shows unmistakably that Shamela was attributed to Fielding by contemporary gossip. But then so was The Causidicade (p. 112), and The Apology for the Life of Mr. The’ Cibber, Comedian (p. 72). I still cling to the hope that Fielding was not the author of Shamela. The matter is examined at some length at pp. 42-45 of the “Men of Letters” Memoir of Richardson; and it is plain that, if Fielding had wished to father it, he would have included it in the Miscellanies of 1743.
The remaining points which call for notice are little more than dispersed adversaria. To the amende honorable which Fielding made to Richardson in the Jacobites Journal (pp. 113-14) should be added a further passage from the later Covent-Garden Journal, No. 10— Pleasantry (as the ingenious Author of Clarissa says of a Story) “should be made only the Vehicle of Instruction.” Among other places connected with the composition of Tom Jones (p. 118) may be mentioned Widcombe House, Bath (then Mr. Philip Bennet’s), a Palladian villa close to the road from Widcombe Hill to Prior Park; and, if we are to believe Rambles round Edge Hills, 1896, p. 17, Fielding actually read that work in MS. to Lyttelton and Lord Chatham in the dining-room of Radway Grange in Warwickshire (Mr. Miller’s). It should also be added that the agreement for Tom Jones (p. 121), dated 5th March 1749, together with Fielding’s antecedent receipt for the money, dated 11th June 1748, of which in 1883 I could obtain no tidings, are (or were lately) in the Huth collection. But perhaps the most important item which has come to light since 1883 is the Will discovered in the Prerogative Court of Canterbury by Mr. George A. Aitken. It is undated, though it was evidently executed at Ealing in the novelist’s last days, and runs as follows:—
“In the name of God Amen. I Henry Fielding of the Parish of Ealing in the County of Middlesex do hereby give and bequeath unto Ralph Allen of Prior Park in the County of Somerset Esqr. and to his heirs executors administrators and assigns for ever for the use of the said Ralph his heirs, &c. all my estate real and personal and whatsoever and do appoint him sole executor of this my last will Beseeching
