_"'Tis not the Poet's wit affords the Jest, But who can Cat-call, Hiss, or Whistle best."_ In previous years the brilliant Leyden student might have merely derided his enemies; to the Fielding of February 1735, struggling to support himself and his beautiful country bride, this 'cruel usage' of his 'poor Play' assumed a graver aspect: _"Can then another's Anguish give you Joy? Or is it such a Triumph to destroy? We, like the fabled Frogs, consider thus, This may be Sport to you, but it is Death to us."_ This note of personal protest recalls an indisputably reminiscent observation in _Amelia_, to the effect that although the kindness of a faithful and beloved wife compensates most of the evils of life, it "rather serves to aggravate the misfortune of distressed circumstances, from the consideration of the share which she is to bear in them." We all know how bravely Amelia bore that share; how cheerfully she would cook the supper; how firmly she confronted disaster. To realise how deeply Fielding felt the pain of such struggles when falling upon "the best, the worthiest and the noblest of women" we need but turn again to his own pages. If, cries Amelia's husband, when his distresses overwhelm him, "if I was to suffer alone, I think I could bear them with some philosophy"; and again "this was the first time I had ever felt that distress which arises from the want of money; a distress very dreadful indeed in the married state for what can be more miserable than to see anything necessary to the preservation of the beloved creature and not be able to supply it?" To supply for his Celia much less than the necessities of life Harry Fielding would undoubtedly have stripped his coat, and his shirt with it, off his back; but, at the end of this same month of February, fortune made the young couple sudden amends for the anxieties that seem to have surrounded them. This turn of the wheel is reflected with curious accuracy by an anonymous satirist of 1735: "F---g, who _Yesterday_ appear'd so rough, Clad in coarse Frize, and plaister'd down with _Snuff_, See how his _Instant_ gaudy _Trappings_ shine; What _Play-house_ Bard was ever seen so fine! But this, not from his _Humour_ glows, you'll say But mere _Necessity_;--for last Night lay In pawn the Velvet which he wears to Day." [3]