History of Tom Jones, a Foundling

by Henry Fielding

  Chapter viii.

  A dreadful alarm in the inn, with the arrival of an unexpected friendof Mrs Fitzpatrick.

  Sophia now, at the desire of her cousin, related--not what follows,but what hath gone before in this history: for which reason the readerwill, I suppose, excuse me for not repeating it over again.

  One remark, however, I cannot forbear making on her narrative, namely,that she made no more mention of Jones, from the beginning to the end,than if there had been no such person alive. This I will neitherendeavour to account for nor to excuse. Indeed, if this may be calleda kind of dishonesty, it seems the more inexcusable, from the apparentopenness and explicit sincerity of the other lady.--But so it was.

  Just as Sophia arrived at the conclusion of her story, there arrivedin the room where the two ladies were sitting a noise, not unlike, inloudness, to that of a pack of hounds just let out from their kennel;nor, in shrillness, to cats, when caterwauling; or to screech owls;or, indeed, more like (for what animal can resemble a human voice?) tothose sounds which, in the pleasant mansions of that gate which seemsto derive its name from a duplicity of tongues, issue from the mouths,and sometimes from the nostrils, of those fair river nymphs, yclepedof old the Naiades; in the vulgar tongue translated oyster-wenches;for when, instead of the antient libations of milk and honey and oil,the rich distillation from the juniper-berry, or, perhaps, from malt,hath, by the early devotion of their votaries, been poured forth ingreat abundance, should any daring tongue with unhallowed licenseprophane, _i.e._, depreciate, the delicate fat Milton oyster, theplaice sound and firm, the flounder as much alive as when in thewater, the shrimp as big as a prawn, the fine cod alive but a fewhours ago, or any other of the various treasures which thosewater-deities who fish the sea and rivers have committed to the careof the nymphs, the angry Naiades lift up their immortal voices, andthe prophane wretch is struck deaf for his impiety.

  Such was the noise which now burst from one of the rooms below; andsoon the thunder, which long had rattled at a distance, began toapproach nearer and nearer, till, having ascended by degrees upstairs,it at last entered the apartment where the ladies were. In short, todrop all metaphor and figure, Mrs Honour, having scolded violentlybelow-stairs, and continued the same all the way up, came in to hermistress in a most outrageous passion, crying out, "What doth yourladyship think? Would you imagine that this impudent villain, themaster of this house, hath had the impudence to tell me, nay, to standit out to my face, that your ladyship is that nasty, stinking wh--re(Jenny Cameron they call her), that runs about the country with thePretender? Nay, the lying, saucy villain had the assurance to tell methat your ladyship had owned yourself to be so; but I have clawed therascal; I have left the marks of my nails in his impudent face. Mylady! says I, you saucy scoundrel; my lady is meat for no pretenders.She is a young lady of as good fashion, and family, and fortune, asany in Somersetshire. Did you never hear of the great Squire Western,sirrah? She is his only daughter; she is----, and heiress to all hisgreat estate. My lady to be called a nasty Scotch wh--re by such avarlet!--To be sure I wish I had knocked his brains out with thepunch-bowl."

  The principal uneasiness with which Sophia was affected on thisoccasion Honour had herself caused, by having in her passiondiscovered who she was. However, as this mistake of the landlordsufficiently accounted for those passages which Sophia had beforemistaken, she acquired some ease on that account; nor could she, uponthe whole, forbear smiling. This enraged Honour, and she cried,"Indeed, madam, I did not think your ladyship would have made alaughing matter of it. To be called whore by such an impudent lowrascal. Your ladyship may be angry with me, for aught I know, fortaking your part, since proffered service, they say, stinks; but to besure I could never bear to hear a lady of mine called whore.--Nor willI bear it. I am sure your ladyship is as virtuous a lady as ever satfoot on English ground, and I will claw any villain's eyes out whodares for to offer to presume for to say the least word to thecontrary. Nobody ever could say the least ill of the character of anylady that ever I waited upon."

  _Hinc illae lachrymae;_ in plain truth, Honour had as much love forher mistress as most servants have, that is to say--But besides this,her pride obliged her to support the character of the lady she waitedon; for she thought her own was in a very close manner connected withit. In proportion as the character of her mistress was raised, herslikewise, as she conceived, was raised with it; and, on the contrary,she thought the one could not be lowered without the other.

  On this subject, reader, I must stop a moment, to tell thee a story."The famous Nell Gwynn, stepping one day, from a house where she hadmade a short visit, into her coach, saw a great mob assembled, and herfootman all bloody and dirty; the fellow, being asked by his mistressthe reason of his being in that condition, answered, `I have beenfighting, madam, with an impudent rascal who called your ladyship awh--re.' `You blockhead,' replied Mrs Gwynn, `at this rate you mustfight every day of your life; why, you fool, all the world knows it.'`Do they?' cries the fellow, in a muttering voice, after he had shutthe coach-door, `they shan't call me a whore's footman for all that.'"

  Thus the passion of Mrs Honour appears natural enough, even if it wereto be no otherwise accounted for; but, in reality, there was anothercause of her anger; for which we must beg leave to remind our readerof a circumstance mentioned in the above simile. There are indeedcertain liquors, which, being applied to our passions, or to fire,produce effects the very reverse of those produced by water, as theyserve to kindle and inflame, rather than to extinguish. Among these,the generous liquor called punch is one. It was not, therefore,without reason, that the learned Dr Cheney used to call drinking punchpouring liquid fire down your throat.

  Now, Mrs Honour had unluckily poured so much of this liquid fire downher throat, that the smoke of it began to ascend into her pericraniumand blinded the eyes of Reason, which is there supposed to keep herresidence, while the fire itself from the stomach easily reached theheart, and there inflamed the noble passion of pride. So that, uponthe whole, we shall cease to wonder at the violent rage of thewaiting-woman; though at first sight we must confess the cause seemsinadequate to the effect.

  Sophia and her cousin both did all in their power to extinguish theseflames which had roared so loudly all over the house. They at lengthprevailed; or, to carry the metaphor one step farther, the fire,having consumed all the fuel which the language affords, to wit, everyreproachful term in it, at last went out of its own accord.

  But, though tranquillity was restored above-stairs, it was not sobelow; where my landlady, highly resenting the injury done to thebeauty of her husband by the flesh-spades of Mrs Honour, called aloudfor revenge and justice. As to the poor man, who had principallysuffered in the engagement, he was perfectly quiet. Perhaps the bloodwhich he lost might have cooled his anger: for the enemy had not onlyapplied her nails to his cheeks, but likewise her fist to hisnostrils, which lamented the blow with tears of blood in greatabundance. To this we may add reflections on his mistake; but indeednothing so effectually silenced his resentment as the manner in whichhe now discovered his error; for as to the behaviour of Mrs Honour, ithad the more confirmed him in his opinion; but he was now assured by aperson of great figure, and who was attended by a great equipage, thatone of the ladies was a woman of fashion, and his intimateacquaintance.

  By the orders of this person, the landlord now ascended, andacquainted our fair travellers that a great gentleman below desired todo them the honour of waiting on them. Sophia turned pale and trembledat this message, though the reader will conclude it was too civil,notwithstanding the landlord's blunder, to have come from her father;but fear hath the common fault of a justice of peace, and is apt toconclude hastily from every slight circumstance, without examining theevidence on both sides.

  To ease the reader's curiosity, therefore, rather than hisapprehensions, we proceed to inform him that an Irish peer had arrivedvery late that evening at the inn, in his way to London. Thisnobleman, having sallied from his supper at the hurric
ane beforecommemorated, had seen the attendant of Mrs Fitzpatrick, and upon ashort enquiry, was informed that her lady, with whom he was veryparticularly acquainted, was above. This information he had no soonerreceived than he addressed himself to the landlord, pacified him, andsent him upstairs with compliments rather civiller than those whichwere delivered.

  It may perhaps be wondered at that the waiting-woman herself was notthe messenger employed on this occasion; but we are sorry to say shewas not at present qualified for that, or indeed for any other office.The rum (for so the landlord chose to call the distillation from malt)had basely taken the advantage of the fatigue which the poor woman hadundergone, and had made terrible depredations on her noble faculties,at a time when they were very unable to resist the attack.

  We shall not describe this tragical scene too fully; but we thoughtourselves obliged, by that historic integrity which we profess,shortly to hint a matter which we would otherwise have been glad tohave spared. Many historians, indeed, for want of this integrity, orof diligence, to say no worse, often leave the reader to find outthese little circumstances in the dark, and sometimes to his greatconfusion and perplexity.

  Sophia was very soon eased of her causeless fright by the entry of thenoble peer, who was not only an intimate acquaintance of MrsFitzpatrick, but in reality a very particular friend of that lady. Tosay truth, it was by his assistance that she had been enabled toescape from her husband; for this nobleman had the same gallantdisposition with those renowned knights of whom we read in heroicstory, and had delivered many an imprisoned nymph from durance. He wasindeed as bitter an enemy to the savage authority too often exercisedby husbands and fathers, over the young and lovely of the other sex,as ever knight-errant was to the barbarous power of enchanters; nay,to say truth, I have often suspected that those very enchanters withwhich romance everywhere abounds were in reality no other than thehusbands of those days; and matrimony itself was, perhaps, theenchanted castle in which the nymphs were said to be confined.

  This nobleman had an estate in the neighbourhood of Fitzpatrick, andhad been for some time acquainted with the lady. No sooner, therefore,did he hear of her confinement, than he earnestly applied himself toprocure her liberty; which he presently effected, not by storming thecastle, according to the example of antient heroes, but by corruptingthe governor, in conformity with the modern art of war, in which craftis held to be preferable to valour, and gold is found to be moreirresistible than either lead or steel.

  This circumstance, however, as the lady did not think it materialenough to relate to her friend, we would not at that time impart it tothe reader. We rather chose to leave him a while under a suppositionthat she had found, or coined, or by some very extraordinary, perhapssupernatural means, had possessed herself of the money with which shehad bribed her keeper, than to interrupt her narrative by giving ahint of what seemed to her of too little importance to be mentioned.

  The peer, after a short conversation, could not forbear expressingsome surprize at meeting the lady in that place; nor could he refrainfrom telling her he imagined she had been gone to Bath. MrsFitzpatrick very freely answered, "That she had been prevented in herpurpose by the arrival of a person she need not mention. In short,"says she, "I was overtaken by my husband (for I need not affect toconceal what the world knows too well already). I had the good fortuneto escape in a most surprizing manner, and am now going to London withthis young lady, who is a near relation of mine, and who hath escapedfrom as great a tyrant as my own."

  His lordship, concluding that this tyrant was likewise a husband, madea speech full of compliments to both the ladies, and as full ofinvectives against his own sex; nor indeed did he avoid some obliqueglances at the matrimonial institution itself, and at the unjustpowers given by it to man over the more sensible and more meritoriouspart of the species. He ended his oration with an offer of hisprotection, and of his coach and six, which was instantly accepted byMrs Fitzpatrick, and at last, upon her persuasions, by Sophia.

  Matters being thus adjusted, his lordship took his leave, and theladies retired to rest, where Mrs Fitzpatrick entertained her cousinwith many high encomiums on the character of the noble peer, andenlarged very particularly on his great fondness for his wife; saying,she believed he was almost the only person of high rank who wasentirely constant to the marriage bed. "Indeed," added she, "my dearSophy, that is a very rare virtue amongst men of condition. Neverexpect it when you marry; for, believe me, if you do, you willcertainly be deceived."

  A gentle sigh stole from Sophia at these words, which perhapscontributed to form a dream of no very pleasant kind; but, as shenever revealed this dream to any one, so the reader cannot expect tosee it related here.