"Henry Ffielding
"Bow Street Jan. 15. 1750 [1751]."
A second edition of the Enquiry appeared early in the spring; and according to the Journals of the House of Commons it was resolved, in April, that a Bill be brought in on the resolution of the Committee appointed two months previously to consider criminal legislation. Again it can only be surmised that Fielding's assistance would be invoked in the drafting of this Bill. That his vigorous denunciations of the national danger of the gin curse were in complete accord with the feeling of the Government is apparent from the fact that two months later, in June 1751, the Tippling [Act] [11] received the royal assent, by which Act very stringent restrictions were imposed on the sale of spirits.
In June Fielding again appears as Chairman of the Westminster [Sessions]. [12] And in September cases occur as brought before John Fielding and others "at Henry Fielding's house in Bow [Street]," [13] from which it appears that Fielding's blind half-brother was already acting as his assistant. In the following month John Fielding appears among the Justices of the Westminster Quarter [Sessions]. [14]
The year that had seen the publication of the Enquiry, affords proof enough of Fielding's active labours in criminal and social reform; but the last month of this year is marked by an occurrence of much greater import for English literature, the publication of the third great novel, Amelia.
[CHAPTER XIV]
Amelia
"of all my Offspring she is my favourite Child."
The Covent Garden Journal. No. 8.
On the 2nd of December 1751 the General Advertiser announces that
On Wednesday the 18th of this Month will be published
IN FOUR VOLUMES DUODECIMO