theatre in Goodman's Fields, which had then just been opened by Thomas
Odell; and it may be presumed that his incentive was rather want of
funds than desire of fame. _The Temple Beau_ certainly shows an advance
upon its predecessor; but it is an advance in the same direction,
imitation of Congreve; and although Geneste ranks it among the best of
Fielding's plays, it is doubtful whether modern criticism would sustain
his verdict. It ran for a short time, and was then withdrawn. The
Prologue was the work of James Ralph, afterwards Fielding's colleague in
the _Champion_, and it thus refers to the prevailing taste. The
_Beggar's Opera_ had killed Italian song, but now a new danger had
arisen,--

"Humour and Wit, in each politer Age,
Triumphant, rear'd the Trophies of the Stage:
But only Farce, and Shew, will now go down,
And Harlequin's the Darling of the Town."

As if to confirm his friend's opinion, Fielding's next piece combined
the popular ingredients above referred to. In March following he
produced at the Haymarket, under the pseudonym of Scriblerus Secundus,
_The Author's Farce_, with a "Puppet Show" called _The Pleasures of the
Town_. In the Puppet Show, Henley, the Clare-Market Orator, and Samuel
Johnson, the quack author of the popular _Hurlothrumbo_, were smartly
satirised, as also was the fashionable craze for Opera and Pantomime.
But the most enduring part of this odd medley is the farce which
occupies the two first acts, and under thin disguises no doubt depicts
much which was within the writer's experience. At all events, Luckless,
the author in the play, has more than one of the characteristics which
distinguish the traditional portrait of Fielding himself in his early
years. He wears a laced coat, is in love, writes plays, and cannot pay