appeared, when opposed to the
virtues of Master Blifil, his companion--a youth of so different a
caste from little Jones, that not only the family but all the
neighborhood resounded his praises. He was indeed a lad of a
remarkable disposition; sober, discreet, and pious beyond his
age,--qualities which gained him the love of every one who knew him;
whilst Tom Jones was universally disliked, and many exprest their
wonder that Mr. Allworthy would suffer such a lad to be educated with
his nephew, lest the morals of the latter should be corrupted by his
example.

An incident which happened about this time will set the character of
these two lads more fairly before the discerning reader than is in the
power of the longest dissertation.

Tom Jones, who bad as he is must serve for the hero of this history,
had only one friend among all the servants of the family; for as to
Mrs. Wilkins, she had long since given him up, and was perfectly
reconciled to her mistress. This friend was the gamekeeper, a fellow
of a loose kind of disposition, and who was thought not to entertain
much stricter notions concerning the difference of _meum_ and _tuum_
than the young gentleman himself. And hence this friendship gave
occasion to many sarcastical remarks among the domestics, most of
which were either proverbs before, or at least are become so now; and
indeed, the wit of them all may be comprised in that short Latin
proverb, "_Noscitur a socio_," which I think is thus exprest in
English: "You may know him by the company he keeps."

To say the truth, some of that atrocious wickedness in Jones, of which
we have just mentioned three examples, might perhaps be derived from
the encouragement he had received from this fellow, who in two or
three instances had been what the law calls an accessory after the
fact. For the whole duck and a great part of the apples were converted
to the use of the gamekeeper and his family. Tho as Jones alone was
discovered, the poor lad bore not only the whole smart but the whole
blame; both which fell again to his lot on the following occasion.

Contiguous to Mr. Allworthy's estate was the manor of one of those
gentlemen who are called preservers of the game. This species of men,
from the great severity with which they revenge the death of a hare or
a partridge, might be thought to cultivate the same superstition with
the Bannians in India, many of whom, we are told, dedicate their whole
lives to the preservatio