CHAPTER XV.
_The arrival of Gaffar and Gammar Andrews, with another person notmuch expected; and a perfect solution of the difficulties raised bythe pedlar._
As soon as Fanny was drest Joseph returned to her, and they had a longconversation together, the conclusion of which was, that, if they foundthemselves to be really brother and sister, they vowed a perpetualcelibacy, and to live together all their days, and indulge a Platonicfriendship for each other.
The company were all very merry at breakfast, and Joseph and Fannyrather more chearful than the preceding night. The Lady Booby producedthe diamond button, which the beau most readily owned, and alledged thathe was very subject to walk in his sleep. Indeed, he was far from beingashamed of his amour, and rather endeavoured to insinuate that more thanwas really true had passed between him and the fair Slipslop.
Their tea was scarce over when news came of the arrival of old MrAndrews and his wife. They were immediately introduced, and kindlyreceived by the Lady Booby, whose heart went now pit-a-pat, as did thoseof Joseph and Fanny. They felt, perhaps, little less anxiety in thisinterval than Oedipus himself, whilst his fate was revealing.
Mr Booby first opened the cause by informing the old gentleman that hehad a child in the company more than he knew of, and, taking Fanny bythe hand, told him, this was that daughter of his who had been stolenaway by gypsies in her infancy. Mr Andrews, after expressing someastonishment, assured his honour that he had never lost a daughter bygypsies, nor ever had any other children than Joseph and Pamela. Thesewords were a cordial to the two lovers; but had a different effect onLady Booby. She ordered the pedlar to be called, who recounted his storyas he had done before.--At the end of which, old Mrs Andrews, running toFanny, embraced her, crying out, "She is, she is my child!" The companywere all amazed at this disagreement between the man and his wife; andthe blood had now forsaken the cheeks of the lovers, when the old woman,turning to her husband, who was more surprized than all the rest, andhaving a little recovered her own spirits, delivered herself as follows:"You may remember, my dear, when you went a serjeant to Gibraltar, youleft me big with child; you stayed abroad, you know, upwards of threeyears. In your absence I was brought to bed, I verily believe, of thisdaughter, whom I am sure I have reason to remember, for I suckled her atthis very breast till the day she was stolen from me. One afternoon,when the child was about a year, or a year and a half old, orthereabouts, two gypsy-women came to the door and offered to tell myfortune. One of them had a child in her lap. I showed them my hand, anddesired to know if you was ever to come home again, which I remember aswell as if it was but yesterday: they faithfully promised me youshould.--I left the girl in the cradle and went to draw them a cup ofliquor, the best I had: when I returned with the pot (I am sure I wasnot absent longer than whilst I am telling it to you) the women weregone. I was afraid they had stolen something, and looked and looked, butto no purpose, and, Heaven knows, I had very little for them to steal.At last, hearing the child cry in the cradle, I went to take it up--but,O the living! how was I surprized to find, instead of my own girl that Ihad put into the cradle, who was as fine a fat thriving child as youshall see in a summer's day, a poor sickly boy, that did not seem tohave an hour to live. I ran out, pulling my hair off and crying like anymad after the women, but never could hear a word of them from that dayto this. When I came back the poor infant (which is our Joseph there, asstout as he now stands) lifted up its eyes upon me so piteously, that,to be sure, notwithstanding my passion, I could not find in my heart todo it any mischief. A neighbour of mine, happening to come in at thesame time, and hearing the case, advised me to take care of this poorchild, and God would perhaps one day restore me my own. Upon which Itook the child up, and suckled it to be sure, all the world as if it hadbeen born of my own natural body; and as true as I am alive, in a littletime I loved the boy all to nothing as if it had been my owngirl.--Well, as I was saying, times growing very hard, I having twochildren and nothing but my own work, which was little enough, Godknows, to maintain them, was obliged to ask relief of the parish; but,instead of giving it me, they removed me, by justices' warrants, fifteenmiles, to the place where I now live, where I had not been long settledbefore you came home. Joseph (for that was the name I gave himmyself--the Lord knows whether he was baptized or no, or by what name),Joseph, I say, seemed to me about five years old when you returned; forI believe he is two or three years older than our daughter here (for Iam thoroughly convinced she is the same); and when you saw him you saidhe was a chopping boy, without ever minding his age; and so I, seeingyou did not suspect anything of the matter, thought I might e'en as wellkeep it to myself, for fear you should not love him as well as I did.And all this is veritably true, and I will take my oath of it before anyjustice in the kingdom."
The pedlar, who had been summoned by the order of Lady Booby, listenedwith the utmost attention to Gammar Andrews's story; and, when she hadfinished, asked her if the supposititious child had no mark on itsbreast? To which she answered, "Yes, he had as fine a strawberry as evergrew in a garden." This Joseph acknowledged, and, unbuttoning his coat,at the intercession of the company, showed to them. "Well," says GaffarAndrews, who was a comical sly old fellow, and very likely desired tohave no more children than he could keep, "you have proved, I think,very plainly, that this boy doth not belong to us; but how are youcertain that the girl is ours?" The parson then brought the pedlarforward, and desired him to repeat the story which he had communicatedto him the preceding day at the ale-house; which he complied with, andrelated what the reader, as well as Mr Adams, hath seen before. He thenconfirmed, from his wife's report, all the circumstances of theexchange, and of the strawberry on Joseph's breast. At the repetition ofthe word strawberry, Adams, who had seen it without any emotion, startedand cried, "Bless me! something comes into my head." But before he hadtime to bring anything out a servant called him forth. When he was gonethe pedlar assured Joseph that his parents were persons of much greatercircumstances than those he had hitherto mistaken for such; for that hehad been stolen from a gentleman's house by those whom they callgypsies, and had been kept by them during a whole year, when, looking onhim as in a dying condition, they had exchanged him for the otherhealthier child, in the manner before related. He said, As to the nameof his father, his wife had either never known or forgot it; but thatshe had acquainted him he lived about forty miles from the place wherethe exchange had been made, and which way, promising to spare no painsin endeavouring with him to discover the place.
But Fortune, which seldom doth good or ill, or makes men happy ormiserable, by halves, resolved to spare him this labour. The reader mayplease to recollect that Mr Wilson had intended a journey to the west,in which he was to pass through Mr Adams's parish, and had promised tocall on him. He was now arrived at the Lady Booby's gates for thatpurpose, being directed thither from the parson's house, and had sent inthe servant whom we have above seen call Mr Adams forth. This had nosooner mentioned the discovery of a stolen child, and had uttered theword strawberry, than Mr Wilson, with wildness in his looks, and theutmost eagerness in his words, begged to be shewed into the room, wherehe entered without the least regard to any of the company but Joseph,and, embracing him with a complexion all pale and trembling, desired tosee the mark on his breast; the parson followed him capering, rubbinghis hands, and crying out, _Hic est quem quaeris; inventus est, &c_.Joseph complied with the request of Mr Wilson, who no sooner saw themark than, abandoning himself to the most extravagant rapture ofpassion, he embraced Joseph with inexpressible ecstasy, and cried out intears of joy, "I have discovered my son, I have him again in my arms!"Joseph was not sufficiently apprized yet to taste the same delight withhis father (for so in reality he was); however, he returned some warmthto his embraces: but he no sooner perceived, from his father's account,the agreement of every circumstance, of person, time, and place, than hethrew himself at his feet, and, embracing his knees, with tears beggedhis blessing, which was given with much affection, and received withsuch
respect, mixed with such tenderness on both sides, that it affectedall present; but none so much as Lady Booby, who left the room in anagony, which was but too much perceived, and not very charitablyaccounted for by some of the company.
Joseph Andrews, Vol. 2 Page 33