The secret subtle influence of jealousy had long been fermenting, and
now it exploded in this way and under this disguise.

Ah! William Fielding, and all of you, "Beware of jealousy"--cursed
jealousy! it is the sultan of all the passions, and the Tartar chief
of all the crimes. Other passions affect the character; this changes,
and, if good, always reverses it! Mind that, reverses it! turns honest
men to snakes, and doves to vultures. Horrible unnatural mixture of
Love with Hate--you poison the whole mental constitution--you bandage
the judgment--you crush the sense of right and wrong--you steel the
bowels of compassion--you madden the brain--you corrupt the heart--you
damn the soul.

The Fieldings, then, shook hands mechanically, and receding each a
step began to spar.

Each of these farmers fancied himself slightly the best man; but they
both knew they had an antagonist with whom it would not do to make the
least mistake.

They therefore sparred and feinted with wary eye before they ventured
to close; George, however, the more impetuous, was preparing to come
to closer quarters when all of a sudden, to the other's surprise, he
dropped his hands by his sides, and turned the other way with a face
anything but warlike, fear being now the prominent expression.

William followed the direction of his eye, and then William partook
his brother's uneasiness; however, he put his hands in his pockets,
and began to saunter about, in a circumference of three yards, and to