History of Tom Jones, a Foundling

Chapter iii. – Chapter vi.

The section opens with Tom Jones in a difficult position: Sophia Western has sent a desperate letter through her maid Honour, charging him by all his regard for her not to visit her lodgings, since she fears Lady Bellaston already suspects their attachment. Deprived of both Sophia’s company and any honest excuse for refusing Lady Bellaston’s appointment, Jones deliberates through a sleepless night and resolves to feign illness, dispatching an excuse to Lady Bellaston and an answer to Sophia. His landlady Mrs Miller, however, soon arrives to deliver a scolding of her own: she has endured a night of scandalous noise from Jones’s female visitors, with chairmen jesting in the entry past two in the morning, and she demands he cease such conduct or remove. To Jones’s alarm, she reveals she knows he is connected to the great Mr Allworthy of Somersetshire, a disclosure he angrily traces to Partridge, who protests that it was Honour herself who carelessly named Allworthy in Mrs Miller’s hearing. Partridge, with absurd volubility, denies all blame and vows he can keep a secret, eventually setting Jones to laughing and ending his anger. Jones resolves to seek new lodgings, and his friend Mr Nightingale soon joins him, confiding that he too intends to quit the same house.

The conversation between Jones and Nightingale turns moral. Jones, having long observed that Nightingale’s flirtations with Nancy Miller have gone far beyond common gallantry, reproaches him for raising the girl’s expectations without intending marriage. Nightingale confesses that he genuinely loves Nancy but is bound by a marriage his father has arranged with a wealthy woman he has never seen; he asks Jones not to speak of his departure, as he cannot bear the pain of taking leave. The narrator pauses to comment that Nightingale is a man of strict honour in trade and ordinary life, yet in love-affairs loose in his morals, glorying in conquests of which, the narrator suggests, a man ought rather to be ashamed.

A short account follows of Mrs Miller’s history, told to Jones over tea. Born a gentlewoman whose father, an army officer, died leaving the family destitute, she had been rescued from ruin by Mr Allworthy himself, who sent her twenty guineas, settled an annuity of fifty pounds a year upon her, and placed her in the lodging-house she now keeps. When Jones corrects her belief that he is a relation of Allworthy’s, she replies that Allworthy himself has told her all, and that the words “dishonourable birth” are nonsense, since children can derive no real dishonour from an act of which they are entirely innocent. The good woman is prevailed upon to permit one last female visit.

That night, Jones is awakened by uproar: Nancy has fainted, having received a letter from Nightingale announcing he is to marry another. Mrs Miller, in floods of tears, shows Jones the letter, in which Nightingale, signing himself “J. N.,” coldly recommends that the unhappy consequence of their love be concealed from the world. He promises to provide for her, but commands her to forget him as a lover. The mother declares that the disclosure of her daughter’s disgrace, twice attempted suicide, and the threat to her younger daughter Betsy have left her family in ruins. Little Betsy herself, a child of astonishing tenderness, begs Jones not to abandon her mamma and sister, declaring she is not afraid to die if she may go with those she loves. Jones weeps, comforts the child, and vows to confront Nightingale.

At Nightingale’s new lodgings, Jones paints the family’s misery in the liveliest colours, demanding that he either marry Nancy or answer for her death. Nightingale protests that his father has forbidden the match and that he is to wait on the intended bride the next morning. When Jones suggests the scandal once it spreads will be worse than any confession, Nightingale half-wishes the marriage were already done, and Jones undertakes to represent the matter to the old gentleman as an accomplished fact. He finds the elder Mr Nightingale in a singularly good humour, having just concluded a long bargain with the father of the intended Miss Harris. Believing Jones a friend of his son come to plead the cause of Miss Harris, he welcomes the supposed news that his son is married — until Jones reveals the bride is Nancy Miller, a lodging-house keeper’s daughter of no fortune. The father bursts into fury, but his brother, the uncle, a country gentleman of different principles who has loved his nephew almost as his own child, intervenes with a long argument that parents ought not to prescribe happiness, that the elder Mr Nightingale’s own conduct in bargaining for a woman he had never seen invited the son’s rebellion, and that to disinherit the boy for an error not unpardonable would only widen his misery.

At Mrs Miller’s house, the uncle, having plied his nephew with wine, draws the young man aside, only to learn the marriage has not yet taken place. The uncle, overjoyed, urges his nephew to break with the girl, arguing that honour is a creature of the world’s making and that women’s hearts are tough. Nightingale, however, insists he would be his Nancy’s murderer by breaking her heart. The uncle, distracted by news that his own daughter Harriet has eloped with a poor neighbouring clergyman, leaves the matter unresolved, and young Nightingale, somewhat flustered, departs with him. Jones, left to wonder whether the truth has been revealed, is summoned to Mrs Honour, who brings dreadful news.

Parallel to these events, the section traces Lady Bellaston’s black design against Sophia. A young nobleman, Lord Fellamar, who had rescued Sophia from the insults of the town at the playhouse, has conceived a violent passion for her and visits her for two hours under the guise of compliment. Lady Bellaston, perceiving that Sophia stands between her and the full indulgence of her desires for Jones, resolves to remove her, and in private conversation with Fellamar paints Jones as a beggar, a bastard, a foundling — a fellow in meaner circumstances than his lordship’s footmen — and hints that only “violent methods” can prevent Sophia’s ruin. To this end, she enlists Tom Edwards, a member of a comic society of habitual fib-tellers, to spread a false report during a card-game that Jones has been killed in a duel. Sophia, hearing the news, faints, and Lady Bellaston uses the occasion to convince Fellamar that Sophia is in desperate danger from Jones and that he alone can save her by marrying her, even by force if necessary. Fellamar, persuaded that the conquest of so inestimable a jewel justifies the means, agrees to a plot whereby Sophia shall be left alone and he admitted to her chamber the following evening at seven.