ning creature, who had often pressed me to it, but found that I could not do it, makes a story of her own inventing, and comes in bluntly to me when we were together. "O widow," said she, "I have bad news to tell you this morning." "What is that," said I, "are the Virginia ships taken by the French?" for that was my fear. "No, no," says she, "but the man you sent to Bristol yesterday for money is come back, and says he has brought you none." Now I could by no means like her project: I thought it looked too much like prompting him, which indeed he did not want, and I saw clearly that I should lose nothing by being backward to ask, so I took her up short; "I can't imagine why he should say so to you," said I, “for I assure you he brought me all the money I sent him for, and here it is," said I, pulling out my purse with about twelve guineas in it, and added, "I intend you shall have most of it by and by." He seemed displeased a little at her talking as she did at first, as well as I, taking it as I fancied he would, as something forward of her; but when he saw me give such an answer, he came immediately to himself again. The next morning we talked of it again, when I found he was fully satisfied; and smiling said, he hoped I would not want money and not tell him of it, and I had promised him otherwise. I told him I had been very much dissatisfied at my landlady's talking so publicly the day before of what she had nothing to do with; but I supposed she wanted what I owed her, which was about eight guineas, which I had resolved to give her, and had accordingly given it her the same night she talked so foolishly. He was in a mighty good humour when he heard me say I had paid her, and it went off into some other discourse at that time; but the next morning having heard me up about my room before him, he called to me, and I answering, he asked me to come into his chamber. He was in bed when I came in, and he made me come and sit down on his bed-side, for he said he had something to say to me which was of some moment. After some very kind expressions, he asked me if I would be very honest to him, and give a sincere answer to one thing he would desire of me. After some little cavil with him at the word sincere, and asking him if I had ever given him any answers which were not sincere, I promised him I would; why then his request was, he said, to let him see my purse; I immediately put my hand into my pocket, and laughing at him, pulled it out, and there was in it three guineas and a half; then he asked me if there was all the money I had? I told him no, laughing again, not by great deal. Well then, he said, he would have me promise to go and fetch him all the money I had, every farthing. I told him I would, and I went into my chamber, and fetched him a little private drawer, where I had about six guineas more, and some silver, and threw it down upon the bed, and told him there was all my wealth, honestly to a shilling. He looked a little at it, but did not tell it, and huddled it all into the drawer again, and reaching his pocket, pulled out a key, and bid me then open a little walnut-tree box he had upon the table, and bring him such a drawer, which I did, in which drawer there was a great deal of money in gold, I believe near two hundred guineas, but I knew not how much. He took the drawer, and taking my hand, made me put it in, and take a whole handful; I was backward at that, but he held my hand hard in his hand, and put it into the drawer, and made me take out as many guineas almost as I could well take up at once. When I had done so he made me put them into my lap, and took my little drawer, and poured out all my own money among his, and bad me get me gone, and carry it all home into my own chamber. I relate this story the more particularly because of the good humour there was in it, and to show the temper with which we conversed. It was not long after this, but he began every day to find fault with my clothes, with my laces, and head-dresses; and, in a word, pressed me to buy better, which by the way I was willing enough to do, though I did not seem to be so, for I loved nothing in the world better than fine clothes; I told him I must housewife the money he had lent me, or else I should not be able to pay him again. He then told me in a few words, that as he had a sincere respect for me, and knew my circumstances, he had not lent me that money, but given it me, and that he thought I had merited it from him, by giving him my company so entirely as I had done. After this he made me take a maid and keep house and his friend that came with him to the Bath, being gone, he obliged me to diet him, which I did very willingly, believing, as it appeared, that I should lose nothing by it, nor did the woman of the house fail to find her account in it too. We had lived thus near three months when the company beginning to wear away at the Bath, he talked of going away, and fain he would have me to go to London with him. I was not very easy in that proposal, not knowing what posture I was to live in there, or how he might use me. But while this was in debate he fell very sick; he had gone out to a place in Somersetshire called Shepton, where he had some business, and was there taken very ill, and so ill that he could not travel; so he sent his man back to the Bath to beg me that I would hire a coach and come over to him. Before he went he had left all his money and other things of value with me, and what to do with them I did not know, but I secured them as well as I could, and locked up the lodgings and went to him, where I found him very ill indeed. I persuaded him to be carried in a litter to the Bath, where there was more help and better advice to be had. He consented, and I brought him to the Bath, which was about fifteen miles, as I remember. Here he continued very ill of a fever, and kept his bed five weeks, all which time I nursed him and tended him myself, as much and as carefully as if I had been his wife. Indeed if I had been his wife I could not have done more; I sat up with him so much and so often, that at last indeed he would not let me sit up any longer, and autumn cheerfully; but having contracted a nearer intimacy with the said woman in whose house I lodged, I could not avoid communicating to her something of what lay hardest upon my mind, and particularly the narrowness of my circumstances, and the loss of my fortune by the damage of my goods by sea: I told her also that I had a good mother and a brother in Virginia in good circumstances, and as I had really written back to my mother in particular to represent my condition, and the great loss I had received, which indeed came to almost 500l., so did not fail to let my new friend know that I expected a supply from thence, and so indeed I did; and as the ships went from Bristol to York river in Virginia, and back again generally in less time than from London, and that my brother corresponded chiefly at Bristol, I thought it was much better for me to wait here for my returns than to go London, where also I had not the least acquaintance. My new friend appeared sensibly affected with my condition, and indeed was so very kind as to reduce the rate of my living with her to so low a price during the winter, that she convinced me she got nothing by me; and as for lodging during the winter, I paid nothing at all. When the spring season came on she continued to be as kind to me as she could, and I lodged with her for a time, till it was found necessary to do otherwise; she had some persons of character that frequently lodged in her house, and in particular the gentleman who, as I said, singled me out for his companion the winter before; and he came down again with another gentleman in his company and two servants, and lodged in the same house: I suspected that my landlady had invited him thither, letting him know that I was still with her, but she denied it, and protested to me that she did not, and he said the same. In a word, this gentleman came down and continued to single me out for his peculiar confidence as well as conversation. He was a complete gentleman, that must be confessed, and his company was very agreeable to me, as mine, if I might believe him, was to him. He made no profession to me but of an extraordinary respect, and he had such an opinion of my virtue that, as he often professed, he believed if he should offer anything else I should reject him with contempt. He soon understood from me that I was a widow that had arrived at Bristol from Virginia by the last ships; and that I waited at Bath till the next Virginia fleet should arrive, by which I expected considerable effects. I understood by him, and by others of him, that he had a wife, but that the lady was distempered in her head,|| and was under the conduct of her own relations, which he consented to, to avoid any reflections that might, as was not unusual in such cases, be cast on him for mismanaging her cure; and in the meantime he came to Bath to divert his thoughts from the disturbance of such a melancholy circumstance as that was. reason to say so of him too; for lodged both on a floor, and he ha come into my chamber, even when and I also into his when he was i never offered anything to me fart} or so much as solicited me to an after, as you shall hear. I frequently took notice to my exceeding modesty, and she a me she believed it was so fro However, she used to tell me t ought to expect some gratifies my company, for indeed he d gross me, and I was seldom f I told her I had not given I stood off very boldly on the first floor, a one inf bad a d that ti him as bound how i not a sired My landlady, who of her own accord encouraged the correspondence on all occasions, gave me an advantageous character of him, as of a man of honour and of virtue, as well as of a great estate; and indeed I had a great deal of ask was Phat he had provided apart- that after a little rdingly y child d a maid on. ariot, and t and the Drought me ; with which well pleased, is, and I was eight of what I wanted nothing could not be in r it; and thereto save what I against a time of that such things as that men that keep grow weary of them, thing or other hapw their bounty; and are thus well used are conduct to preserve the or the nice article of they are justly cast off this point, for as I had no so I had no manner of acole house, and so no tempther; kept no company where I lodged, and with a next door; so that when he d nobody, nor did he ever find mber or parlour whenever he went anywhere to take the air h him. this manner with him, and his rtainly the most undesigned thing he often protested to me, that me first acquainted with me, and ery night when we first broke in es, he never had the least design of e; that he always had a sincere me, but not the least real inclination he had done. I assured him I never him; that if I had, I should not so e yielded to the freedoms which brought that it was all a surprise, and was the accident of our having yielded too ur mutual inclinations that night; and I have often observed since, and leave it caution to the readers of this story, that ght to be cautious of gratifying our inclins in loose and lewd freedoms, lest we our resolutions of virtue fail us in the eture when their assistance should be most cessary. it is true, and I have confessed it before, that, om the first hour I began to converse with him, resolved to let him lie with me, if he offered it; but it was because I wanted his help and assistance, and I knew no other way of securing him than that. But when we were that night together, and, as I have said, had gone such a length, I L then I got a pallet bed into his room and lay in it just at his bed's feet. I was indeed sensibly affected with his condition, and with the apprehension of losing such a friend as he was, and was like to be, to me, and I used to sit and cry by him many hours together. However, at last he grew better, and gave hopes that he would recover, as indeed he did, though very slowly. Were it otherwise than what I am going to say, I should not be backward to disclose it, as it is apparent I have done in other cases in this account; but I affirm, that through all the conversation, abating the freedom of coming into the chamber when he or I was in bed, and abating the necessary offices of attending him night and day when he was sick, there had not passed the least immodest word or action between us. that it had been so to the last. how just I will be to you, and that I can keep my word, and away he comes to my bed." I resisted a little, but I must confess I should not have resisted him much, if he had not made those promises at all; so after a little struggle, as I said, I lay still, and let him come to bed; when he was there he took me in his arms, and so I lay all night with him, but he had no more to do with me, or offered anything to me other than embracing me, as I say, in his arms, no, not the whole night, but rose up and dressed him in the morning, and left me as innocent for him as I was the day I was born. This was a surprising thing to me, and perhaps may be so to others who know how the laws of nature work; for he was a strong, vigorous, brisk person; nor did he act thus on a principle of reOligion at all, but of mere affection; insisting on it, that though I was to him the most agreeable woman in the world, yet because he loved me he could not injure me. After some time he gathered strength, and grew well apace, and I would have removed my pallet bed, but he would not let me till he was able to venture himself without anybody to sit up with him, and then I removed to my own chamber. He took many occasions to express his sense of my tenderness and concern for him; and when he grew quite well he made me a present of fifty guineas for my care, and, as he called it, for hazarding my life to save his. I own it was a noble principle; but as it was what I never understood before, so it was to me perfectly amazing. We travelled the rest of the journey as we did before, and came back to the Bath, where, as he had opportunity to come to me when he would, he often repeated the mo deration, and I frequently lay with him, and he with me; and although all the familiarities between man and wife were common to us, yet he never once offered to go any farther, and he valued himself muen upon it; I do not say that I was so wholly pleased with it as he thought I was; for I own I was much wickeder than he, as you shall hear presently. And now he made deep protestations of a sincere, inviolable affection for me; but all along attested it to be with the utmost reserve for my virtue, and his own. I told him I was fully satisfied of it; he carried it that length that he protested to me, that if he was naked in bed with me, he would as sacredly preserve my virtue, as We lived thus near two years, only with this he would defend it if I was assaulted by a ra- exception, that he went three times to London visher; I believed him, and told him I did so ; in that time, and once he continued there four but this did not satisfy him; he would, he said, months; but, to do him justice, he always supwait for some opportunity to give me an un-plied me with money to subsist me very handdoubted testimony of it. somely. It was a great while after this that I had occa- Had we continued thus, I confess we had had sion, on my own business, to go to Bristol, upon much to boast of; but, as wise men say, it is ill which he hired me a coach, and would go with venturing too near the brink of a command, so me, and did so; and now indeed our intimacy in- we found it; and here again I must do him the creased; from Bristol he carried me to Glouces-justice to own that the first breach was not on ter, which was merely a journey of pleasure to his part; it was one night that we were in bed take the air; and here it was our hap to have no together warm and merry, and having drank, I lodging in the inn but in one large chamber with think a little more wine that night, both of us than two beds in it. The master of the house going usual, though not in the least to disorder either up with us to show his rooms, and coming into of us, when after some other follies, which I canthat room, said very frankly to him-" Sir, it is not name, and being clasped close in his arms, I none of my business to inquire whether the lady told him (I repeat it with shame and horror of be your spouse or no, but if not, you may lie soul) that I could find in my heart to discharge as honestly in these two beds as if you were him of his engagement for one night and no more. in two chambers;" and with that he pulls a great curtain which drew quite across the room, and effectually divided the beds. "Well," says my friend, very readily, "these beds will do, and as for the rest, we are too near akin to lie together, though we may lodge near one another ;" and this put an honest face on the thing too. When we came to go to bed he decently went out of the room till I was in bed, and then went to bed in the bed on his own side of the room, but lay there talking to me a great while. At last, repeating his usual saying, that he could lie in the bed naked with me and not offer me the least injury; he starts out of his bed with. "And now, my dear," says he, "you shall see i He took me at my word immediately; and after that there was no resisting him. Neither, indeed, had I any mind to resist him any more, let what would come of it. Thus the government of our virtue was broken, and I exchanged the place of friend for that unmusical, harsh-sounding title of whore. In the morning we were both at our penitentials. I cried very heartily; he expressed himself very sorry; but that was all either of us could do at that time; and the way being thus cleared, and the bars of virtue and conscience being thus removed, we had the less difficulty afterwards to struggle It was but a dull kind of conversation that we 1 had together for all the rest of that week; I looked on him with blushes; and every now and then started that melancholy objection,-what if I should be with child now? What will become of me then? He encouraged me by telling me that as long as I was true to him he would be so to me; and since it was gone such a length (which indeed he never intended), yet if I was with child he would take care of that and of me too. This hardened us both; I assured him if I was with child, I would die for want of a midwife rather than name him as the father of it; and he assured me I should never want if I should be with child. These mutual assurances hardened us in the thing; and after this we repeated the crime as often as we pleased, till at length, as I had feared, so it came to pass, and I was indeed with child. was up and well; that he had provided apartments for me at Hammersmith, as if I came thither only from London, and that after a little while I should go back to the Bath, and he would go with me. I liked this offer very well, and accordingly hired a coach on purpose, and taking my child and a wet nurse to tend and suckle it, and a maid servant with me, away I went for London. He met me at Reading in his own chariot, and taking me into that, left the servant and the child in the hired coach, and so he brought me to my new lodgings at Hammersmith; with which I had abundance of reason to be very well pleased, for they were very handsome rooms, and I was very well accommodated. And now I was indeed in the height of what I might call my prosperity, and I wanted nothing After I was sure it was so, and I had satisfied but to be a wife, which however could not be in him of it too, we began to think of taking mea- this case, there was no room for it; and theresures for the managing it, and I proposed trust- fore on all occasions I studied to save what I ing the secret to my landlady, and asking her could, as I have said above, against a time of advice, which he agreed to; a woman (as I found) scarcity; knowing well enough that such things as who was used to such things, and made light of these do not always continue, that men that keep it. She said she knew it would come to that at mistresses often change them, grow weary of them, last, and made us very merry about it. As I or jealous of them, or something or other hapsaid above, we found her an experienced old lady pens to make them withdraw their bounty; and at such work; she undertook every thing, en- sometimes the ladies that are thus well used are gaged to procure a midwife and nurse; to sa- not careful by a prudent conduct to preserve the tisfy all inquiries; and bring us off with reputa-esteem of their persons, or the nice article of tion, and she did so very dexterously indeed. their fidelity, and then they are justly cast off with contempt. When I grew near my time she desired my gentleman to go away to London, or make as if he did so; when he was gone, she acquainted the parish officers that there was a lady ready to lie in at her house, but that she knew her husband very well, and gave them, as she pretended, an account of his name, which she called Sir Walter Cleave; telling them, that he was a very worthy gentleman, and that she would answer for all inquiries and the like. This satisfied the parish officers presently, and I lay in with as much credit as I could have done if I had been my Lady Cleave; and was assisted in my travail by three or four of the best citizens' wives of Bath, who lived in the neighbourhood, which, however, made me a little the more expensive to him. I often expressed my concern to him about it, but he bid me not be concerned at it. As he had furnished me very sufficiently with money for the extraordinary expenses of my lying in, I had every thing very handsome about me; but I did not affect to be gay or extravagant neither; besides, knowing my own circumstances, and knowing the world as I have done, and that such kind of things do not often last long, I took care to lay up as much money as I could for a wet day, as I called it, making him believe it was all spent upon the extraordinary appearance of things in my lying-in. By this means, and including what he had given me as above, I had at the end of my lyingabout two hundred guineas by me, including also what was left of my own. a in he I was brought to bed of a fine boy indeed, and harming child it was; and when he heard of it wrote me a very kind obliging letter about it, then told me he thought it would look bette for me to come away for London as soon as I But I was secured in this point, for as I had no inclination to change, so I had no manner of acquaintance in the whole house, and so no temptation to look any farther; I kept no company but in the family where I lodged, and with a clergyman's lady at next door; so that when he was absent I visited nobody, nor did he ever find me out of my chamber or parlour whenever he came down; if I went anywhere to take the air it was always with him. The living in this manner with him, and his with me, was certainly the most undesigned thing in the world; he often protested to me, that when he became first acquainted with me, and even to the very night when we first broke in upon our rules, he never had the least design of lying with me; that he always had a sincere affection for me, but not the least real inclination to do what he had done. I assured him I never suspected him; that if I had, I should not so easily have yielded to the freedoms which brought it on, but that it was all a surprise, and was owing to the accident of our having yielded too far to our mutual inclinations that night; and indeed I have often observed since, and leave it as a caution to the readers of this story, that we ought to be cautious of gratifying our inclinations in loose and lewd freedoms, lest we find our resolutions of virtue fail us in the juncture when their assistance should be most necessary. it is true, and I have confessed it before, that, from the first hour I began to converse with him, I resolved to let him lie with me, if he offered it; but it was because I wanted his help and assistance, and I knew no other way of securing him than that. But when we were that night together, and, as I have said, had gone such a length, Í L |