section 28 of Tom Jones this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Kalinda Tom Jones by Henry Fielding book 8 containing about two days chapter 1 a wonderful long chapter concerning the Marvelous being much the longest of all our introductory chapters as we are now entering upon a book in which the course of our history will oblige us to relate some matters of a more strange and surprising kind than any which have hitherto occurred it may not be a miss in the prologominous or introductory chapter to say something of that species of writing which is called the Marvelous to this we shall as well for the sake of ourselves as of others endeavor to set some certain bounds and indeed nothing can be more necessary as critics of different complexions are here apt to run into very different extremes for while some are with Mr. Dessier ready to allow that the same thing which is impossible may yet be probable others have so little historical or poetic faith that they believe nothing to be either possible or probable the like to which have not occurred to their own observation first then I think it may very reasonably be required of every writer that he keeps within the bounds of possibility and still remembers that what is not possible for man to perform it is scarce possible for man to believe he did perform this conviction perhaps gave birth to many stories of the ancient heathen deities for most of them are of poetical origin the poet being desirous to indulge a wanton and extravagant imagination took refuge in that power of the extent of which his readers were no judges or rather which they imagine to be infinite and consequently they could not be shocked at any prodigies related of it this has been strongly urged in defense of Homer's miracles and it is perhaps a defense not as Mr. Pope would have it because Ulysses told a set of foolish lies to the fations who were a very dull nation but because the poet himself wrote to heathens to whom poetical fables were articles of faith for my own part I must confess so compassionate as my temper I wish polypheme had confined himself to his milk diet and preserved his eye nor could Ulysses be much more concerned than myself when his companions were turned into swine by Cersei who showed I think afterwards too much regard for man's flesh to be supposed capable of converting it into bacon I wish likewise with all my heart that Homer could have known the rule prescribed by Horace to introduce supernatural agents as seldom as possible we should not then have seen his gods coming on trivial errands and often behaving themselves so as not only to forfeit all title to respect but to become the objects of scorn and derision a conduct which must have shocked the credulity of a pious and sagacious heathen and which could never have been defended unless by agreeing with the supposition to which I have been sometimes almost inclined that this most glorious poet as he certainly was had an intent to burlesque the superstitious faith of his own age in country but I have rested too long on a doctrine which can be of no use to a Christian writer for as he cannot introduce into his works any of that heavenly host which make a part of his creed so is it horrid purity to search the heathen theology for any of those deities who have been long since to thrown from their immortality lord shaftsbury observes that nothing is more cold than the invocation of a muse by a modern he might have added that nothing can be more absurd a modern may with much more elegance invoke a ballad as some thought Homer did or a mug of ale with the author of hoodabras which latter may perhaps have inspired much more poetry as well as prose than all the liquors of hippocrine or helicon the only supernatural agents which can in any manner be allowed to us moderns are ghosts but of these I would advise an author to be extremely sparing these are indeed like arsenic and other dangerous drugs in physics to be used with the utmost caution nor would I advise the introduction of them at all in those works or by those authors to which or to whom a horse laugh in the reader would be any great prejudice or mortification as for elves and fairies and other such memory I purposely omit the mention of them as I should be very unwilling to confine within any bands those surprising imaginations for whose vast capacity the limits of human nature are too narrow whose works are to be considered as a new creation and you have consequently just right to do what they will with their own man therefore is the highest subject unless on very extraordinary occasions indeed which presents itself to the panavar historian or of our poet and in relating his actions great care is to be taken that we do not exceed the capacity of the agent we describe nor is possibility alone sufficient to justify us we must keep likewise within the rules of probability it is I think the opinion of Aristotle or if not it is the opinion of some wise man whose authority will be as weighty when it is old that it is no excuse for a poet who relates what is incredible that the thing related is really a matter of fact this may perhaps be allowed true with regard to poetry but it may be thought impracticable to extend it to the historian for he is obliged to record matters as he finds them though they may be of so extraordinary a nature as will require no small degree of historical faith to swallow them such was the success less armament of Xerxes described by Herodotus or the successful expedition of Alexander related by Aryan such of later years was the victory of Agincourt obtained by Harry the fifth or that of Narva won by Charles the twelfth of Sweden all which instances the more we reflect on them appear still the more astonishing such facts however as they occur in the thread of the story nay indeed as they constitute the essential parts of it the historian is not only justifiable in recording as they really happened but indeed would be unpardonable should he omit or alter them but there are other facts not of such consequence nor so necessary which though ever so well attested may nevertheless be sacrificed to oblivion in complacence to the skepticism of a reader such as that memorable story of the ghost of George Villier which might with more propriety have been made a present of to Dr. Drellancourt to have kept the ghost of Mrs. Ville company at the head of his discourse upon death then have been introduced into so solemn a work as the history of the rebellion to say the truth if the historian will confine himself to what really happened and utterly reject any circumstance which though never so well attested he must be well assured as false he will sometimes fall into the marvelous but never into the incredible he will often raise the wonder and surprise of his reader but never that incredulous hatred mentioned by Horace it is by falling into fiction therefore that we generally offend against this rule of deserting probability which the historian seldom if ever quits tell you for sakes his character and commences a writer of romance in this however those historians who relate public transactions have the advantage of us who confine ourselves to scenes of private life the credit of the former is by common notoriety supported for a long time and public records with the concurrent testimony of many authors bear evidence to their truth in future ages thus a Trajan and an Antoninus and a Nero and a Caligula have all met with the belief of posterity and no one doubts but the men so very good and so very bad were once the masters of mankind but we who deal in private character who search into the most retired recesses and draw forth examples of virtue and vice from holes and corners of the world are in a more dangerous situation as we have no public notoriety no concurrent testimony no records to support and corroborate what we deliver it becomes us to keep within the limits not only of possibility but of probability too and this more especially in painting what is greatly good and amiable navery and folly though never so exorbitant will more easily meet with ascent for ill nature adds great support and strength to faith thus we may perhaps with little danger relate the history of Fisher who having long owed his bread to the generosity of Mr Derby and having one morning received a considerable bounty from his hands yet in order to possess himself of what remained in his friend's screwtor concealed himself in a public office of the temple through which there was a passage into Mr Derby's chamber here he overheard Mr Derby for many hours soliciting himself at an entertainment which he that evening gave his friends and to which Fisher had been invited during all this time no tender no grateful reflections arose to restrain his purpose but when the poor gentleman had let his company out through the office Fisher came suddenly from his lurking place and walking softly behind his friend into his chamber discharged a pistol ball into his head this may be believed when the bones of Fisher are as rotten as his heart nay perhaps it will be credited that the villain went two days afterwards with some young ladies to the play of Hamlet and with an unaltered countenance heard one of the ladies who little suspected how near she was to the person cry out good god if the man that murdered Mr Derby was now present manifesting in this a more seared and callous conscience than even Nero himself of whom we are told by Suetonius that the consciousness of his guilt after the death of his mother became immediately intolerable and so continued nor could all the congratulations of the soldiers of the senate and the people allay the horrors of his conscience but now on the other hand should I tell my reader that I had known a man who's penetrating genius had enabled him to raise a large fortune in a way where no beginning was chalked out to him that he had done this with the most perfect preservation of his integrity and not only without the least injustice or injury to any one individual person but with the highest advantage to trade and a vast increase of the public revenue that he had expended one part of the income of this fortune in discovering a taste superior to most by works where the highest dignity was united with the purest simplicity and another part in displaying a degree of goodness superior to all men by acts of charity to objects whose only recommendations were their merits or their wants that he was most industrious in searching after merit in distress most eager to relieve it and then is careful perhaps too careful to conceal what he had done that his house his furniture his gardens his table his private hospitality and his public beneficence all denoted the mine from which they flowed and were all intrinsically rich and noble without tinsel or external ostentation that he filled every relation in life with the most adequate virtue that he was most piously religious to his creator most zealously loyal to his sovereign a most tender husband to his wife a kind relation a munificent patron a warm and firm friend an unknowing and cheerful companion indulgence to his servants hospitable to his neighbors charitable to the poor and benevolent to all mankind should I add to these the epithets of wise brave elegant and indeed every other amiable epithet in our language I might truly say please credit Nemo Herkulei Nemo Velduo Velnemo and yet I know a man who was all I have here described but a single instance and I really know not such another is not sufficient to justify us while we are writing to thousands who have never heard of the person nor of anything like him such rare avace should be remitted to the epitaph writer or to some poet who may condescend to hitch him into a dystic or to slide him into a rhyme with an air of carelessness and neglect without giving any offense to the reader in the last place the action should be such as may not only be within the compass of human agency and which human agents may probably be supposed to do but they should be likely for the very actors and characters themselves to have performed for what may be only wonderful and surprising in one man may become improbable or indeed impossible when related of another this last requisite is what the dramatic critics call conversation of character and it requires a very extraordinary degree of judgment and a most exact knowledge of human nature it is admirable you're remarked by a most excellent writer that zeal can no more hurry a man to act in direct opposition to itself than a rapid stream can carry a boat against its own current I will venture to say that for a man to act in direct contradiction to the dictates of his nature is if not impossible as improbable and as miraculous as anything which can well be conceived should the best parts of the story of Mr. Antoninus be ascribed to Nero or should the worst incidents of Nero's life be imputed to Antoninus what would be more shocking to believe than either instance whereas both these being related of their proper agent constitute the truly marvelous our modern authors of comedy have fallen almost universally into the error here hinted at their heroes generally are notorious rogues and their heroines abandon jades during the first four acts but in the fifth the former become very worthy gentleman and the latter women of virtue and discretion nor is the writer often so kind as to give himself the least trouble to reconcile their account for this monstrous change and incongruity there is indeed no other reason to be assigned for it than because the play is drawing to a conclusion as if it was no less natural in a rogue to repent in the last act of a play than in the last of his life which we perceive to be generally the case at tyburn a place which might indeed close the scene of some comedies with much propriety as the heroes and these are most commonly eminent for those very talents which not only bring men to the gallows but enable them to make a heroic figure when they are there within these few restrictions i think every writer may be permitted to deal as much in the wonderful as he pleases nay if he thus keeps within the rules of credibility the more he can surprise the reader the more he will engage his attention and the more he will charm him as a genius of the highest rank observes in his fifth chapter of the bathos the great art of all poetry is to mix truth with fiction in order to join the credible with the surprising for though every good author will confine himself within the bounds of probability it is by no means necessary that his characters or his incidents should be trite common or vulgar such as happen in every street or in every house or which may be met with in the home articles of a newspaper nor must he be inhibited from showing many persons and things which may possibly have never fallen within the knowledge of great part of his readers if the writer strictly observes the rules above mentioned he have discharged his part and is then entitled to some faith from his reader who is indeed guilty of critical infidelity if he disbelieves him for want of a portion of such faith i remember the character of a young lady of quality which was condemned on the stage for being unnatural by the unanimous voice of a very large assembly of clerks and apprentices that would had the previous suffrages of many ladies of the first rank one of whom very eminent for her understanding declared it was the picture of half the young people of her acquaintance chapter two in which the land lady pays a visit to mr. jones when jones had taken leave of his friend the lieutenant he endeavored to close his eyes but all in vain his spirits were too lively and wakeful to be lulled to sleep so having amused or rather tormented himself with the thoughts of his sophia till it was open daylight he called for some tea upon which occasion my land lady herself about safe to pay him a visit this was indeed the first time she had seen him or at least had taken any notice of him but as the lieutenant had assured her that he was certainly some young gentleman of fashion she now determined to show him all the respect in her power for to speak truly this was one of those houses where gentlemen to use the language of advertisements meet with civil treatment for their money she had no sooner begun to make his tea then she likewise began to discourse last sir said she i think it is great pity that such a pretty young gentleman should undervalue himself so as to go about with these soldier fellows they call themselves gentlemen i warrant you but as my first husband used to say they should remember it is we that pay them and to be sure it is very hard upon us to be obliged to pay them and to keep them too as we publicans are i had 20 of them last night besides officers nay for matter of that i'd rather have the soldiers than officers for nothing is ever good enough for those sparks and i am sure if you was to see the bills lost sir it is nothing i have had less trouble i warrant you with a good squires family where we take 40 or 50 shillings of a night besides horses and yet i warrants me there is narrow one of those officer fellows but looks upon himself to be as good as arrow a squire of 500 pounds a year to be sure it doth meet good to hear their men run about after him crying your honor and your honor mary come up with such honor and ordinary at a shilling ahead then there's such swearing among them to be short frightens me out of my wits i think nothing can ever prosper with such wicked people and here one of them has used you in so barbarous a manner i thought indeed how well the rest would secure him and they all hang together for if you had been in danger of death which i'm glad to see you or not it would have been all as one to such wicked people they would have let the murderer go law would have mercy upon him i would not have such a sin to answer for for the whole world but though you are likely with the blessing to recover there is law for him yet and if you will employ a lawyer small i'd darest be sworn he'll make the fellow fly the country for him though perhaps he'll have fled the country before for it is here today and gone tomorrow with such chaps i hope however you will learn more wit for the future and return back to your friends i warrant they're all miserable for your loss and if they was but to know what had happened law my seeming i would not for the world they should come come we know very well what all the matter is but if one won't another will so pretty a gentleman need never want a lady i am sure if i was you i would see the finest she that ever wore a head hanged before i would go for a soldier for her nay don't blush so for indeed he did to a violent degree while you thought sir i knew nothing of the matter i warrant you about madame sophia how said jones starting up do you know my sophia do i i'm mary cries the landlady many's the time had she lain in this house with her aunt i suppose says jones why there it is now cries the landlady i i i i know the old lady very well and a sweet young creature is madame sophia that's the truth on it a sweet creature cries jones oh heavens angels are painted fair to look like her there's in her all that we believe of heaven amazing brightness purity and truth eternal joy and everlasting love and could i have ever imagined that you had known my sophia i wish says the landlady you knew half so much of her what would you have given to have sat by her bedside what a delicious neck she had her lovely limbs have stretched themselves in that very bed you now lie in here christ jones had sophia ever laid here i i here there in that very bed says the landlady where i wish you had her this moment and she may wish so too for anything i know the contrary where she had mentioned your name to me ha cries he did she ever mention her poor jones you flatter me now i can never believe so much why then answered she as i hope to be saved and may the devil fetch me if i speak a syllable more than the truth i have heard her mention mr jones but in a civil and modest way i confess yet i could perceive she thought a great deal more than she said oh my dear woman cries jones her thoughts of me she'll never be worthy of me oh she is all gentle in this kindness goodness why was such a rascal as i born ever to give her soft bosom a moment's uneasiness why am i cursed i who would undergo all the plagues and miseries which any demon ever invented for mankind to procure her any good nay torture itself could not be misery to me did i but know that she was happy why look you there now says the landlady i told her you was a constant lover but pray madam tell me when or where you knew anything of me for i never was here before nor do i remember ever to have seen you nor is it possible you should answered she for you was a little thing when i had you in my lap at the squires how the squires says jones what do you know that great and good mr all worthy then yes mary do i says she who in the country dot not the fame of his goodness indeed answered jones must have extended farther than this but heaven only can know him can know that benevolence which it copied from itself and sent upon earth as its own pattern mankind are as ignorant of such divine goodness as they are unworthy of it but none so unworthy of it as myself i who was raised by him to such a height taken in as you must well know a poor baseborn child adopted by him and treated as his own son to dare by my follies to discipline him to draw his vengeance upon me yes i deserve it all for i will never be so ungrateful as ever to think he had done an act of injustice by me now i deserve to be turned out of doors as i am and now madam says he i believe you will not blame me for turning soldier especially with such a fortune as this in my pocket at which words he shook a purse which had but very little in it and which still appeared to the landlady to have less my good landlady was according to vulgar phrase struck all of a heap by this relation she answered coldly that to be sure people were the best judges what was most proper for their circumstances but hark says she i think i hear somebody call coming coming the devils and all our folk nobody had many years i must go downstairs if you want any more breakfast the maid will come up coming at which words without taking any leave she flung out of the room for the lower sort of people are very tenacious of respect and though they are contented to give this gratis to persons of quality yet they never conferred upon those of their own order without taking care to be well paid for their pains chapter three in which the surgeon makes a second appearance before we proceed any farther that the reader may not be mistaken and in imagining the landlady knew more than she did nor surprised that she knew so much it may be necessary to inform him that the lieutenant had acquainted her that the name of sofia had been the occasion of the quarrel and as for the rest of her knowledge the sagacious reader will observe how she came by it in the proceeding scene great curiosity was indeed mixed with her virtues and she never willingly suffered anyone to depart from her house without inquiring as much as possible into their names families and fortunes she was no sooner gone than jones instead of annamedverting on her behavior reflected that he was in the same bed which he was informed had held his dear sofia this occasion to thousand fond and tender thoughts which we would dwell longer upon did we not consider that such kind of lovers will make a very inconsiderable part of our readers in this situation the surgeon found him when he came to dress his wound the doctor perceiving upon him examination that his pulse was disordered and hearing that he had not slept declare that he was in great danger for he apprehended a fever was coming on which he would have prevented by bleeding but jones would not submit declaring he would lose no more blood and doctor says he if you will be so kind only to dress my head i have no doubt of being well in a day or two i wish answered the surgeon i could assure you're being well in a month or two well indeed no no people are not so soon well of such confusions but sir i am not at this time of day to be instructed in my operations by a patient and i insist on making a revulsion before i dress you jones persisted obstinately in his refusal and the doctor at last yielded telling him at the same time that he would not be answerable for the ill consequence and hoped he would do him the justice to acknowledge that he had given him contrary advice which the patient promised he would the doctor retired into the kitchen where addressing himself to the landlady he complained bitterly of the undutiful behavior of his patient who would not be blooded though he was in a fever it is an eating fever then says the landlady for he has devoured two swinging buttered toast this morning for breakfast very likely says the doctor i have known people eat in a fever and it is very easily accounted for because the acidity occasioned by the febrile matter may stimulate the nerves of the diaphragm and thereby occasion a craving which will not be easily distinguishable from a natural appetite but the element will not be concreted nor assimilated into kyle and so will corrode the vascular orifices and thus will aggravate the feveric symptoms indeed i think the gentleman in a very dangerous way and if he is not blooded i am afraid he will die every man must die sometime or another answer the good woman it is no business of mine i hope doctor you would not have me hold him while you bleed him but harky a word in your ear i would advise you before you proceed too far to take care who is to be your paymaster paymasters to the doctor staring why i have a gentleman under my hands have i not i imagine so as well as you so the landlady but as my first husband used to say everything is not what it looks to be he is an errant scrub i assure you however take no notice that i mentioned anything to you of the matter but i think people in business opt always to let one another know such things and have i suffered such a fellow as this cries the doctor in a passion to instruct me shall i hear my practice insulted by one who will not pay me i'm glad i have made this discovery in time i will see now whether he will be blooded or no he then immediately went upstairs and flinging open the door of the chamber with much violence awaked poor jones from a very sound nap into which he had fallen and what was still worse from a delicious dream concerning sophia will you be blooded or no cries the doctor in a rage i have told you my resolution already answered jones and i wish with all my heart you would take in my answer for you have awake me out of the sweetest sleep which i have ever had in my life i i cries the doctor many a man has dozed away his life sleep is not always good no more than food but remember i demand of you for the last time will you be blooded i answer you for the last time said jones i will not then i wash my hands of you cries the doctor and i desire you to pay me for the trouble i have had already two journeys at five shillings each two dressings at five shillings more and half a crown for phlebotomy i hope said jones you don't intend to leave me in this condition indeed but i shall said the other then said jones you have used me rascally and i will not pay you a farthing very well cries the doctor the first loss is the best what a pox did my landlady mean by sending for me to such vagabonds at which words he flung out of the room and his patient turning himself about soon recovered his sleep but his dream was unfortunately gone end of section 28 recording by kalinda in reyman new hampshire on october 25th 2007 section 29 of tom jones this is a libra vox recording all libra vox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit libravox.org recording by kalinda tom jones by henry fielding chapter four in which is introduced one of the pleasantest barbers that was ever recorded in history the barber of bagdad or he and donkey hote not accepted the clock had now struck five when jones awaked from a nap of seven hours so much refreshed and in such perfect health and spirits that he resolved to get up and dress himself for which purpose he unlocked his portmanteau and took out clean linen and a suit of clothes but first he slipped on a frock and went down into the kitchen to bespeak something that might pacify certain tumults he found rising within his stomach meeting the landlady he accosted her with great civility and asked what he could have for dinner for dinner says she it is an odd time of day to think about dinner there is nothing dressed in the house and the fire is almost out well but says he i must have something to eat and it is almost indifferent to me what for to tell you the truth i was never more hungry in my life then says she i believe there is a piece of cold but i can care it which will fit you nothing better answered jones but i should be obliged to you if you would let it be fried to which the landlady consented and said smiling she was glad to see him so well recovered for the sweetness of our hero's temper was almost irresistible besides she was really no ill-humored woman at the bottom but she loved money so much that she hated everything which had the semblance of poverty jones now returned in order to dress himself while his dinner was preparing and was according to his orders attended by the barber this barber who went by the name of little benderman was a fellow of great oddity and humor which had frequently led him into small inconveniences such as slaps in the face kicks in the breach broken bones etc for everyone doth not understand a jest and those who do are often displeased with being themselves the subjects of it this vice was however incurable in him and though he had often smarted for it yet if he ever conceived a joke he was certain to be delivered of it without the least respect of person's time or place he had a great many other particularities in his character which i shall not mention as the reader will himself very easily perceive them on his farther acquaintance with this extraordinary person jones being impatient to be dressed for a reason which may be easily imagined thought the shaver was very tedious in preparing his suds and begged him to make haste to which the other answered with much gravity for he never discomposed his muscles on any account festina lente is a proverb which i learned long before i ever touched a razor i find friend you are a scholar replied jones a poor one said the barber non omnia posamus unis again said jones i fancy you are good at capping verses excuse me sir said the barber non tanto may dig nor honor a and then proceeding to his operation sir said he since i have dealt in suds i could never discover more than two reasons for shaving the one is to get a beard and the other is to get rid of one i conjecture sir it may not be long since you shave from the former of these motives upon my word you have had good success for one may say of your beard that it is ton venti gravure i conjecture says jones that thou art a very comical fellow you mistake me widely sir said the barber i am too much addicted to the study of philosophy hink ille lacrume sir that's my misfortune too much learning has been my ruin indeed says jones i confess friend you have more learning than generally belongs to your trade but i can't see how it can have injured you alas sir answered the shaver my father disinherited me for it he was a dancing master and because i could read before i could dance he took an aversion to me and left every farthing among his other children will you please to have your temples oh la i ask your pardon i fancy there is hiatus in manuscriptus i heard you was going to the wars but i find it was a mistake why do you conclude so says jones sure sir answered the barber you were too wise a man to carry a broken head thither but that would be carrying coals to new castle upon my word christ jones thou art a very odd fellow and i like thy humor extremely i should be very glad if that will come to me after dinner and drink a glass with me i long to be better acquainted with thee oh dear sir said the barber i can do you 20 times this great a favor if you will accept of it what is that my friend christ jones why i would drink a bottle with you if you please for i dearly love good nature and as you have found me out to be a comical fellow so i have no skill in physiognomy if you were not one of the best natured gentlemen in the new universe jones now walked downstairs neatly dressed and perhaps the fair adonis was not a lovelier figure and yet he had no terms for my landlady for as that good woman did not resemble venus at all in her person so neither did she in her taste happy had it been for nanny the chambermaid if she had seen with the eyes of remistress for that poor girl fell so violently in love with jones in five minutes that her passion afterwards cost her many a sigh this nanny was extremely pretty and altogether as koi for she had refused a drawer and one or two young farmers in the neighborhood but the bright eyes of our hero thought all her ice in a moment when jones returned to the kitchen his cloth was not yet laid nor indeed was there any occasion it should his dinner remaining in statue quo as did the fire which was to dress it this disappointment might have put many a philosophical temper into a passion but it had no such effect on jones he only gave the landlady a gentle rebuke saying since it was so difficult to get it heated he would eat the beef cold but now the good woman whether moved by her compassion or by shame or by whatever other motive i cannot tell first gave her servants a round skull for disobeying the orders which she had never given and then bidding the drawer lay a napkin in the sun she said about the matter in good earnest and soon accomplished it this son into which jones was now conducted was truly named as luchus annun luchendo for it was an apartment into which the sun had scarce ever looked it was indeed the worst room in the house and happy was it for jones that it was so however he was now too hungry to find any fault but having once satisfied his appetite he ordered the drawer to carry a bottle of wine into a better room and expressed some resentment at having been shown into a dungeon the drawer having obeyed his commands he was after some time attended by the barber would not indeed have suffered him to wait so long for his company had he not been listening in the kitchen to the landlady who was entertaining a circle that she had gathered round her with the history of poor jones part of which she had extracted from his own lips and the other part was her own ingenious composition for she said he was a poor parish boy taken into the house of squire all worthy where he was bred up as an apprentice and now turned out of doors for his misdeeds particularly for making love to his young mistress and probably for robbing the house for how else should he come by the little money he has and this says she is your gentleman for sooth a servant of squire all worthy says the barber what's his name why he told me his name was jones says she perhaps he goes by a wrong name nay and he told me too that the squire had maintained him as his own son though he had quarreled with him now and if his name be jones he told you the truths of the barber for I have relations who live in that country nay and some people say he is his son why doth he not go by the name of his father I can't tell that said the barber many people's sons don't go by the name of their father nay said the landlady if I thought he was a gentleman's son though he was a bible I should behave to him in another guest manner for many of these bibles come to be great men and as my poor first husband used to say never affront any customer that's a gentleman chapter five a dialogue between Mr. Jones and the barber this conversation passed partly while jones was at dinner in his dungeon and partly while he was expecting the barber and the parlor and as soon as it was ended Mr. Benjamin as we've said attended him and was very kindly desired to sit down jones then filling out a glass of wine drank his health by the appellation of doctissime tanzorum and then looking very steadfastly at jones he said with great gravity and with a seeming surprise as if he had recollected a face he had seen before sir may I crave the favor to know if your name is not jones to which the other answered that it was the barber how strangely things come to pass Mr. Jones I am your most obedient servant I find you do not know me which indeed is no wonder since you never saw me once and then he was very young praise sir how doth the good spire all worthy how doth ille optimus omnium protronus I find said jones you do indeed know me but I have not the like happiness of recollecting you I do not wonder at that cries Benjamin but I am surprised I did not know you sooner for you are not in the least altered and praise sir may I without a fence inquire whether you are traveling this way fill the glass Mr. Barber says jones and ask no more questions nayser answered Benjamin I would not be troublesome and I hope you don't think me a man of an impertinent curiosity for that is a vice which nobody can lay to my charge but I ask pardon for when a gentleman of your figure travels without his servants we may suppose him to be as we say incazu incognito and perhaps I ought not to have mentioned your name I own says jones I did not expect to have been so well known in this country as I find I am yet for particular reasons I shall be obliged to you if you will not mention my name to any other person till I am gone from hence and I wish no other here knew you but myself for some people have tongues but I promise you I can keep a secret my enemies will allow me that virtue and yet that is not the characteristic of your profession Mr. Barber answered jones Alas sir replied Benjamin I was not born nor brought a barber I assure you I have spent most of my time among gentlemen and though I say it I understand something of gentility and if you would thought me as worthy of your confidence as you have some other people I should have shown you I could have kept a secret better I should not have degraded your name in a public kitchen for indeed sir some people have not used you well for besides making a public proclamation of what you told them of a quarrel between yourself and squire all worthy they added lies of their own things which I knew to be lies you surprise me greatly cries jones upon my word sir answered Benjamin I tell the truth and I need not tell you my landlady was the person I am sure it moved me to hear the story and I hope it is all false for I have a great respect for you I do assure you I have and have had ever since the good nature you showed to black George which was talked of all over the country and I received more than one letter about it indeed it made you beloved by everybody you will pardon me therefore for it was real concern at what I heard made me ask many questions for I have no impertinent curiosity about me but I love good nature and then every profession of friendship easily gains credit with the miserable it is no wonder therefore Jones who besides his being miserable was extremely open-hearted very readily believed all the professions of Benjamin and received him into his bosom the scraps of Latin some of which Benjamin applied properly enough that would did not savor of profound literature seemed yet to indicate something superior to a common barber and so indeed did his whole behavior Jones therefore believed the truth of what he had said as to his original and education and at length after much in treaty he said since you've heard my friend so much of my affairs and seems so desirous to know the truth if you will have patience to hear it I will inform you of the whole patience cries Benjamin thought I will if the chapter was never so long and I am very much obliged to you for the honor you do me Jones now began and related the whole history for getting only a circumstance or two namely everything which passed on that day in which he had fought with Fackham and ended with his resolution to go to sea till the rebellion in the north had made him change his purpose and had brought him to the place where he then was little Benjamin who had been all attention never once interrupted the narrative when it was ended he could not help observing that there must be surely something more invented by his enemies and told Mr. Allworthy against him or so good a man would never have dismissed one he had loved so tenderly in such a manner to which Jones answered he doubted not but such villainous arts had been made use of to destroy him and surely it was scarce possible for anyone to avoid it making the same remark with the barber who had not indeed heard from Jones one single circumstance upon which he was condemned for his actions were not now placed in those injurious lights in which they had been misrepresented to Allworthy nor could he mention those many false accusations which had been from time to time preferred against him to Allworthy for with none of these he was himself acquainted he had likewise as we have observed omitted many material facts in his present relation upon the whole indeed everything now appeared in such favorable colors to Jones that malice itself would have found it no easy matter to fix any blame upon him not that Jones desired to conceal or to disguise the truth nay he would have been more unwilling to have suffered any censure to fall on Mr. Allworthy for punishing him then on his own actions for deserving it but in reality so it happened and so it always will happen for let a man be never so honest the account of his own conduct will in spite of himself be so favorable that his vices will come purified through his lips and like foul liquors well strained will leave all their foulness behind for though the facts themselves may appear yet so different will be the motive circumstances and consequences when a man tells his own story and when his enemy tells it that we scarce can recognize the facts to be one in the same though the barber had drank down this story with greedy ears he was not yet satisfied there was a circumstance beyond which his curiosity cold as it was most eagerly longed for Jones had mentioned the fact of his amour and of his being the rival of bliffle but had cautiously concealed the name of the young lady the barber therefore after some hesitation and many hums and haze at last begged leave to crave the name of the lady who appeared to be the principal cause of all this mischief jones paused a moment and then said since i have trusted you with so much and since i am afraid her name has become too public already on this occasion i will not conceal it from you her name is syphia western prodeum atque hominem fetum squire western had the daughter grown a woman i in such a woman cries jones that the world cannot match no i ever saw anything so beautiful but that is her least excellence such sense such goodness oh i could praise her forever and yet should omit half her virtues mr. western a daughter grown up cries the barber i remember the father a boy well tempus edox verum the wine being now at an end the barber pressed very eagerly to be his bottle but jones absolutely refused saying he had already drank more than he ought and that he now chose to retire to his room where he wished he could procure himself a book a book cries benjamin what book would you have latin or english i have some curious books in both languages such as a razzmi colloquia avid detristibus grado said parnasum and in english i have several of the best books though some of them are a little torn and i have a great part of stoves chronicle the sixth volume of popes homer the third volume of the spectator the second volume of ecard's roman history the craftsman robinson cruzo thomas akampus and two volumes of tom browns works those last christ jones are books i never saw so if you please lend me one of those volumes the barber assured me would be highly entertained for he looked upon the author to have been one of the greatest wits that ever the nation produced he then stepped to his house which was hard buy and immediately returned after which the barber having received very strict injunctions of secrecy from jones and having sworn inviolably to maintain it they separated the barber went home and jones retired to his chamber chapter six in which more of the talents of mr benjamin will appear as well as who this extraordinary person was in the morning jones grew a little uneasy at the desertion of his surgeon as he apprehended some inconvenience or even danger might attend the not dressing his wound he inquired of the drawer what other surgeons were to be met with in that neighborhood the drawer told him there was one not far off but he had known him often refused to be concerned after another had been sent before him but sir says he if he will take my advice there's not a man in the kingdom can do your business better than the barber who was with you last night we look upon him to be one of the ablest men at a cut in all this neighborhood for though we have not been here above three months he has done several great cures the drawer was presently dispatched for little benjamin who being acquainted in what capacity he was wanted prepared himself accordingly and attended but was so different an errant aspect from that which he wore when his basin was under his arm that he could scarce be known to be the same person so tan sir says jones i find you have more trades than one how came you not to inform me of this last night a surgeon answered benjamin with great gravity as a profession not a trade the reason why i did not quaint you last night that i professed this art was that i then concluded you was under the hands of another gentleman and i never loved to interfere with my brethren in their business ours amnibus comunis but now sir if you please i will inspect your head and when i see into your skull i will give my opinion of your case jones had no great faith in this new professor however he suffered him to open the bandage and to look at his wound which as soon as he had done benjamin began to groan and shake his head violently upon which jones in a peevish manner bid him not to play the fool but tell him in what condition he found him shall i answer you as a surgeon or a friend says benjamin as a friend and seriously said jones why then upon my soul cries benjamin it would require a great deal of art to keep you from being well after a very few dressings and if you will suffer me to apply some salve of mine i will answer for the success jones gave his consent and the plaster was applied accordingly there sir cries benjamin now i will if you please resume my former self but a man is obliged to keep up some dignity and discountance while he is performing these operations or the world will not submit to be handled by him you can't imagine sir of how much consequence a grave aspect is to a grave character a barber may make you laugh but a surgeon ought rather to make you cry mr barber or mr surgeon or mr barber said jones oh dear sir answered benjamin interrupting him in fondom regina you base renavare de lorum you recall to my mind that crew separation of the united fraternities so much to the prejudice of both bodies as all separations must be according to the old adage vis unita fortior which to be sure there are not wanting some of one or of the other fraternity who are able to construe what a blow was this to me who unite both in my own person well by whatever name you pleased to be called continued jones you certainly aren't one of the oddest most comical fellows i ever met with and must have something very surprising in your story which you must confess i have a right to hear i do confess it answered benjamin and will very readily acquaint you with it when you have sufficient leisure for i promise you will require a good deal of time jones told him he could never be more at leisure than at present well then said benjamin i will obey you but first i will fasten the door that none may interrupt us he did so and then advancing the solemn air to jones said i must begin by telling you sir that you yourself have been the greatest enemy i ever had jones was a little startled at this sudden declaration i your enemy sir says he with much amazement and some sternness in his look nay be not angry said benjamin for i promise you i am not you were perfectly innocent of having intended me any wrong for you was then an infant but i shall i believe unriddle all this the moment i mentioned my name did you never hear sir of one partridge who had the honor of being reputed your father and the misfortune of being ruined by that honor i have indeed heard of that partridge says jones and have always believed myself to be his son well sir answered benjamin i am that partridge and i hear absolve you from all filial duty for i do assure you you are no son of mine how replied jones and it is it possible that a false suspicion should have drawn all the ill consequences upon you with which i am too well acquainted it is possible cries benjamin for it is so but though it is natural enough for men to hate even the innocent causes of their sufferings yet i am of a different temper i have loved you ever since i heard your behavior to black george as i told you and i am convinced from this extraordinary meeting that you were born to make amends for all i have suffered on that account besides i dreamt the night before i saw you that i stumbled over a stool without hurting myself which plainly showed me something good was towards me and last night i dreamt again that i rode behind you on a milk white mare which is a very excellent dream and betokens much good fortune which i am resolved to pursue unless you have the cruelty to deny me i should be very glad mr partridge answered jones to have it in my power to make you amends for your sufferings on my account though at present i see no likelihood of it however i assure you i will deny you nothing which is in my power to grant it is in your power sure enough replied benjamin for i desire nothing more than leave to attend you in this expedition nay i have so entirely set my heart upon it that if you should refuse me you will kill both a barber and a surgeon in one breath jones answered smiling that he should be very sorry to be the occasion of so much mischief to the public he then advanced many prudential reasons in order to dissuade benjamin whom we shall hear after call partridge from his purpose but all were in vain partridge lied strongly on his dream of the milk white mare besides sir says he i promise you i have as good an inclination to the cause as any man can possibly have and go i will whether you admit me to go in your company or not jones who was as much pleased with partridge as partridge could be with him and he had not consulted his own inclination but the good of the other in desiring him to stay behind when he found his friend so resolute at last gave his consent but then recollecting himself he said perhaps mr partridge you think i should be able to support you but i really am not and then taking out his purse he's told out nine guineas which he declared were his whole fortune partridge answered that his dependence was only on his future favor for he was thoroughly convinced he would shortly have enough in his power at present sir said he i believe i am rather the richer man of the two but all i have is at your service and at your disposal i insist upon your taking the whole and i beg only to attend you in the quality of your servant nil desperandum estoicro duche et auspice toicro but to this generous proposal concerning the money jones would by no means submit it was resolved to set out the next morning when a difficulty arose concerning the baggage for the portmanteau of mr jones was too large to be carried without a horse if i may presume to give my advice said partridge this portmanteau with everything in it except a few shirts should be left behind those i shall be easily able to carry for you and the rest of your clothes will remain very safe locked up in my house this method was no sooner proposed than agreed to and then the barber departed in order to prepare everything for his intended expedition end of section 29 recording by colinda in raymond new hampshire on october 26th 2007 section 30 of tom jones this is a liberox recording all liberox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit liberox.org recording by colinda 7 containing better reasons than any which have yet appeared for the conduct of partridge an apology for the weakness of jones and some further anecdotes concerning my landlady though partridge was one of the most superstitious of men he would hardly perhaps have desired to accompany jones on his expedition merely from the omens of the joint stool and the white mare if his prospect had been no better than to have shared the plunder gained in the field of battle in fact when partridge came to ruminate on the relation he had heard from jones he could not so reconcile to himself that mr allworthy should turn his son for so he most firmly believed him to be out of doors for any reason which he had heard assigned he concluded therefore that the whole was a fiction and that jones of whom he had often from his correspondence heard the wildest character had in reality run away from his father it came into his head therefore that if he could prevail with the young gentleman to return back to his father he should by that means render a service to all worthy which would obliterate all his former anger nay indeed he conceived that very anger was counterfeited and that all worthy had sacrificed him to his own reputation and this is mission indeed he well accounted for from the tender behavior of that excellent man to the founding child from his great severity to partridge who knowing himself to be innocent could not conceive that any other should think him guilty lastly from the allowance which he had privately received long after the annuity had been publicly taken from him and which he looked upon as a kind of smart money or rather by way of atonement for injustice for it is very uncommon I believe for men to ascribe the benefactions they received pure charity when they can possibly impute them to any other motive if he could my any means therefore persuade the young gentleman to return home he doubted not but that he should again be received into the favor of all worthy and well rewarded for his pains nay and should be again restored to his native country a restoration which ulysses himself never wished more heartily than poor partridge as for jones he was well satisfied with the truth of what the other had asserted and believed that partridge had no other inducements but love to him and zeal for the cause a blamable want of caution and diffidence in the veracity of others in which he was highly worthy of censure to say the truth there are two ways which men become possessed of this excellent quality the one is from long experience and the other is from nature which last I presume is often meant by genius or great natural parts and it is infinitely the better of the two not only as we are masters of it much earlier in life but as it is much more infallible and conclusive for a man with been imposed on by ever so many may still hope to find others more honest whereas he who receives certain necessary admonitions from within that this is impossible must have very little understanding indeed if he ever renders himself liable to be once deceived as jones had not this gift from nature he was too young to have gained it by experience for at the diffident wisdom which is to be acquired this way we seldom arrive till very late in life which is perhaps the reason why some old men are apt to despise the understandings of all those who are little younger than themselves jones spent most part of the day in the company of a new acquaintance this was no other than the landlord of the house or rather the husband of the landlady he had but lately made his descent downstairs after a long fit of the gout in which distemper he was generally confined to his room during one half of the year and during the rest he walked about the house smoked his pipe and drank his bottle with his friends without concerning himself in the least with any kind of business he had been bred as they call it a gentleman that is bred up to do nothing and had spent a very small fortune which he inherited from an industrious farmer his uncle in hunting horse racing and cock fighting and had been married by my landlady for certain purposes which he had long since desisted from answering for which she hated him heartily but as he was a surly kind of fellow so she contented herself with frequently upgrading him by disadvantageous comparisons with her first husband whose praise she had eternally in her mouth and as she was for the most part mistress of the profit so she was satisfied to take upon herself the care and government of the family and after a long successful struggle to suffer her husband to be the master of himself in the evening when jones retired to his room a small dispute arose between this fond couple concerning him what says the wife you've been tippling with the gentleman I see yes answered the husband we have cracked a bottle together and a very gentleman like man he is and have a very pretty notion of horse flesh indeed he's young and have not seen much of the world for I believe he has been at very few horse races oh ho he is one of your order is he replied the landlady he must be a gentleman to be sure if he is a horse racer the devil fetched such gentry I am sure I wish I have never seen any of them I have reason to love horse racers truly that you have says the husband for I was one you know yes answered she you are a pure one indeed as my first husband used to say I may put all the good I have ever got by you in my eyes and see never the worse damn your first husband cries he don't damn a better man than yourself answered the wife if he had been alive you'd just not have done it then you think he said I have not so much courage as yourself for you have damned him often enough in my hearing if I did says she I have repented of it many's the good time adopt and if he was so good to forgive me a word spoken in haste or so it does not become such a one as you to twitter me he was a husband to me he was and if ever I did make use of an ill word or so in a passion I never called him rascal I should have told a lie if I called him rascal much more she said but not in his hearing for having lighted his pipe he staggered off as fast as he could we shall therefore transcribe no more for speech as it approached still nearer and nearer to a subject too indelicate to find any place in this history early in the morning partridge appeared at the bedside of Jones ready equipped for the journey with his knapsack at his back this was his own workmanship for besides his other trades he was no indifferent tailor he had already put up his whole stock of linen in it consisting of four shirts to which he now added eight for Mr. Jones and then packing up the portmanteau he was departing with it towards his own house but was stopped in his way by the landlady who refused to suffer any removal still after the payment of the reckoning the landlady was as we have said absolute governess in these regions it was therefore necessary to comply with her rules so the bill was presently written out which amounted to a much larger sum than might have been expected from the entertainment which Jones had met with but here we are obliged to disclose some maxims which publicans hold to be the grand mysteries of their trade the first is if they have anything good in their house which indeed very seldom happens to produce it only to persons who travel with great acupage secondly to charge the same for the very worst provisions as if they were the best and lastly if any of their guests call but for little to make them pay a double price for everything they have so that the amount by the head may be much the same the bill being made and discharged Jones set forward with partridge carrying his knapsack nor did the landlady condescend to wish him a good journey for this was it seems an infrequented by people of fashion and I know not whence it is but all those who get their livelihood by people of fashion contract as much insolence to the rest of mankind as if they really belong to that rank themselves chapter eight Jones arrives at Gloucester and goes to the bell the character of that house and of a petty fogger which he there meets with Mr. Jones and partridge or little Benjamin which epithet of little was perhaps given him ironically him he being in reality near six feet high having left their glass quarters in the manner before described travel on to Gloucester without meeting any adventure worth relating being arrived here they chose for their house of entertainment the sign of the bell an excellent house indeed and which I do most seriously recommend to every reader who shall visit this ancient city the master of it is brother to the great preacher whitefield but is absolutely untainted with the pernicious principles of methodism or of any other heretical sect he is indeed a very honest plain man and in my opinion not likely to create any disturbance either in church or state his wife hath I believe had much pretension to beauty and is still a very fine woman her person in deportment might have made a shining figure in the politest assemblies but though she must be conscious of this and many other perfections she seems perfectly contented with and resigned to that state of life to which she is called and this resignation is entirely owing to the prudence and wisdom of her temper for she is at present as free from any methodistical notions as her husband I say at present for she freely confesses that her brother's documents made at first some impression upon her and that she had put herself to the expense of a long hood in order to attend the extraordinary emotions of the spirit but having found during an experiment of three weeks no emotions she says worth a farthing she very wisely laid by her hood and abandoned the sect to be concise she is a very friendly good natured woman and so industrious to oblige that the guests must be of a very morose disposition who are not extremely well satisfied in her house Mrs. Whitefield happened to be in the yard when Jones and his attendant marched in her sagacity soon discovered in the air of our hero something which distinguished him from the vulgar she ordered her servants therefore immediately to show him into a room and presently afterwards invited him to dinner with herself which invitation he very thankfully accepted for indeed much less agreeable company than that of Mrs. Whitefield and a much worse entertainment that she had provided would have been welcome after so long fasting and so long a walk besides Mr. Jones and the good governance of the mansion there sat down at table and attorney of Salisbury indeed the very same who had brought the news of Mrs. Bliffle's death to Mr. Allworthy and whose name which I think we did not before mention was Dowling there was likewise present another person who styled himself a lawyer and who lived somewhere near Linn Lynch in Somersetshire this fellow I say styled himself a lawyer but was indeed a most vile petty fogger without sense or knowledge of any kind one of those who may be termed train bearers to the law a sort of super numeraries in the profession who are the hackneys of attorneys and will ride more miles for half a crown than a postboy during the time of dinner the Somersetshire lawyer recollected the face of Jones which he had seen at Mr. Allworthy's for he had often visited in that gentleman's kitchen he therefore took occasion to inquire after the good family there with that familiarity which would have become an intimate friend or acquaintance of Mr. Allworthy and indeed he did all in his power to insinuate himself to be such though he had never had the honor of speaking to any person in that family higher than the butler Jones answered all his questions with much civility though he never remembered to have seen the petty fogger before and though he concluded from the outward appearance and behavior of the man that he usurped a freedom with his bedders to which he was by no means entitled as the conversation of fellows of this kind is of all others the most testable to men of any sense the cloth was no sooner removed than Mr. Jones withdrew and a little barbarously left poor Mrs. Whitefield to do a penance which I have often heard Mr. Timothy Harris and other publicans of good taste lament as the severest lot annexed to their calling namely that of being obliged to keep company with their guests Jones had no sooner quitted the room than the petty fogger in a whispering tone asked Mrs. Whitefield if she knew who that fine spark was she answered she had never seen the gentleman before the gentleman indeed replied the petty fogger a pretty gentleman truly why he's the bastard of a fellow who was hanged for horse stealing he was dropped at squire all worthy's door where one of the servants found him in a box so full of rainwater that he would certainly have been drowned had he not been reserved for another fate I you need not mention it I protest we understand what that fate is very well Christ Dowling with the most facetious grin well continued the other the squire ordered him to be taken in for he's a timbersome man everybody knows and was afraid of drawing himself into a scrape and there the bastard was bred up and fed and clothified all to the world like any gentleman and there he got one of the servant maids with child and persuaded her to swear it to the squire himself and afterwards he broke the arm of one Mr. Thwackam a clergyman only because he reprimanded him for following horse and afterwards he snapped a pistol at Mr. Bliffville behind his back and once when squire all worthy was sick he got a drum and beat it all over the house to prevent him from sleeping and twenty other pranks he had played for all which about four or five days ago just before I left the country the squire stripped him stark naked and turned him out of doors and very justly to I protest Christ Dowling I would turn my own son out of doors if he was guilty of half as much and pray what is the name of this pretty gentleman the name on answer the petty fogger why he is called Thomas Jones Jones answered Dowling a little eagerly what Mr. Jones that lived at Mr. Allworthies was that the gentleman that died with us the very same said the other I have heard of that gentleman cried Dowling often but I never heard any ill character of him and I am sure says Mrs. Whitefield if half of what this gentleman have said be true Mr. Jones had the most deceitful countenance I ever saw for sure his looks promise something very different and I must say for the little I have seen of him he is a civil a well bred man as he would wish to converse with petty fogger calling to mind that he had not been sworn as he usually was before he gave his evidence now bound what he had declared with so many oaths and implications the landlady's ears were shocked and she put a stop to his swearing by assuring him of her belief upon which he said I hope madam you imagine I would scorn to tell such things about any man unless I knew them to be true what interest have I in taking away the reputation of a man who never injured me I promise you every syllable of what I have said is fact and the whole country knows it as Mrs. Whitefield had no reason to suspect the petty fogger had any motive or temptation to abuse Jones the reader cannot blame her for believing what he so confidently affirmed with many oaths she accordingly gave up her skill and physiognomy and hence forwards conceived so ill an opinion of her gas that she heartily wished him out of her house this dislike was now farther increased by a report which Mr. Whitefield made from the kitchen where a partridge had informed the company that though he carried the knapsack and contented himself with staying among servants while Tom Jones as he called him was regaling in the parlor he was not his servant but only a friend and companion and as good a gentleman as Mr. Jones himself Dowling sat all this while silent biting his fingers making faces grinning and looking wonderfully arch at last he opened his lips and protested that the gentleman looked like another sort of man he then called for his bill with the utmost haste declared he must be at her for that evening lamented his great hurry of business and wish he could divide himself into twenty pieces in order to be at once in twenty places the petty fogger now likewise departed and then Jones desired the favor of Mrs. Whitefield's company to drink tea with him but she refused and with a manner so different from that which she had received him at dinner that it a little surprised him and now he soon perceived her behavior totally changed for instead of that natural affability which we have before celebrated she wore a constrained severity on her countenance which was so disagreeable to Mr. Jones that he resolved however late to quit the house that evening he did indeed account somewhat unfairly for this sudden change for besides some hard and unjust surmises concerning female fickleness and mutability he began to suspect that he owed this want of civility to his want of horses a sort of animals which as they dirty no sheets are thought in inns to pay better for their beds than their riders and are therefore considered as the more desirable company but Mrs. Whitefield to do her justice had a much more liberal way of thinking she was perfectly well bred and could be very civil to a gentleman though he walked on foot in reality she looked on our hero as a sorry scandal and therefore treated him as such for which not even Jones himself had he known as much as the reader could have blamed her nay on the contrary he must have approved her conduct and have esteemed her the more for the disrespect shown towards himself this is indeed a most aggravating circumstance which attends depriving men unjustly of their reputation for a man who is conscious of having an ill character cannot justly be angry with those who neglect and slight him but odd rather to despise such as affect his conversation unless we're a perfect intimacy must have convinced them that their friend's character had been falsely and injuriously dispersed this was not however the case of Jones for as he was a perfect stranger to the truth so he was with good reason offended at the treatment he received he therefore paid his reckoning and departed highly against the will of Mr. Partridge who having remonstrated much against it to no purpose at last condescended to take up his knapsack and to attend his friend chapter nine containing several dialogues between Jones and Partridge concerning love cold hunger and other matters with the lucky and narrow escape of Partridge as he was on the very brink of making a fatal discovery to his friend the shadows began now to ascend larger from the high mountains the feathered creation had betaken themselves to their rest now the highest order of mortals were sitting down to their dinners and the lowest order to their suppers in a word the clock struck five just as Mr. Jones took his leave of Gloucester an hour at which as it was now midwinter the dirty fingers of night would have drawn her sable curtain over the universe had not the moon forbid her who now with a face as broad and as red as those of some jolly mortals who like her and turn night into day began to rise from her bed where she had slumbered away the day in order to sit up all night Jones had not traveled far before he paid his compliments to that beautiful planet and turning to his companion asked him if he had ever beheld so delicious an evening Partridge making no ready answer to his question he proceeded to comment on the beauty of the moon and repeated some passages from Milton who had certainly excelled all other poets in his description of the heavenly luminaries he then told Partridge the story from the spectator of two lovers who had agreed to entertain themselves when they were at a great distance from each other by repairing at a certain fixed hour to look at the moon thus pleasing themselves with the thought that they were both employed in contemplating the same object at the same time those lovers added he must have had souls truly capable of feeling all the tenderness of the sublimest of all human passions very probably Christ Partridge but I envy them more if they had had bodies incapable of feeling cold for I am almost frozen to death and I'm very much afraid I shall lose a piece of my nose before we get to another house of entertainment nay truly we may well expect some judgment should happen to us for our folly and running away so by night from one of the most excellent ends I have ever set my foot into I am sure I never saw more good things in my life and the greatest lord in the land cannot live better in his own house than he may there and to forsake such a house and go rambling about the country the lord knows wither per diva roar of VRM I say nothing for my part but some people might not have charity enough to conclude we were in our sober senses fire upon it Mr. Partridge says Jones have a better heart consider you are going to face an enemy and are you afraid of facing a little cold I wish indeed we had a guide to advise us which of these roads we should take may I be so bold says Partridge to offer my advice interdome stultas opportuna locator why which of them Christ Jones would you recommend truly neither of them answered Partridge the only road we can be certain of finding is the road we came a good hearty pace will bring us back to Gloucester in an hour but if we go forward the Lord Harry knows when we shall arrive at any place for I see at least 50 miles before me and no house in all the way you see indeed a very fair prospect says Jones which receives great additional beauty from the extreme luster of the moon however I will keep the left hand track as that seems to lead directly to those hills which we were informed by not far from Worcester and here if you were inclined to quit me you may and return back again but for my part I am resolved to go forward it is unkind in you sir says Partridge to suspect me of any such intention what I have advised has been as much on your account as on my own but since you were determined to go on I am as much determined to follow Ypresse Quartet they now traveled some miles without speaking to each other during which suspense of discourse Jones often sighed and Benjamin groaned as bitterly though from a very different reason at length Jones made a full stop and turning about cries who knows Partridge but the loveliest creature in the universe may have her eyes now fixed on the very moon which I behold at this instant very likely sir answered Partridge and if my eyes were fixed on a good sirloin of roast beef the devil might take the moon and her horns into the bargain did ever try Montaigne make such an answer Christ Jones Prithee Partridge was thou ever susceptible of love in thy life or had time worn away all the traces of it from thy memory a lack a day Christ Partridge well would it have been for me if I had never known what love was in fandom Regina you base for Novare Dolorum I am sure I have tasted all the tenderness and sublimities and bitternesses of the passion was your Mr. Sun kind then says Jones very unkind indeed sir answered Partridge for she married me and made one of the most confounded wives in the world however heaven be praised she's gone and if I believe she was in the moon according to a book I once read which teaches that to be the receptacle of departed spirits I would never look at it for fear of seeing her but I wish sir that the moon was a looking glass for your sake and the miss Sophia Western was now placed before it my dear Partridge Christ Jones what a thought was there a thought which I am certain could never have entered into any mind but that of a lover all Partridge could I hope once again to see that face but alas all those golden dreams are vanished forever and my only refuge from future misery is to forget the object of all my former happiness and do you really despair of ever seeing this Western again answered Partridge if you will follow my advice I will engage you shall not only see her but have her in your arms ha do not awaken a thought of that nature Christ Jones I have struggled sufficiently to conquer all such wishes already nay answered Partridge if you do not wish to have your mistress in your arms you are a most extraordinary lover indeed well well says Jones let us avoid this subject but pray what is your advice to give it to you in the military phrase then says Partridge as we are soldiers to the right about let us return the way we came we may yet reach Gloucester tonight though late whereas if we proceed we are likely for odd I see to ramble about forever without coming either to a house or home I have already told you my resolution is to go on answered Jones but I would have you go back I'm obliged to you for your company hither and I beg you to accept a guinea as a small instance of my gratitude nay it would be cruel in me to suffer you to go any farther for to deal plainly with you my chief end and desire is a glorious death in the service of my king and country as for your money replied Partridge I beg sir you will put it up I will receive none of you at this time for at present I am I believe the richer man of the two and as your resolution is to go on so mine is to follow you if you do nay now my presence appears absolutely necessary to take care of you since your intentions are so desperate for I promise you my views are much more prudent as you are resolved to fall in battle if you can so I am resolved this firmly to come to no hurt if I can help it and indeed I have the comfort to think there will be but little danger for a popish priest told me the other day the business would soon be over and he believed without a battle a popish priest cried Jones I have heard is not always to be believed when he speaks in behalf of his religion yes but so far and said the other from speaking in behalf of his religion he assured me the Catholics did not expect to be any gainers by the change for that Prince Charles was stood a Protestant as any in England and that nothing but regard to right made him and the rest of the popish party to be Jacobites I believe him to be as much a Protestant as I believe he had any rights as Jones and I make no doubt of our success but not without a battle so that I am not so sanguine as your friend the popish priest nay to be sure sir answered Partridge all the prophecies I have ever read speak of a great deal of blood to be spilt in the quarrel and the Miller with three thumbs who is now alive is to hold the horses of three kings up to his knees in blood Lord have mercy upon us all and send better times with what stuff and nonsense has thou filled thy head answered Jones this too I suppose comes from the popish priest monsters and prodigies are the proper arguments to support monstrous and absurd doctrines the cause of King George is the cause of liberty and true religion in other words it is the cause of common sense my boy and I warrant you will succeed though briaries himself was to rise again with his hundred thumbs and to turn Miller Partridge made no reply to this he was indeed cast into the utmost confusion by this declaration of Jones for to inform the reader of a secret which he had no proper opportunity of revealing before Partridge was in truth a Jacobite and had concluded that Jones was of the same party and was now proceeding to join the rebels an opinion which was not without foundation for the tall long-sided dame mentioned by Huda Brass that many eyed many tongued many mouths many eared monster of Virgil had related the story of the quarrel between Jones and the officer with the usual regard to truth she had indeed changed the name of Sophia into that of the pretender and had reported that drinking his health was the cause for which Jones was knocked down this Partridge had heard and most firmly believed tis no wonder therefore that he had thence entertained the above mentioned opinion of Jones and which he had almost discovered to him before he found out his own mistake and at this the reader will be the less inclined to wonder if he pleases to recollect the doubtful phrase in which Jones first communicated his resolution to Mr. Partridge and indeed had the words been less ambiguous Partridge might very well have construed them as he did being persuaded as he was that the whole nation were of the same inclination in their hearts nor did it stagger him that Jones had traveled in the company of soldiers for he had the same opinion of the army which he had of the rest of the people but however well affected he might be to James or Charles he was still much more attached to little Benjamin than to either for which reason he no sooner discovered the principles of his fellow traveler than he thought proper to conceal and outwardly give up his own to the man who on whom he depended for the making his fortune since he by no means believed the affairs of Jones to be so desperate as they really were with Mr. Allworthy for as he had kept a constant correspondence with some of his neighbors since he left that country he had heard much indeed more than was true of the great affection Mr. Allworthy bore this young man who as Partridge had been instructed was to be that gentleman's heir and whom as we have said he did not in the least doubt to be his son he imagined therefore that whatever quarrel was between them it would be certainly made up at the return of Mr. Jones an event from which he promised great advantages if he could take this opportunity of ingratiating himself with that young gentleman and if he could by any means be instrumental in procuring his return he doubted not as we have before said but it would as highly advance him in the favor of Mr. Allworthy we have already observed that he was a very good natured fellow and he had himself declared the violent attachment he had to the person and character of Jones but possibly the views which I have just before mentioned might likewise have some little share in prompting him to undertake this expedition at least in urging him to continue it after he had discovered that his master and himself like some prudent fathers and sons though they traveled together in great friendship had embraced opposite parties I am led into this conjecture by having remarked that the love friendship esteem and such like have very powerful operations in the human mind interest however is an ingredient seldom emitted by wise men when they would work others to their own purposes this is indeed a most excellent medicine and like wards pill flies at once to the particular part of the body on which you desire to operate whether it be the tongue the hand or any other member where it scarce ever fails of immediately producing the desired effect end of section 30 recording by Kalinda in Raymond, New Hampshire on October 28th 2007