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.