The Fortunate Foundlings

<p><em>The Fortunate Foundlings </em>was one of Eliza Haywood's more successful novels though it remains one of her lesser known works. Ittells the story of a brother and sister left as babies in the care of a gentleman. Like many another eighteenth-century foundling the siblings leave their guardian behind and make their own way in the world: Horatio as a soldier and Louisa as a lady's companion finding love and adventure in the battlefields and courts of Europe. Haywood uses the Continental setting to explore different customs - especially those that might benefit women - and different political choices.</p><p>Also published here for the first time is her anonymous pamphlet of 1750 <em>A Letter from H--- G---g Esq.</em> ostensibly a letter from Charles Edward Stuart's <em>aide-de-camp</em> travelling with him after the prince's expulsion from France. Seemingly a straightforward expression of Jacobite sympathies it also encodes support for the Patriot cause of the 1740s and '50s.</p><p>Both works were translated and adapted having an extended afterlife in the writings of Crébillon <em>fils</em> Edward Kimber and Robert Louis Stevenson. They add to our expanding sense of the author's range influence and political agenda.</p><p>Edward Kimber's adaptation Crébillon's version <em>The Happy Orphans</em> is also available in the MHRA Critical Texts series.</p>