be questioned," says Sir Walter, "whether the example is not as well calculated to encourage a spirit of rash enterprise, as of virtuous resistance. It may occur

to an humble maiden (and the case, we believe, is not hypothetical) that to merit Pamela's reward, she must go through Pamela's trials; and that there can be no great harm in affording some encouragement to the assailant. We need not add how dangerous this experiment must be for both parties."

1

A discussion has lately arisen as to the authorship of this Apology, which has attracted to it more attention than it has hitherto received or deserves. Miss Thomson, who gives some account of the pamphlet is disposed to attribute it to Fielding; and following upon this, a writer who has recently prefaced a new edition of Richardson's Works, speaks roundly of it as Fielding's "famous parody," which is certainly to beg the question. Miss Thomson's chief reason for connecting the Apology with Fielding is, that, in Shamela, “Mr. B.” is already transformed into Mr. Booby, the name given to him in Joseph Andrews.2 There are also, besides the burlesque "Letters to the Editor" to which

1 If we are to believe a review in the Gentleman's Magazine for April 1754, the lesson of Pamela was not only learned but taught below-stairs. Among other things in the Servant's Sure Guide to Favour and Fortune of that year, it is recorded that John the coachman, by his discreet behaviour on the box, attracted the notice of two maiden sisters of great fortune, one of whom fell in love with him. Further, that John, "after enquiring her character of many noble families (the italics are ours), consented to her proposal of marriage, and became a great man."

2 It may be noted that in some later editions of Pamela, an endeavour has been made to neutralise this outrage by revealing "Mr. B." as "Mr. Boothby."

Miss Thomson refers, some minor touches which certainly suggest Fielding's hand. The Mrs. Jewkes of Shamela talks of her "Sect" like Mrs. Slipslop;1 and Shamela's own use of "Syllabub" for "Syllable," and "Statue of Lamentations" for "Statute of Limitations," is quite in the manner of that estimable Waiting Gentlewoman. It is curious, also, that a Parson Oliver (of Motcombe) had been Fielding's first tutor; and that Dodd, the publisher of Shamela, had published books for Fielding. Finally, Richardson himself, writing to "Mrs. Belfour" in 1749 (Corr. iv. 286), distinctly attributes Shamela to Fielding; and, in collecting material for this memoir, we have found confirmation of this belief on his part. To a letter at South Kensington in which Shamela is mentioned, Richardson has appended, in the tremulous script of his old age: "Written by Mr. H. Fielding." All these things make for the Fielding authorship. On the other hand, Mrs. Barbauld is absolutely silent on the question; Arthur Murphy, who wrote Fielding's life, makes no reference to it; and, as far as we can remember, there is no mention of it in Fielding's works. If Fielding wrote it, he must have been glad to forget it; and, in any case, the mere assertion of Richardson, and even the coincidences noted above, do not, in the absence of further corroborative evidence, warrant any one in describing the book as Fielding's "famous parody."

There is, however, one point in connection with Shamela, which, if it tends somewhat to strengthen the case against Fielding, appears also to indicate that he

1 "Sect" for "sex" is, of course, as old as Falstaff. But the point here is, that it is used in a book by Fielding and a book which it is sought to attribute to Fielding.

did not associate the authorship of Pamela with Richardson. Referring to the "Composer" of that book, he makes Parson Oliver say: "Who that is, though you so earnestly require of me, I shall leave you to guess from the Ciceronian Eloquence, with which the Work abounds; and that excellent Knack of making every Character amiable, which he lays his hands on" (p. 6). "I have seen a Piece of his Performance (says Parson Williams to Shamela), where the Person, whose Life was written, could he have risen from the Dead again, would not have even suspected he had been aimed at, unless by the Title of the Book, which was superscribed with his Name" (p. 52). These are certainly not obvious references to Richardson. On the contrary, they seem rather to point obscurely to Cibber, with whom Fielding had a longstanding quarrel, and who, in his own Apology for his Life (published a year before), a work which Fielding attacked vigorously in the Champion, had described the author of Pasquin as "a broken Wit," a " Herculean Satyrist," and so forth, but without mentioning his And if Fielding really associated Colley Cibber with Pamela, it accounts in some measure for the association of Shamela's Apology with " Conny Keyber"

name.

a surname he had already applied to Cibber in the Author's Farce, ten years earlier.

Shamela appeared in April 1741, just after the third edition of Pamela was issued; and it was not until February 1742 that Fielding put forth what has a better title to be described as his "famous parody," The History of the Adventures of Joseph Andrews, and his friend Mr. Abraham Adams. By this time he was certainly aware that Cibber was not the author of

Pamela, since, in his first chapter, he speaks distinctly of the author of the life of Mr. Colley Cibber and the author of the life of Mrs. Pamela Andrews as

different persons. Fortunately, no uncertainty of pedigree makes it needful to dwell here upon the story of the work with which Fielding inaugurated the Novel of Manners as opposed to the Novel of Analysis. Moreover, its connection with Richardson is in reality but small. Apart from the "lewd and ungenerous engraftment" (the words are Richardson's) which makes Fielding's hero Pamela's brother, and, it may be added, furnishes its least attractive scenes, Joseph Andrews has not much to do with Pamela. When Parson Adams mades his appearance in Chapter iii. the author's original purpose begins to be forgotten, and after Chapter x. it is practically shelved, only to be recalled at the end of the book for the sake of coherence. To Pamela herself, the references are few. One usefully turns on the pronunciation of her name. "They had a Daughter," says a pedlar at the end of vol. ii., speaking of Goodman Andrews and his wife, "of a very strange Name, Paměla or Pamela; some pronounced it one way, and some the other." Sidney, from whose Arcadia Richardson got it, made it Pamela, and so did Pope in the Epistle he wrote in 1712 to Teresa Blount:—

"The Gods, to curse Pamela with her pray'rs,

Gave the gilt Coach and dappled Flanders Mares."

"Mr.

But Richardson, in Pamela's hymns, made it Paměla, and his parasites persuaded him he was right. Pope," wrote Aaron Hill, "has taught half the women in England to pronounce it wrong." Beyond the fact

that Parson Adams publicly rebuked Mr. and Mrs. Booby for laughing in church at Joseph's wedding, there are no further material references to Pamela, unless they can be held to be contained in Fielding's final words, which inform his readers that the hero will not be "prevailed on by any Booksellers, or their Authors, to make his Appearance in High-Life.”

Of other works prompted by Pamela, it is not needful to make mention here, although they seem to have been numerous. Richardson himself, in a footnote to one of the South Kensington Mss., says: "The Publication of the History of Pamela gave Birth to no less than 16 Pieces, as Remarks, Imitations, Retailings of the Story, Pyracies, etc. etc." But a brief word may be devoted to the adaptations for the stage. The first of these was Pamela, a comedy, played "gratis" in 1741 at Goodman's Fields. The author, one Dance, whose stage-name was James Love, was also an actor at Drury Lane. The piece had little merit; but it is interesting, because a character interpolated in it, that of a fop named Jack Smatter, was

1 One of the imitations, probably not included in the sixteen was Pamela in Wax Work, showing that "Fortunate Maid from the Lady's first taking her to her Marriage; also Mr. B. her Lady's Son, and several Passages after; with the Hardships she suffer'd in Lincolnshire, where her Master sent her, and the grand Appearance they made when they came back to Bedfordshire: The whole containing above a hundred Figures in Miniature, richly dress'd, suitable to their Characters, in Rooms and Gardens, as the Circumstances require, adorn'd with Fruit and Flowers, as natural as if growing. Price Sixpence each" (Daily Advertiser, 23 April 1745). Richardson must have visited this artless exhibition, which was just at his door, being "at the Corner of Shoe-Lane, facing Salisbury-Court, FleetStreet."