striking portrait' of this pedagogue in the Rev. Mr Trulliber, the
pig-breeding parson of _Joseph Andrews_. If this be so, Harry Fielding's
first tutor at Stour was of a figure eminently calculated to foster the
comic genius of his pupil. "He" (Trulliber), wrote that pupil, some thirty
years later, "was indeed one of the largest Men you should see, and could
have acted the part of Sir _John Falstaff_ without stuffing. Add to this,
that the Rotundity of his Belly was considerably increased by the
shortness of his Stature, his shadow ascending very near as far in height
when he lay on his Back, as when he stood on his Legs. His Voice was loud
and hoarse, and his Accents extremely broad; to complete the whole he had
a Stateliness in his Gait when he walked, not unlike that of a Goose, only
he stalked slower." It appears that the widow of the Motcombe curate
denied the alleged portrait; but the house where Mr Oliver lived, "seemed
to accord with Fielding's description ... and an old woman who remembered
him observed that 'he dearly loved a bit of good victuals, and a drop of
drink.'" Bearing in mind the great novelist's own earnest declaration that
he painted "not men but manners," we may fairly assume that his
Dorsetshire tutor belonged to that class of coarse farmer-parson so justly
satirised in the person of Trulliber. According to another sketch of
Fielding's life, his early education was also directed by the rector of
Stour Provost, "his Parson Adams." [4]

While Harry Fielding was thus learning his first rudiments, his father,
the colonel, seems to have been engaged in less useful pursuits in
London. The nature of these pursuits appears from a _Bill of Complaint_,
which by a happy chance has been preserved, between "Edmund Fielding of
East Stour, Dorsetshire," and one Robert Midford, pretending to be a
captain of the army. In this _Bill_ [5] the said Edmund declares that in
1716, being then resident in London, he often frequented Princes
Coffee-house in the Parish of St James. At Princes he found his company