Tom brings Nightingale’s uncle back to the Millers, and everything goes wonderfully. The uncle (remember, he’s under the impression that the wedding already happened) is very supportive, absolutely making up for his father’s clear antagonism. Nancy is overjoyed, Nightingale is happy, Mrs. Miller pulls Tom into another room to lavish gratitude and praise on him–she’s sussed out that he’s the one who got the uncle on board. Everything is going so well that the reader knows another shoe is going to drop.
And it does–Nightingale is so drunk he confesses everything to his uncle. And that support vanishes in the light of reality. Oh? You’re not married? Excellent, there’s time to prevent the mistake. He agrees with his nephew to not change the way he treats Nancy if Nightingale will go home with him to continue their argument. When they get back to the party, the women can tell something’s different, even if the two are on their best behavior. Tom can tell, too–and he correctly guesses what’s going on, and plans on fixing things.
But–of course there’s a but–you don’t get a novel this long if every plan doesn’t “gang aft agley,” right? While Tom is deciding how he’s going to proceed,
the maid of the house informed him that a gentlewoman desired to speak with him.——He went immediately out, and, taking the candle from the maid, ushered his visitant upstairs, who, in the person of Mrs Honour, acquainted him with such dreadful news concerning his Sophia, that he immediately lost all consideration for every other person; and his whole stock of compassion was entirely swallowed up in reflections on his own misery, and on that of his unfortunate angel.
That’s bad enough, but Fielding has to follow that up with:
What this dreadful matter was, the reader will be informed, after we have first related the many preceding steps which produced it, and those will be the subject of the following book.
I think every reality competition show host must study this technique, “the contestant going home this week is….revealed after the break.”
We get our customary commentary from Fielding to open the next book. This time, it’s short and to the point, too all the writers/philosophers/whatever “who teach that virtue is the certain road to happiness, and vice to misery, in this world.” He states, this is “a very wholesome and comfortable doctrine, and to which we have but one objection, namely, that it is not true.”
We see that in the way that Tom is trying to do the virtuous thing with Nightingale and Nancy, yet things with Sophia aren’t going well for him. He develops the idea a bit more, but not much before concluding, “But as the reader’s curiosity (if he hath any) must be now awake, and hungry, we shall provide to feed it as fast as we can.”
So, Lady Bellaston is jealous of poor Sophia. She needs to get her out of the way if she’s going to have Tom all to herself. Several chapters back, when there was that commotion at the play, which brought Sophia home early, interrupting the visit between Tom and Bellaston–Sophia’d been escorted home by a young gentleman. He’d seen her around town a little bit and after the play, had developed a little crush on her.
He came to check on her the next day, visited for a while, and convinced himself he was in love. Bellaston hatches a plan, on the one hand trying to make Sophia all the more appealing to him, but at the same time warning Lord Fellmar before he thinks of proposing,
“there is a bar, which I am almost ashamed to mention; and yet it is one you will never be able to conquer. You have a rival, my lord, and a rival who, though I blush to name him, neither you, nor all the world, will ever be able to conquer…he is,” said she, “what I am sorry to say most happy men with us are, one of the lowest fellows in the world. He is a beggar, a bastard, a foundling, a fellow in meaner circumstances than one of your lordship’s footmen.”
As Sophia’s a silly country-girl, she has these silly romantic notions that she can overcome these deficiencies in character.
The two come to an agreement (okay, Fellmar falls into her trap), he’ll come and spend more time with Sophia to try to pry her away from Tom, while witnessing for himself just how devoted Sophia is. From the chapter titles, we get more of this next week.
I’m not sure what the point of the Nightingale/Nancy storyline is–unless it’s just to prove one more time that despite everything else we know about him, Tom’s a pretty good guy who’s always willing to help those who need it. Which I guess is always good to see about a protagonist. Especially one who seems to attract scandal and trouble the way Tom does.
Bellaston, despite being a lousy excuse for a human being, is pretty entertaining. “Oh, you must rescue my innocent cousin from this low bellow, so I can have him all for myself.” And the dullard falls for it. Still, I wonder how this turns bad for Sophia (which I guess is the point of Fielding’s tease).
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