrown out. +Under the name of a notorious thief-taker hanged at Tyburn in 1725, +Fielding has traced the Progress of a Rogue to the Gallows, showing by +innumerable subtle touches that the (so-called) greatness of a villain +does not very materially differ from any other kind of greatness, which +is equally independent of goodness. This continually suggested affinity +between the ignoble and the pseudo-noble is the text of the book. +Against genuine worth (its author is careful to explain) his satire is +in no wise directed. He is far from considering "_Newgate_ as no other +than Human Nature with its Mask off;" but he thinks "we may be excused +for suspecting, that the splendid Palaces of the Great are often no +other than _Newgate_ with the Mask on." Thus _Jonathan Wild the Great_ +is a prolonged satire upon the spurious eminence in which benevolence, +honesty, charity, and the like have no part; or, as Fielding prefers to +term it, that false or "Bombast greatness" which is so often mistaken +for the "_true Sublime_ in Human Nature"--Greatness and Goodness +combined. So thoroughly has he explained his intention in the Prefaces +to the _Miscellanies_, and to the book itself, that it is difficult to +comprehend how Scott could fail to see his drift. Possibly, like some +others, he found the subject repugnant and painful to his kindly nature. +Possibly, too, he did not, for this reason, study the book very +carefully, for, with the episode of Heartfree under one's eyes, it is +not strictly accurate to say (as he does) that it presents "a picture of +complete vice, _unrelieved by any thing of human feeling_, and never by +any accident even deviating into virtue." If the author's introduction +be borne in mind, and if the book be read steadily in the light there +supplied, no one can refrain from admiring the extraordinary skill and +concentration with which the plan is pursued, and the adroitness with +which, at every turn, the villainy of Wild is approximated to that of +those securer and more illustrious criminals with whom he is so seldom +confused. And Fielding has never carried one of his chief and +characteristic excellences to so great perfection: the book is a model +of sustained and sleepless irony. To make any extracts from it--still +less to make any extracts which should do justice to it, is almost +impracticable; but the edifying discourse between Wild and Count La Ruse +in Book i., and the pure comedy of that in Book iv. with the Ordinary of +Newgate (who objects to wine, but drinks punch because "it is no where +spoken against in Scripture"), as well as the account of the prison +faction between Wild and Johnson, [Footnote: Some critics at this point +appear to have identified Johnson and Wild with Lord Wilmington and Sir +Robert Walpole (who resigned in 1742), while Mr. Keightley suspects that +Wild throughout typifies Walpole. But the advertisement "from the +Publisher" to the edition of 1754 disclaims any such "personal +Application." "The Truth is (he says), as a very corrupt State of Morals +is here represented, the Scene seems very properly to have been laid in +Newgate: Nor do I see any Reason for introducing any allegory at all; +unless we will agree that there are, without those Walls, some other +Bodies of Men of worse Morals than those within; and who have, +consequently, a Right to change Places with its present Inhabitants." +The writer was probably Fielding.] with its admirable speech of the +"grave Man" against Party, may all be cited as examples of its style and +method. Nor should the character of Wild in the last chapter, and his +famous rules of conduct, be neglected. It must be admitted, however, +that the book is not calculated to suit the nicely-sensitive in letters; +or, it may be added, those readers for whom the evolution of a purely +intellectual conception is either unmeaning or uninteresting. Its place +in Fielding's works is immediately after his three great novels, and +this is more by reason of its subject than its workmanship, which could +hardly be excelled. When it was actually composed is doubtful. If it may +be connected with the already-quoted passage in the _Champion_, it must +be placed after March 1740, which is the date of the paper; but, from a +reference to Peter Pounce in Book ii., it might also be supposed to have +been written after _Joseph Andrews_. The Bath simile in chapter xiv. +Book i., makes it likely that some part of it was penned at that place, +where, from an epigram in the _Miscellanies_ "written _Extempore_ in the +Pump Room," it is clear that Fielding was staying in 1742. But, whenever +it was completed, we are inclined to think that it was planned and begun +before _Joseph Andrews_ was published, as it is in the highest degree +improbable that Fielding, always carefully watching the public taste, +would have followed up that fortunate adventure in a new direction by a +work so entirely different from it as _Jonathan Wild_. + +A second edition of the _Miscellanies_ appeared in the same year as the +first, namely in 1743. From this date until the publication of _Tom +Jones_ in 1749, Fielding produced no work of signal importance, and his +personal history for the next few years is exceedingly obscure. We are +inclined to suspect that this must have been the most trying period of +his career. His health was shattered, and he had become a martyr to +gout, which seriously interfered with the active practice of his +profession. Again, "about this time," says Murphy vaguely, after +speaking of the _Wedding Day_, he lost his first wife. That she was +alive in the winter of 1742-3 is clear, for, in the Preface to the +_Miscellanies_, he describes himself as being then laid up, "with a +favourite Child dying in one Bed, and my Wife in a Condition very little +better, on another, attended with other Circumstances, which served as +very proper Decorations to such a Scene,"--by which Mr. Keightley no +doubt rightly supposes him to refer to writs and bailiffs. It must also +be assumed that Mrs. Fielding was alive when the Preface was written, +since, in apologising for an apparent delay in publishing the book, he +says the "real Reason" was "the dangerous Illness of one from whom I +_draw_ [the italics are ours] all the solid Comfort of my Life." There +is another unmistakable reference to her in one of the minor papers in +the first volume, viz. that _Of the Remedy of Affliction for the Loss of +our Friends_. "I remember the most excellent of Women, and tenderest of +Mothers, when, after a painful and dangerous Delivery, she was told she +had a Daughter, answering; _Good God! have I produced a Creature who is +to undergo what I have suffered!_ Some Years afterwards, I heard the +same Woman, on the Death of that very Child, then one of the loveliest +Creatures ever seen, comforting herself with reflecting, that _her Child +could never know what it was to feel such a Loss as she then lamented_." +Were it not for the passages already quoted from the Preface, it might +almost be concluded from the tone of the foregoing quotation and the +final words of the paper, which refer to our meeting with those we have +lost in Heaven, that Mrs. Fielding was already dead. But the use of the +word "draw" in the Preface affords distinct evidence to the contrary. It +is therefore most probable that she died in the latter part of 1743, +having been long in a declining state of health. For a time her husband +was inconsolable. "The fortitude of mind," says Murphy, "with which he +met all the other calamities of life, deserted him on this most trying +occasion." His grief was so vehement "that his friends began to think +him in danger of losing his reason." + +That Fielding had depicted his first wife in Sophia Western has already +been pointed out, and we have the authority of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu +and Richardson for saying that she was afterwards reproduced in +_Amelia_. "Amelia," says the latter, in a letter to Mrs. Donnellan, +"even to her _noselessness_, is again his first wife." Some of her +traits, too, are to be detected in the Mrs. Wilson of _Joseph Andrews_. +But, beyond these indications, we hear little about her. Almost all that +is definitely known is contained in a passage of the admirable +_Introductory Anecdotes_ contributed by Lady Louisa Stuart in 1837 to +Lord Wharncliffe's edition of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu's _Letters and +Works_. This account was based upon the recollections of Lady Bute, Lady +Mary's daughter. + +"Only those persons (says Lady Stuart) are mentioned here of whom Lady +Bute could speak from her own recollection or her mother's report. Both +had made her well informed of every particular that concerned her +relation Henry Fielding; nor was she a stranger to that beloved first +wife whose picture he drew in his Amelia, where, as she said, even the +glowing language he knew how to employ did not do more than justice to +the amiable qualities of the original, or to her beauty, although this +had suffered a little from the accident related in the novel,--a +frightful overturn, which destroyed the gristle of her nose. [Footnote: +That any one could have remained lovely after such a catastrophe is +difficult to believe. But probably Lady Bute (or Lady Stuart) +exaggerated its effects; for--to say nothing of the fact that, +throughout the novel, Amelia's beauty is continually commended--in the +delightfully feminine description which is given of her by Mrs. James in +Book xi. chap. i., pp. 114-15 of the first edition of 1752, although she +is literally pulled to pieces, there is no reference whatever to her +nose, which may be taken as proof positive that it was not an assailable +feature. Moreover, in the book as we now have it, Fielding, obviously in +deference to contemporary criticism, inserted the following specific +passages:--"She was, indeed, a most charming woman; and I know not +whether the little scar on her nose did not rather add to, than diminish +her beauty" (Book iv. chap, vii.); and in Mrs. James's portrait:--"Then +her nose, as well proportioned as it is, has a visible scar on one +side." No previous biographer seems to have thought it necessary to make +any mention of these statements, while Johnson's speech about "That vile +broken nose, _never cured_," and Richardson's coarsely-malignant +utterance to Mrs. Donnellan, are everywhere industriously remembered and +repeated.] He loved her passionately, and she returned his affection; +yet led no happy life, for they were almost always miserably poor, and +seldom in a state of quiet and safety. All the world knows what was his +imprudence; if ever he possessed a score of pounds, nothing could keep +him from lavishing it idly, or make him think of tomorrow. Sometimes +they were living in decent lodgings with tolerable comfort; sometimes in +a wretched garret without necessaries; not to speak of the spunging- +houses and hiding-places where he was occasionally to be found. His +elastic gaiety of spirit carried him through it all; but, meanwhile, +care and anxiety were preying upon her more delicate mind, and +undermining her constitution. She gradually declined, caught a fever, +and died in his arms." + +As usual, Mr. Keightley has done his best to test this statement to the +utmost. Part of his examination may be neglected, because it is based +upon the misconception that Lord Wharncliffe, Lady Mary's greatgrandson, +and not Lady Stuart, her granddaughter, was the writer of the foregoing +account. But as a set-off to the extreme destitution alleged, Mr. +Keightley very justly observes that Mrs. Fielding must for some time +have had a maid, since it was a maid who had been devotedly attached to +her whom Fielding subsequently married. He also argues that "living in a +garret and skulking in out o' the way retreats," are incompatible with +studying law and practising as a barrister. Making every allowance, +however, for the somewhat exaggerated way in which those of high rank +often speak of the distresses of their less opulent kinsfolk, it is +probable that Fielding's married life was one of continual shifts and +privations. Such a state of things is completely in accordance with his +profuse nature [Footnote: The passage as to his imprudence is, oddly +enough, omitted from Mr. Keightley's quotation.] and his precarious +means. Of his family by the first Mrs. Fielding no very material +particulars have been preserved. Writing, in November 1745, in the _True +Patriot_, he speaks of having a son and a daughter, but no son by his +first wife seems to have survived him. The late Colonel Chester found +the burial of a "James Fielding, son of Henry Fielding," recorded under +date of 19th February 1736, in the register of St. Giles in the Fields; +but it is by no means certain that this entry refers to the novelist. A +daughter, Harriet or Harriot, certainly did survive him, for she is +mentioned in the _Voyage to Lisbon_ as being of the party who +accompanied him. Another daughter, as already stated, probably died in +the winter of 1742-3; and the _Journey from this World to the Next_ +contains the touching reference to this or another child, of which +Dickens writes so warmly in one of his letters. "I presently," says +Fielding, speaking of his entrance into Elysium, "met a little Daughter, +whom I had lost several Years before. Good Gods! what Words can describe +the Raptures, the melting passionate Tenderness, with which we kiss'd +each other, continuing in our Embrace, with the most extatic Joy, a +Space, which if Time had been measured here as on Earth, could not have +been less than half a Year." + +From the death of Mrs. Fielding until the publication of the _True +Patriot_ in 1745 another comparative blank ensues in Fielding's history; +and it can only be filled by the assumption that he was still +endeavouring to follow his profession as a barrister. His literary work +seems to have been confined to a Preface to the second edition of his +sister's novel of _David Simple_, which appeared in 1744. This, while +rendering fraternal justice to that now forgotten book, is memorable for +some personal utterances on Fielding's part. In denying the authorship +of _David Simple_, which had been attributed to him, he takes occasion +to appeal against the injustice of referring anonymous works to his pen, +in the face of his distinct engagement in the Preface to the +_Miscellanies_, that he would thenceforth write nothing except over his +own signature; and he complains that such a course has a tendency to +injure him in a profession to which "he has applied with so arduous and +intent a diligence, that he has had no leisure, if he had inclination, +to compose anything of this kind (i.e. _David Simple_)." At the same +time, he formally withdraws his promise, since it has in no wise +exempted him from the scandal of putting forth anonymous work. From +other passages in this "Preface," it may be gathered the immediate cause +of irritation was the assignment to his pen of "that infamous paultry +libel" the _Causidicade_, a satire directed at the law in general, and +some of the subscribers to the _Miscellanies_ in particular. "This," he +says, "accused me not only of being a bad writer, and a bad man, but +with downright idiotism, in flying in the face of the greatest men of my +profession." It may easily be conceived that such a report must be +unfavourable to a struggling barrister, and Fielding's anxiety on this +head is a strong proof that he was still hoping to succeed at the Bar. +To a subsequent collection of _Familiar Letters between the Principal +Characters in David Simple and some others_, he supplied another preface +three years later, together with five little-known epistles which, +nevertheless, are not without evidence of his characteristic touch. + +A life of ups and downs like Fielding's is seldom remarkable for its +consistency. It is therefore not surprising to find that, despite his +desire in 1744 to refrain from writing, he was again writing in 1745. +The landing of Charles Edward attracted him once more into the ranks of +journalism, on the side of the Government, and gave rise to the _True +Patriot_, a weekly paper, the first number of which appeared in +November. This, having come to an end with the Rebellion, was succeeded +in December 1747 by the _Jacobite's Journal_, supposed to emanate from +"John Trott-Plaid, Esq.," and intended to push the discomfiture of +Jacobite sentiment still further. It is needless to discuss these mainly +political efforts at any length. They are said to have been highly +approved by those in power: it is certain that they earned for their +author the stigma of "pension'd scribbler." Both are now very rare; and +in Murphy the former is represented by twenty-four numbers, the latter +by two only. The _True Patriot_ contains a dream of London abandoned to +the rebels, which is admirably graphic; and there is also a prophetic +chronicle of events for 1746, in which the same idea is treated in a +lighter and more satirical vein. But perhaps the most interesting +feature is the reappearance of Parson Adams, who addresses a couple of +letters to the same periodical--one on the rising generally, and the +other on the "young England" of the day, as exemplified in a very +offensive specimen he had recently encountered at Mr. Wilson's. Other +minor points of interest in connection with the _Jacobite's Journal_, +are the tradition associating Hogarth with the rude woodcut headpiece (a +Scotch man and woman on an ass led by a monk) which surmounted its +earlier numbers, and the genial welcome given in No. 5, perhaps not +without some touch of contrition, to the two first volumes, then just +published, of Richardson's _Clarissa_. The pen is the pen of an +imaginary "correspondent," but the words are unmistakably Fielding's:-- + +"When I tell you I have lately received this Pleasure [i.e. of reading a +new master-piece], you will not want me to inform you that I owe it to +the Author of CLARISSA. Such Simplicity, such Manners, such deep +Penetration into Nature; such Power to raise and alarm the Passions, few +Writers, either ancient or modern, have been possessed of. My Affections +are so strongly engaged, and my Fears are so raised, by what I have +already read, that I cannot express my Eagerness to see the rest. Sure +this Mr. _Richardson_ is Master of all that Art which _Horace_ compares +to Witchcraft + + --Pectus inaniter angit, + Irritat, mulcet, falsis terroribus implet + Ut Magus.--" + +Between the discontinuance of the True Patriot and the establishment of +its successor occurred an event, the precise date of which has been +hitherto unknown, namely, Fielding's second marriage. The account given +of this by Lady Louisa Stuart is as follows:-- + +"His [Fielding's] biographers seem to have been shy of disclosing that +after the death of this charming woman [his first wife] he married her +maid. And yet the act was not so discreditable to his character as it +may sound. The maid had few personal charms, but was an excellent +creature, devotedly attached to her mistress, and almost broken-hearted +for her loss. In the first agonies of his own grief, which approached to +frenzy, he found no relief but from weeping along with her; nor solace, +when a degree calmer, but in talking to her of the angel they mutually +regretted. This made her his habitual confidential associate, and in +process of time he began to think he could not give his children a +tenderer mother, or secure for himself a more faithful housekeeper and +nurse. At least this was what he told his friends; and it is certain +that her conduct as his wife confirmed it, and fully justified his good +opinion." + +It has now been ascertained that the marriage took place at St. +Bene't's, Paul's Wharf, an obscure little church in the City, at present +surrendered to a Welsh congregation, but at that time, like Mary-le-bone +old church, much in request for unions of a private character. The date +in the register is the 27th of November 1747. The second Mrs. Fielding's +maiden name, which has been hitherto variously reported as Macdonnell, +Macdonald, and Macdaniel, is given as Mary Daniel, [Footnote: See note +to Fielding's letter in Chap. vii.] and she is further described as "of +St Clement's Danes, Middlesex, Spinster." Either previously to this +occurrence, or immediately after it, Fielding seems to have taken two +rooms in a house in Back Lane, Twickenham, "not far," says the Rev. Mr. +Cobbett in his _Memorials_, "from the site of Copt Hall." In 1872 this +house was still standing,--a quaint old-fashioned wooden structure; +[Footnote: Now (1883) it no longer exists, and a row of cottages +occupies the site.]--and from hence, on the 25th February 1748, was +baptized the first of the novelist's sons concerning whom any definite +information exists--the William Fielding who, like his father, became a +Westminster magistrate. Beyond suggesting that it may supply a reason +why, during Mrs. Fielding's life-time, her husband's earliest biographer +made no reference to the marriage, it is needless to dwell upon the +proximity between the foregoing dates. In other respects the +circumstance now first made public is not inconsistent with Lady +Stuart's narrative; and there is no doubt, from the references to her in +the _Journal of a Voyage to Lisbon_ and elsewhere, that Mary Daniel did +prove an excellent wife, mother, and nurse. Another thing is made clear +by the date established, and this is that the verses "On Felix; Marry'd +to a Cook-Maid" in the _Gentleman's Magazine_ for July 1746, to which +Mr. Lawrence refers, cannot possibly have anything to do with Fielding, +although they seem to indicate that alliances of the kind were not +unusual. Perhaps _Pamela_ had made them fashionable. On the other hand, +the supposed allusion to Lyttelton and Fielding, to be found in the +first edition of _Peregrine Pickle_, but afterwards suppressed, receives +a certain confirmation. "When," says Smollett, speaking of the relations +of an imaginary Mr. Spondy with Gosling Scrag, who is understood to +represent Lyttelton, "he is inclined to marry his own cook-wench, his +gracious patron may condescend to give the bride away; and may finally +settle him in his old age, as a trading Westminster justice." That, +looking to the facts, Fielding's second marriage should have gained the +approval and countenance of Lyttelton is no more than the upright and +honourable character of the latter would lead us to expect. + +The _Jacobite's Journal_ ceased to appear in November 1748. In the early +part of the December following, the remainder of Smollett's programme +came to pass, and by Lyttelton's interest Fielding was appointed a +Justice of the Peace for Westminster. From a letter in the _Bedford +Correspondence_, dated 13th December 1748, respecting the lease of a +house or houses which would qualify him to act for Middlesex, it would +seem that the county was afterwards added to his commission. He must +have entered upon his office in the first weeks of December, as upon the +ninth of that month one John Salter was committed to the Gatehouse by +Henry Fielding, Esq., "of Bow Street, Covent Garden, formerly Sir Thomas +de Veil's." Sir Thomas de Veil, who died in 1746, and whose _Memoirs_ +had just been published, could not, however, have been Fielding's +immediate predecessor. + + + + +CHAPTER V. + +TOM JONES. + + +Writing from Basingstoke to his brother Tom, on the 29th October 1746, +Joseph Warton thus refers to a visit he paid to Fielding:-- + +"I wish you had been with me last week, when I spent two evenings with +Fielding and his sister, who wrote David Simple, and you may guess I was +very well entertained. The lady indeed retir'd pretty soon, but Russell +and I sat up with the Poet [Warton no doubt uses the word here in the +sense of 'maker' or 'creator'] till one or two in the morning, and were +inexpressibly diverted. I find he values, as he justly may, his Joseph +Andrews above all his writings: he was extremely civil to me, I fancy, +on my Father's account." [Footnote: i.e. the Rev. Thomas Warton, Vicar +of Basingstoke, and sometime Professor of Poetry at Oxford.] + +This mention of _Joseph Andrews_ has misled some of Fielding's +biographers into thinking that he ranked that novel above _Tom Jones_. +But, in October 1746, _Tom Jones_ had not been published; and, from the +absence of any reference to it by Warton, it is only reasonable to +conclude that it had not yet assumed a definite form, or Fielding, who +was by no means uncommunicative, would in all probability have spoken of +it as an effort from which he expected still greater things. It is +clear, too, that at this date he was staying in London, presumably in +lodgings with his sister; and it is also most likely that he lived much +in town when he was conducting the _True Patriot_ and the _Jacobite's +Journal_. At other times he would appear to have had no settled place of +abode. There are traditions that _Tom Jones_ was composed in part at +Salisbury, in a house at the foot of Milford Hill; and again that it was +written at Twiverton, or Twerton-on-Avon, near Bath, where, as the Vicar +pointed out in _Notes and Queries_ for March 15th, 1879, there still +exists a house called Fielding's Lodge, over the door of which is a +stone crest of a phoenix rising out of a mural coronet. This latter +tradition is supported by the statement of Mr. Richard Graves, author of +the _Spiritual Quixote_, and rector, _circa_ 1750, of the neighbouring +parish of Claverton, who says in his _Trifling Anecdotes of the late +Ralph Allen_, that Fielding while at Twerton used to dine almost daily +with Allen at Prior Park. There are also traces of his residence at Bath +itself; and of visits to the seat of Lyttelton's father at Hagley in +Worcestershire. Towards the close of 1747 he had, as before stated, +rooms in Back Lane, Twickenham; and it must be to this or to some +earlier period that Walpole alludes in his _Parish Register_ (1759):-- + + "Here Fielding met his bunter Muse + And, as they quaff'd the fiery juice, + Droll Nature stamp'd each lucky hit + With unimaginable wit;"-- + +a quatrain in which the last lines excuse the first. According to Mr. +Cobbett's already-quoted _Memorials of Twickenham_, he left that place +upon his appointment as a Middlesex magistrate, when he moved to Bow +Street. His house in Bow Street belonged to John, Duke of Bedford; and +he continued to live in it until a short time before his death. It was +subsequently occupied by his half-brother and successor, Sir John, +[Footnote: In the riots of '80--as Dickens has not forgotten to note in +_Barnaby Rudge_--the house was destroyed by the mob, who burned Sir +John's goods in the street (Boswell's _Johnson_, chap. lxx.)] who, +writing to the Duke in March 1770, to thank him for his munificent gift +of an additional ten years to the lease, recalls "that princely instance +of generosity which his Grace shewed to his late brother, Henry +Fielding." + +What this was, is not specified. It may have been the gift of the leases +of those tenements which, as explained, were necessary to qualify +Fielding to act as a Justice of the Peace for the county of Middlesex; +it may even have been the lease of the Bow Street house; or it may have +been simply a gift of money. But whatever it was, it was something +considerable. In his appeal to the Duke, at the close of the last +chapter, Fielding referred to previous obligations, and in his +dedication of _Tom Jones_ to Lyttelton, he returns again to his Grace's +beneficence. Another person, of whose kindness grateful but indirect +mention is made in the same dedication, is Ralph Allen, who, according +to Derrick, the Bath M.C., sent the novelist a present of L200, before +he had even made his acquaintance, [Footnote: Derrick's Letters, 1767, +ii. 95.] which, from the reference to Allen in _Joseph Andrews_, +probably began before 1742. Lastly, there is Lyttelton himself, +concerning whom, in addition to a sentence which implies that he +actually suggested the writing of _Tom Jones_, we have the express +statements on Fielding's part that "without your Assistance this History +had never been completed," and "I partly owe to you my Existence during +great Part of the Time which I have employed in composing it." These +words must plainly be accepted as indicating pecuniary help; and, taking +all things together, there can be little doubt that for some years +antecedent to his appointment as a Justice of the Peace, Fielding was in +straitened circumstances, and was largely aided, if not practically +supported, by his friends. Even supposing him to have been subsidised by +Government as alleged, his profits from the _True Patriot_ and the +_Jacobite's Journal_ could not have been excessive; and his gout, of +which he speaks in one of his letters to the Duke of Bedford, must have +been a serious obstacle in the way of his legal labours. + +_The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling_, was published by Andrew Millar +on the 28th of February 1749, and its appearance in six volumes, 12mo, +was announced in the _General Advertiser_ of that day's date. There had +been no author's name on the title-page of _Joseph Andrews_; but _Tom +Jones_ was duly described as "by Henry Fielding, Esq.," and bore the +motto from Horace, seldom so justly applied, of "_Mores hominum multorum +vidit._" The advertisement also ingenuously stated that as it was +"impossible to get Sets bound fast enough to answer the Demand for them, +such Gentlemen and Ladies as pleased, might have them sew'd in Blue +Paper and Boards at the Price of 16s a Set." The date of issue +sufficiently disposes of the statement of Cunningham and others, that +the book was written at Bow Street. Little more than the dedication, +which is preface as well, can have been produced by Fielding in his new +home. Making fair allowance for the usual tardy progress of a book +through the press, and taking into consideration the fact that the +author was actively occupied with his yet unfamiliar magisterial duties, +it is most probable that the last chapter of _Tom Jones_ had been penned +before the end of 1748, and that after that time it had been at the +printer's. For the exact price paid to the author by the publisher on +this occasion we are indebted to Horace Walpole, who, writing to George +Montagu in May 1749, says--"Millar the bookseller has done very +generously by him [Fielding]: finding Tom Jones, for which he had given +him six hundred pounds, sell so greatly, he has since given him another +hundred." + +It is time, however, to turn from these particulars to the book itself. +In _Joseph Andrews_, Fielding's work had been mainly experimental. He +had set out with an intention which had unexpectedly developed into +something else. That something else, he had explained, was the comic +epic in prose. He had discovered its scope and possibilities only when +it was too late to re-cast his original design; and though _Joseph +Andrews_ has all the freshness and energy of a first attempt in a new +direction, it has also the manifest disadvantages of a mixed conception +and an uncertain plan. No one had perceived these defects more plainly +than the author; and in _Tom Jones_ he set himself diligently to perfect +his new-found method. He believed that he foresaw a "new Province of +Writing," of which he regarded himself with justice as the founder and +lawgiver; and in the "prolegomenous, or introductory Chapters" to each +book--those delightful resting-spaces where, as George Eliot says, +"he seems to bring his arm-chair to the proscenium and chat with us in +all the lusty ease of his fine English"--he takes us, as it were, into +his confidence, and discourses frankly of his aims and his way of work. +He looked upon these little "initial Essays" indeed, as an indispensable +part of his scheme. They have given him, says he more than once, "the +greatest Pains in composing" of any part of his book, and he hopes that, +like the Greek and Latin mottoes in the _Spectator_, they may serve to +secure him against imitation by inferior authors. [Footnote: +Notwithstanding this warning, Cumberland (who copied so much) copied +these in his novel of _Henry_. On the other hand, Fielding's French and +Polish translators omitted them as superfluous.] Naturally a great deal +they contain is by this time commonplace, although it was unhackneyed +enough when Fielding wrote. The absolute necessity in work of this kind +for genius, learning, and knowledge of the world, the constant +obligation to preserve character and probability--to regard variety and +the law of contrast:--these are things with which the modern tiro +(however much he may fail to possess or observe them) is now supposed to +be at least theoretically acquainted. But there are other chapters in +which Fielding may also be said to reveal his personal point of view, +and these can scarcely be disregarded. His "Fare," he says, following +the language of the table, is "HUMAN NATURE," which he shall first +present "in that more plain and simple Manner in which it is found in +the Country," and afterwards "hash and ragoo it with all the high +_French_ and _Italian_ seasoning of Affectation and Vice which Courts +and Cities afford." His inclination, he admits, is rather to the middle +and lower classes than to "the highest Life," which he considers to +present "very little Humour or Entertainment." His characters (as +before) are based upon actual experience; or, as he terms it, +"Conversation." He does not propose to present his reader with "Models +of Perfection;" he has never happened to meet with those "faultless +Monsters." He holds that mankind is constitutionally defective, and that +a single bad act does not, of necessity, imply a bad nature. He has also +observed, without surprise, that virtue in this world is not always "the +certain Road to Happiness," nor "Vice to Misery." In short, having been +admitted "behind the Scenes of this Great Theatre of Nature," he paints +humanity as he has found it, extenuating nothing, nor setting down aught +in malice, but reserving the full force of his satire and irony for +affectation and hypocrisy. His sincere endeavour, he says moreover in +his dedication to Lyttelton, has been "to recommend Goodness and +Innocence," and promote the cause of religion and virtue. And he has all +the consciousness that what he is engaged upon is no ordinary +enterprise. He is certain that his pages will outlive both "their own +infirm Author" and his enemies; and he appeals to Fame to solace and +reassure him-- + +"Come, bright Love of Fame,"--says the beautiful "Invocation" which +begins the thirteenth Book,--"inspire my glowing Breast: Not thee I +call, who over swelling Tides of Blood and Tears, dost bear the Heroe on +to Glory, while Sighs of Millions waft his spreading Sails; but thee, +fair, gentle Maid, whom _Mnesis_, happy Nymph, first on the Banks of +_Hebrus_ didst produce. Thee, whom _Maeonia_ educated, whom _Mantua_ +charm'd, and who, on that fair Hill which overlooks the proud Metropolis +of _Britain_, sat, with thy _Milton_, sweetly tuning the Heroic Lyre; +fill my ravished Fancy with the Hopes of charming Ages yet to come. +Foretel me that some tender Maid, whose Grandmother is yet unborn, +hereafter, when, under the fictitious Name of _Sophia_, she reads the +real Worth which once existed in my _Charlotte_, shall, from her +sympathetic Breast, send forth the heaving Sigh. Do thou teach me not +only to foresee, but to enjoy, nay, even to feed on future Praise. +Comfort me by a solemn Assurance, that when the little Parlour in which +I sit at this Instant, shall be reduced to a worse furnished Box, I +shall be read, with Honour, by those who never knew nor saw me, and whom +I shall neither know nor see." + +With no less earnestness, after a mock apostrophe to Wealth, he appeals +to Genius:-- + +"Teach me (he exclaims), which to thee is no difficult Task, to know +Mankind better than they know themselves. Remove that Mist which dims +the Intellects of Mortals, and causes them to adore Men for their Art, +or to detest them for their Cunning in deceiving others, when they are, +in Reality, the Objects only of Ridicule, for deceiving themselves. +Strip off the thin Disguise of Wisdom from Self-Conceit, of Plenty from +Avarice, and of Glory from Ambition. Come thou, that hast inspired thy +_Aristophanes_, thy _Lucian_, thy _Cervantes_, thy _Rabelais_, thy +_Moliere_, thy _Shakespear_, thy _Swift_, thy _Marivaux_, fill my Pages +with Humour, till Mankind learn the Good-Nature to laugh only at the +Follies of others, and the Humility to grieve at their own." + +From the little group of immortals who are here enumerated, it may be +gathered with whom Fielding sought to compete, and with whom he hoped +hereafter to be associated. His hopes were not in vain. Indeed, in one +respect, he must be held to have even outrivalled that particular +predecessor with whom he has been oftenest compared. Like _Don Quixote_, +_Tom Jones_ is the precursor of a new order of things,--the earliest and +freshest expression of a new departure in art. But while _Tom Jones_ is, +to the full, as amusing as _Don Quixote_, it has the advantage of a +greatly superior plan, and an interest more skilfully sustained. The +incidents which, in Cervantes, simply succeed each other like the scenes +in a panorama, are, in _Tom Jones_, but parts of an organised and +carefully-arranged progression towards a foreseen conclusion. As the +hero and heroine cross and re-cross each other's track, there is +scarcely an episode which does not aid in the moving forward of the +story. Little details rise lightly and naturally to the surface of the +narrative, not more noticeable at first than the most everyday +occurrences, and a few pages farther on become of the greatest +importance. The hero makes a mock proposal of marriage to Lady +Bellaston. It scarcely detains attention, so natural an expedient does +it appear, and behold in a chapter or two it has become a terrible +weapon in the hands of the injured Sophia! Again, when the secret of +Jones' birth [Footnote: Much ink has been shed respecting Fielding's +reason for making his hero illegitimate. But may not "The History of Tom +Jones, a _Foundling_," have had no subtler origin than the recent +establishment of the Foundling Hospital, of which Fielding had written +in the _Champion_, and in which his friend Hogarth was interested?] is +finally disclosed, we look back and discover a hundred little +premonitions which escaped us at first, but which, read by the light of +our latest knowledge, assume a fresh significance. At the same time, it +must be admitted that the over-quoted and somewhat antiquated dictum of +Coleridge, by which _Tom Jones_ is grouped with the _Alchemist_ and +_OEdipus Tyrannus_, as one of the three most perfect plots in the world, +requires revision. It is impossible to apply the term "perfect" to a +work which contains such an inexplicable stumbling-block as the Man of +the Hill's story. Then again, progress and animation alone will not make +a perfect plot, unless probability be superadded. And although it cannot +be said that Fielding disregards probability, he certainly strains it +considerably. Money is conveniently lost and found; the naivest +coincidences continually occur; people turn up in the nick of time at +the exact spot required, and develop the most needful (but entirely +casual) relations with the characters. Sometimes an episode is so +inartistically introduced as to be almost clumsy. Towards the end of the +book, for instance, it has to be shown that Jones has still some power +of resisting temptation, and he accordingly receives from a Mrs. +Arabella Hunt, a written offer of her hand, which he declines. Mrs. +Hunt's name has never been mentioned before, nor, after this occurrence, +is it mentioned again. But in the brief fortnight which Jones has been +in town, with his head full of Lady Bellaston, Sophia, and the rest, we +are to assume that he has unwittingly inspired her with so desperate a +passion that she proposes and is refused--all in a chapter. +Imperfections of this kind are more worthy of consideration than some of +the minor negligences which criticism has amused itself by detecting in +this famous book. Such, among others, is the discovery made by a writer +in the _Gentleman's Magazine_, that in one place winter and summer come +too close together; or the "strange specimen of oscitancy" which another +(it is, in fact, Mr. Keightley) considers it worth while to record +respecting the misplacing of the village of Hambrook. To such trifles as +these last the precept of _non offendar maculis_ may safely be applied, +although Fielding, wiser than his critics, seems to have foreseen the +necessity for still larger allowances:-- + +"Cruel indeed," says he in his proemium to Book XI., "would it be, if +such a Work as this History, which hath employed some Thousands of Hours +in the composing, should be liable to be condemned, because some +particular Chapter, or perhaps Chapters, may be obnoxious to very just +and sensible Objections.... To write within such severe Rules as these, +is as impossible as to live up to some splenetic Opinions; and if we +judge according to the Sentiments of some Critics, and of some +Christians, no Author will be saved in this World, and no Man in the +next." + +Notwithstanding its admitted superiority to _Joseph Andrews_ as a work +of art, there is no male character in _Tom Jones_ which can compete with +Parson Adams--none certainly which we regard with equal admiration. +Allworthy, excellent compound of Lyttelton and Allen though he be, +remains always a little stiff and cold in comparison with the "veined +humanity" around him. We feel of him, as of another impeccable +personage, that we "cannot breathe in that fine air, That pure severity +of perfect light," and that we want the "warmth and colour" which we +find in Adams. Allworthy is a type rather than a character--a fault +which also seems to apply to that Molieresque hypocrite, the younger +Blifil. Fielding seems to have welded this latter together, rather than +to have fused him entire, and the result is a certain lack of +verisimilitude, which makes us wonder how his pinchbeck professions and +vamped-up virtues could deceive so many persons. On the other hand, his +father, Captain John Blifil, has all the look of life. Nor can there be +any doubt about the vitality of Squire Western. Whether the germ of his +character be derived from Addison's Tory Foxhunter or not, it is certain +that Fielding must have had superabundant material of his own from which +to model this thoroughly representative, and at the same time, +completely individual character. Western has all the rustic tastes, the +narrow prejudices, the imperfect education, the unreasoning hatred to +the court, which distinguished the Jacobite country gentleman of the +Georgian era; but his divided love for his daughter and his horses, his +good-humour and his shrewdness, his foaming impulses and his quick +subsidings, his tears, his oaths, and his barbaric dialect, are all +essential features in a personal portrait. When Jones has rescued +Sophia, he will give him all his stable, the Chevalier and Miss Slouch +excepted; when he finds he is in love with her, he is in a frenzy to +"get _at un_" and "spoil his Caterwauling." He will have the surgeon's +heart's blood if he takes a drop too much from Sophia's white arm; when +she opposes his wishes as to Blifil, he will turn her into the street +with no more than a smock, and give his estate to the "_zinking_ Fund." +Throughout the book he is _qualis ab incepto_,--boisterous, brutal, +jovial, and inimitable; so that when finally in "Chapter the Last," we +get that pretty picture of him in Sophy's nursery, protesting that the +tattling of his little granddaughter is "sweeter Music than the finest +Cry of Dogs in _England_," we part with him almost with a feeling of +esteem. Scott seems to have thought it unreasonable that he should have +"taken a beating so unresistingly from the friend of Lord Fellamar," and +even hints that the passage is an interpolation, although he wisely +refrains from suggesting by whom, and should have known that it was in +the first edition. With all deference to so eminent an authority, it is +impossible to share his hesitation. Fielding was fully aware that even +the bravest have their fits of panic. It must besides be remembered that +Lord Fellamar's friend was not an effeminate dandy, but a military man-- +probably a professed _sabreur_, if not a salaried bully like Captain +Stab in the _Rake's Progress_; that he was armed with a stick and +Western was not; and that he fell upon him in the most unexpected +manner, in a place where he was wholly out of his element. It is +inconceivable that the sturdy squire, with his faculty for distributing +"Flicks" and "Dowses,"--who came so valiantly to the aid of Jones in his +battle-royal with Blifil and Thwackum,--was likely, under any but very +exceptional circumstances, to be dismayed by a cane. It was the +exceptional character of the assault which made a coward of him; and +Fielding, who had the keenest eye for inconsistencies of the kind, knew +perfectly well what he was doing. + +Of the remaining _dramatis personae_--the swarming individualities with +which the great comic epic is literally "all alive," as Lord Monboddo +said--it is impossible to give any adequate account. Few of them, if +any, are open to the objection already pointed out with respect to +Allworthy and the younger Blifil, and most of them bear signs of having +been closely copied from living models. Parson Thwackum, with his +Antinomian doctrines, his bigotry, and his pedagogic notions of justice; +Square the philosopher, with his faith in human virtue (alas! poor +Square), and his cuckoo-cry about "the unalterable Rule of Eight and the +eternal Fitness of Things;" Partridge--the unapproachable Partridge,-- +with his superstition, his vanity, and his perpetual _Infandum regina_, +but who, notwithstanding all his cheap Latinity, cannot construe an +unexpected phrase of Horace; Ensign Northerton, with his vague and +disrespectful recollections of "Homo;" young Nightingale and Parson +Supple:--each is a definite character bearing upon his forehead the mark +of his absolute fidelity to human nature. Nor are the female actors less +accurately conceived. Starched Miss Bridget Allworthy, with her pinched +Hogarthian face; Miss Western, with her disjointed diplomatic jargon; +that budding Slipslop, Mrs. Honour; worthy Mrs. Miller, Mrs. +Fitzpatrick, Mrs. Waters, Lady Bellaston,--all are to the full as real. +Lady Bellaston especially, deserves more than a word. Like Lady Booby in +_Joseph Andrews_, she is not a pleasant character; but the picture of +the fashionable demirep, cynical, sensual, and imperious, has never been +drawn more vigorously, or more completely--even by Balzac. Lastly, there +is the adorable Sophia herself, whose pardon should be asked for naming +her in such close proximity to her frailer sister. Byron calls her +(perhaps with a slight suspicion of exigence of rhyme) too "emphatic;" +meaning, apparently, to refer to such passages as her conversation with +Mrs. Fitzpatrick, etc. But the heroine of Fielding's time--a time which +made merry over a lady's misadventures in horsemanship, and subjected +her to such atrocities as those of Lord Fellamar--required to be +strongly moulded; and Sophia Western is pure and womanly, in spite of +her unfavourable surroundings. She is a charming example--the first of +her race--of an unsentimentalised flesh-and-blood heroine; and Time has +hated no jot of her frank vitality or her healthy beauty. Her +descendants in the modern novel are far more numerous than the family +which she bore to the fortunate--the too fortunate--Mr. Jones. + +And this reminds us that in the foregoing enumeration we have left out +Hamlet. In truth, it is by no means easy to speak of this handsome, but +very un-heroic hero. Lady Mary, employing, curiously enough, the very +phrase which Fielding has made one of his characters apply to Jones, +goes so far as to call him a "sorry scoundrel;" and eminent critics have +dilated upon his fondness for drink and play. But it is a notable +instance of the way in which preconceived attributes are gradually +attached to certain characters, that there is in reality little or +nothing to show that he was either sot or gamester. With one exception, +when, in the joy of his heart at his benefactor's recovery, he takes too +much wine (and it may be noted that on the same occasion the Catonic +Thwackum drinks considerably more), there is no evidence that he was +specially given to tippling, even in an age of hard drinkers, while of +his gambling there is absolutely no trace at all. On the other hand, he +is admittedly brave, generous, chivalrous, kind to the poor, and +courteous to women. What, then, is his cardinal defect? The answer lies +in the fact that Fielding, following the doctrine laid down in his +initial chapters, has depicted him under certain conditions (in which, +it is material to note, he is always rather the tempted than the +tempter), with an unvarnished truthfulness which to the pure-minded is +repugnant, and to the prurient indecent. Remembering that he too had +been young, and reproducing, it may be, his own experiences, he exhibits +his youth as he had found him--a "piebald miscellany,"-- + + "Bursts of great heart and slips in sensual mire;" + +and, to our modern ideas, when no one dares, as Thackeray complained, +"to depict to his utmost power a Man," the spectacle is discomforting. +Yet those who look upon human nature as keenly and unflinchingly as +Fielding did, knowing how weak and fallible it is,--how prone to fall +away by accident or passion,--can scarcely deny the truth of Tom Jones. +That such a person cannot properly serve as a hero now is rather a +question of our time than of Fielding's, and it may safely be set aside. +One objection which has been made, and made with reason, is that +Fielding, while taking care that Nemesis shall follow his hero's lapses, +has spoken of them with too much indulgence, or rather without +sufficient excuse. Coleridge, who was certainly not squeamish, seems to +have felt this when, in a MS. note [Footnote: These notes were +communicated by Mr. James Gillman to _The Literary Remains of Samuel +Taylor Coleridge_, published by H. N. Coleridge in 1836. The book in +which they were made, (it is the four volume edition of 1773, and has +Gillman's book-plate), is now in the British Museum. The above +transcript is from the MS.] in the well-known British Museum edition, he +says:-- + +"Even in this most questionable part of Tom Jones [i.e. the Lady +Bellaston episode, chap. ix. Book xv.], I cannot but think after +frequent reflection on it, that an additional paragraph, more fully & +forcibly unfolding Tom Jones's sense of self-degradation on the +discovery of the true character of the relation, in which he had stood +to Lady Bellaston--& his awakened feeling of the dignity and manliness +of Chastity--would have removed in great measure any just objection, at +all events relating to Fielding himself, by taking in the state of +manners in his time." + +Another point suggested by these last lines may be touched _en passant_. +Lady Bellaston, as Fielding has carefully explained (chap. i. Book +xiv.), was not a typical, but an exceptional, member of society; and +although there were eighteenth-century precedents for such alliances +(e.g. Miss Edwards and Lord Anne Hamilton, Mrs. Upton and General +Braddock,) it is a question whether in a picture of average English life +it was necessary to deal with exceptions of this kind, or, at all +events, to exemplify them in the principal personage. But the discussion +of this subject would prove endless. Right or wrong, Fielding has +certainly suffered in popularity for his candour in this respect, since +one of the wisest and wittiest books ever written cannot, without +hesitation, be now placed in the hands of women or very young people. +Moreover, this same candour has undoubtedly attracted to its pages many, +neither young nor women, whom its wit finds unintelligent, and its +wisdom leaves unconcerned. + +But what a brave wit it is, what a wisdom after all, that is contained +in this wonderful novel! Where shall we find its like for richness of +reflection--for inexhaustible good-humour--for large and liberal +humanity! Like Fontenelle, Fielding might fairly claim that he had never +cast the smallest ridicule upon the most infinitesimal of virtues; it is +against hypocrisy, affectation, insincerity of all kinds, that he wages +war. And what a keen and searching observation,--what a perpetual +faculty of surprise,--what an endless variety of method! Take the +chapter headed ironically _A Receipt to regain the lost Affections of a +Wife_, in which Captain John Blifil gives so striking an example of Mr. +Samuel Johnson's just published _Vanity of Human Wishes_, by dying +suddenly of apoplexy while he is considering what he will do with Mr. +Allworthy's property (when it reverts to him); or that admirable scene, +commended by Macaulay, of Partridge at the Playhouse, which is none the +worse because it has just a slight look of kinship with that other +famous visit which Sir Roger de Coverley paid to Philips's _Distrest +Mother_. Or take again, as utterly unlike either of these, that +burlesque Homeric battle in the churchyard, where the "sweetly-winding +Stour" stands for "reedy Simois," and the bumpkins round for Greeks and +Trojans! Or take yet once more, though it is woful work to offer bricks +from this edifice which _has_ already (in a sense) outlived the +Escorial, [Footnote: The Escorial, it will be remembered, was partially +burned in 1872.] the still more diverse passage which depicts the +changing conflict in Black George's mind as to whether he shall return +to Jones the sixteen guineas that he has found:-- + +"_Black George_ having received the Purse, set forward towards the +Alehouse; but in the Way a Thought occurred whether he should not detain +this Money likewise. His Conscience, however, immediately started at +this Suggestion, and began to upbraid him with Ingratitude to his +Benefactor. To this his Avarice answered, 'That his conscience should +have considered that Matter before, when he deprived poor _Jones_ of his +500l. That having quietly acquiesced in what was of so much greater +Importance, it was absurd, if not downright Hypocrisy, to affect any +Qualms at this Trifle.'--In return to which, Conscience, like a good +Lawyer, attempted to distinguish between an absolute Breach of Trust, as +here where the Goods were delivered, and a bare Concealment of what was +found, as in the former Case. Avarice presently treated this with +Ridicule, called it a Distinction without a Difference, and absolutely +insisted, that when once all Pretensions of Honour and Virtue were given +up in any one Instance, that there was no Precedent for resorting to +them upon a second Occasion. In short, poor Conscience had certainly +been defeated in the Argument, had not Fear stept in to her Assistance, +and very strenuously urged, that the real Distinction between the two +Actions, did not lie in the different degrees of Honour, but of Safety: +For that the secreting the 500l. was a Matter of very little Hazard; +whereas the detaining the sixteen Guineas was liable to the utmost +Danger of Discovery. + +"By this friendly Aid of Fear, Conscience obtained a compleat Victory in +the Mind of _Black George_, and after making him a few Compliments on +his Honesty, forced him to deliver the Money to _Jones_." + +When one remembers that this is but one of many such passages, and that +the book, notwithstanding the indulgence claimed by the author in the +Preface, and despite a certain hurry at the close, is singularly even in +its workmanship, it certainly increases our respect for the manly genius +of the writer, who, amid all the distractions of ill-health and poverty, +could find the courage to pursue and perfect such a conception. It is +true that both Cervantes and Bunyan wrote their immortal works in the +confinement of a prison. But they must at least have enjoyed the +seclusion so needful to literary labour; while _Tom Jones_ was written +here and there, at all times and in all places, with the dun at the door +and the wolf not very far from the gate. [Footnote: Salisbury, in the +neighbourhood of which _Tom Jones_ is laid, claims the originals of some +of the characters. Thwackum is said to have been Hele, a schoolmaster; +Square, one Chubb, a Deist; and Dowling the lawyer a person named +Stillingfleet.] + +The little sentence quoted some pages back from Walpole's letters is +sufficient proof, if proof were needed, of its immediate success. Andrew +Millar was shrewd enough, despite his constitutional confusion, and he +is not likely to have given an additional L100 to the author of any book +without good reason. But the indications of that success are not very +plainly impressed upon the public prints. The _Gentleman's Magazine_ for +1749, which, as might be expected from Johnson's connection with it, +contains ample accounts of his own tragedy of _Irene_ and Richardson's +recently-published _Clarissa_, has no notice of _Tom Jones_, nor is +there even any advertisement of the second edition issued in the same +year. But, in the emblematic frontispiece, it appears under _Clarissa_ +(and sharing with that work a possibly unintended proximity to a sprig +of laurel stuck in a bottle of Nantes), among a pile of the books of the +year; and in the "poetical essays" for August, one Thomas Cawthorn +breaks into rhymed panegyric. "Sick of her fools," sings this +enthusiastic but scarcely lucid admirer-- + + "Sick of her fools, great _Nature_ broke the jest, + And _Truth_ held out each character to test, + When _Genius_ spoke: Let _Fielding_ take the pen! + Life dropt her mask, and all mankind were men." + +There were others, however, who would scarcely have echoed the laudatory +sentiments of Mr. Cawthorn. Among these was again the excellent +Richardson, who seems to have been wholly unpropitiated by the olive +branch held out to him in the _Jacobite's Journal_. His vexation at the +indignity put upon _Pamela_ by _Joseph Andrews_ was now complicated by a +twittering jealousy of the "spurious brat," as he obligingly called _Tom +Jones_, whose success had been so "unaccountable." In these +circumstances, some of the letters of his correspondents must have been +gall and wormwood to him. Lady Bradshaigh, for instance, under her _nom +de guerre_ of "Belfour," tells him that she is fatigued with the very +name of the book, having met several young ladies who were for ever +talking of their Tom Jones's, "for so they call their favourites," and +that the gentlemen, on their side, had their Sophias, one having gone so +far as to give that all-popular name to his "Dutch mastiff puppy." But +perhaps the best and freshest exhibition (for, as far as can be +ascertained, it has never hitherto been made public) of Richardson's +attitude to his rival is to be found in a little group of letters in the +Forster collection at South Kensington. The writers are Aaron Hill and +his daughters; but the letters do not seem to have been known to Mrs. +Barbauld, whose last communication from Hill is dated November 2, 1748. +Nor are they to be found in Hill's own Correspondence. The ladies, it +appears, had visited Richardson at Salisbury Court in 1741, and were +great admirers of _Pamela_, and the "divine _Clarissa_." Some months +after _Tom Jones_ was published, Richardson (not yet having brought +himself to read the book) had asked them to do so, and give him their +opinion as to its merits. Thereupon Minerva and Astraea, who despite +their names, and their description of themselves as "Girls of an +untittering Disposition," must have been very bright and lively young +persons, began seriously "to lay their two wise heads together" and +"hazard this Discovery of their Emptiness." Having "with much ado got +over some Reluctance, that was bred by a familiar coarseness in the +_Title_," they report "much (masqu'd) merit" in the "whole six volumes" +--"a double merit, both of Head, and _Heart_." + +Had it been the latter only it would be more worthy of Mr. Richardson's +perusal; but, say these considerate pioneers, if he does spare it his +attention, he must only do so at his leisure, for the author "introduces +All his Sections (and too often interweaves the _serious_ Body of his +meanings), with long Runs of bantering Levity, which his [Fielding's] +Good sense may suffer by Effect of." "It is true (they continue), he +seems to wear this Lightness, as a grave Head sometime wears a +_Feather_: which tho' He and Fashion may consider as an ornament, +Reflection will condemn, as a Disguise, and _covering_." Then follows a +brief excursus, intended for their correspondent's special consolation, +upon the folly of treating grave things lightly; and with delightful +sententiousness the letter thus concludes:-- + +"Mean while, it is an honest pleasure, which we take in adding, that +(exclusive of one wild, detach'd, and independent Story of a _Man of the +Hill_, that neither brings on Anything, nor rose from Anything that went +before it) All the changefull windings of the Author's Fancy carry on a +course of regular Design; and end in an extremely moving Close, where +Lives that seem'd to wander and run different ways, meet, All, in an +instructive Center. + +"The whole Piece consists of an inventive Race of Disapointments and +Recoveries. It excites Curiosity, and holds it watchful. It has just and +pointed Satire; but it is a partial Satire, and confin'd, too narrowly: +It sacrifices to Authority, and Interest. Its _Events_ reward Sincerity, +and punish and expose Hypocrisy; shew Pity and Benevolence in amiable +Lights, and Avarice and Brutality in very despicable ones. In every Part +It has Humanity for its Intention: In too many, it _seems_ wantoner than +It was meant to be: It has bold shocking Pictures; and (I fear) +[Footnote: The "pen-holder" is the fair Astraea.] not unresembling ones, +in high Life, and in low. And (to conclude this too adventurous Guess- +work, from a Pair of forward Baggages) woud, every where, (we think,) +_deserve_ to please,--if stript of what the Author thought himself most +sure to _please by_. + +"And thus, Sir, we have told you our sincere opinion of _Tom Jones_.... + +"Your most profest Admirers and most humble Servants, + +"Astraea and Minerva Hill. + +"PLAISTOW the 27th of July 1749." + +Richardson's reply to this ingenuous criticism is dated the 4th of +August. His requesting two young women to study and criticise a book +which he has heard strongly condemned as immoral,--his own obvious +familiarity with what he has not read but does not scruple to censure,-- +his transparently jealous anticipation of its author's ability,--all +this forms a picture so characteristic alike of the man and the time +that no apology is needed for the following textual extract:-- + +"I must confess, that I have been prejudiced by the Opinion of Several +judicious Friends against the truly coarse-titled Tom Jones; and so have +been discouraged from reading it.--I was told, that it was a rambling +Collection of Waking Dreams, in which Probability was not observed: And +that it had a very bad Tendency. And I had Reason to think that the +Author intended for his Second View (His _first_, to fill his Pocket, by +accommodating it to the reigning Taste) in writing it, to whiten a +vicious Character, and to make Morality bend to his Practices. What +Reason had he to make his Tom illegitimate, in an Age where Keeping is +become a Fashion? Why did he make him a common--What shall I call it? +And a Kept Fellow, the Lowest of all Fellows, yet in Love with a Young +Creature who was traping [trapesing?] after him, a Fugitive from her +Father's House?--Why did he draw his Heroine so fond, so foolish, and so +insipid?--Indeed he has one Excuse--He knows not how to draw a delicate +Woman--He has not been accustomed to such Company,--And is too +prescribing, too impetuous, too immoral, I will venture to say, to take +any other Byass than that a perverse and crooked Nature has given him; +or Evil Habits, at least, have confirm'd in him. Do Men expect Grapes of +Thorns, or Figs of Thistles? But, perhaps, I think the worse of the +Piece because I know the Writer, and dislike his Principles both Public +and Private, tho' I wish well to the _Man_, and Love Four worthy Sisters +of his, with whom I am well acquainted. And indeed should admire him, +did he make the Use of his Talents which I wish him to make, For the +Vein of Humour, and Ridicule, which he is Master of, might, if properly +turned do great Service to ye Cause of Virtue. + +"But no more of this Gentleman's Work, after I have said, That the +favourable Things, you say of the Piece, will tempt me, if I can find +Leisure, to give it a Perusal." + +Notwithstanding this last sentence, Richardson more than once reverts to +_Tom Jones_ before he finishes his letter. Its effect upon Minerva and +Astraea is hest described in an extract from Aaron Hill's reply, dated +seven days later (August the 11th):-- + +"Unfortunate _Tom Jones_! how sadly has he mortify'd Two sawcy +Correspondents of your making! They are with me now: and bid me tell +you, You have spoil'd 'em Both, for Criticks.--Shall I add, a Secret +which they did not bid me tell you?--They, Both, fairly _cry'd_, that +You shou'd think it possible they you'd approve of Any thing, in Any +work, that had an _Evil Tendency_, in any Part or Purpose of it. They +maintain their Point so far, however, as to be convinc'd they say, that +_you_ will disapprove this over-rigid Judgment of those Friends, who +you'd not find a Thread of Moral Meaning in Tom Jones, quite independent +of the Levities they justly censure.--And, as soon as you have Time to +read him, for yourself, tis there, pert Sluts, they will be bold enough +to rest the Matter.--Mean while, they love and honour you and your +opinions." + +To this the author of _Clarissa_ replied by writing a long epistle +deploring the pain he had given the "dear Ladies," and minutely +justifying his foregone conclusions from the expressions they had used. +He refers to Fielding again as "a very indelicate, a very impetuous, an +unyielding-spirited Man;" and he also trusts to be able to "bestow a +Reading" on _Tom Jones_; but by a letter from Lady Bradshaigh, printed +in Barbauld, and dated December 1749, it seems that even at that date he +had not, or pretended he had not, yet done so. In another of the +unpublished South Kensington letters, from a Mr. Solomon Lowe, occurs +the following:--"I do not doubt"--says the writer--"but all Europe will +ring of it [_Clarissa_]: when a Cracker, that was some thous'd hours a- +com-posing, [Footnote: _Vide Tom Jones_, Book xi. chap. i.] will no +longer be heard, or talkt-of." Richardson, with business-like precision, +has gravely docketed this in his own handwriting,--"Cracker, T. Jones." + +It is unfortunate for Mr. Lowe's reputation as a prophet that, after +more than one hundred and thirty years, this ephemeral firework, as he +deemed it, should still be sparkling with undiminished brilliancy, and +to judge by recent editions, is selling as vigorously as ever. From the +days when Lady Mary wrote "_Ne plus ultra_" in her own copy, and La +Harpe called it _le premier roman du monde_, (a phrase which, by the +way, De Musset applies to _Clarissa_), it has come down to us with an +almost universal accompaniment of praise. Gibbon, Byron, Coleridge, +Scott, Dickens, Thackeray,--have all left their admiration on record,-- +to say nothing of professional critics innumerable. As may be seen from +the British Museum Catalogue, it has been translated into French, +German, Polish, Dutch, and Spanish. Russia and Sweden have also their +versions. The first French translation, or rather abridgment, by M. de +La Place was prohibited in France (to Richardson's delight) by royal +decree, an act which affords another instance, in Scott's words, of that +"French delicacy, which, on so many occasions, has strained at a gnat, +and swallowed a camel" (e.g. the novels of M. Crebillon _fils_). La +Place's edition (1750) was gracefully illustrated with sixteen plates by +Hubert Bourguignon, called Gravelot, one of those eighteenth-century +illustrators whose designs at present are the rage in Paris. In England, +Fielding's best-known pictorial interpreters are Rowlandson and +Cruikshank, the latter being by far the more sympathetic. Stothard also +prepared some designs for Harrison's _Novelists Magazine_; but his +refined and effeminate pencil was scarcely strong enough for the task. +Hogarth alone could have been the ideal illustrator of Henry Fielding; +that is to say--if, in lieu of the rude designs he made for _Tristram +Shandy_, he could have been induced to undertake the work in the larger +fashion of the _Rake's Progress_, or _The Marriage a la Mode_. + +As might perhaps be anticipated, _Tom Jones_ attracted the dramatist. +[Footnote: It may be added that it also attracted the plagiarist. As +_Pamela_ had its sequel in _Pamela's Conduct in High Life_, 1741, so +_Tom Jones_ was continued in _The History of Tom Jones the Foundling, in +his Married State_, a second edition of which was issued in 1750. The +Preface announces, needlessly enough, that "Henry Fielding, Esq., is not +the Author of this Book." It deserves no serious consideration.] In +1765, one J. H. Steffens made a comedy of it for the German boards; and +in 1785, a M. Desforges based upon it another, called _Tom Jones a +Londres_, which was acted at the _Theatre Francais_. It was also turned +into a comic opera by Joseph Reed in 1769, and played at Covent Garden. +But its most piquant transformation is the _Comedie lyrique_ of +Poinsinet, acted at Paris in 1765-6 to the lively music of Philidor. The +famous Caillot took the part of Squire Western, who, surrounded by +_piqueurs_, and girt with the conventional _cor de chasse_ of the Gallic +sportsman, sings the following _ariette_, diversified with true +Fontainebleau terms of venery:-- + + "D'un Cerf, dix Cors, j'ai connaissance: + On l'attaque au fort, on le lance; + Tous sont prets: + Piqueurs & Valets + Suivent les pas de l'ami Jone (_sic_). + J'entends crier: Volcelets, Volcelets. + Aussitot j'ordonne + Que la Meute donne. + Tayaut, Tayaut, Tayaut. + Mes chiens decouples l'environnent; + Les trompes sonnent: + 'Courage, Amis: Tayaut, Tayaut.' + Quelques chiens, que l'ardeur derange, + Quittent la voye & prennent le change + Jones les rassure d'un cri: + Ourvari, ourvari. + Accoute, accoute, accoute. + Au retour nous en revoyons. + Accoute, a Mirmiraut, courons + Tout a Griffaut; + Y apres: Tayaut, Tayaut. + On reprend route, + Voila le Cerf a l'eau. + La trompe sonne, + La Meute donne, + L'echo resonne, + Nous pressons les nouveaux relais: + Volcelets, Volcelets. + L'animal force succombe, + Fait un effort, se releve, enfin tombe: + Et nos chasseurs chantent tous a l'envi: + 'Amis, goutons les fruits de la victoire; + 'Amis, Amis, celebrons notre gloire. + 'Halali, Fanfare, Halali + 'Halali.'" + +With this triumphant flourish of trumpets the present chapter may be +fittingly concluded. [Footnote: See Appendix No. II.: Fielding and Mrs. +Hussey.] + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + +JUSTICE LIFE--AMELIA. + + +In one of Horace Walpole's letters to George Montagu, already quoted, +there is a description of Fielding's Bow Street establishment, which has +attracted more attention than it deserves. The letter is dated May the +18th, 1749, and the passage (in Cunningham's edition) runs as follows:-- + +"He [Rigby] and Peter Bathurst [Footnote: Probably a son of Peter +Bathurst (d. 1748), brother of Pope's friend, Allen, Lord Bathurst. +Rigby was the Richard Rigby whose despicable character is familiar in +Eighteenth-Century Memoirs. "He died (says Cunningham) involved in debt, +with his accounts as Paymaster of the Forces hopelessly unsettled."] +t'other night carried a servant of the latter's, who had attempted to +shoot him, before Fielding; who, to all his other vocations, has, by the +grace of Mr. Lyttelton, added that of Middlesex justice. He sent them +word he was at supper, that they must come next morning. They did not +understand that freedom, and ran up, where they found him banqueting +with a blind man, a whore, and three Irishmen, on some cold mutton and a +bone of ham, both in one dish, and the dirtiest cloth. He never stirred +nor asked them to sit. Rigby, who had seen him so often come to beg a +guinea of Sir C. Williams, and Bathurst, at whose father's he had lived +for victuals, understood that dignity as little, and pulled themselves +chairs; on which he civilised." + +Scott calls this "a humiliating anecdote;" and both Mr. Lawrence and Mr. +Keightley have exhausted rhetoric in the effort to explain it away. As +told, it is certainly uncomplimentary; but considerable deductions must +be made, both for the attitude of the narrator and the occasion of the +narrative. Walpole's championship of his friends was notorious; and his +absolute injustice, when his partisan spirit was uppermost, is +everywhere patent to the readers of his Letters. In the present case he +was not of the encroaching party; and he speaks from hearsay solely. But +his friends had, in his opinion, been outraged by a man, who, according +to his ideas of fitness, should have come to them cap in hand; and as a +natural consequence, the story, no doubt exaggerated when it reached +him, loses nothing under his transforming and malicious pen. Stripped of +its decorative flippancy, however, there remains but little that can +really be regarded as "humiliating." Scott himself suggests, what is +most unquestionably the case, that the blind man was the novelist's +half-brother, afterwards Sir John Fielding; and it is extremely unlikely +that the lady so discourteously characterised could have been any other +than his wife, who, Lady Stuart tells us, "had few personal charms." +There remain the "three Irishmen," who may, or may not, have been +perfectly presentable members of society. At all events, their mere +nationality, so rapidly decided upon, cannot be regarded as a stigma. +That the company and entertainment were scarcely calculated to suit the +superfine standard of Mr. Bathurst and Mr. Rigby may perhaps be +conceded. Fielding was by no means a rich man, and in his chequered +career had possibly grown indifferent to minor decencies. Moreover, we +are told by Murphy that, as a Westminster justice, he "kept his table +open to those who had been his friends when young, and had impaired +their own fortunes." Thus, it must always have been a more or less +ragged regiment who met about that kindly Bow Street board; but that the +fact reflects upon either the host or guests cannot be admitted for a +moment. If the anecdote is discreditable to anyone it is to that facile +retailer of _ana_, and incorrigible society-gossip, Mr. Horace Walpole. + +But while these unflattering tales were told of his private life, +Fielding was fast becoming eminent in his public capacity. On the 12th +of May 1749 he was unanimously chosen chairman of Quarter Sessions at +Hicks's Hall (as the Clerkenwell Sessions House was then called); and on +the 29th of June following he delivered a charge to the Westminster +Grand Jury which is usually printed with his works, and which is still +regarded by lawyers as a model exposition. It is at first a little +unexpected to read his impressive and earnest denunciations of +masquerades and theatres (in which latter, by the way, one Samuel Foote +had very recently been following the example of the author of +_Pasquin_); but Fielding the magistrate and Fielding the playwright were +two different persons; and a long interval of changeful experience lay +between them. In another part of his charge, which deals with the +offence of libelling, it is possible that his very vigorous appeal was +not the less forcible by reason of the personal attacks to which he had +referred in the Preface to _David Simple_, the _Jacobite's Journal_, and +elsewhere. His only other literary efforts during this year appear to +have been a little pamphlet entitled _A True State of the Case of +Bosavern Penlez_; and a formal congratulatory letter to Lyttelton upon +his second marriage, in which, while speaking gratefully of his own +obligations to his friend, he endeavours to enlist his sympathies for +Moore the fabulist who was also "about to marry." The pamphlet had +reference to an occurrence which took place in July. Three sailors of +the "Grafton" man-of-war had been robbed in a house of ill fame in the +Strand. Failing to obtain redress, they attacked the house with their +comrades, and wrecked it, causing a "dangerous riot," to which Fielding +makes incidental reference in one of his letters to the Duke of Bedford, +and which was witnessed by John Byrom, the poet and stenographer, in +whose _Remains_ it is described. Bosavern Penlez or Pen Lez, who had +joined the crowd, and in whose possession some of the stolen property +was found, was tried and hanged in September. His sentence, which was +considered extremely severe, excited much controversy, and the object of +Fielding's pamphlet was to vindicate the justice and necessity of his +conviction. + +Towards the close of 1749 Fielding fell seriously ill with fever +aggravated by gout. It was indeed at one time reported that +mortification had supervened; but under the care of Dr. Thomson, that +dubious practitioner whose treatment of Winnington in 1746 had given +rise to so much paper war, he recovered; and during 1750 was actively +employed in his magisterial duties. At this period lawlessness and +violence appear to have prevailed to an unusual extent in the +metropolis, and the office of a Bow Street justice was no sinecure. +Reform of some kind was felt on all sides to be urgently required; and +Fielding threw his two years' experience and his deductions therefrom +into the form of a pamphlet entitled _An Enquiry into the Causes of the +late Increase of Robbers, etc., with some Proposals for remedying this +growing Evil_. It was dedicated to the then Lord High Chancellor, Philip +Yorke, Lord Hardwicke, by whom, as well as by more recent legal +authorities, it was highly appreciated. Like the _Charge to the Grand +Jury_, it is a grave argumentative document, dealing seriously with +luxury, drunkenness, gaming, and other prevalent vices. Once only, in an +ironical passage respecting beaus and fine ladies, does the author +remind us of the author of _Tom Jones_. As a rule, he is weighty, +practical, and learned in the law. Against the curse of Gin-drinking, +which, owing to the facilities for obtaining that liquor, had increased +to an alarming extent among the poorer classes, he is especially urgent +and energetic. He points out that it is not only making dreadful havoc +in the present, but that it is enfeebling the race of the future, and he +concludes-- + +"Some little Care on this Head is surely necessary: For tho' the +Encrease of Thieves, and the Destruction of Morality; though the Loss of +our Labourers, our Sailors, and our Soldiers, should not be sufficient +Reasons, there is one which seems to be unanswerable, and that is, the +Loss of our Gin-drinkers: Since, should the drinking this Poison be +continued in its present Height during the next twenty Years, there +will, by that Time, be very few of the common People left to drink it." + +To the appeal thus made by Fielding in January 1751, Hogarth added his +pictorial protest in the following month by his awful plate of _Gin +Lane_, which, if not actually prompted by his friend's words, was +certainly inspired by the same crying evil. One good result of these +efforts was the "Bill for restricting the Sale of Spirituous Liquors," +to which the royal assent was given in June, and Fielding's connection +with this enactment is practically acknowledged by Horace Walpole in his +_Memoires of the Last ten Years of the Reign of George II_. The law was +not wholly effectual, and was difficult to enforce; but it was not by +any means without its good effects. [Footnote: The Rev. R. Hurd, +afterwards Bishop of Worcester, an upright and scholarly, but formal and +censorious man, whom Johnson called a "word-picker," and franker +contemporaries "an old maid in breeches," has left a reference to +Fielding at this time which is not flattering. "I dined with him [Ralph +Allen] yesterday, where I met Mr. Fielding,--a poor emaciated, worn-out +rake, whose gout and infirmities have got the better even of his +buffoonery" (Letter to Balguy, dated "Inner Temple, 19th March, 1751.") +That Fielding had not long before been dangerously ill, and that he was +a martyr to gout, is fact: the rest is probably no more than the echo of +a foregone conclusion, based upon report, or dislike to his works. Hurd +praised Richardson and proscribed Sterne. He must have been wholly out +of sympathy with the author of _Tom Jones_.] + +Between the publication of the _Enquiry_ and that of _Amelia_ there is +nothing of importance to chronicle except Fielding's connection with one +of the events of 1751, the discovery of the Glastonbury waters. +According to the account given in the _Gentleman's_ for July in that +year, a certain Matthew Chancellor had been cured of "an asthma and +phthisic" of thirty years' standing by drinking from a spring near Chain +Gate, Glastonbury, to which he had (so he alleged) been directed in a +dream. The spring forthwith became famous; and in May an entry in the +Historical Chronicle for Sunday, the 5th, records that above 10,000 +persons had visited it, deserting Bristol, Bath, and other popular +resorts. Numerous pamphlets were published for and against the new +waters; and a letter in their favour, which appeared in the _London +Daily Advertiser_ for the 31st August, signed "Z. Z.," is "supposed to +be wrote" by "J--e F--g." Fielding was, as may be remembered, a +Somersetshire man, Sharpham Park, his birthplace, being about three +miles from Glastonbury; and he testifies to the "wonderful Effects of +this salubrious Spring" in words which show that he had himself +experienced them. "Having seen great Numbers of my Fellow Creatures +under two of the most miserable Diseases human Nature can labour under, +the Asthma and Evil, return from _Glastonbury_ blessed with the Return +of Health, and having myself been relieved from a Disorder which baffled +the most skilful Physicians," justice to mankind (he says) obliges him +to take notice of the subject. The letter is interesting, more as +showing that, at this time, Fielding's health was broken, than as +proving the efficacy of the cure; for, whatever temporary relief the +waters afforded, it is clear (as Mr. Lawrence pertinently remarks) that +he derived no permanent benefit from them. They must, however, have +continued to attract visitors, as a pump-room was opened in August 1753; +and, although they have now fallen into disuse, they were popular for +many years. + +But a more important occurrence than the discovery of the Somersetshire +spring is a little announcement contained in Sylvanus Urban's list of +publications for December 1751, No. 17 of which is "_Amelia_, in 4 +books, 12mo; by Henry Fielding, Esq." The publisher, of course, was +Andrew Millar; and the actual day of issue, as appears from the _General +Advertiser_, was December the 19th, although the title-page, by +anticipation, bore the date of 1752. There were two mottoes, one of +which was the appropriate-- + + "_Felices ter & amplius + Quos irrupta tenet Copula;_" + +and the dedication, brief and simply expressed, was to Ralph Allen. As +before, the "artful aid" of advertisement was invoked to whet the public +appetite. + +"To satisfy the earnest Demand of the Publick (says Millar), this Work +has been printed at four Presses; but the Proprietor notwithstanding +finds it impossible to get them (_sic_) bound in Time, without spoiling +the Beauty of the Impression, and therefore will sell them sew'd at +Half-a-Guinea." + +This was open enough; but, according to Scott, Millar adopted a second +expedient to assist _Amelia_ with the booksellers. + +"He had paid a thousand pounds for the copyright; and when he began to +suspect that the work would be judged inferior to its predecessor, he +employed the following stratagem to push it upon the trade. At a sale +made to the booksellers, previous to the publication, Millar offered his +friends his other publications on the usual terms of discount; but when +he came to _Amelia_, he laid it aside, as a work expected to be in such +demand, that he could not afford to deliver it to the trade in the usual +manner. The _ruse_ succeeded--the impression was anxiously bought up, +and the bookseller relieved from every apprehension of a slow sale." + +There were several reasons why--superficially speaking--_Amelia_ should +be "judged inferior to its predecessor." That it succeeded _Tom Jones_ +after an interval of little more than two years and eight months would +be an important element in the comparison, if it were known at all +definitely what period was occupied in writing _Tom Jones_. All that can +be affirmed is that Fielding must have been far more at leisure when he +composed the earlier work than he could possibly have been when filling +the office of a Bow Street magistrate. But, in reality, there is a much +better explanation of the superiority of _Tom Jones_ to _Amelia_ than +the merely empirical one of the time it took. _Tom Jones_, it has been +admirably said by a French critic, "_est la condensation et le resume de +toute une existence. C'est le resultat et la conclusion de plusieurs +annees de passions et de pensees, la formule derniere et complete de la +philosophie personnelle que l'on s'est faite sur tout ce que l'on a vu +et senti_." Such an experiment, argues Planche, is not twice repeated in +a lifetime: the soil which produced so rich a crop can but yield a +poorer aftermath. Behind _Tom Jones_ there was the author's ebullient +youth and manhood; behind _Amelia_ but a section of his graver middle- +age. There are other reasons for diversity in the manner of the book +itself. The absence of the initial chapters, which gave so much variety +to _Tom Jones_, tends to heighten the sense of impatience which, it must +be confessed, occasionally creeps over the reader of _Amelia_, +especially in those parts where, like Dickens at a later period, +Fielding delays the progress of his narrative for the discussion of +social problems and popular grievances. However laudable the desire +(expressed in the dedication) "to expose some of the most glaring Evils, +as well public as private, which at present infest this Country," the +result in _Amelia_, from an art point of view, is as unsatisfactory as +that of certain well-known pages of _Bleak House_ and _Little Dorrit_. +Again, there is a marked change in the attitude of the author,--a change +not wholly reconcilable with the brief period which separates the two +novels. However it may have chanced, whether from failing health or +otherwise, the Fielding of _Amelia_ is suddenly a far older man than the +Fielding of _Tom Jones_. The robust and irrepressible vitality, the +full-veined delight of living, the energy of observation and strength of +satire, which characterise the one give place in the other to a calmer +retrospection, a more compassionate humanity, a gentler and more +benignant criticism of life. That, as some have contended, _Amelia_ +shows an intellectual falling-off cannot for a moment be admitted, least +of all upon the ground--as even so staunch an admirer as Mr. Keightley +has allowed himself to believe--that certain of its incidents are +obviously repeated from the _Modern Husband_ and others of the author's +plays. At this rate _Tom Jones_ might be judged inferior to _Joseph +Andrews_, because the Political Apothecary in the "Man of the Hill's" +story has his prototype in the _Coffee-House Politician_, whose original +is Addison's Upholsterer. The plain fact is, that Fielding recognised +the failure of his plays as literature; he regarded them as dead; and +freely transplanted what was good of his forgotten work into the work +which he hoped would live. In this, it may be, there was something of +indolence or haste; but assuredly there was no proof of declining +powers. + +If, for the sake of comparison, _Tom Jones_ may be described as an +animated and happily-constructed comedy, with more than the usual +allowance of first-rate characters, _Amelia_ must be regarded as a one- +part piece, in which the rest of the _dramatis personae_ are wholly +subordinate to the central figure. Captain Booth, the two Colonels, +Atkinson and his wife, Miss Matthews, Dr. Harrison, Trent, the shadowy +and maleficent "My Lord," are all less active on their own account than +energised and set in motion by Amelia. Round her they revolve; from her +they obtain their impulse and their orbit. The best of the men, as +studies, are Dr. Harrison and Colonel Bath. The former, who is as +benevolent as Allworthy, is far more human, and it may be added, more +humorous in well-doing. He is an individual rather than an abstraction. +Bath, with his dignity and gun-cotton honour, is also admirable, but not +entirely free from the objection made to some of Dickens's creations, +that they are rather characteristics than characters. Captain William +Booth, beyond his truth to nature, manifests no qualities that can +compensate for his weakness, and the best that can be said of him is, +that without it, his wife would have had no opportunity for the display +of her magnanimity. There is also a certain want of consistency in his +presentment; and when, in the residence of Mr. Bondum the bailiff, he +suddenly develops an unexpected scholarship, it is impossible not to +suspect that Fielding was unwilling to lose the opportunity of +preserving some neglected scenes of the _Author's Farce_. Miss Matthews +is a new and remarkable study of the _femme entretenue_, to parallel +which, as in the case of Lady Bellaston, we must go to Balzac; Mrs. +James, again, is an excellent example of that vapid and colourless +nonentity, the "person of condition." Mrs. Bennet, although apparently +more contradictory and less intelligible, is nevertheless true to her +past history and present environments; while her husband, the sergeant, +with his concealed and reverential love for his beautiful foster-sister, +has had a long line of descendants in the modern novel. It is upon +Amelia, however, that the author has lavished all his pains, and there +is no more touching portrait in the whole of fiction than this heroic +and immortal one of feminine goodness and forbearance. It is needless to +repeat that it is painted from Fielding's first wife, or to insist that, +as Lady Mary was fully persuaded, "several of the incidents he mentions +are real matters of fact." That famous scene where Amelia is spreading, +for the recreant who is losing his money at the King's Arms, the +historic little supper of hashed mutton which she has cooked with her +own hands, and denying herself a glass of white wine to save the paltry +sum of sixpence, "while her Husband was paying a Debt of several Guineas +incurred by the Ace of Trumps being in the Hands of his Adversary"--a +scene which it is impossible to read aloud without a certain huskiness +in the throat,--the visits to the pawnbroker and the sponging-house, +the robbery by the little servant, the encounter at Vauxhall, and some +of the pretty vignettes of the children, are no doubt founded on +personal recollections. Whether the pursuit to which the heroine is +exposed had any foundation in reality it is impossible to say; and there +is a passage in Murphy's memoir which almost reads as if it had been +penned with the express purpose of anticipating any too harshly literal +identification of Booth with Fielding, since we are told of the latter +that "though disposed to gallantry by his strong animal spirits, and the +vivacity of his passions, he was remarkable for tenderness _and +constancy to his wife_ [the italics are ours], and the strongest +affection for his children." These, however, are questions beside the +matter, which is the conception of _Amelia_. That remains, and must +remain for ever, in the words of one of Fielding's greatest modern +successors, a figure + + "wrought with love.... + Nought modish in it, pure and noble lines + Of generous womanhood that fits all time." + +There are many women who forgive; but Amelia does more--she not only +forgives, but she forgets. The passage in which she exhibits to her +contrite husband the letter received long before from Miss Matthews is +one of the noblest in literature; and if it had been recorded that +Fielding--like Thackeray on a memorable occasion--had here slapped his +fist upon the table, and said "_That_ is a stroke of genius!" it would +scarcely have been a thing to be marvelled at. One final point in +connection with her may be noted, which has not always been borne in +mind by those who depict good women--much after Hogarth's fashion-- +without a head. She is not by any means a simpleton, and it is +misleading to describe her as a tender, fluttering little creature, who, +because she can cook her husband's supper, and caresses him with the +obsolete name of Billy, must necessarily be contemptible. On the +contrary, she has plenty of ability and good sense, with a fund of +humour which enables her to enjoy slily and even gently satirise the +fine lady airs of Mrs. James. Nor is it necessary to contend that her +faculties are subordinated to her affections; but rather that conjugal +fidelity and Christian charity are inseparable alike from her character +and her creed. + +As illustrating the tradition that Fielding depicted his first wife in +Sophia Western and in Amelia, it has been remarked that there is no +formal description of her personal appearance in his last novel, her +portrait having already been drawn at length in _Tom Jones_. But the +following depreciatory sketch by Mrs. James is worth quoting, not only +because it indirectly conveys the impression of a very handsome woman, +but because it is also an admirable specimen of Fielding's lighter +manner:-- + +"'In the first place,' cries Mrs. James, 'her eyes are too large; and +she hath a look with them that I don't know how to describe; but I know +I don't like it. Then her eyebrows are too large; therefore, indeed, she +doth all in her power to remedy this with her pincers; for if it was not +for those, her eyebrows would be preposterous.--Then her nose, as well +proportioned as it is, has a visible scar on one side. [Footnote: See +note on this subject in chapter iv., and Appendix No. III.]--Her neck +likewise is too protuberant for the genteel size, especially as she +laces herself; for no woman, in my opinion, can be genteel who is not +entirely flat before. And lastly, she is both too short, and too tall.-- +Well, you may laugh, Mr. James, I know what I mean, though I cannot well +express it. I mean, that she is too tall for a pretty woman, and too +short for a fine woman.--There is such a thing as a kind of insipid +medium--a kind of something that is neither one thing or another. I know +not how to express it more clearly; but when I say such a one is a +pretty woman, a pretty thing, a pretty creature, you know very well I +mean a little woman; and when I say such a one is a very fine woman, a +very fine person of a woman, to be sure I must mean a tall woman. Now a +woman that is between both, is certainly neither the one nor the other." + +The ingenious expedients of Andrew Millar, to which reference has been +made, appear to have so far succeeded that a new edition of _Amelia_ was +called for on the day of publication. Johnson, to whom we owe this +story, was thoroughly captivated with the book. Notwithstanding that on +another occasion he paradoxically asserted that the author was "a +blockhead"--"a barren rascal," he read it through without stopping, and +pronounced Mrs. Booth to be "the most pleasing heroine of all the +romances." Richardson, on the other hand, found "the characters and +situations so wretchedly low and dirty" that he could not get farther +than the first volume. With the professional reviewers, a certain +Criticulus in the _Gentleman's_ excepted, it seems to have fared but +ill; and although these adverse verdicts, if they exist, are now more or +less inaccessible, Fielding has apparently summarised most of them in a +mock-trial of _Amelia_ before the "_Court of_ Censorial Enquiry," the +proceedings of which are recorded in Nos. 7 and 8 of the _Covent-Garden +Journal_. The book is indicted upon the Statute of Dulness, and the +heroine is charged with being a "_low_ Character," a "_Milksop_," and a +"_Fool_;" with lack of spirit and fainting too frequently; with dressing +her children, cooking and other "servile Offices;" with being too +forgiving to her husband; and lastly, as may be expected, with the +inconsistency, already amply referred to, of being "a Beauty _without a +nose_." Dr. Harrison and Colonel Bath are arraigned much in the same +fashion. After some evidence against her has been tendered, and "a Great +Number of Beaus, Rakes, fine Ladies, and several formal Persons with +bushy Wigs, and Canes at their Noses," are preparing to supplement it, a +grave man steps forward, and, begging to be heard, delivers what must be +regarded as Fielding's final apology for his last novel:-- + +"If you, Mr. Censor, are yourself a Parent, you will view me with +Compassion when I declare I am the Father of this poor Girl the Prisoner +at the Bar; nay, when I go further and avow, that of all my Offspring +she is my favourite Child. I can truly say that I bestowed a more than +ordinary Pains in her Education; in which I will venture to affirm, I +followed the Rules of all those who are acknowledged to have writ best +on the Subject; and if her Conduct be fairly examined, she will be found +to deviate very little from the strictest Observation of all those +Rules; neither Homer nor Virgil pursued them with greater Care than +myself, and the candid and learned Reader will see that the latter was +the noble model, which I made use of on this Occasion. + +"I do not think my Child is entirely free from Faults. I know nothing +human that is so; but surely she doth not deserve the Rancour with which +she hath been treated by the Public. However, it is not my Intention, at +present, to make any Defence; but shall submit to a Compromise, which +hath been always allowed in this Court in all Prosecutions for Dulness. +I do, therefore, solemnly declare to you, Mr. Censor, that I will +trouble the World no more with any Children of mine by the same Muse." + +Whether sincere or not, this last statement appears to have afforded the +greatest gratification to Richardson. "Will I leave you to Captain +Booth?" he writes triumphantly to Mrs. Donnellan, in answer to a +question she had put to him. "Captain Booth, Madam, has done his own +business. Mr. Fielding has overwritten himself, or rather _under_- +written; and in his own journal seems ashamed of his last piece; and has +promised that the same Muse shall write no more for him. The piece, in +short, is as dead as if it had been published forty years ago, as to +sale." There is much to the same effect in the worthy little printer's +correspondence; but enough has been quoted to show how intolerable to +the super-sentimental creator of the high-souled and heroic _Clarissa_ +was his rival's plainer and more practical picture of matronly virtue +and modesty. In cases of this kind, _parva seges satis est_, and Amelia +has long since outlived both rival malice and contemporary coldness. It +is a proof of her author's genius, that she is even more intelligible to +our age than she was to her own. + +At the end of the second volume of the first edition of her history was +a notice announcing the immediate appearance of the above-mentioned +_Covent-Garden Journal_, a bi-weekly paper, in which Fielding, under the +style and title of Sir Alexander Drawcansir, assumed the office of +Censor of Great Britain. The first number of this new venture was issued +on January the 4th, 1752, and the price was threepence. In plan, and +general appearance, it resembled the _Jacobite's Journal_, consisting +mainly of an introductory Essay, paragraphs of current news, often +accompanied by pointed editorial comment, miscellaneous articles, and +advertisements. One of the features of the earlier numbers was a +burlesque, but not very successful, _Journal of the present Paper War_, +which speedily involved the author in actual hostilities with the +notorious quack and adventurer Dr. John Hill, who for some time had been +publishing certain impudent lucubrations in the _London Daily +Advertiser_ under the heading of _The Inspector_; and also with +Smollett, whom he (Fielding) had ridiculed in his second number, perhaps +on account of that little paragraph in the first edition of _Peregrine +Pickle_, to which reference was made in an earlier chapter. Smollett, +always irritable and combative, retorted by a needlessly coarse and +venomous pamphlet, in which, under the name of "Habbakkuk Hilding, +Justice, Dealer and Chapman," Fielding was attacked with indescribable +brutality. Another, and seemingly unprovoked, adversary whom the +_Journal of the War_ brought upon him was Bonnel Thornton, afterwards +joint-author with George Colman of the _Connoisseur_, who, in a +production styled _Have at you All; or, The Drury Lane Journal_, +lampooned Sir Alexander with remarkable rancour and assiduity. Mr. +Lawrence has treated these "quarrels of authors" at some length; and +they also have some record in the curious collections of the elder +Disraeli. As a general rule, Fielding was far less personal and much +more scrupulous in his choice of weapons than those who assailed him; +but the conflict was an undignified one, and, as Scott has justly said, +"neither party would obtain honour by an inquiry into the cause or +conduct of its hostilities." + +In the enumeration of Fielding's works it is somewhat difficult (if due +proportion be observed) to assign any real importance to efforts like +the _Covent-Garden Journal_. Compared with his novels, they are +insignificant enough. But even the worst work of such a man is notable +in its way; and Fielding's contributions to the _Journal_ are by no +means to be despised. They are shrewd lay sermons, often exhibiting much +out-of-the-way erudition, and nearly always distinguished by some of his +personal qualities. In No. 33, on "Profanity," there is a character- +sketch which, for vigour and vitality, is worthy of his best days; and +there is also a very thoughtful paper on "Reading," containing a kindly +reference to "the ingenious Author of _Clarissa_," which should have +mollified that implacable moralist. In this essay it is curious to +notice that, while Fielding speaks with due admiration of Shakespeare +and Moliere, Lucian, Cervantes, and Swift, he condemns Rabelais and +Aristophanes, although in the invocation already quoted from _Tom +Jones_, he had included both these authors among the models he admired. +Another paper in the _Covent-Garden Journal_ is especially interesting +because it affords a clue to a project of Fielding's which unfortunately +remained a project. This was a Translation of the works of Lucian, to be +undertaken in conjunction with his old colleague, the Rev. William +Young. Proposals were advertised, and the enterprise was duly heralded +by a "puff preliminary," in which Fielding, while abstaining from +anything directly concerning his own abilities, observes, "I will only +venture to say, that no Man seems so likely to translate an Author well, +as he who hath formed his Stile upon that very Author"--a sentence +which, taken in connection with the references to Lucian in _Tom Thumb_, +the _Champion_ and elsewhere, must be accepted as distinctly +autobiographic. The last number of the Covent-Garden Journal (No. 72) +was issued in November 1752. By this time Sir Alexander seems to have +thoroughly wearied of his task. With more gravity than usual he takes +leave of letters, begging the Public that they will not henceforth +father on him the dulness and scurrility of his worthy contemporaries; +"since I solemnly declare that unless in revising my former Works, I +have at present no Intention to hold any further Correspondence with the +gayer Muses." + +The labour of conducting the _Covent-Garden Journal_ must have been the +more severe in that, during the whole period of its existence, the +editor was vigorously carrying out his duties as a magistrate. The +prison and political scenes in _Amelia_, which contemporary critics +regarded as redundant, and which even to us are more curious than +essential, testify at once to his growing interest in reform, and his +keen appreciation of the defects which existed both in the law itself +and in the administration of the law; while the numerous cases heard +before him, and periodically reported in his paper by his clerk, afford +ample evidence of his judicial activity. How completely he regarded +himself (Bathurst and Rigby notwithstanding) as the servant of the +public, may be gathered from the following regularly repeated notice:-- + +"To the PUBLIC. + +"All Persons who shall for the Future, suffer by Robbers, Burglars, &c., +are desired immediately to bring, or send, the best Description they can +of such Robbers, &c., with the Time and Place, and Circumstances of the +Fact, to Henry Fielding, Esq.; at his House in Bow Street." + +Another instance of his energy in his vocation is to be found in the +little collection of cases entitled _Examples of the Interposition of +Providence, in the Detection and Punishment of Murder_, published, with +Preface and Introduction, in April 1752, and prompted, as advertisement +announces, "by the many horrid Murders committed within this last Year." +It appeared, as a matter of fact, only a few days after the execution at +Oxford, for parricide, of the notorious Miss Mary Blandy, and might be +assumed to have a more or less timely intention; but the purity of +Fielding's purpose is placed beyond a doubt by the fact that he freely +distributed it in court to those whom it seemed calculated to profit. + +The only other works of Fielding which precede the posthumously +published _Journal of a Voyage to Lisbon_ are the _Proposal for Making +an Effectual Provision for the Poor_, etc., a pamphlet dedicated to the +Right Honble. Henry Pelham, published in January 1753; and the _Clear +State of the Case of Elizabeth Canning_, published in March. The former, +which the hitherto unfriendly _Gentleman's_ patronisingly styles an +"excellent piece," conceived in a manner which gives "a high idea of his +[the author's] present temper, manners and ability," is an elaborate +project for the erection, _inter alia_, of a vast building, of which a +plan, "drawn by an Eminent Hand," was given, to be called the County- +house, capable of containing 5000 inmates, and including work-rooms, +prisons, an infirmary, and other features, the details of which are too +minute to be repeated in these pages, even if they had received any +attention from the Legislature, which they did not. The latter was +Fielding's contribution to the extraordinary judicial puzzle, which +agitated London in 1753-4. It is needless to do more than recall its +outline. On the 29th of January 1753, one Elizabeth Canning, a domestic +servant aged eighteen or thereabouts, and who had hitherto borne an +excellent character, returned to her mother, having been missing from +the house of her master, a carpenter in Aldermanbury, since the 1st of +the same month. She was half starved and half clad, and alleged that she +had been abducted, and confined during her absence in a house on the +Hertford Road, from which she had just escaped. This house she +afterwards identified as that of one Mother Wells, a person of very +indifferent reputation. An ill-favoured old gipsy woman named Mary +Squires was also declared by her to have been the main agent in ill- +using and detaining her. The gipsy, it is true, averred that at the time +of the occurrence she was a hundred and twenty miles away; but Canning +persisted in her statement. Among other people before whom she came was +Fielding, who examined her, as well as a young woman called Virtue Hall, +who appeared subsequently as one of Canning's witnesses. Fielding seems +to have been strongly impressed by her appearance and her story, and his +pamphlet (which was contradicted in every particular by his adversary, +John Hill) gives a curious and not very edifying picture of the +magisterial procedure of the time. In February, Wells and Squires were +tried; Squires was sentenced to death, and Wells to imprisonment and +burning in the hand. Then, by the exertions of the Lord Mayor, Sir Crisp +Gascoyne, who doubted the justice of the verdict, Squires was respited +and pardoned. Forthwith London was split up into Egyptian and Canningite +factions; a hailstorm of pamphlets set in; portraits and caricatures of +the principal personages were in all the print shops; and, to use +Churchill's words, + + "--_Betty Canning_ was at least, + With _Gascoyne's_ help, a six months feast." + +In April 1754, however, Fate so far prevailed against her that she +herself, in turn, was tried for perjury. Thirty-eight witnesses swore +that Squires had been in Dorsetshire; twenty-seven that she had been +seen in Middlesex. After some hesitation, quite of a piece with the rest +of the proceedings, the jury found Canning guilty; and she was +transported for seven years. At the end of her sentence she returned to +England to receive a legacy of L500, which had been left her by an +enthusiastic old lady of Newington-green. [Footnote: So says the _Annual +Register_ for 1761, p. 179. But according to later accounts (_Gent. +Mag._ xliii. 413), she never returned, dying in 1773 at Weathersfield in +Connecticut.] Her "case" is full of the most inexplicable +contradictions; and it occupies in the _State Trials_ some four hundred +and twenty closely-printed pages of the most curious and picturesque +eighteenth-century details. But how, from the 1st of January 1753 to the +29th of the same month, Elizabeth Canning really did manage to spend her +time is a secret that, to this day, remains undivulged. + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + +THE JOURNAL OF A VOYAGE TO LISBON. + + +In March 1753, when Fielding published his pamphlet on Elizabeth +Canning, his life was plainly drawing to a close. His energies indeed +were unabated, as may be gathered from a brief record in the +_Gentleman's_ for that month, describing his judicial raid, at four in +the morning, upon a gaming-room, where he suspected certain highwaymen +to be assembled. But his body was enfeebled by disease, and he knew he +could not look for length of days. He had lived not long, but much; he +had seen in little space, as the motto to _Tom Jones_ announced, "the +manners of many men;" and now that, prematurely, the inevitable hour +approached, he called Cicero and Horace to his aid, and prepared to meet +his fate with philosophic fortitude. Between + + _"Quem fors dierum cunque dabit, lucro + Appone,"_ + +and + + _"Grata superveniet, quae non sperabitur, hora,"_ + +he tells us in his too-little-consulted _Proposal for the Poor_, he had +schooled himself to regard events with equanimity, striving above all, +in what remained to him of life, to perform the duties of his office +efficiently, and solicitous only for those he must leave behind him. +Henceforward his literary efforts should be mainly philanthropic and +practical, not without the hope that, if successful, they might be the +means of securing some provision for his family. Of fiction he had taken +formal leave in the trial of _Amelia_; and of lighter writing generally +in the last paper of the _Covent-Garden Journal_. But, if we may trust +his Introduction, the amount of work he had done for his poor-law +project must have been enormous, for he had read and considered all the +laws upon the subject, as well as everything that had been written on it +since the days of Elizabeth, yet he speaks nevertheless as one over +whose head the sword had all the while been impending:-- + +"The Attempt, indeed, is such, that the Want of Success can scarce be +called a Disappointment, tho' I shall have lost much Time, and +misemployed much Pains; and what is above all, shall miss the Pleasure +of thinking that in the Decline of my Health and Life, I have conferred +a great and lasting Benefit on my Country." + +In words still more resigned and dignified, he concludes the book:-- + +His enemies, he says, will no doubt "discover, that instead of intending +a Provision for the Poor, I have been carving out one for myself, +[Footnote: Presumably as Governor of the proposed County-house.] and +have very cunningly projected to build myself a fine House at the +Expence (_sic_) of the Public. This would be to act in direct Opposition +to the Advice of my above Master [i.e. Horace]; it would be indeed + + Struere domos immemor sepulchri. + +Those who do not know me, may believe this; but those who do, will +hardly be so deceived by that Chearfulness which was always natural to +me; and which, I thank God, my Conscience doth not reprove me for, to +imagine that I am not sensible of my declining Constitution.... Ambition +or Avarice can no longer raise a Hope, or dictate any Scheme to me, who +have no further Design than to pass my short Remainder of Life in some +Degree of Ease, and barely to preserve my Family from being the Objects +of any such Laws as I have here proposed." + +With the exception of the above, and kindred passages quoted from the +Prefaces to the _Miscellanies_ and the Plays, the preceding pages, as +the reader has no doubt observed, contain little of a purely +autobiographical character. Moreover, the anecdotes related of Fielding +by Murphy and others have not always been of such a nature as to inspire +implicit confidence in their accuracy, while of the very few letters +that have been referred to, none have any of those intimate and familiar +touches which reveal the individuality of the writer. But from the +middle of 1753 up to a short time before his death, Fielding has himself +related the story of his life, in one of the most unfeigned and touching +little tracts in our own or any other literature. The only thing which, +at the moment, suggests itself for comparison with the _Journal of a +Voyage to Lisbon_ is the letter and dedication which Fielding's +predecessor, Cervantes, prefixes to his last romance of _Persiles and +Sigismunda_. In each case the words are animated by the same +uncomplaining kindliness--the same gallant and indomitable spirit; in +each case the writer is a dying man. Cervantes survived the date of his +letter to the Conde de Lemos but three days; and the _Journal_, says +Fielding's editor (probably his brother John), was "finished almost at +the same period with life." It was written, from its author's account, +in those moments of the voyage when, his womankind being sea-sick, and +the crew wholly absorbed in working the ship, he was thrown upon his own +resources, and compelled to employ his pen to while away the time. The +Preface, and perhaps the Introduction, were added after his arrival at +Lisbon, in the brief period before his death. The former is a semi- +humorous apology for voyage-writing; the latter gives an account of the +circumstances which led to this, his last expedition in search of +health. + +At the beginning of August 1753, Fielding tells us, having taken the +Duke of Portland's medicine [Footnote: A popular eighteenth-century +gout-powder, but as old as Galen. The receipt for it is given in the +_Gentleman's Magazine_, vol. xxiii., 579.] for near a year, "the effects +of which had been the carrying off the symptoms of a lingering imperfect +gout," Mr. Ranby, the King's Sergeant-Surgeon [Footnote: Mr. Ranby was +also the friend of Hogarth, who etched his house at Chiswick.] (to whom +complimentary reference had been made in the Man of the Hill's story in +_Tom Jones_), with other able physicians, advised him "to go immediately +to Bath." He accordingly engaged lodgings, and prepared to leave town +forthwith. While he was making ready for his departure, and was "almost +fatigued to death with several long examinations, relating to five +different murders, all committed within the space of a week, by +different gangs of street robbers," he received a message from the Duke +of Newcastle, afterwards Premier, through that Mr. Carrington whom +Walpole calls "the cleverest of all ministerial terriers," requesting +his attendance in Lincoln's-Inn Fields (Newcastle House). Being lame, +and greatly over-taxed, Fielding excused himself. But the Duke sent Mr. +Carrington again next day, and Fielding with great difficulty obeyed the +summons. After waiting some three hours in the antechamber (no unusual +feature, as Lord Chesterfield informs us, of the Newcastle audiences), a +gentleman was deputed to consult him as to the devising of a plan for +putting an immediate end to the murders and robberies which had become +so common. This, although the visit cost him "a severe cold," Fielding +at once undertook. A proposal was speedily drawn out and submitted to +the Privy Council. Its essential features were the employment of a known +informer, and the provision of funds for that purpose. + +By the time this scheme was finally approved, Fielding's disorder had +"turned to a deep jaundice," in which case the Bath waters were +generally regarded as "almost infallible." But his eager desire to break +up "this gang of villains and cut-throats" delayed him in London; and a +day or two after he had received a portion of the stipulated grant, +(which portion, it seems, took several weeks in arriving), the whole +body were entirely dispersed,--"seven of them were in actual custody, +and the rest driven, some out of town, and others out of the kingdom." +In examining them, however, and in taking depositions, which often +occupied whole days and sometimes nights, although he had the +satisfaction of knowing that during the dark months of November and +December the metropolis enjoyed complete immunity from murder and +robbery, his own health was "reduced to the last extremity." + +"Mine (he says) was now no longer what is called a Bath case," nor, if +it had been, could his strength have sustained the "intolerable fatigue" +of the journey thither. He accordingly gave up his Bath lodgings, which +he had hitherto retained, and went into the country "in a very weak and +deplorable condition." He was suffering from jaundice, dropsy, and +asthma, under which combination of diseases his body was "so entirely +emaciated, that it had lost all its muscular flesh." He had begun with +reason "to look on his case as desperate," and might fairly have +regarded himself as voluntarily sacrificed to the good of the public. +But he is far too honest to assign his action to philanthropy alone. His +chief object (he owns) had been, if possible, to secure some provision +for his family in the event of his death. Not being a "trading +justice,"--that is, a justice who took bribes from suitors, like Justice +Thrasher in _Amelia_, or Justice Squeez'um in the _Coffee House +Politician_,--his post at Bow Street had scarcely been a lucrative one. +"By composing, instead of inflaming, the quarrels of porters and beggars +(which I blush when I say hath not been universally practised) and by +refusing to take a shilling from a man who most undoubtedly would not +have had another left, I had reduced an income of about L500 a year of +the dirtiest money upon earth to little more than L300, a considerable +proportion of which remained with my clerk." Besides the residue of his +justice's fees, he had also, he informs us, a yearly pension from the +Government, "out of the public service-money," but the amount is not +stated. The rest of his means, as far as can be ascertained, were +derived from his literary labours. To a man of his lavish disposition, +and with the claims of a family upon him, this could scarcely have been +a competence; and if, as appears not very clearly from a note in the +Journal, he now resigned his office to his half-brother, who had long +been his assistant, his private affairs at the beginning of the winter +of 1753-54 must, as he says, have "had but a gloomy aspect." In the +event of his death his wife and children could have no hope except from +some acknowledgment by the Government of his past services. + +Meanwhile his diseases were slowly gaining ground. The terrible winter +of 1753-54, which, from the weather record in the _Gentleman's_, seems, +with small intermission, to have been prolonged far into April, was +especially trying to asthmatic patients, and consequently wholly against +him. In February he returned to town, and put himself under the care of +the notorious Dr. Joshua Ward of Pall Mall, by whom he was treated and +tapped for dropsy. [Footnote: Ward appears in Hogarth's _Consultation of +Physicians_, 1736, and in Pope--"Ward try'd on Puppies, and the Poor, +his Drop." He was a quack, but must have possessed considerable ability. +Bolingbroke wished Pope to consult him in 1744; and he attended George +II. There is an account of him in Nichols's _Genuine Works of Hogarth_, +i. 89.] He was at his worst, he says, "on that memorable day when the +public lost Mr. Pelham (March 6th);" but from this time, he began, under +Ward's medicines, to acquire "some little degree of strength," although +his dropsy increased. With May came the long-delayed spring, and he +moved to Fordhook, [Footnote: It lay on the Uxbridge Road, a little +beyond Acton, and nearly opposite the subsequent site of the Ealing +Common Station of the Metropolitan District Railway. The spot is now +occupied by "commodious villas."] a "little house" belonging to him at +Ealing, the air of which place then enjoyed a considerable reputation, +being reckoned the best in Middlesex, "and far superior to that of +Kensington Gravel-Pits." Here a re-perusal of Bishop Berkeley's _Siris_, +which had been recalled to his memory by Mrs. Charlotte Lennox, "the +inimitable author of the _Female Quixote_," set him drinking tar-water +with apparent good effect, except as far as his chief ailment was +concerned. The applications of the trocar became more frequent: the +summer, if summer it could be called, was "mouldering away;" and winter, +with all its danger to an invalid, was drawing on apace. Nothing seemed +hopeful but removal to a warmer climate. Aix in Provence was at first +thought of, but the idea was abandoned on account of the difficulties of +the journey. Lisbon, where Doddridge had died three years before, was +then chosen; a passage in a vessel trading to the port was engaged for +the sick man, his wife, daughter, and two servants; and after some +delays they started. At this point the actual _Journal_ begins with a +well-remembered entry:-- + +"_Wednesday, June 26th_, 1754.--On this day, the most melancholy sun I +had ever beheld arose, and found me awake at my house at Fordhook. By +the light of this sun, I was, in my own opinion, last to behold and take +leave of some of those creatures on whom I doated with a mother-like +fondness, guided by nature and passion, and uncured and unhardened by +all the doctrine of that philosophical school where I had learnt to bear +pains and to despise death. + +"In this situation, as I could not conquer nature, I submitted entirely +to her, and she made as great a fool of me as she had ever done of any +woman whatsoever: under pretence of giving me leave to enjoy, she drew +me to suffer the company of my little ones, during eight hours; and I +doubt not whether, in that time, I did not undergo more than in all my +distemper. + +"At twelve precisely my coach was at the door, which was no sooner told +me than I kiss'd my children round, and went into it with some little +resolution. My wife, who behaved more like a heroine and philosopher, +tho' at the same time the tenderest mother in the world, and my eldest +daughter, followed me; some friends went with us, and others here took +their leave; and I heard my behaviour applauded, with many murmurs and +praises to which I well knew I had no title; as all other such +philosophers may, if they have any modesty, confess on the like +occasions." + +Two hours later the party reached Rotherhithe. Here, with the kindly +assistance of his and Hogarth's friend, Mr. Saunders Welch, High +Constable of Holborn, the sick man, who, at this time, "had no use of +his limbs," was carried to a boat, and hoisted in a chair over the +ship's side. This latter journey, far more fatiguing to the sufferer +than the twelve miles ride which he had previously undergone, was not +rendered more easy to bear by the jests of the watermen and sailors, to +whom his ghastly, death-stricken countenance seemed matter for +merriment; and he was greatly rejoiced to find himself safely seated in +the cabin. The voyage, however, already more than once deferred, was not +yet to begin. Wednesday, being King's Proclamation Day, the vessel could +not be cleared at the Custom House; and on Thursday the skipper +announced that he should not set out until Saturday. As Fielding's +complaint was again becoming troublesome, and no surgeon was available +on board, he sent for his friend, the famous anatomist, Mr. Hunter, of +Covent Garden, [Footnote: This must have been William Hunter, for in +1754 his more distinguished brother John had not yet become celebrated.] +by whom he was tapped, to his own relief, and the admiration of the +simple sea-captain, who (he writes) was greatly impressed by "the heroic +constancy, with which I had borne an operation that is attended with +scarce any degree of pain." On Sunday the vessel dropped down to +Gravesend, where, on the next day, Mr. Welch, who until then had +attended them, took his leave; and, Fielding, relieved by the trocar of +any immediate apprehensions of discomfort, might, in spite of his +forlorn case, have been fairly at ease. He had a new concern, however, +in the state of Mrs. Fielding, who was in agony with toothache, which +successive operators failed to relieve; and there is an unconsciously +touching little picture of the sick man and his skipper, who was deaf, +sitting silently over "a small bowl of punch" in the narrow cabin, for +fear of waking the pain-worn sleeper in the adjoining state-room. Of his +second wife, as may be gathered from the opening words of the _Journal_, +Fielding always speaks with the warmest affection and gratitude. +Elsewhere, recording a storm off the Isle of Wight, he says, "My dear +wife and child must pardon me, if what I did not conceive to be any +great evil to myself, I was not much terrified with the thoughts of +happening to them: in truth, I have often thought they are both too +good, and too gentle, to be trusted to the power of any man." With what +a tenacity of courtesy he treated the whilom Mary Daniel may be gathered +from the following vignette of insolence in office, which can be taken +as a set-off to the malicious tattle of Walpole:-- + +"Soon after their departure [i.e. Mr. Welch and a companion], our cabin, +where my wife and I were sitting together, was visited by two ruffians, +whose appearance greatly corresponded with that of the sheriffs, or +rather the knight-marshal's bailiffs. One of these, especially, who +seemed to affect a more than ordinary degree of rudeness and insolence, +came in without any kind of ceremony, with a broad gold lace upon his +hat, which was cocked with much military fierceness on his head. An +inkhorn at his button-hole, and some papers in his hand, sufficiently +assured me what he was, and I asked him if he and his companions were +not custom-house officers; he answered with sufficient dignity that they +were, as an information which he seemed to consider would strike the +hearer with awe, and suppress all further inquiry; but on the contrary I +proceeded to ask of what rank he was in the Custom house, and receiving +an answer from his companion, as I remember, that the gentleman was a +riding surveyor; I replied, that he might be a riding surveyor, but +could be no gentleman, for that none who had any title to that +denomination would break into the presence of a lady, without any +apology, or even moving his hat. He then took his covering from his +head, and laid it on the table, saying, he asked pardon, and blamed the +mate, who should, he said, have informed him if any persons of +distinction were below. I told him he might guess from our appearance +(which, perhaps, was rather more than could be said with the strictest +adherence to truth) that he was before a gentleman and lady, which +should teach him to be very civil in his behaviour, tho' we should not +happen to be of the number whom the world calls people of fashion and +distinction. However, I said, that as he seemed sensible of his error, +and had asked pardon, the lady would permit him to put his hat on again, +if he chose it. This he refused with some degree of surliness, and +failed not to convince me that, if I should condescend to become more +gentle, he would soon grow more rude." + +The date of this occurrence was July the 1st. On the evening of the same +day they weighed anchor and managed to reach the Nore. For more than a +week they were wind-bound in the Downs, but on the 11th they anchored +off Hyde, from which place, on the next morning, Fielding despatched the +following letter to his brother. Besides giving the names of the captain +and the ship, which are carefully suppressed in the _Journal_, +[Footnote: Probably this was intentional. Notwithstanding the statement +in the "Dedication to the Public" that the text is given "as it came +from the hands of the author," the Journal, in the first issue of 1755, +seems to have been considerably "edited." "Mrs. Francis" (the Ryde +landlady) is there called "Mrs. Humphrys," and the portrait of the +military coxcomb, together with some particulars of Fielding's visit to +the Duke of Newcastle, and other details, are wholly omitted.] it is +especially interesting as being the last letter written by Fielding of +which we have any knowledge:-- + +"On board the Queen of Portugal, Rich'd Veal at anchor on the +Mother Bank, off Ryde, to the Care of the Post Master of Portsmouth +--this is my Date and yr Direction. + +"July 12 1754. + +"Dear Jack, After receiving that agreeable Lre from Mess'rs Fielding and +Co., we weighed on monday morning and sailed from Deal to the Westward. +Four Days long but inconceivably pleasant Passage brought us yesterday +to an Anchor on the Mother Bank, on the Back of the Isle of Wight, where +we had last Night in Safety the Pleasure of hearing the Winds roar over +our Heads in as violent a Tempest as I have known, and where my only +Consideration were the Fears which must possess any Friend of ours, (if +there is happily any such) who really makes our Wellbeing the Object of +his Concern especially if such Friend should be totally inexperienced in +Sea Affairs. I therefore beg that on the Day you receive this Mrs. +Daniel [Footnote: It will be remembered that the maiden-name of +Fielding's second wife, as given in the Register of St. Bene't's, was +Mary Daniel. "Mrs. Daniel" was therefore, in all probability, Fielding's +mother-in-law; and it may reasonably be assumed that she had remained in +charge of the little family at Fordhook.] may know that we are just +risen from Breakfast in Health and Spirits this twelfth Instant at 9 in +the morning. Our Voyage hath proved fruitful in Adventures all which +being to be written in the Book, you must postpone yr. Curiosity--As the +Incidents which fall under yr Cognizance will possibly be consigned to +Oblivion, do give them to us as they pass. Tell yr Neighbour I am much +obliged to him for recommending me to the Care of a most able and +experienced Seaman to whom other Captains seem to pay such Deference +that they attend and watch his Motions, and think themselves only safe +when they act under his Direction and Example. Our Ship in Truth seems +to give Laws on the Water with as much Authority and Superiority as you +Dispense Laws to the Public and Examples to yr Brethren in Commission. +Please to direct yr Answer to me on Board as in the Date, if gone to be +returned, and then send it by the Post and Pacquet to Lisbon to + +"Yr affect Brother + +"H. FIELDING + +"To John Fielding Esq. at his House in + +"Bow Street Covt Garden London." + +As the _Queen of Portugal_ did not leave Ryde until the 23d, it is +possible that Fielding received a reply. During the remainder of this +desultory voyage he continued to beguile his solitary hours--hours of +which we are left to imagine the physical torture and monotony, for he +says but little of himself--by jottings and notes of the, for the most +part, trivial accidents of his progress. That happy cheerfulness, of +which he spoke in the _Proposal for the Poor_, had not yet deserted him; +and there are moments when he seems rather on a pleasure-trip than a +forlorn pilgrimage in search of health. At Ryde, where, for change of +air, he went ashore, he chronicles, after many discomforts from the most +disobliging of landladies (let the name of Mrs. Francis go down to +posterity!), "the best, the pleasantest, and the merriest meal, [in a +barn] with more appetite, more real, solid luxury, and more festivity, +than was ever seen in an entertainment at White's." At Torbay, he +expatiates upon the merits and flavour of the John Dory, a specimen of +which "gloriously regaled" the party, and furnished him with a pretext +for a dissertation on the London Fish Supply. Another page he devotes to +commendation of the excellent _Vinum Pomonae_, or Southam cyder, supplied +by "Mr. Giles Leverance of Cheeshurst, near Dartmouth in Devon," of +which, for the sum of five pounds ten shillings, he extravagantly +purchases three hogsheads, one for himself, and the others as presents +for friends, among whom no doubt was kindly Mr. Welch. Here and there he +sketches, with but little abatement of his earlier gaiety and vigour, +the human nature around him. Of the objectionable Ryde landlady and her +husband there are portraits not much inferior to those of the Tow-wouses +in _Joseph Andrews_, while the military fop, who visits his uncle the +captain off Spithead, is drawn with all the insight which depicted the +vagaries of Ensign Northerton, whom indeed the real hero of the +_Journal_ not a little resembles. The best character sketch, however, in +the whole is that of Captain Richard Veal himself (one almost feels +inclined to wonder whether he was in any way related to the worthy lady +whose apparition visited Mrs. Bargrave at Canterbury!), but it is of +necessity somewhat dispersed. It has also an additional attraction, +because, if we remember rightly, it is Fielding's sole excursion into +the domain of Smollett. The rough old sea-dog of the Haddock and Vernon +period, who had been a privateer; and who still, as skipper of a +merchant-man, when he visits a friend or gallants the ladies, decorates +himself with a scarlet coat, cockade, and sword; who gives vent to a +kind of Irish howl when his favourite kitten is suffocated under a +feather bed; and falls abjectly on his knees when threatened with the +dreadful name of Law, is a character which, in its surly good-humour and +sensitive dignity, might easily, under more favourable circumstances, +have grown into an individuality, if not equal to that of Squire +Western, at least on a level with Partridge or Colonel Bath. There are +numbers of minute touches--as, for example, his mistaking "a lion" for +"Elias" when he reads prayers to the ship's company; and his quaint +asseverations when exercised by the inconstancy of the wind--which show +how closely Fielding studied his deaf companion. But it would occupy too +large a space to examine the _Journal_ more in detail. It is sufficient +to say that after some further delays from wind and tide, the travellers +sailed up the Tagus. Here, having undergone the usual quarantine and +custom-house obstruction, they landed, and Fielding's penultimate words +record a good supper at Lisbon, "for which we were as well charged, as +if the bill had been made on the Bath Road, between Newbury and London." +The book ends with a line from the poet whom, in the _Proposal for the +Poor_, he had called his master:-- + + "--hic finis chartaeque viaeque." + +Two months afterwards he died at Lisbon, on the 8th of October, in the +forty-eighth year of his age. + +He was buried on the hillside in the centre of the beautiful English +cemetery, which faces the great Basilica of the Heart of Jesus, +otherwise known as the Church of the Estrella. Here, in a leafy spot +where the nightingales fill the still air with song, and watched by +those secular cypresses from which the place takes its Portuguese name +of _Os Cyprestes_, lies all that was mortal of him whom Scott called the +"Father of the English Novel." His first tomb, which Wraxall found in +1772, "nearly concealed by weeds and nettles," was erected by the +English factory, in consequence mainly--as it seems--of a proposal made +by an enthusiastic Chevalier de Meyrionnet, to provide one (with an +epitaph) at his own expense. That now existing was substituted in 1830, +by the exertions of the Rev. Christopher Neville, British Chaplain at +Lisbon. It is a heavy sarcophagus, resting upon a large base, and +surmounted by just such another urn and flame as that on Hogarth's Tomb +at Chiswick. On the front is a long Latin inscription; on the back the +better-known words:-- + +LUGET BRITANNIA GREMIO NON DARI FOVERE NATUM. [Footnote: The fifth word +is generally given as "datum." But the above version, which has been +verified at Lisbon, may be accepted as correct.] + +It is to this last memorial that the late George Borrow referred in his +_Bible in Spain:_-- + +"Let travellers devote one entire morning to inspecting the Arcos and +the Mai das agoas, after which they may repair to the English church and +cemetery, Pere-la-chaise in miniature, where, if they be of England, +they may well be excused if they kiss the cold tomb, as I did, of the +author of "Amelia," the most singular genius which their island ever +produced, whose works it has long been the fashion to abuse in public +and to read in secret." + +Borrow's book was first published in 1843. Of late years the tomb had +been somewhat neglected; but from a communication in the _Athenaeum_ of +May 1879, it appears that it had then been recently cleaned, and the +inscriptions restored, by order of the present chaplain, the Rev. +Godfrey Pope. + +There is but one authentic portrait of Henry Fielding. This is the pen- +and-ink sketch drawn from memory by Hogarth, long after Fielding's +death, to serve as a frontispiece for Murphy's edition of his works. It +was engraved in _facsimile_ by James Basire, with such success that the +artist is said to have mistaken an impression of the plate (without its +emblematic border) for his own drawing. Hogarth's sketch is the sole +source of all the portraits, more or less "romanced," which are prefixed +to editions of Fielding; and also, there is good reason to suspect, of +the dubious little miniature, still in possession of his descendants, +which figures in Hutchins's _History of Dorset_ and elsewhere. More than +one account has been given of the way in which the drawing was produced. +The most effective, and, unfortunately, the most popular, version has, +of course, been selected by Murphy. In this he tells us that Hogarth, +being unable to recall his dead friend's features, had recourse to a +profile cut in paper by a lady, who possessed the happy talent which +Pope ascribes to Lady Burlington. Her name, which is given in Nichols, +was Margaret Collier, and she was possibly the identical Miss Collier +who figures in Richardson's _Correspondence_. Setting aside the fact +that, as Hogarth's eye-memory was marvellous, this story is highly +improbable, it was expressly contradicted by George Steevens in 1781, +and by John Ireland in 1798, both of whom, from their relations with +Hogarth's family, were likely to be credibly informed. Steevens, after +referring to Murphy's fable, says in the _Biographical Anecdotes of +William Hogarth_, "I am assured that our artist began and finished the +head in the presence of his wife and another lady. He had no assistance +but from his own memory, which, on such occasions, was remarkably +tenacious." Ireland, in his _Hogarth Illustrated_, gives us as the +simple fact the following:--"Hogarth being told, after his friend's +death, that a portrait was wanted as a frontispiece to his works, +sketched this from memory." According to the inscription on Basire's +plate, it represents Fielding at the age of forty-eight, or in the year +of his death. This, however, can only mean that it represents him as +Hogarth had last seen him. But long before he died, disease had greatly +altered his appearance; and he must have been little more than the +shadow of the handsome Harry Fielding, who wrote farces for Mrs. Clive, +and heard the chimes at midnight. As he himself says in the _Voyage to +Lisbon_, he had lost his teeth, and the consequent falling-in of the +lips is plainly perceptible in the profile. The shape of the Roman nose, +which Colonel James in _Amelia_ irreverently styled a "proboscis," +would, however, remain unaltered, and it is still possible to divine a +curl, half humorous, half ironic, in the short upper lip. The eye, +apparently, was dark and deep-set. Oddly enough, the chin, to the length +of which he had himself referred in the _Champion_, does not appear +abnormal. [Footnote: In the bust of Fielding which Miss Margaret Thomas +has been commissioned by Mr. R. A. Kinglake to execute for the Somerset +Valhalla, the Shire-Hall at Taunton, these points have been carefully +considered; and the sculptor has succeeded in producing a work which, +while it suggests the mingling of humour and dignity that is Fielding's +chief characteristic, is also generally faithful to Hogarth's +indications. From these, indeed, it is impossible to deviate. Not only +is his portrait unique; but it was admitted to be like Fielding by +Fielding's friends. The bust was placed in the Shire Hall, 4th September +1883.] + +Beyond the fact that he was above six feet in height, and, until the +gout had broken his constitution, unusually robust, Murphy adds nothing +further to our idea of his personal appearance. + +That other picture of his character, traced and retraced (often with +much exaggeration of outline), is so familiar in English literature, +that it cannot now be materially altered or amended. Yet it is +impossible not to wish that it were derived from some less prejudiced or +more trustworthy witnesses than those who have spoken,--say, for +example, from Lyttelton or Allen. There are always signs that Walpole's +malice, and Smollett's animosity, and the rancour of Richardson, have +had too much to do with the representation; and even Murphy and Lady +Mary are scarcely persons whom one would select as ideal biographers. +The latter is probably right in comparing her cousin to Sir Richard +Steele. Both were generous, kindly, brave, and sensitive; both were +improvident; both loved women and little children; both sinned often, +and had their moments of sincere repentance; to both was given that +irrepressible hopefulness, and full delight of being which forgets to- +morrow in to-day. That Henry Fielding was wild and reckless in his youth +it would be idle to contest;--indeed it is an intelligible, if not a +necessary, consequence of his physique and his temperament. But it is +not fair to speak of him as if his youth lasted for ever. "Critics and +biographers," says Mr. Leslie Stephen, "have dwelt far too exclusively +upon the uglier side of his Bohemian life;" and Fielding himself, in the +_Jacobite's Journal_, complains sadly that his enemies have traced his +impeachment "even to his boyish Years." That he who was prodigal as a +lad was prodigal as a man may be conceded; that he who was sanguine at +twenty would be sanguine at forty (although this is less defensible) may +also be allowed. But, if we press for "better assurance than Bardolph," +there is absolutely no good evidence that Fielding's career after his +marriage materially differed from that of other men struggling for a +livelihood, hampered with ill-health, and exposed to all the shifts and +humiliations of necessity. If any portrait of him is to be handed down +to posterity, let it be the last rather than the first;--not the +Fielding of the green-room and the tavern--of Covent Garden frolics and +"modern conversations;" but the energetic magistrate, the tender husband +and father, the kindly host of his poorer friends, the practical +philanthropist, the patient and magnanimous hero of the _Voyage to +Lisbon_. If these things be remembered, it will seem of minor importance +that to his dying day he never knew the value of money, or that he +forgot his troubles over a chicken and champagne. And even his +improvidence was not without its excusable side. Once--so runs the +legend--Andrew Millar made him an advance to meet the claims of an +importunate tax-gatherer. Carrying it home, he met a friend, in even +worse straits than his own; and the money changed hands. When the tax- +gatherer arrived there was nothing but the answer--"Friendship has +called for the money and had it; let the collector call again." Justice, +it is needless to say, was satisfied by a second advance from the +bookseller. But who shall condemn the man of whom such a story can be +told? + +The literary work of Fielding is so inextricably interwoven with what is +known of his life that most of it has been examined in the course of the +foregoing narrative. What remains to be said is chiefly in summary of +what has been said already. As a dramatist he has no eminence; and +though his plays do not deserve the sweeping condemnation with which +Macaulay once spoke of them in the House of Commons, they are not likely +to attract any critics but those for whom the inferior efforts of a +great genius possess a morbid fascination. Some of them serve, in a +measure, to illustrate his career; others contain hints and situations +which he afterwards worked into his novels; but the only ones that +possess real stage qualities are those which he borrowed from Regnard +and Moliere. _Don Quixote in England_, _Pasquin_, the _Historical +Register_, can claim no present consideration commensurate with that +which they received as contemporary satires, and their interest is +mainly antiquarian; while _Tom Thumb_ and the _Covent-Garden Tragedy_, +the former of which would make the reputation of a smaller man, can +scarcely hope to be remembered beside _Amelia_ or _Jonathan Wild_. Nor +can it be admitted that, as a periodical writer, Fielding was at his +best. In spite of effective passages, his essays remain far below the +work of the great Augustans, and are not above the level of many of +their less illustrious imitators. That instinct of popular selection, +which retains a faint hold upon the _Rambler_, the _Adventurer_, the +_World_, and the _Connoisseur_, or at least consents to give them +honourable interment as "British Essayists" in a secluded corner of the +shelves, has made no pretence to any preservation, or even any +winnowing, of the _Champion_ and the _True Patriot_. Fielding's papers +are learned and ingenious; they are frequently humorous; they are often +earnest; but it must be a loiterer in literature who, in these days, +except for antiquarian or biographical purposes, can honestly find it +worth while to consult them. His pamphlets and projects are more +valuable, if only that they prove him to have looked curiously and +sagaciously at social and political problems, and to have striven, as +far as in him lay, to set the crooked straight. Their import, to-day, is +chiefly that of links in a chain--of contributions to a progressive +literature which has travelled into regions unforeseen by the author of +the _Proposal for the Poor_, and the _Inquiry into the Causes of the +late Increase of Robbers_. As such, they have their place in that +library of Political Economy of which Mr. McCulloch has catalogued the +riches. It is not, however, by his pamphlets, his essays, or his plays +that Fielding is really memorable; it is by his triad of novels, and the +surpassing study in irony of _Jonathan Wild_. In _Joseph Andrews_ we +have the first sprightly runnings of a genius that, after much +uncertainty, had at last found its fitting vein, but was yet doubtful +and undisciplined; in _Tom Jones_ the perfect plan has come, with the +perfected method and the assured expression. There is an inevitable loss +of that fine waywardness which is sometimes the result of untrained +effort, but there is the general gain of order, and the full production +which results of art. The highest point is reached in _Tom Jones_, which +is the earliest definite and authoritative manifestation of the modern +novel. Its relation to De Foe is that of the vertebrate to the +invertebrate: to Richardson, that of the real to the ideal--one might +almost add, the impossible. It can be compared to no contemporary +English work of its own kind; and if we seek for its parallel at the +time of publication we must go beyond literature to art--to the +masterpiece of that great pictorial satirist who was Fielding's friend. +In both Fielding and Hogarth there is the same constructive power, the +same rigid sequence of cause and effect, the same significance of +detail, the same side-light of allusion. Both have the same hatred of +affectation and hypocrisy--the same unerring insight into character. +Both are equally attracted by striking contrasts and comic situations; +in both there is the same declared morality of purpose, coupled with the +same sturdy virility of expression. One, it is true, leaned more +strongly to tragedy, the other to comedy. But if Fielding had painted +pictures, it would have been in the style of the _Marriage a la Mode_; +if Hogarth had written novels, they would have been in the style of _Tom +Jones_. In the gentler and more subdued _Amelia_, with its tender and +womanly central-figure, there is a certain change of plan, due to +altered conditions--it may be, to an altered philosophy of art. The +narrative is less brisk and animated; the character-painting less +broadly humorous; the philanthropic element more strongly developed. To +trace the influence of these three great works in succeeding writers +would hold us too long. It may, nevertheless, be safely asserted that +there are few English novels of manners, written since Fielding's day, +which do not descend from him as from their fount and source; and that +more than one of our modern masters betray unmistakable signs of a form +and fashion studied minutely from their frank and manly ancestor. + + + + +POSTSCRIPT. + + +A few particulars respecting Fielding's family and posthumous works can +scarcely be omitted from the present memoir. It has been stated that by +his first wife he had one daughter, the Harriet or Harriot who +accompanied him to Lisbon, and survived him, although Mr. Keightley +says, but without giving his authority, she did not survive him long. Of +his family by Mary Daniel, the eldest son, William, to whose birth +reference has already been made, was bred to the law, became a barrister +of the Middle Temple eminent as a special pleader, and ultimately a +Westminster magistrate. He died in October 1820, at the age of seventy- +three. He seems to have shared his father's conversational qualities, +[Footnote: _Vide_ Lockhart's _Life of Scott_, chap. 1.] and, like him, +to have been a strenuous advocate of the poor and unfortunate. Southey, +writing from Keswick in 1830 to Sir Egerton Brydges, speaks of a meeting +he had in St. James's Park, about 1817, with one of the novelist's sons. +"He was then," says Southey, "a fine old man, though visibly shaken by +time: he received me in a manner which had much of old courtesy about +it, and I looked upon him with great interest for his father's sake." +The date, and the fact that William Fielding had had a paralytic stroke, +make it almost certain that this was he; and a further reference by +Southey to his religious opinions is confirmed by the obituary notice in +the _Gentleman's_, which speaks of him as a worthy and pious man. The +names and baptisms of the remaining children, as supplied for these +pages by the late Colonel Chester, were Mary Amelia, baptized January 6, +1749; Sophia, January 21, 1750; Louisa, December 3, 1752; and Allen, +April 6, 1754, about a month before Fielding removed to Ealing. All +these baptisms took place at St. Paul's, Covent Garden, from the +registers of which these particulars were extracted. The eldest +daughter, Mary Amelia, does not appear to have long survived, for the +same registers record her burial on the 17th December 1749. Allen +Fielding became a clergyman, and died, according to Burke, in 1823, +being then vicar of St. Stephen's, Canterbury. He left a family of four +sons and three daughters. One of the sons, George, became rector of +North Ockendon, Essex, and married, in 1825, Mary Rebecca, daughter of +Ferdinand Hanbury-Williams, and grandniece of Fielding's friend and +school-fellow Sir Charles. This lady, who so curiously linked the +present and the past, died not long since at Hereford Square, Brompton, +in her eighty-fifth year. Mrs. Fielding herself (Mary Daniel) appears to +have attained a good old age. Her death took place at Canterbury on the +11th of March 1802, perhaps in the house of her son Allen, who is stated +by Nichols in his _Leicestershire_ to have been rector in 1803 of St. +Cosmus and Damian-in-the-Blean. After her husband's death, her children +were educated by their uncle John and Ralph Allen, the latter of whom-- +says Murphy--made a very liberal annual donation for that purpose; and +(adds Chalmers in a note), when he died in 1764, bequeathed to the widow +and those of her family then living, the sum of L100 each. + +Among Fielding's other connections it is only necessary to speak of his +sister Sarah, and his above-mentioned brother John. Sarah Fielding +continued to write; and in addition to _David Simple_, published the +_Governess_, 1749; a translation of Xenophon's _Memorabilia_; a dramatic +fable called the _Cry_, and some other forgotten books. During the +latter part of her life she lived at Bath, where she was highly popular, +both for her personal character and her accomplishments. She died in +1768; and her friend, Dr. John Hoadly, who wrote the verses to the +_Rake's Progress_, erected a monument to her memory in the Abbey Church. + + "Her unaffected Manners, candid Mind, + Her Heart benevolent, and Soul resign'd; + Were more her Praise than all she knew or thought + Though Athens Wisdom to her Sex she taught,"-- + +says he; but in mere facts the inscription is, as he modestly styles it, +a "deficient Memorial," for she is described as having been born in 1714 +instead of 1710, and as being the second daughter of General _Henry_ +instead of General _Edmund_ Fielding. John Fielding, the novelist's +half-brother, as already stated, succeeded him at Bow Street, though the +post is sometimes claimed (on Boswell's authority) for Mr. Welch. The +mistake no doubt arose from the circumstance that they frequently worked +in concert. Previous to his appointment as a magistrate, John Fielding, +in addition to assisting his brother, seems to have been largely +concerned in the promotion of that curious enterprise, the "Universal- +Register-Office," so often advertised in the _Covent-Garden Journal_. It +appears to have been an Estate Office, Lost Property Office, Servants' +Registry, Curiosity Shop, and multifarious General Agency. As a +magistrate, in spite of his blindness, John Fielding was remarkably +energetic, and is reported to have known more than 3000 thieves by their +voices alone, and could recognise them when brought into Court. A +description of London and Westminster is often ascribed to him, but he +denied the authorship. He was knighted in 1761, and died at Brompton +Place in 1780. Lyttelton, who had become Sir George in 1751, was raised +to the peerage as Baron Lyttelton of Frankley three years after +Fielding's death. He died in 1773. In 1760-5 he published his _Dialogues +of the Dead_, profanely characterised by Mr. Walpole as "Dead +Dialogues." No. 28 of these is a colloquy between "Plutarch, Charon, and +a Modern Bookseller," and it contains the following reference to +Fielding:--"We have [says Mr. Bookseller] another writer of these +imaginary histories, one who has not long since descended to these +regions. His name is Fielding; and his works, as I have heard the best +judges say, have a true spirit of comedy, and an exact representation of +nature, with fine moral touches. He has not indeed given lessons of pure +and consummate virtue, but he has exposed vice and meanness with all the +powers of ridicule." It is perhaps excusable that Lawrence, like Roscoe +and others, should have attributed this to Lyttelton; but the preface +nevertheless assigns it, with two other dialogues, to a "different +hand." They were, in fact, the first essays in authorship of that +illustrious blue-stocking, Mrs. Elizabeth Montagu. + +Fielding's only posthumous works are the _Journal of a Voyage to Lisbon_ +and the comedy of _The Fathers; or, The Good-Natur'd Man_. The _Journal_ +was published in February 1755, together with a fragment of a Comment on +Bolingbroke's _Essays_, which Mallet had issued in March of the previous +year. This fragment must therefore have been begun in the last months of +Fielding's life; and, according to Murphy, he made very careful +preparation for the work, as attested by long extracts from the Fathers +and the leading controversialists, which, after his death, were +preserved by his brother. Beyond a passage or two in Richardson's +_Correspondence_, and a sneering reference by Walpole to Fielding's +"account how his dropsy was treated and teased by an innkeeper's wife in +the Isle of Wight," there is nothing to show how the _Journal_ was +received, still less that it brought any substantial pecuniary relief to +"those innocents," to whom reference had been made in the "Dedication." +The play was not placed upon the stage until 1778. Its story, which is +related in the _Advertisement_, is curious. After it had been set aside +in 1742, [Footnote: _Vide_ chap. iv. p. 94.] it seems to have been +submitted to Sir Charles Hanbury Williams. Sir Charles was just starting +for Russia, as Envoy Extraordinary. Whether the MS. went with him or not +is unknown; but it was lost until 1775 or 1776, when it was recovered in +a tattered and forlorn condition by Mr. Johnes, M.P. for Cardigan, from +a person who entertained a very poor and even contemptuous opinion of +its merits. Mr. Johnes thought otherwise. He sent it to Garrick, who at +once recognised it as "Harry Fielding's Comedy." Revised and retouched +by the actor and Sheridan, it was produced at Drury Lane, as _The +Fathers_, with a Prologue and Epilogue by Garrick. For a few nights it +was received with interest, and even some flickering enthusiasm. It was +then withdrawn; and there is no likelihood that it will ever be revived. + + + + +APPENDIX No I. + +FIELDING AND SARAH ANDREW. + + +By the courtesy of the editor of the _Athenaeum_, the following letter is +here reprinted from that paper for 2d June 1883:-- + +75 Eaton Rise, Ealing. + +In 1855, when Mr. Frederick Lawrence published his _Life of Henry +Fielding_, he thus referred (ch. vii. p. 67) to an "early passage" in +the novelist's career: "On his [Fielding's] return from Leyden he +conceived a desperate attachment for his cousin, Miss Sarah Andrews +[_sic_]. That young lady's friends had, however, so little confidence in +her wild kinsman, that they took the precaution of removing her out of +his reach; not, it is said, until he had attempted an abduction or +elopement.... His cousin was afterwards married to a plain country +gentleman, and in that alliance found, perhaps, more solid happiness +than she would have experienced in an early and improvident marriage +with her gifted kinsman. Her image, however, was never effaced from his +recollection; and there is a charming picture (so tradition tells) of +her luxuriant beauty in the portrait of Sophia Western, in _Tom Jones_." +Mr. Lawrence gave no hint or sign of his authority for this unexpected +and hitherto unrecorded incident. But the review of his book in the +_Athenaeum_ for 10th November 1855 elicited the following notes on the +subject from Mr. George Roberts, some time mayor of Lyme, and author of +a brief history of that town. "Henry Fielding," wrote Mr. Roberts, "was +at Lyme Regis, Dorset, for the purpose of carrying off an heiress, Miss +Andrew, the daughter of Solomon Andrew, Esq., the last of a series of +merchants of that name at Lyme. The young lady was living with Mr. +Andrew Tucker, one of the corporation, who sent her away to Modbury, in +South Devon, where she married an ancestor of the present Rev. Mr. +Rhodes, an eloquent preacher of Bath, who possesses the Andrew property. +Mr. Rhodes's son married the young lady upon his return to Modbury from +Oxford. The circumstances about the attempts of Henry Fielding to carry +off the young lady, handed down in the ancient Tucker family, were +doubted by the late head of his family, Dr. Rhodes, of Shapwick, Uplyme, +etc. Since his decease I have found an entry in the old archives of Lyme +about the fears of Andrew Tucker, Esq., the guardian, as to his safety, +owing to the behaviour of Henry Fielding and his attendant, or man. +According to the tradition of the Tucker family, given in my _History of +Lyme_, Sophia Western was intended to pourtray Miss Andrew." To Mr. +Roberts's communication succeeded that of another correspondent--one "P. +S."--who gave some additional particulars: "There is now, at Bellair, in +the immediate neighbourhood of Exeter the portrait of 'Sophia Western' +[Miss Andrew]. Bellair belongs to the Rhodes family, and was the +residence of the late George Ambrose Rhodes, Fellow of Caius College, +and formerly Physician to the Devon and Exeter Hospital. He himself +directed my attention to this picture. In the board-room of the above +hospital there is also the three-quarter length portrait of Ralph Allen, +Esq., the 'Squire Allworthy' of the same novel." No further contribution +appears to have been made to the literature of the subject. The late Mr. +Keightley, in his articles on Lawrence's book in _Fraser's Magazine_ for +January and February 1858, did, as a matter of fact, refer to the story +and Mr. Roberts's confirmation of it; but beyond pointing out that Miss +Andrew could not have been the original of Sophia Western, who is +declared by Fielding himself (_Tom Jones_, bk. xiii. ch. i.) to have +been the portrait of his first wife, Charlotte Cradock, he added nothing +to the existing information. + +When I began to prepare the sketch of Fielding recently included in Mr. +John Morley's series of "English Men of Letters," matters stood at this +point, and I had little hope that any supplementary details could be +obtained. I was, indeed, fortunate enough to discover that Burke's +_Landed Gentry_ for 1858 gave the year of Miss Andrew's marriage as +1726; and inquiries at Modbury, though they did not actually confirm +this, practically did so, by disclosing the fact that a child of Mr. and +Mrs. Ambrose Rhodes was baptized at that place in April 1727. It became +clear, therefore, that instead of being subsequent to Fielding's "return +from Leyden" in 1728, as Lawrence supposed, the date of the reported +attempt at elopement could not have been later than 1725 or the early +part of 1726--so far back, in fact, in Fielding's life that I confess to +having entertained a private doubt whether it ever occurred at all. That +doubt has now been completely removed by the appearance of some new and +wholly unlooked-for evidence. + +After the publication in 1858 of his _Fraser_ papers, Mr. Keightley +seems to have continued his researches with the intention of writing a +final biography of Fielding. In this, which was to include a reprint of +the _Journal of a Voyage to Lisbon_ and a critical examination of +Fielding's works, he made considerable progress; and by the courtesy of +his nephew, Mr. Alfred C. Lyster, his MSS. have been placed at my +disposal. Much that relates to Fielding's life has manifestly the +disadvantage of having been written more than twenty years ago, and it +reproduces some aspects of Fielding which have now been abandoned; but +in the elucidation and expansion of the Sarah Andrew episode Mr. +Keightley leaves little to be desired. His first step, apparently, was +to communicate with Mr. Roberts, who furnished him (6th May 1859) with +the following transcript or summary of the original record in the +_Register Book_ of Lyme Regis:-- + +"John Bowdidge, Jun., was Mayor when Andrew Tucker, Gent., one of the +corporation, caused Henry Fielding, Gent., and his servant or companion, +Joseph Lewis--both now and for some time past residing in the borough-- +to be bound over to keep the peace, as he was in fear of his life or +some bodily hurt to be done or to be procured to be done to him by H. +Fielding and his man. Mr. A. Tucker feared that the man would beat, +maim, or kill him. 14th November 1725." + +We thus get the exact date of the occurrence, 14th November 1725 (_i._. +when Fielding was eighteen), the fact that he had been staying for some +time in Lyme at that date, and the name of his servant. In a further +letter of 14th May 1859, Mr. Roberts referred Mr. Keightley to Mr. James +Davidson, a Devon antiquary, in whose _History of Newenham Abbey_, +Longmans, 1843 (surely a most out-of-the-way source of information!), he +found the following, derived by the author from the Rhodes family (pp. +165, 166): + +"The estate [of Shapwick, near Axminster] continued but a short time the +property of the noble family of Petre, being sold by William the fourth +baron, on the 10th of November 1670, to Solomon Andrew of Lyme Regis, a +gentleman, who possessed a considerable property obtained by his +ancestors and himself in mercantile affairs. From him it descended to +his only son, who died at the age of twenty-nine years, leaving two sons +and a daughter, the latter of whom, by the decease of her brothers, +became heiress to the estate. This young lady was placed under the +guardianship of Mr. Rhodes of Modbury, and her uncle, Mr. Tucker of +Lyme, in whose family she resided. At this time Henry Fielding, whose +very objectionable but once popular works have placed his name high on +the list of novel-writers, was an occasional visitor at the place, and +enraptured with the charms and the more solid attractions of Miss +Andrew, paid her the most assiduous attention. The views of her +guardians were, however, opposed to a connection with so dissipated, +though well-born and well-educated a youth, who is said to have in +consequence made a desperate attempt to carry the lady off by force on a +Sunday, when she was on her way to church. The residence of the heiress +was then removed to Modbury, and the disappointed admirer found +consolation in the society of a beauty at Salisbury whom he married." + +There are some manifest misconceptions in this account, due, no doubt, +to Mr. Davidson's ignorance of the exact period of the occurrence as +established by the above record in the Lyme archives. In the first +place, it must have been four or five years at least before Fielding +consoled himself with Miss Charlotte Cradock, and nearly ten (according +to the received date) before he married her. Again, in saying that he +was "dissipated," Mr. Davidson must have been thinking of his +conventional after-character, for in 1725 he was but a boy fresh from +Eton, and could scarcely have established any reputation as a rake. Nor +is there anything in our whole knowledge of him to justify us in +supposing that he was at any time a mere mercenary fortune-hunter. +Finally, according to one of Mr. Roberts's letters to Mr. Keightley, +timorous Mr. Tucker of Lyme had a very different reason from his +personal shortcomings for objecting to Fielding as a suitor to his ward. +"The Tucker family," says Mr. Roberts, "by tradition consider themselves +tricked out of the heiress, Miss Andrew, by Mr. Rhodes of Modbury, Mr. +Andrew Tucker intending the lady for his own son." Nevertheless, these +reservations made, Mr. Davidson's version, although _ex parte_, supplies +colour and detail to the story. From a pedigree which he gives in his +book, it further appears that Mrs. Rhodes died on the 22d of August +1783, aged seventy-three. This would make her fifteen in 1725. There +remained Lawrence's enigmatical declaration that she was Fielding's +cousin. Briefly stated, the result of Mr. Keightley's inquiries in this +direction tends to show that Miss Andrew's mother was connected with the +family of Fielding's mother, the Goulds of Sharpham Park; and as Mr. +Lawrence does not seem to have been aware of the existence of Davidson's +book, or to have had any acquaintance with the traditions or archives of +Lyme, Mr. Keightley surmises, very plausibly, that his unvouched data +must have been derived, directly or indirectly, from the Rhodes family. + +Mr. Keightley also ingeniously attempts to connect Fielding's subsequent +residence at Leyden (1726-28?) [Footnote: See Peacock's _Index to +English-speaking Students who have graduated at Leyden University_, 1883 +(p. 35), where Fielding's name occurs under date of 16th March 1728, and +_Cornhill Magazine_ for November 1863--"A Scotchman in Holland."] with +this affair by assuming that he was despatched to the Dutch university, +instead of Oxford or Cambridge, in order to keep him out of harm's way. +This is, however, to travel somewhat from the realm of fact into that of +romance. At the same time, it must be admitted that the materials for +romance are tempting. A charming girl, who is also an heiress; a +pusillanimous guardian with ulterior views of his own; a handsome and +high-spirited young suitor; a faithful attendant ready to "beat, maim, +or kill" in his master's behalf; a frustrated elopement and a compulsory +visit to the mayor--all these, with the picturesque old town of Lyme +for a background, suggest a most appropriate first act to Harry +Fielding's biographical tragi-comedy. But to do such a theme justice we +must + + "call up him that left half-told" + +the story of _Denis Duval_. + + + + +APPENDIX No. II. + +FIELDING AND MRS. HUSSEY. + + +At pp. 124-5, vol. i., of J. T. Smith's _Nollekens and his Times_, 1828, +occurs the following note:-- + +"Henry Fielding was fond of colouring his pictures of life with the +glowing and variegated tints of Nature, by conversing with persons of +every situation and calling, as I have frequently been informed by one +of my [i.e. J. T. Smith's] great-aunts, the late Mrs. Hussey, who knew +him intimately. I have heard her say, that Mr. Fielding never suffered +his talent for sprightly conversation to mildew for a moment; and that +his manners were so gentlemanly, that even with the lower classes, with +which he frequently condescended particularly to chat, such as Sir Roger +de Coverley's old friends, the Vauxhall watermen, they seldom outstepped +the limits of propriety. My aunt, who lived to the age of 105, had been +blessed with four husbands, and her name had twice been changed to that +of Hussey: she was of a most delightful disposition, of a retentive +memory, highly entertaining, and liberally communicative; and to her I +have frequently been obliged for an interesting anecdote. She was, after +the death of her second husband, Mr. Hussey, a fashionable sacque and +mantua-maker, and lived in the Strand, a few doors west of the residence +of the celebrated Le Beck, a famous cook, who had a large portrait of +himself for the sign of his house, at the north-west corner of Half-moon +Street, since called Little Bedford Street. One day Mr. Fielding +observed to Mrs. Hussey, that he was then engaged in writing a novel, +which he thought would be his best production; and that he intended to +introduce in it the characters of all his friends. Mrs. Hussey, with a +smile, ventured to remark, that he must have many niches, and that +surely they must already be filled. 'I assure you, my dear madam,' +replied he, 'there shall be a bracket for a bust of you.' Some time +after this, he informed Mrs. Hussey that the work was in the press; but, +immediately recollecting that he had forgotten his promise to her, went +to the printer, and was time enough to insert, in vol. iii. p. 17 [bk. +x. ch. iv.], where he speaks of the shape of Sophia Western--'Such +charms are there in affability, and so sure is it to attract the praises +of all kinds of people.'--'It may, indeed, be compared to the celebrated +Mrs. Hussey.' To which observation he has given the following note: 'A +celebrated mantua-maker in the Strand, famous for setting off the shapes +of women.'" + +There is no reason for supposing that this neglected anecdote should not +be in all respects authentic. In fact, upon the venerated principle that + + "there it stands unto this day + To witness if I lie,"-- + +the existence of the passage and note in Tom Jones is practically +sufficient argument for its veracity. This being so, it surely deserves +some consideration for the light which it throws on Fielding's +character. Mrs. Hussey's testimony as to his dignified and gentlemanly +manners, which does not seem to be advanced to meet any particular +charge, may surely be set against any innuendoes of the Burney and +Walpole type as to his mean environment and coarse conversation. And the +suggestion that "the characters of all his friends"--by which must be +intended rather mention of them than portraits--are to be found in his +masterpiece, is fairly borne out by the most casual inspection of _Tom +Jones_, especially the first edition, where all the proper names are in +italics. In the dedication alone are references to the "princely +Benefactions" of John, Duke of Bedford, and to Lyttelton and Ralph +Allen, both of whom are also mentioned by name in bk. xiii. ch. i. The +names of Hogarth and Garrick also occur frequently. In bk. iv. ch. i. is +an anecdote of Wilks the player, who had been one of Fielding's earliest +patrons. The surgeon in the story of the "Man of the Hill" (bk. viii. +ch. xiii.) "whose Name began with an _R_," and who "was Sergeant-Surgeon +to the King," evidently stands for Hogarth's Chiswick neighbour, Mr. +Ranby, by whose advice Fielding was ordered to Bath in 1753. Again, he +knew, though he did not greatly admire, Warburton, to whose learning +there is a handsome compliment in bk. xiii. ch. i. In bk. xv. ch. iv. is +the name of another friend or acquaintance (also mentioned in the +_Journey from this World to the Next_), Hooke, of the _Roman History_, +who, like the author of _Tom Jones_, had drawn his pen for Sarah, +Duchess of Marlborough. Bk. xi. ch. iv. contains an anecdote, real or +imaginary, of Richard Nash, with whom Fielding must certainly have +become familiar in his visits to Bath; and it is probable that Square's +medical advisers (bk. xviii. ch. iv.), Dr. Harrington and Dr. Brewster, +both of whom subscribed to the _Miscellanies_ of 1743, were well-known +Bathonians. Mr. Willoughby, also a subscriber, was probably "Justice +Willoughby of Noyle" referred to in bk. viii. ch. xi. Whether the use of +Handel's name in bk. iv. ch. v. is of any significance there is no +evidence; but the description in bk. iv. ch. vi. of Conscience "sitting +on its Throne in the Mind, like the LORD HIGH CHANCELLOR of this Kingdom +in his Court," and fulfilling its functions "with a Knowledge which +nothing escapes, a Penetration which nothing can deceive, and an +Integrity which nothing can corrupt," is clearly an oblique panegyric of +Philip Yorke, Lord Hardwicke, to whom, two years later, Fielding +dedicated his _Enquiry into the late Increase of Robbers_, etc. Besides +these, there are references to Bishop Hoadly (bk. ii. ch. vii.), Mrs. +Whitefield, of the "Bell" at Gloucester, and Mr. Timothy Harris (bk. +viii. ch. viii), Mrs. Clive, and Mr. Miller of the _Gardener's +Dictionary_ (bk. ix. ch. i.); and closer examination would no doubt +reveal further allusions. Meanwhile the above will be sufficient to show +that the statement of the "celebrated mantua-maker in the Strand" +respecting Fielding's friends in _Tom Jones_ is not without foundation. + + + + +APPENDIX No. III. + +AMELIA'S ACCIDENT. + + +In addition to the alterations mentioned at p. 109 _n_., Fielding +inserted the following paragraph in the _Covent-Garden Journal_, No. 3, +for 11th January 1752:-- + +"It is currently reported that a famous Surgeon, who absolutely cured +one Mrs. Amelia Booth, of a violent Hurt in her Nose, insomuch, that she +had scarce a Scar left on it, intends to bring Actions against several +ill-meaning and slanderous People, who have reported that the said Lady +had no Nose, merely because the Author of her History, in a Hurry, +forgot to inform his Readers of that Particular, and which, if those +Readers had any Nose themselves, except that which is mentioned in the +Motto of this Paper, they would have smelt out." + +The motto is the passage from Martial (Ep. i. 4. 6) in which he speaks +of the _nasus rhinocerotis_. + + + + +APPENDIX No. IV. + +FIELDINGIANA. + + +The three foregoing Appendices were added to the second edition of 1889. +In this Appendix, No. IV., I propose to bring together a few dispersed +fragments of information, which, either in the way of fresh particulars, +or in correction of hitherto-accepted statements made in the body of the +book, have come to light during the interval. Much that is absolutely +new cannot, at this date, be reasonably anticipated. But the unexpected +always happens; and the unexpected in the present instance has been +productive of two or three items which are not unworthy of brief record. + +The first relates to that famous "eulogy of Gibbon" mentioned in the +second sentence of the book. The connexion of Fielding's family with the +Hapsburgs is now no longer asserted. In April 1894, the question was +exhaustively examined in the _Genealogist_ (New Series) by Mr. J. Horace +Round, who came to the conclusion that such a claim could not be +established; and that, consequently, any picturesque conjunction between +that "exquisite picture of human manners" (as Gibbon called _Tom Jones_) +[Footnote: _Autobiographies of Edward Gibbon_, 1896, p. 419.] and the +"Imperial Eagle of the house of Austria" must henceforth be abandoned. +Mr. Round has since reprinted his paper at pp. 216-49 of his _Studies in +Peerage and Family History_, 1901; and in a final paragraph he announces +that his arguments, at first hotly contested, have now been accepted by +Burke, from whose records the story has been withdrawn. + +The next matter is the exact period of Fielding's residence at Leyden +(p. 8). This, although somewhat developed, long remained obscure. In +1883, in the absence of other data, I accepted, as my predecessors had +done, Murphy's statement that Fielding "went _from Eton to Leyden_, and +there continued to show an eager thirst for knowledge, and to _study the +civilians_ with a remarkable application for _about two years_, when, +remittances failing, he was obliged to return to London, _not then quite +twenty years old_ [i.e. before 22nd April 1727]." [Footnote: Fielding's +_Works_, 1762, i. 8. The italics are mine.] When the "Sarah Andrew" +episode was conclusively traced to November 1725 (Appendix I. p. 200), +it seemed only reasonable to suppose that it was succeeded by the Leyden +expatriation, especially as Fielding's first play was produced in +February 1728. Nor was this supposition seriously disturbed by the +appearance of further information. Among Mr. Keightley's MSS. I found +reference to a paper in the _Cornhill Magazine_ for November 1863, +entitled "A Scotchman in Holland" (I believe it to have been by James +Hannay). In this the writer stated that he had been allowed to inspect +the Album of the University of Leyden, and had there, under 1728, found +the entry, "Henricus Fielding, Anglus, Ann. 20. Stud. Lit." Further, +that Fielding was living at the Hotel of Antwerp. It will be noted that +this account was derived from the Album itself; and that Fielding is +styled "Stud. Lit." Twelve years after the _Cornhill_ article, the +University published their list of students from 1575 to 1875; and in +1883 Mr. Edward Peacock, F.S.A., compiled from it, for the "Index +Society," an _Index to English speaking Students who have graduated at +Leyden University_. At p. 35 of this appears "Fielding, Henricus, +_Anglus_, 16 Mart. 1728. [col.] 915." This, it will be observed, adds +the month and day, but reveals nothing as to the class of study. As I +have implied, neither of these entries was seriously inconsistent with +Murphy's statement, except as regards "studying the civilians." But in +1906, Mr. A. E. H. Swaen printed in the _Modern Language Review_ +[Footnote: Vol. i, pp. 327-8 (July 1906, No. iv.)] what was apparently +the fullest version of the inscription. From col. 915 (the column given +by Mr. Peacock), he copied the following:--"Febr. 16 1728: Rectore +Johanne Wesselio, Henricus Fielding, Anglus. 20, L." Mr. Swaen held that +this meant that, on the date named, Fielding was _entered as litterarum +studiosus_ at Leyden. In this case, it would follow that his stay in +Holland must have been subsequent to February 16, 1728; and Mr. Swaen +went on to suggest that as Fielding's "first play, _Love in Several +Masques_, was staged at Drury Lane in February 1728, and his next play, +_The Temple Beau_, was produced in January 1730," the barren interval or +part of it, may have been filled by residence at Leyden. + +The fresh complications imported into the question by this new aspect of +it will be at once apparent. Up to 1875 there had been but one Fielding +on the Leyden books; so that all these differing accounts were +variations from a single source. In this difficulty I was fortunate +enough to enlist the sympathy of Mr. Frederic Harrison, who most kindly +undertook to make inquiries on my behalf at Leyden University itself. In +reply to certain definite queries drawn up by me, he obtained from the +distinguished scholar and Professor of History, Dr. Pieter Blok, the +following authoritative particulars. The exact words in the original +_Album Academicum_ are:--"le Martii _1728_ Henricus Fielding, Anglus, +annor. 20 Litt. Stud." He was then staying at the "Casteel van +Antwerpen"--as related by "A Scotchman in Holland." His name only occurs +again in the yearly _recensiones_ under the 22nd February 1729, as +"Henricus Fieldingh," when he was domiciled with one Jan Oson. He must, +consequently, have left Leyden before the 8th February 1730,--the 8th +February being the birthday of the University, after which all students +had to be annually registered. The entry in the _Album_ (as Mr. Swaen +affirmed) is an admission entry; there are no leaving entries. As +regards "studying the civilians," Fielding might, in those days--Dr. +Blok explains--have had private lessons from the professors, but could +not have studied in the University without being on the books. To sum +up:--After producing _Love in Several Masques_ at Drury Lane, probably +on the 12th February 1728, [Footnote: Genest, iii. 209.] Fielding was +admitted a "Litt. Stud." at Leyden University on 16th March; was still +there in February 1729; and left before 8th February 1730. Murphy is +therefore in fault in almost every particular. Fielding did _not_ go +from Eton to Leyden; he did _not_ make any recognised study of the +civilians "with remarkable application" or otherwise; and he did _not_ +return to London before he was twenty. But it is by no means improbable +that the proximate cause of his coming home was the failure of +remittances. + +Another of the hitherto-unsolved difficulties in Fielding's life has +been the date of his first marriage (p. 38). Lawrence gave the year as +1735; and Keightley suggested the spring of that year. This, as Swift +would say, is near the mark, though confirmation has been slow in +coming. In a letter dated 18th June 1906, Mr. Thomas S. Bush announced +in the _Bath Chronicle_ that the desired information was to be found in +a register (not at Salisbury, where search had been fruitlessly made, +but) at the tiny church of St. Mary, Charlcombe, a secluded parish about +one and a half miles north of Bath. Here is the record:--"November ye +28, 1734.--Henry Fielding, of ye Parish of St. James in Bath, Esq., and +Charlotte Cradock, of ye same Parish, spinster, were married by virtue +of a license from ye Court of Wells." All Fielding lovers owe a debt of +gratitude to Mr. Bush, whose researches also revealed the fact that +Sarah Fielding, the novelist's third sister, was buried, not in Bath +Abbey, where Dr. John Hoadly [Footnote: Bishop Hoadly is sometimes said +to have written her epitaph. In this case it must have been (like Dr. +Primrose's on his Deborah) anticipatory, for Dr. Benjamin Hoadly, Bishop +of Winchester, died in 1761.] raised a mural memorial to her, but "in yr +entrance of the chancel [of Charlcombe Church] close to yr Rector's +seat," 14th April 1768. These are not the only fresh traces of the +connexion of the Fieldings with the old "Queen of the West." In June +last a tablet to Fielding and his sister was placed on the wall of Yew +Cottage, now Widcombe Lodge, Church Street, Widcombe, where they once +lived. + +Sarah Fielding figures frequently in Richardson's _Correspondence_; and +it is with Richardson as much as with Fielding that the next jotting is +concerned. Previously to 1900, although second-hand booksellers had, I +believe, occasionally attributed to Fielding the pamphlet known as _An +Apology for the Life of Mrs. Shamela Andrews_, April 1741, no one had +devoted much attention to that unworshipful performance. But when Miss +Clara Thomson began to prepare her excellent and careful life of +Richardson (1900), it became a part of her task to examine into this +question. She found, first, that Richardson had himself ascribed +_Shamela_ to Fielding in a letter to "Mrs. Belfour" (Lady Bradshaigh); +[Footnote: _Correspondence_, 1804, iv. p. 286.] and she was acute enough +to discover, in the pamphlet itself, which appeared some months before +_Joseph Andrews_, the suggestive, though not conclusive, fact that "Mr. +B." was provisionally transformed into "Mr. Booby." When, in 1902, I was +engaged upon my own Memoir of Richardson for the "Men of Letters" +series, I was naturally indisposed to connect this undoubtedly clever, +but also unquestionably gross production with Fielding, already +"unjustly censured," as he complained in the "Preface" to the +_Miscellanies_ of 1743, for much that he had never written (p. 72). But +I must honestly confess that for the present it has been my ill-fortune +to discover only corroborative evidence. To a document at South +Kensington, in which _Shamela_ is mentioned, I found that Richardson had +appended, in the tremulous script of his old age:--"Written by Mr. H. +Fielding"; and since the publication of my book on Richardson, Mr. +Frederick Macmillan has drawn my attention to the fact that a letter +written in July 1741, by Mr. T. Dampier, afterwards Sub-Master of Eton +and Dean of Durham, to one of the Windhams, contains the following:-- +"The book that has made the greatest noise lately in the polite world is +_Pamela_, a romance in low life. It is thought to contain such excellent +precepts, that a learned divine at London [Footnote: This enables me to +correct an error at p. 74. As Miss Thomson points out (_Samuel +Richardson_, 1900, p. 31) it was Dr. Benjamin Slocock of St. Saviour's, +Southwark, and not Dr. Sherlock, who praised _Pamela_ from the pulpit. +The mistake seems to have originated with Jeffrey, and was freely +repeated.] recommended it very strongly from the pulpit.... The +dedication [of Conyers Middleton's _Life of Cicero_] to Lord Hervey has +been very justly and prettily ridiculed by Fielding in a dedication to a +pamphlet called _Shamela_ which he wrote to burlesque the fore-mentioned +romance." [Footnote: Hist. MSS. Commission, 12th Report, Appendix, Part +IX., p. 204.] This shows unmistakably that _Shamela_ was attributed to +Fielding by contemporary gossip. But then so was The _Causidicade_ (p. +112), and _The Apology for the Life of Mr. The' Cibber_, _Comedian_ (p. +72). I still cling to the hope that Fielding was _not_ the author of +_Shamela_. The matter is examined at some length at pp. 42-45 of the +"Men of Letters" Memoir of Richardson; and it is plain that, if Fielding +had wished to father it, he would have included it in the _Miscellanies_ +of 1743. + +The remaining points which call for notice are little more than +dispersed adversaria. To the _amende honorable_ which Fielding made to +Richardson in the _Jacobites Journal_ (pp. 113-14) should be added a +further passage from the later _Covent-Garden Journal_, No. 10-- +_Pleasantry_ (as the ingenious Author of _Clarissa_ says of a Story) +"_should be made only the Vehicle of Instruction_." Among other places +connected with the composition of _Tom Jones_ (p. 118) may be mentioned +Widcombe House, Bath (then Mr. Philip Bennet's), a Palladian villa close +to the road from Widcombe Hill to Prior Park; and, if we are to believe +_Rambles round Edge Hills_, 1896, p. 17, Fielding actually read that +work in MS. to Lyttelton and Lord Chatham in the dining-room of Radway +Grange in Warwickshire (Mr. Miller's). It should also be added that the +agreement for _Tom Jones_ (p. 121), dated 5th March 1749, together with +Fielding's antecedent receipt for the money, dated 11th June 1748, of +which in 1883 I could obtain no tidings, are (or were lately) in the +Huth collection. But perhaps the most important item which has come to +light since 1883 is the Will discovered in the Prerogative Court of +Canterbury by Mr. George A. Aitken. It is undated, though it was +evidently executed at Ealing in the novelist's last days, and runs as +follows:-- + +"In the name of God Amen. I Henry Fielding of the Parish of Ealing in +the County of Middlesex do hereby give and bequeath unto Ralph Allen of +Prior Park in the County of Somerset Esq. and to his heirs executors +administrators and assigns for ever for the use of the said Ralph his +heirs, &c. all my estate real and personal and whatsoever and do appoint +him sole executor of this my last will Beseeching him that the whole +(except my share in the Register Office) may be sold and forthwith +converted into money and annuities purchased thereout for the lives of +my dear wife Mary and my daughters Harriet and Sophia and what +proportions my said executor shall please to reserve to my sons William +and Allen shall be paid them severally as they shall attain the age of +twenty and three. And as for my shares in the Register or Universal +Register Office I give ten thereof to my aforesaid wife seven to my +daughter Harriet and three to my daughter Sophia my wife to be put in +immediate possession of her shares and my daughters of theirs as they +shall severally arrive at the age of twenty one the immediate profits to +be then likewise paid to my two daughters by my executor who is desired +to retain the same in his hands until that time. Witness my hand Henry +Fielding. Signed and acknowledged as his last will and testament by the +within named testator in the presence of Margaret Collier, Richd. Boor, +Isabella Ash." + +"On the 14th November 1754," comments Mr. Aitken, "administration (with +the will annexed) of the goods, &c., of Henry Fielding, at Lisbon, +deceased, was granted to John Fielding, Esq., uncle and guardian +lawfully assigned to Harriet Fielding, spinster, a minor, and Sophia +Fielding, an infant, for the use and benefit and of the minor and infant +until they were twenty one; Ralph Allen, Esq., having renounced as well +the execution of the will as administration of the goods, &c.; and Mary +Fielding, the relict, having also renounced administration of the goods +of the deceased." [Footnote: _Athenaeum_, February 1, 1890. A portrait of +Mary Fielding by Cotes, described by one who knew it as "a very fine +drawing of a very ugly woman," was sold not many years since at +Christie's.] + +The Register Office, above mentioned, is that referred to at p. 194. +What was the amount of the property so disposed of is not known. But in +making inquiries in connexion with an edition of the _Journal of a +Voyage to Lisbon_ issued by the Chiswick Press in 1892, [Footnote: This +considerably elaborates the first note at p. 179.] I discovered that +Fielding died possessed of a considerable library (653 lots), which was +sold in February 1755, "for the Benefit of his Wife and Family," by +Samuel Baker of York Street, Covent Garden, realising L364:7:1, or about +L100 more than the public gave in 1785 for the books of Johnson. An +account of this collection, rich particularly in law, classics, poetry +and drama, is given in the third series of my _Eighteenth Century +Vignettes_, 1896, pp. 164-178. + +A few words, in supplement to those in the "Postscript" (pp. 191-2), may +be devoted to Fielding's family. Concerning the daughter Harriet, or +Harriot, mentioned in the foregoing will, I am indebted to Colonel W. F. +Prideaux for pointing out to me that in Burke's _Landed Gentry_, 1875, +vol. ii. p. 938, it is stated that she afterwards became the second wife +of Colonel James Gabriel Montresor. As his first wife died in March +1761, when he was more than fifty-eight; and as he afterwards married +for the third time, a widow, Mrs. Kemp of Teynham, Kent, it is probable +that, as Keightley says, Harriet Montresor was not long-lived. +[Footnote: According to Thomas Whitehead's _Original Anecdotes of the +late Duke of Kingston and Miss Chudleigh_, 1792, p. 95 (for reference to +which I am also indebted to Col. Prideaux), Miss Fielding was, at the +date of her marriage, "in a deep decline,"--a circumstance which lends a +touch of chivalry to Col. Montresor's devotion. She is said by Whitehead +to have been of "a sweet temper, and great understanding."] Of the other +children spoken of at p. 192, Louisa died in May 1753, being buried from +a house in Hammersmith. And this brings me to a final question as to +Fielding's sisters. Richardson speaks in August 1749 of being "well +acquainted" with _four_ Miss Fieldings; and Murphy and Lawrence both +refer to a Catherine and an Ursula of whom Mr. Keightley could learn +nothing. With Colonel Prideaux's help, and the kind offices of Mr. +Samuel Martin of the Hammersmith Free Library, the matter has now been +set at rest. In 1887 the late Sir Leslie Stephen had suggested to me +that Catherine and Ursula were probably born at Sharpham Park. This must +have been the case, though Keightley had failed to establish it. At all +events Catherine and Ursula existed, for they both died in 1750. The +Hammersmith Registers at Fulham record the following burials:--1750 +July 9th, Mrs. Catherine Feilding (_sic_). + +1750 Nov. 12th, Mrs. Ursula Fielding. + +1750[-1] Feby. 24th, Mrs. Beatrice Fielding. + +1753 May 10th, Louisa, d. of Henry Fielding, Esq. + +The first three, with Sarah, make up Richardson's "Four worthy Sisters" +(p. 140); and the final entry renders it probable that, in May 1753, +Fielding was staying in the house at Hammersmith then occupied by his +surviving sister, Sarah. + +No well-authenticated likeness of Fielding has yet superseded Hogarth's +outline (pp. 184-5), nor, if Murphy's statement (_Works_, 1762, i. p. +47) that "no portrait of him had ever been made" previously, be +accurate, can any new likeness be looked for. Nevertheless, both at the +Guelph (1891) and Georgian (1906) exhibitions, the Hon. Gerald Ponsonby +exhibited a portrait of Fielding; and another is included in the picture +attributed to Hogarth (also shown at the latter exhibition, and lately +belonging to Sir Charles Tennant), of the "Green Room, Drury Lane." +There is also a bust (posthumous) by W. F. Woodington at Eton. And this +reminds me that no more fitting tail-piece to this Appendix can be +conceived than the compact and penetrating lines which the late James +Russell Lowell composed as an inscription for the bust of Henry Fielding +at Taunton:-- + + "He looked on naked nature unashamed, + And saw the Sphinx, now bestial, now divine, + In change and re-change; he nor praised nor blamed, + But drew her as he saw with fearless line. + Did he good service? God must judge, not we. + Manly he was, and generous and sincere; + English in all, of genius blithely free: + Who loves a Man may see his image here." + +A. D. + +_March_ 1907. + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Fielding, by Austin Dobson + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FIELDING *** + +This file should be named 6689.txt or 6689.zip + +Produced by Tonya Allen, Charles Aldarondo, Charles Franks +and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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