The available copies of the True Patriot, now in the British [Museum], [1] include only thirty-two numbers, starting from No. 1, which appeared on the 5th of November, 1745, and ending on June 3, 1746. The first number contains a characteristic tribute to Dean Swift, whose death had occurred 'a few days since.' Doctor Jonathan Swift, says the Patriot, was "A genius who deserves to be rank'd among the first whom the World ever saw. He possessed the Talents of a Lucian a Rabelais and a Cervantes and in his Works exceeded them all. He employed his Wit to the noblest Purposes in ridiculing as well Superstition in Religion as Infidelity and the several Errors and Immoralities which sprung up from time to time in his Age; and lastly in defence of his Country.... Nor was he only a Genius and a Patriot; he was in Private Life a good and charitable Man and frequently lent Sums of Money, without interest, to the Poor and Industrious; by which means many Families were preserved from Destruction." In No. 2, the Patriot reiterates his "sincere Intention to calm and heal, not to blow up and inflame, any Party-Divisions"; but even the task of defending the British Constitution could not stifle Fielding's wit, and he escapes, for breathing space as it were, into a column devoted to the news items of the week, gathered from various papers, and adorned by comments of his own, printed in italics. And in this running commentary on the daily occurences of the time we get nearer, perhaps, to the table-talk of Henry Fielding than by any other means. Thus he faithfully repeats the inflated obituary lists that were then in fashion, but with such a variation as the following, "Thomas Tonkin, ... universally lamented by his Acquaintance. Upwards of 40 Cows belonging to one at Tottenham Court, universally lamented by all their Acquaintance." On a notice of an anniversary meeting of the Society for propagating the Gospel in Foreign Parts there is the pertinent comment "It is a Pity some Method--was not invented for the Propagation of the Gospel in Great Britain." After the deaths of a wealthy banker and factor, comes the obituary of "One Nowns a Labourer, most probably immensely poor, and yet as rich now as either of the two Preceeding"; beside which may be placed the very characteristic assertion in No. 6 that "Spleen and Vapours inhabit Palaces and are attired with Pomp and Splendor, while they shun Rags and Prisons."
There is scarcely a personal allusion in all the thirty-two numbers of the Patriot, save the charming picture of that gentleman sitting in his study "meditating for the good and entertainment of the public, with my two little children (as is my usual course to suffer them) playing near me." And the ending of his horrid nightmare, in which a Jacobite executioner was placing a rope round his neck, "when my little girl entered my bedchamber and put an end to my dream by pulling open my eyes, and telling me that the taylor had brought home my cloaths for his Majesty's Birthday." The number for January 28 must not be overlooked, containing as it does, a scathing and humourous exposure of the profligate young sparks of the Town, from no less a pen than that of the Rev. Mr. Abraham Adams; and Parson Adams' letter concludes with a paragraph in which may be heard the voice of the future zealous magistrate: "No man can doubt but that the education of youth ought to be the principal care of every legislation; by the neglect of which great mischief accrues to the civil polity in every city." When himself but a lad of twenty, and in the prologue of his first comedy, Fielding had entered his protest against certain popular vices of the time, and had made merry over its follies. The desire to make the world he knew too well a better place than he found it is just as keen in the wit and humourist of thirty-nine; a desire, moreover, undulled by twenty years of vivacious living. Surely not the least amazing feature of Fielding's genius is this dual capacity for exuberant enjoyment, and incisive judgement. "His wit," said Thackeray, "is wonderfully wise and detective; it flashes upon a rogue and brightens up a rascal like a policeman's lantern."
To this time of national ferment belongs a publication of which we know nothing but the title, a Serious Address; and also one of our rare glimpses of the novelist's home life. Joseph Warton writes to his brother Tom, on October 29, 1746:--"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 till one or two in the morning, and were inexpressibly diverted. I find he values, as he justly may, Joseph Andrews above all his writings: he was extremely civil to me, I fancy, on my Father's account." Joseph Warton's father was Vicar of Basingstoke, Professor of Poetry at Oxford, and moreover, something of a Jacobite; whereby, we may surmise, that the True Patriot did not allow his staunch Hanoverian sentiments too great an invasion into his private society. Alas, that it did not occur to Warton to preserve, for the entertainment of later ages, some fuller record of those two noctes ambrosianae.
This sister, Sally Fielding as her cousin Lady Mary Wortley Montagu called her, made some figure in the literary world of the day. Richardson extolled her "knowledge of the human heart"; Murphy writes of her "lively and penetrating genius"; and her classical scholarship is attested by a translation of Xenophon's Memorabilia. That she also shared some of the engaging qualities of her brother may be assumed from the lines written to the memory of the "esteemed and loved ... Mrs. Sarah Fielding," by her friend Dr. John Hoadley.
"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."
Sarah Fielding's name occurs again as living with her brother in that house in Beaufort Buildings with which is associated perhaps the happiest instance of Fielding's warm-hearted generosity. The story may be given as nearly as possible in the words of the narrator, one G. S., writing from Harley Street in 1786. After speaking of the conspicuous good nature of "the late Harry Fielding," G. S. says: "His receipts were never large, and his pocket was an open bank for distress and friendship at all times to draw on. Marked by such a liberality of mind it is not to be wondered at if he was frequently under pecuniary embarrassments.... Some parochial taxes for his house in Beaufort Buildings being unpaid, and for which he had been demanded again and again [we may remember how Mr. Luckless' door was "almost beat down with duns">[...he was at last given to understand by the collector who had an esteem for him, that he could procrastinate the payment no longer." To a bookseller, therefore he addressed himself, and mortgaged the coming sheets of some work then in hand. He received the cash, some ten or twelve guineas, and was returning home, full freighted with this sum, when, in the Strand, within a few yards of his own house, he met an old college chum whom he had not seen for many years. "Harry felt the enthusiasm of friendship; an hundred interrogatives were put to him in a moment as where had he been? where was he going? how did he do? &c. &c. His friend told him in reply he had long been buffeting the waves of adverse fortunes, but never could surmount them." Fielding took him off to dine at a neighbouring tavern, and as they talked, becoming acquainted with the state of his friend's pocket, emptied his own into it; and a little before dawn, he turned homewards "greater and happier than a monarch." Arrived at Beaufort Buildings his sister, who had anxiously awaited him, reported that the collector had called for the taxes twice that day. "Friendship," answered Harry Fielding "has called for the money and had it;--let the collector call again." Well might his cousin Lady Mary say of the man of whom such a story could be told, "I am persuaded he has known more happy moments than any prince upon earth."
During the summer following Warton's visit to the brother and sister, Fielding published a Dialogue between an Alderman and a Courtier. And in the following November his second marriage took place, at the little City church of St Bene't's, Paul's Wharf. The story of this marriage cannot be better told than in the words of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu's granddaughter, Lady Louisa Stuart, quoting from the personal knowledge of her mother and grandmother:
"His 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 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." From a supposed allusion by Smollett, in the first edition of Peregrine Pickle, (an allusion afterwards suppressed) it would appear that Fielding's old schoolfellow and lifelong friend 'the good Lord Lyttelton' so far approved the marriage as himself to give Mary Daniel away; and, as the dates in the Twickenham Register of births show that the marriage was one of justice as well as expediency, this well accords with Lyttelton's upright and honourable character. Of Fielding's affectionate and grateful loyalty to his second wife ample evidence appears in the pages of his last book, the Journal of a Voyage to Lisbon. Throughout this touching record of the journey of a dying man, there are references to her tenderness, ability and devotion. At the sad parting from children and friends, on the morning of their departure for Lisbon, he writes of her behaviour as "more like a heroine and philosopher, though at the same time the tenderest mother in the world." When, during the voyage down the Thames, an unmannerly custom house officer burst into the cabin where Fielding and his wife were sitting, the man was soundly rated for breaking "into the presence of a lady without an apology or even moving his hat"; by which we may see his sensitive care that due respect was accorded her. He tells us how he persuaded her with difficulty to take a walk on shore when their vessel was wind bound in Torbay, it being "no easy matter for me to force [her] from my side." With anxious forboding he thinks of his "dear wife and child" facing the world alone after his death, for "in truth I have often thought they are both too good and too gentle to be trusted to the power of any man I know, to whom they could possibly be so trusted." And in a more formal tribute he acknowledges the abilities that accompanied her worth, when he says that "besides discharging excellently well her own and all tender offices becoming the female character; ... besides being a faithful friend, an amiable companion, and a tender nurse, [she] could likewise supply the wants of a decrepit husband and occasionally perform his part." That Fielding suffered socially by the fact of his second marriage is probable. But the fact is proof, if proof were needed, of his courage in reparation, and of the unworldly spirit in which he ultimately followed the dictates of that incorruptible judge which he himself asserted to be in every man's breast.
It was in December 1747, just a month after his second marriage, that Fielding again flung himself into the arena of contentious journalism, 'brandishing' his pen as truculently as ever on behalf of the Protestant and Hanoverian succession, and in despite of the Jacobite cause. He called his new paper "The Jacobite's Journal, by John Trott Plaid Esq're.," and the ironic title was accompanied by a woodcut traditionally associated with Hogarth. The ironic mask, Fielding explains, was assumed "in order if possible to laugh Men out of their follies and to make men ashamed of owning or acting by" Jacobite principles.