This was the first bill; the second was the same terms:—

1. For three months’ lodging and diet, etc., at 20s. per week . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13£, 0s., 0d.

2. For a nurse for the month, and the use of linen and lace . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . . . . 2£, 10s., 0d.

3. For the minister to christen the child, etc., as above . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2£, 0s., 0d.

4. For supper and for sweetmeats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

. . . . 3£, 3s., 0d.

For her fees as above . . . . . . . . . . . . 5£, 5s., 0d.

For a servant-maid . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1£, 0s., 0d.

-------------- 26£, 18s., 0d.

This was the second-rate bill; the third, she said, was for a degree

higher, and when the father or friends appeared:—

1. For three months’ lodging and diet, having two rooms and a garret

for a servant . . . . . . 30£, 0s., 0d.,

2. For a nurse for the month, and the finest suit of childbed linen .

. . . . . . . . . . . . . 4£, 4s., 0d.

3. For the minister to christen the child, etc. 2£, 10s., 0d.

4. For a supper, the gentlemen to send in the wine . . . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . 6£, 0s., 0d.

For my fees, etc. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10£, 10s., 0d.

The maid, besides their own maid, only . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . 0£, 10s., 0d. -------------- 53£, 14s., 0d.

I looked upon all three bills, and smiled, and told her I did not see

but that she was very reasonable in her demands, all things considered,

and for that I did not doubt but her accommodations were good.

She told me I should be judge of that when I saw them. I told her I was

sorry to tell her that I feared I must be her lowest-rated customer.

“And perhaps, madam,” said I, “you will make me the less welcome upon

that account.” “No, not at all,” said she; “for where I have one of the

third sort I have two of the second, and four to one of the first, and

I get as much by them in proportion as by any; but if you doubt my care

of you, I will allow any friend you have to overlook and see if you are

well waited on or no.”

Then she explained the particulars of her bill. “In the first place,

madam,” said she, “I would have you observe that here is three months’

keeping; you are but ten shillings a week; I undertake to say you will

not complain of my table. I suppose,” says she, “you do not live

cheaper where you are now?” “No, indeed,” said I, “not so cheap, for I

give six shillings per week for my chamber, and find my own diet as

well as I can, which costs me a great deal more.”

“Then, madam,” says she, “if the child should not live, or should be

dead-born, as you know sometimes happens, then there is the minister’s

article saved; and if you have no friends to come to you, you may save

the expense of a supper; so that take those articles out, madam,” says

she, “your lying in will not cost you above £5, 3s. in all more than

your ordinary charge of living.”

This was the most reasonable thing that I ever heard of; so I smiled,

and told her I would come and be her customer; but I told her also,

that as I had two months and more to do, I might perhaps be obliged to

stay longer with her than three months, and desired to know if she

would not be obliged to remove me before it was proper. No, she said;

her house was large, and besides, she never put anybody to remove, that

had lain in, till they were willing to go; and if she had more ladies

offered, she was not so ill-beloved among her neighbours but she could

provide accommodations for twenty, if there was occasion.

I found she was an eminent lady in her way; and, in short, I agreed to

put myself into her hands, and promised her. She then talked of other

things, looked about into my accommodations where I was, found fault

with my wanting attendance and conveniences, and that I should not be

used so at her house. I told her I was shy of speaking, for the woman

of the house looked stranger, or at least I thought so, since I had

been ill, because I was with child; and I was afraid she would put some

affront or other upon me, supposing that I had been able to give but a

slight account of myself.

“Oh dear,” said she, “her ladyship is no stranger to these things; she

has tried to entertain ladies in your condition several times, but she

could not secure the parish; and besides, she is not such a nice lady

as you take her to be; however, since you are a-going, you shall not

meddle with her, but I’ll see you are a little better looked after

while you are here than I think you are, and it shall not cost you the

more neither.”

I did not understand her at all; however, I thanked her, and so we

parted. The next morning she sent me a chicken roasted and hot, and a

pint bottle of sherry, and ordered the maid to tell me that she was to

wait on me every day as long as I stayed there.

This was surprisingly good and kind, and I accepted it very willingly.

At night she sent to me again, to know if I wanted anything, and how I

did, and to order the maid to come to her in the morning with my

dinner. The maid had orders to make me some chocolate in the morning

before she came away, and did so, and at noon she brought me the

sweetbread of a breast of veal, whole, and a dish of soup for my

dinner; and after this manner she nursed me up at a distance, so that I

was mightily well pleased, and quickly well, for indeed my dejections

before were the principal part of my illness.

I expected, as is usually the case among such people, that the servant

she sent me would have been some imprudent brazen wench of Drury Lane

breeding, and I was very uneasy at having her with me upon that

account; so I would not let her lie in that house the first night by

any means, but had my eyes about me as narrowly as if she had been a

public thief.

My gentlewoman guessed presently what was the matter, and sent her back

with a short note, that I might depend upon the honesty of her maid;

that she would be answerable for her upon all accounts; and that she

took no servants into her house without very good security for their

fidelity. I was then perfectly easy; and indeed the maid’s behaviour

spoke for itself, for a modester, quieter, soberer girl never came into

anybody’s family, and I found her so afterwards.

As soon as I was well enough to go abroad, I went with the maid to see

the house, and to see the apartment I was to have; and everything was

so handsome and so clean and well, that, in short, I had nothing to

say, but was wonderfully pleased and satisfied with what I had met

with, which, considering the melancholy circumstances I was in, was far

beyond what I looked for.

It might be expected that I should give some account of the nature of

the wicked practices of this woman, in whose hands I was now fallen;

but it would be too much encouragement to the vice, to let the world

see what easy measures were here taken to rid the women’s unwelcome

burthen of a child clandestinely gotten. This grave matron had several

sorts of practice, and this was one particular, that if a child was

born, though not in her house (for she had occasion to be called to

many private labours), she had people at hand, who for a piece of money

would take the child off their hands, and off from the hands of the

parish too; and those children, as she said, were honestly provided for

and taken care of. What should become of them all, considering so many,

as by her account she was concerned with, I cannot conceive.

I had many times discourses upon that subject with her; but she was

full of this argument, that she save the life of many an innocent lamb,

as she called them, which would otherwise perhaps have been murdered;

and of many women who, made desperate by the misfortune, would

otherwise be tempted to destroy their children, and bring themselves to

the gallows. I granted her that this was true, and a very commendable

thing, provided the poor children fell into good hands afterwards, and

were not abused, starved, and neglected by the nurses that bred them

up. She answered, that she always took care of that, and had no nurses

in her business but what were very good, honest people, and such as

might be depended upon.

I could say nothing to the contrary, and so was obliged to say, “Madam,

I do not question you do your part honestly, but what those people do

afterwards is the main question”; and she stopped my mouth again with

saying that she took the utmost care about it.

The only thing I found in all her conversation on these subjects that

gave me any distaste, was, that one time in discouraging about my being

far gone with child, and the time I expected to come, she said

something that looked as if she could help me off with my burthen

sooner, if I was willing; or, in English, that she could give me

something to make me miscarry, if I had a desire to put an end to my

troubles that way; but I soon let her see that I abhorred the thoughts

of it; and, to do her justice, she put it off so cleverly, that I could

not say she really intended it, or whether she only mentioned the

practice as a horrible thing; for she couched her words so well, and

took my meaning so quickly, that she gave her negative before I could

explain myself.

To bring this part into as narrow a compass as possible, I quitted my

lodging at St. Jones’s and went to my new governess, for so they called

her in the house, and there I was indeed treated with so much courtesy,

so carefully looked to, so handsomely provided, and everything so well,

that I was surprised at it, and could not at first see what advantage

my governess made of it; but I found afterwards that she professed to

make no profit of lodgers’ diet, nor indeed could she get much by it,

but that her profit lay in the other articles of her management, and

she made enough that way, I assure you; for ’tis scarce credible what

practice she had, as well abroad as at home, and yet all upon the

private account, or, in plain English, the whoring account.

While I was in her house, which was near four months, she had no less

than twelve ladies of pleasure brought to bed within the doors, and I

think she had two-and-thirty, or thereabouts, under her conduct without

doors, whereof one, as nice as she was with me, was lodged with my old

landlady at St. Jones’s.

This was a strange testimony of the growing vice of the age, and such a

one, that as bad as I had been myself, it shocked my very senses. I

began to nauseate the place I was in and, about all, the wicked

practice; and yet I must say that I never saw, or do I believe there

was to be seen, the least indecency in the house the whole time I was

there.

Not a man was ever seen to come upstairs, except to visit the lying-in

ladies within their month, nor then without the old lady with them, who

made it a piece of honour of her management that no man should touch a

woman, no, not his own wife, within the month; nor would she permit any

man to lie in the house upon any pretence whatever, no, not though she

was sure it was with his own wife; and her general saying for it was,

that she cared not how many children were born in her house, but she

would have none got there if she could help it.

It might perhaps be carried further than was needful, but it was an

error of the right hand if it was an error, for by this she kept up the

reputation, such as it was, of her business, and obtained this

character, that though she did take care of the women when they were

debauched, yet she was not instrumental to their being debauched at

all; and yet it was a wicked trade she drove too.

While I was there, and before I was brought to bed, I received a letter

from my trustee at the bank, full of kind, obliging things, and

earnestly pressing me to return to London. It was near a fortnight old

when it came to me, because it had been first sent into Lancashire, and

then returned to me. He concludes with telling me that he had obtained

a decree, I think he called it, against his wife, and that he would be

ready to make good his engagement to me, if I would accept of him,

adding a great many protestations of kindness and affection, such as he

would have been far from offering if he had known the circumstances I

had been in, and which as it was I had been very far from deserving.

I returned an answer to his letter, and dated it at Liverpool, but sent

it by messenger, alleging that it came in cover to a friend in town. I

gave him joy of his deliverance, but raised some scruples at the

lawfulness of his marrying again, and told him I supposed he would

consider very seriously upon that point before he resolved on it, the

consequence being too great for a man of his judgment to venture rashly

upon a thing of that nature; so concluded, wishing him very well in

whatever he resolved, without letting him into anything of my own mind,

or giving any answer to his proposal of my coming to London to him, but

mentioned at a distance my intention to return the latter end of the

year, this being dated in April.

I was brought to bed about the middle of May and had another brave boy,

and myself in as good condition as usual on such occasions. My

governess did her part as a midwife with the greatest art and dexterity

imaginable, and far beyond all that ever I had had any experience of

before.

Her care of me in my travail, and after in my lying in, was such, that

if she had been my own mother it could not have been better. Let none

be encouraged in their loose practices from this dexterous lady’s

management, for she is gone to her place, and I dare say has left

nothing behind her that can or will come up on it.

I think I had been brought to bed about twenty-two days when I received

another letter from my friend at the bank, with the surprising news

that he had obtained a final sentence of divorce against his wife, and

had served her with it on such a day, and that he had such an answer to

give to all my scruples about his marrying again, as I could not

expect, and as he had no desire of; for that his wife, who had been

under some remorse before for her usage of him, as soon as she had the

account that he had gained his point, had very unhappily destroyed

herself that same evening.

He expressed himself very handsomely as to his being concerned at her

disaster, but cleared himself of having any hand in it, and that he had

only done himself justice in a case in which he was notoriously injured

and abused. However, he said that he was extremely afflicted at it, and

had no view of any satisfaction left in his world, but only in the hope

that I would come and relieve him by my company; and then he pressed me

violently indeed to give him some hopes that I would at least come up

to town and let him see me, when he would further enter into discourse

about it.

I was exceedingly surprised at the news, and began now seriously to

reflect on my present circumstances, and the inexpressible misfortune

it was to me to have a child upon my hands, and what to do in it I knew

not. At last I opened my case at a distance to my governess. I appeared

melancholy and uneasy for several days, and she lay at me continually

to know what trouble me. I could not for my life tell her that I had an

offer of marriage, after I had so often told her that I had a husband,

so that I really knew not what to say to her. I owned I had something

which very much troubled me, but at the same time told her I could not

speak of it to any one alive.

She continued importuning me several days, but it was impossible, I

told her, for me to commit the secret to anybody. This, instead of

being an answer to her, increased her importunities; she urged her

having been trusted with the greatest secrets of this nature, that it

was her business to conceal everything, and that to discover things of

that nature would be her ruin. She asked me if ever I had found her

tattling to me of other people’s affairs, and how could I suspect her?

She told me, to unfold myself to her was telling it to nobody; that she

was silent as death; that it must be a very strange case indeed that

she could not help me out of; but to conceal it was to deprive myself

of all possible help, or means of help, and to deprive her of the

opportunity of serving me. In short, she had such a bewitching

eloquence, and so great a power of persuasion that there was no

concealing anything from her.

So I resolved to unbosom myself to her. I told her the history of my

Lancashire marriage, and how both of us had been disappointed; how we

came together, and how we parted; how he absolutely discharged me, as

far as lay in him, free liberty to marry again, protesting that if he

knew it he would never claim me, or disturb or expose me; that I

thought I was free, but was dreadfully afraid to venture, for fear of

the consequences that might follow in case of a discovery.

Then I told her what a good offer I had; showed her my friend’s two

last letters, inviting me to come to London, and let her see with what

affection and earnestness they were written, but blotted out the name,

and also the story about the disaster of his wife, only that she was

dead.

She fell a-laughing at my scruples about marrying, and told me the

other was no marriage, but a cheat on both sides; and that, as we were

parted by mutual consent, the nature of the contract was destroyed, and

the obligation was mutually discharged. She had arguments for this at

the tip of her tongue; and, in short, reasoned me out of my reason; not

but that it was too by the help of my own inclination.

But then came the great and main difficulty, and that was the child;

this, she told me in so many words, must be removed, and that so as

that it should never be possible for any one to discover it. I knew

there was no marrying without entirely concealing that I had had a

child, for he would soon have discovered by the age of it that it was

born, nay, and gotten too, since my parley with him, and that would

have destroyed all the affair.

But it touched my heart so forcibly to think of parting entirely with

the child, and, for aught I knew, of having it murdered, or starved by

neglect and ill-usage (which was much the same), that I could not think

of it without horror. I wish all those women who consent to the

disposing their children out of the way, as it is called, for decency

sake, would consider that ’tis only a contrived method for murder; that

is to say, a-killing their children with safety.

It is manifest to all that understand anything of children, that we are

born into the world helpless, and incapable either to supply our own

wants or so much as make them known; and that without help we must

perish; and this help requires not only an assisting hand, whether of

the mother or somebody else, but there are two things necessary in that

assisting hand, that is, care and skill; without both which, half the

children that are born would die, nay, though they were not to be

denied food; and one half more of those that remained would be cripples

or fools, lose their limbs, and perhaps their sense. I question not but

that these are partly the reasons why affection was placed by nature in

the hearts of mothers to their children; without which they would never

be able to give themselves up, as ’tis necessary they should, to the

care and waking pains needful to the support of their children.

Since this care is needful to the life of children, to neglect them is

to murder them; again, to give them up to be managed by those people

who have none of that needful affection placed by nature in them, is to

neglect them in the highest degree; nay, in some it goes farther, and

is a neglect in order to their being lost; so that ’tis even an

intentional murder, whether the child lives or dies.

All those things represented themselves to my view, and that is the

blackest and most frightful form: and as I was very free with my

governess, whom I had now learned to call mother, I represented to her

all the dark thoughts which I had upon me about it, and told her what

distress I was in. She seemed graver by much at this part than at the

other; but as she was hardened in these things beyond all possibility

of being touched with the religious part, and the scruples about the

murder, so she was equally impenetrable in that part which related to

affection. She asked me if she had not been careful and tender to me in

my lying in, as if I had been her own child. I told her I owned she

had. “Well, my dear,” says she, “and when you are gone, what are you to

me? And what would it be to me if you were to be hanged? Do you think

there are not women who, as it is their trade and they get their bread

by it, value themselves upon their being as careful of children as

their own mothers can be, and understand it rather better? Yes, yes,

child,” says she, “fear it not; how were we nursed ourselves? Are you

sure you was nursed up by your own mother? and yet you look fat and

fair, child,” says the old beldam; and with that she stroked me over

the face. “Never be concerned, child,” says she, going on in her

drolling way; “I have no murderers about me; I employ the best and the

honestest nurses that can be had, and have as few children miscarry

under their hands as there would if they were all nursed by mothers; we

want neither care nor skill.”

She touched me to the quick when she asked if I was sure that I was

nursed by my own mother; on the contrary I was sure I was not; and I

trembled, and looked pale at the very expression. “Sure,” said I to

myself, “this creature cannot be a witch, or have any conversation with

a spirit, that can inform her what was done with me before I was able

to know it myself”; and I looked at her as if I had been frightened;

but reflecting that it could not be possible for her to know anything

about me, that disorder went off, and I began to be easy, but it was

not presently.

She perceived the disorder I was in, but did not know the meaning of

it; so she ran on in her wild talk upon the weakness of my supposing

that children were murdered because they were not all nursed by the

mother, and to persuade me that the children she disposed of were as

well used as if the mothers had the nursing of them themselves.

“It may be true, mother,” says I, “for aught I know, but my doubts are

very strongly grounded indeed.” “Come, then,” says she, “let’s hear

some of them.” “Why, first,” says I, “you give a piece of money to

these people to take the child off the parent’s hands, and to take care

of it as long as it lives. Now we know, mother,” said I, “that those

are poor people, and their gain consists in being quit of the charge as

soon as they can; how can I doubt but that, as it is best for them to

have the child die, they are not over solicitous about life?”

“This is all vapours and fancy,” says the old woman; “I tell you their

credit depends upon the child’s life, and they are as careful as any

mother of you all.”

“O mother,” says I, “if I was but sure my little baby would be

carefully looked to, and have justice done it, I should be happy

indeed; but it is impossible I can be satisfied in that point unless I

saw it, and to see it would be ruin and destruction to me, as now my

case stands; so what to do I know not.”

“A fine story!” says the governess. “You would see the child, and you

would not see the child; you would be concealed and discovered both

together. These are things impossible, my dear; so you must e’en do as

other conscientious mothers have done before you, and be contented with

things as they must be, though they are not as you wish them to be.”

I understood what she meant by conscientious mothers; she would have

said conscientious whores, but she was not willing to disoblige me, for

really in this case I was not a whore, because legally married, the

force of former marriage excepted.

However, let me be what I would, I was not come up to that pitch of

hardness common to the profession; I mean, to be unnatural, and

regardless of the safety of my child; and I preserved this honest

affection so long, that I was upon the point of giving up my friend at

the bank, who lay so hard at me to come to him and marry him, that, in

short, there was hardly any room to deny him.

At last my old governess came to me, with her usual assurance. “Come,

my dear,” says she, “I have found out a way how you shall be at a

certainty that your child shall be used well, and yet the people that

take care of it shall never know you, or who the mother of the child

is.”

“Oh mother,” says I, “if you can do so, you will engage me to you for

ever.” “Well,” says she, “are you willing to be a some small annual

expense, more than what we usually give to the people we contract

with?” “Ay,” says I, “with all my heart, provided I may be concealed.”

“As to that,” says the governess, “you shall be secure, for the nurse

shall never so much as dare to inquire about you, and you shall once or

twice a year go with me and see your child, and see how ’tis used, and

be satisfied that it is in good hands, nobody knowing who you are.”

“Why,” said I, “do you think, mother, that when I come to see my child,

I shall be able to conceal my being the mother of it? Do you think that

possible?”

“Well, well,” says my governess, “if you discover it, the nurse shall

be never the wiser; for she shall be forbid to ask any questions about

you, or to take any notice. If she offers it, she shall lose the money

which you are suppose to give her, and the child shall be taken from

her too.”

I was very well pleased with this. So the next week a countrywoman was

brought from Hertford, or thereabouts, who was to take the child off

our hands entirely for £10 in money. But if I would allow £5 a year

more of her, she would be obliged to bring the child to my governess’s

house as often as we desired, or we should come down and look at it,

and see how well she used it.

The woman was very wholesome-looking, a likely woman, a cottager’s

wife, but she had very good clothes and linen, and everything well

about her; and with a heavy heart and many a tear, I let her have my

child. I had been down at Hertford, and looked at her and at her

dwelling, which I liked well enough; and I promised her great things if

she would be kind to the child, so she knew at first word that I was

the child’s mother. But she seemed to be so much out of the way, and to

have no room to inquire after me, that I thought I was safe enough. So,

in short, I consented to let her have the child, and I gave her £10;

that is to say, I gave it to my governess, who gave it the poor woman

before my face, she agreeing never to return the child back to me, or

to claim anything more for its keeping or bringing up; only that I

promised, if she took a great deal of care of it, I would give her

something more as often as I came to see it; so that I was not bound to

pay the £5, only that I promised my governess I would do it. And thus

my great care was over, after a manner, which though it did not at all

satisfy my mind, yet was the most convenient for me, as my affairs then

stood, of any that could be thought of at that time.

I then began to write to my friend at the bank in a more kindly style,

and particularly about the beginning of July I sent him a letter, that

I proposed to be in town some time in August. He returned me an answer

in the most passionate terms imaginable, and desired me to let him have

timely notice, and he would come and meet me, two day’s journey. This

puzzled me scurvily, and I did not know what answer to make of it. Once

I resolved to take the stage-coach to West Chester, on purpose only to

have the satisfaction of coming back, that he might see me really come

in the same coach; for I had a jealous thought, though I had no ground

for it at all, lest he should think I was not really in the country.

And it was no ill-grounded thought as you shall hear presently.

I endeavoured to reason myself out of it, but it was in vain; the

impression lay so strong on my mind, that it was not to be resisted. At

last it came as an addition to my new design of going into the country,

that it would be an excellent blind to my old governess, and would

cover entirely all my other affairs, for she did not know in the least

whether my new lover lived in London or in Lancashire; and when I told

her my resolution, she was fully persuaded it was in Lancashire.

Having taken my measure for this journey I let her know it, and sent

the maid that tended me, from the beginning, to take a place for me in

the coach. She would have had me let the maid have waited on me down to

the last stage, and come up again in the waggon, but I convinced her it

would not be convenient. When I went away, she told me she would enter

into no measures for correspondence, for she saw evidently that my

affection to my child would cause me to write to her, and to visit her

too when I came to town again. I assured her it would, and so took my

leave, well satisfied to have been freed from such a house, however

good my accommodations there had been, as I have related above.

I took the place in the coach not to its full extent, but to a place

called Stone, in Cheshire, I think it is, where I not only had no

manner of business, but not so much as the least acquaintance with any

person in the town or near it. But I knew that with money in the pocket

one is at home anywhere; so I lodged there two or three days, till,

watching my opportunity, I found room in another stage-coach, and took

passage back again for London, sending a letter to my gentleman that I

should be such a certain day at Stony-Stratford, where the coachman

told me he was to lodge.

It happened to be a chance coach that I had taken up, which, having

been hired on purpose to carry some gentlemen to West Chester who were

going for Ireland, was now returning, and did not tie itself to exact

times or places as the stages did; so that, having been obliged to lie

still on Sunday, he had time to get himself ready to come out, which

otherwise he could not have done.

However, his warning was so short, that he could not reach to

Stony-Stratford time enough to be with me at night, but he met me at a

place called Brickhill the next morning, as we were just coming in to

tow.

I confess I was very glad to see him, for I had thought myself a little

disappointed over-night, seeing I had gone so far to contrive my coming

on purpose. He pleased me doubly too by the figure he came in, for he

brought a very handsome (gentleman’s) coach and four horses, with a

servant to attend him.

He took me out of the stage-coach immediately, which stopped at an inn

in Brickhill; and putting into the same inn, he set up his own coach,

and bespoke his dinner. I asked him what he meant by that, for I was

for going forward with the journey. He said, No, I had need of a little

rest upon the road, and that was a very good sort of a house, though it

was but a little town; so we would go no farther that night, whatever

came of it.

I did not press him much, for since he had come so to meet me, and put

himself to so much expense, it was but reasonable I should oblige him a

little too; so I was easy as to that point.

After dinner we walked to see the town, to see the church, and to view

the fields, and the country, as is usual for strangers to do; and our

landlord was our guide in going to see the church. I observed my

gentleman inquired pretty much about the parson, and I took the hint

immediately that he certainly would propose to be married; and though

it was a sudden thought, it followed presently, that, in short, I would

not refuse him; for, to be plain, with my circumstances I was in no

condition now to say No; I had no reason now to run any more such

hazards.

But while these thoughts ran round in my head, which was the work but

of a few moments, I observed my landlord took him aside and whispered

to him, though not very softly neither, for so much I overheard: “Sir,

if you shall have occasion——” the rest I could not hear, but it seems

it was to this purpose: “Sir, if you shall have occasion for a

minister, I have a friend a little way off that will serve you, and be

as private as you please.” My gentleman answered loud enough for me to

hear, “Very well, I believe I shall.”

I was no sooner come back to the inn but he fell upon me with

irresistible words, that since he had had the good fortune to meet me,

and everything concurred, it would be hastening his felicity if I would

put an end to the matter just there. “What do you mean?” says I,

colouring a little. “What, in an inn, and upon the road! Bless us all,”

said I, as if I had been surprised, “how can you talk so?” “Oh, I can

talk so very well,” says he, “I came a-purpose to talk so, and I’ll

show you that I did”; and with that he pulls out a great bundle of

papers. “You fright me,” said I; “what are all these?” “Don’t be

frighted, my dear,” said he, and kissed me. This was the first time

that he had been so free to call me “my dear”; then he repeated it,

“Don’t be frighted; you shall see what it is all”; then he laid them

all abroad. There was first the deed or sentence of divorce from his

wife, and the full evidence of her playing the whore; then there were

the certificates of the minister and churchwardens of the parish where

she lived, proving that she was buried, and intimating the manner of

her death; the copy of the coroner’s warrant for a jury to sit upon

her, and the verdict of the jury, who brought it in Non compos mentis.

All this was indeed to the purpose, and to give me satisfaction,

though, by the way, I was not so scrupulous, had he known all, but that

I might have taken him without it. However, I looked them all over as

well as I could, and told him that this was all very clear indeed, but

that he need not have given himself the trouble to have brought them

out with him, for it was time enough. Well, he said, it might be time

enough for me, but no time but the present time was time enough for

him.

There were other papers rolled up, and I asked him what they were.

“Why, ay,” says he, “that’s the question I wanted to have you ask me”;

so he unrolls them and takes out a little shagreen case, and gives me

out of it a very fine diamond ring. I could not refuse it, if I had a

mind to do so, for he put it upon my finger; so I made him a curtsy and

accepted it. Then he takes out another ring: “And this,” says he, “is

for another occasion,” so he puts that in his pocket. “Well, but let me

see it, though,” says I, and smiled; “I guess what it is; I think you

are mad.” “I should have been mad if I had done less,” says he, and

still he did not show me, and I had a great mind to see it; so I says,

“Well, but let me see it.” “Hold,” says he, “first look here”; then he

took up the roll again and read it, and behold! it was a licence for us

to be married. “Why,” says I, “are you distracted? Why, you were fully

satisfied that I would comply and yield at first word, or resolved to

take no denial.” “The last is certainly the case,” said he. “But you

may be mistaken,” said I. “No, no,” says he, “how can you think so? I

must not be denied, I can’t be denied”; and with that he fell to

kissing me so violently, I could not get rid of him.

There was a bed in the room, and we were walking to and again, eager in

the discourse; at last he takes me by surprise in his arms, and threw

me on the bed and himself with me, and holding me fast in his arms, but

without the least offer of any indecency, courted me to consent with

such repeated entreaties and arguments, protesting his affection, and

vowing he would not let me go till I had promised him, that at last I

said, “Why, you resolve not to be denied, indeed, I can’t be denied.”

“Well, well,” said I, and giving him a slight kiss, “then you shan’t be

denied,” said I; “let me get up.”

He was so transported with my consent, and the kind manner of it, that

I began to think once he took it for a marriage, and would not stay for

the form; but I wronged him, for he gave over kissing me, and then

giving me two or three kisses again, thanked me for my kind yielding to

him; and was so overcome with the satisfaction and joy of it, that I

saw tears stand in his eyes.

I turned from him, for it filled my eyes with tears too, and I asked

him leave to retire a little to my chamber. If ever I had a grain of

true repentance for a vicious and abominable life for twenty-four years

past, it was then. Oh, what a felicity is it to mankind, said I to

myself, that they cannot see into the hearts of one another! How happy

had it been for me if I had been wife to a man of so much honesty, and

so much affection from the beginning!

Then it occurred to me, “What an abominable creature am I! and how is

this innocent gentleman going to be abused by me! How little does he

think, that having divorced a whore, he is throwing himself into the

arms of another! that he is going to marry one that has lain with two

brothers, and has had three children by her own brother! one that was

born in Newgate, whose mother was a whore, and is now a transported

thief! one that has lain with thirteen men, and has had a child since

he saw me! Poor gentleman!” said I, “what is he going to do?” After

this reproaching myself was over, it following thus: “Well, if I must

be his wife, if it please God to give me grace, I’ll be a true wife to

him, and love him suitably to the strange excess of his passion for me;

I will make him amends if possible, by what he shall see, for the

cheats and abuses I put upon him, which he does not see.”

He was impatient for my coming out of my chamber, but finding me long,

he went downstairs and talked with my landlord about the parson.

My landlord, an officious though well-meaning fellow, had sent away for

the neighbouring clergyman; and when my gentleman began to speak of it

to him, and talk of sending for him, “Sir,” says he to him, “my friend

is in the house”; so without any more words he brought them together.

When he came to the minister, he asked him if he would venture to marry

a couple of strangers that were both willing. The parson said that Mr.

—— had said something to him of it; that he hoped it was no clandestine

business; that he seemed to be a grave gentleman, and he supposed madam

was not a girl, so that the consent of friends should be wanted. “To

put you out of doubt of that,” says my gentleman, “read this paper”;

and out he pulls the license. “I am satisfied,” says the minister;

“where is the lady?” “You shall see her presently,” says my gentleman.

When he had said thus he comes upstairs, and I was by that time come

out of my room; so he tells me the minister was below, and that he had

talked with him, and that upon showing him the license, he was free to

marry us with all his heart, “but he asks to see you”; so he asked if I

would let him come up.

“’Tis time enough,” said I, “in the morning, is it not?” “Why,” said

he, “my dear, he seemed to scruple whether it was not some young girl

stolen from her parents, and I assured him we were both of age to

command our own consent; and that made him ask to see you.” “Well,”

said I, “do as you please”; so up they brings the parson, and a merry,

good sort of gentleman he was. He had been told, it seems, that we had

met there by accident, that I came in the Chester coach, and my

gentleman in his own coach to meet me; that we were to have met last

night at Stony-Stratford, but that he could not reach so far. “Well,

sir,” says the parson, “every ill turn has some good in it. The

disappointment, sir,” says he to my gentleman, “was yours, and the good

turn is mine, for if you had met at Stony-Stratford I had not had the

honour to marry you. Landlord, have you a Common Prayer Book?”

I started as if I had been frightened. “Lord, sir,” says I, “what do

you mean? What, to marry in an inn, and at night too?” “Madam,” says

the minister, “if you will have it be in the church, you shall; but I

assure you your marriage will be as firm here as in the church; we are

not tied by the canons to marry nowhere but in the church; and if you

will have it in the church, it will be a public as a county fair; and

as for the time of day, it does not at all weigh in this case; our

princes are married in their chambers, and at eight or ten o’clock at

night.”

I was a great while before I could be persuaded, and pretended not to

be willing at all to be married but in the church. But it was all

grimace; so I seemed at last to be prevailed on, and my landlord and

his wife and daughter were called up. My landlord was father and clerk

and all together, and we were married, and very merry we were; though I

confess the self-reproaches which I had upon me before lay close to me,

and extorted every now and then a deep sigh from me, which my

bridegroom took notice of, and endeavoured to encourage me, thinking,

poor man, that I had some little hesitations at the step I had taken so

hastily.

We enjoyed ourselves that evening completely, and yet all was kept so

private in the inn that not a servant in the house knew of it, for my

landlady and her daughter waited on me, and would not let any of the

maids come upstairs, except while we were at supper. My landlady’s

daughter I called my bridesmaid; and sending for a shopkeeper the next

morning, I gave the young woman a good suit of knots, as good as the

town would afford, and finding it was a lace-making town, I gave her

mother a piece of bone-lace for a head.

One reason that my landlord was so close was, that he was unwilling the

minister of the parish should hear of it; but for all that somebody

heard of it, so at that we had the bells set a-ringing the next morning

early, and the music, such as the town would afford, under our window;

but my landlord brazened it out, that we were married before we came

thither, only that, being his former guests, we would have our

wedding-supper at his house.

We could not find in our hearts to stir the next day; for, in short,

having been disturbed by the bells in the morning, and having perhaps

not slept overmuch before, we were so sleepy afterwards that we lay in

bed till almost twelve o’clock.

I begged my landlady that we might not have any more music in the town,

nor ringing of bells, and she managed it so well that we were very

quiet; but an odd passage interrupted all my mirth for a good while.

The great room of the house looked into the street, and my new spouse

being belowstairs, I had walked to the end of the room; and it being a

pleasant, warm day, I had opened the window, and was standing at it for

some air, when I saw three gentlemen come by on horseback and go into

an inn just against us.

It was not to be concealed, nor was it so doubtful as to leave me any

room to question it, but the second of the three was my Lancashire

husband. I was frightened to death; I never was in such a consternation

in my life; I thought I should have sunk into the ground; my blood ran

chill in my veins, and I trembled as if I had been in a cold fit of

ague. I say, there was no room to question the truth of it; I knew his

clothes, I knew his horse, and I knew his face.

The first sensible reflect I made was, that my husband was not by to

see my disorder, and that I was very glad of it. The gentlemen had not

been long in the house but they came to the window of their room, as is

usual; but my window was shut, you may be sure. However, I could not

keep from peeping at them, and there I saw him again, heard him call

out to one of the servants of the house for something he wanted, and

received all the terrifying confirmations of its being the same person

that were possible to be had.

My next concern was to know, if possible, what was his business there;

but that was impossible. Sometimes my imagination formed an idea of one

frightful thing, sometimes of another; sometimes I thought he had

discovered me, and was come to upbraid me with ingratitude and breach

of honour; and every moment I fancied he was coming up the stairs to

insult me; and innumerable fancies came into my head of what was never

in his head, nor ever could be, unless the devil had revealed it to

him.

I remained in this fright nearly two hours, and scarce ever kept my eye

from the window or door of the inn where they were. At last, hearing a

great clatter in the passage of their inn, I ran to the window, and, to

my great satisfaction, saw them all three go out again and travel on

westward. Had they gone towards London, I should have been still in a

fright, lest I should meet him on the road again, and that he should

know me; but he went the contrary way, and so I was eased of that

disorder.

We resolved to be going the next day, but about six o’clock at night we

were alarmed with a great uproar in the street, and people riding as if

they had been out of their wits; and what was it but a hue-and-cry

after three highwaymen that had robbed two coaches and some other

travellers near Dunstable Hill, and notice had, it seems, been given

that they had been seen at Brickhill at such a house, meaning the house

where those gentlemen had been.

The house was immediately beset and searched, but there were witnesses

enough that the gentlemen had been gone over three hours. The crowd

having gathered about, we had the news presently; and I was heartily

concerned now another way. I presently told the people of the house,

that I durst to say those were not the persons, for that I knew one of

the gentlemen to be a very honest person, and of a good estate in

Lancashire.

The constable who came with the hue-and-cry was immediately informed of

this, and came over to me to be satisfied from my own mouth, and I

assured him that I saw the three gentlemen as I was at the window; that

I saw them afterwards at the windows of the room they dined in; that I

saw them afterwards take horse, and I could assure him I knew one of

them to be such a man, that he was a gentleman of a very good estate,

and an undoubted character in Lancashire, from whence I was just now

upon my journey.

The assurance with which I delivered this gave the mob gentry a check,

and gave the constable such satisfaction, that he immediately sounded a

retreat, told his people these were not the men, but that he had an

account they were very honest gentlemen; and so they went all back

again. What the truth of the matter was I knew not, but certain it was

that the coaches were robbed at Dunstable Hill, and £560 in money

taken; besides, some of the lace merchants that always travel that way

had been visited too. As to the three gentlemen, that remains to be

explained hereafter.

Well, this alarm stopped us another day, though my spouse was for

travelling, and told me that it was always safest travelling after a

robbery, for that the thieves were sure to be gone far enough off when

they had alarmed the country; but I was afraid and uneasy, and indeed

principally lest my old acquaintance should be upon the road still, and

should chance to see me.

I never lived four pleasanter days together in my life. I was a mere

bride all this while, and my new spouse strove to make me entirely easy

in everything. Oh could this state of life have continued, how had all

my past troubles been forgot, and my future sorrows avoided! But I had

a past life of a most wretched kind to account for, some of it in this

world as well as in another.

We came away the fifth day; and my landlord, because he saw me uneasy,

mounted himself, his son, and three honest country fellows with good

firearms, and, without telling us of it, followed the coach, and would

see us safe into Dunstable. We could do no less than treat them very

handsomely at Dunstable, which cost my spouse about ten or twelve

shillings, and something he gave the men for their time too, but my

landlord would take nothing for himself.

This was the most happy contrivance for me that could have fallen out;

for had I come to London unmarried, I must either have come to him for

the first night’s entertainment, or have discovered to him that I had

not one acquaintance in the whole city of London that could receive a

poor bride for the first night’s lodging with her spouse. But now,

being an old married woman, I made no scruple of going directly home

with him, and there I took possession at once of a house well

furnished, and a husband in very good circumstances, so that I had a

prospect of a very happy life, if I knew how to manage it; and I had

leisure to consider of the real value of the life I was likely to live.

How different it was to be from the loose ungoverned part I had acted

before, and how much happier a life of virtue and sobriety is, than

that which we call a life of pleasure.

Oh had this particular scene of life lasted, or had I learned from that

time I enjoyed it, to have tasted the true sweetness of it, and had I

not fallen into that poverty which is the sure bane of virtue, how

happy had I been, not only here, but perhaps for ever! for while I

lived thus, I was really a penitent for all my life past. I looked back

on it with abhorrence, and might truly be said to hate myself for it. I

often reflected how my lover at the Bath, struck at the hand of God,

repented and abandoned me, and refused to see me any more, though he

loved me to an extreme; but I, prompted by that worst of devils,

poverty, returned to the vile practice, and made the advantage of what

they call a handsome face to be the relief to my necessities, and

beauty be a pimp to vice.

Now I seemed landed in a safe harbour, after the stormy voyage of life

past was at an end, and I began to be thankful for my deliverance. I

sat many an hour by myself, and wept over the remembrance of past

follies, and the dreadful extravagances of a wicked life, and sometimes

I flattered myself that I had sincerely repented.

But there are temptations which it is not in the power of human nature

to resist, and few know what would be their case if driven to the same

exigencies. As covetousness is the root of all evil, so poverty is, I

believe, the worst of all snares. But I waive that discourse till I

come to an experiment.

I lived with this husband with the utmost tranquillity; he was a quiet,

sensible, sober man; virtuous, modest, sincere, and in his business

diligent and just. His business was in a narrow compass, and his income

sufficient to a plentiful way of living in the ordinary way. I do not

say to keep an equipage, and make a figure, as the world calls it, nor

did I expect it, or desire it; for as I abhorred the levity and

extravagance of my former life, so I chose now to live retired, frugal,

and within ourselves. I kept no company, made no visits; minded my

family, and obliged my husband; and this kind of life became a pleasure

to me.

We lived in an uninterrupted course of ease and content for five years,

when a sudden blow from an almost invisible hand blasted all my

happiness, and turned me out into the world in a condition the reverse

of all that had been before it.

My husband having trusted one of his fellow-clerks with a sum of money,

too much for our fortunes to bear the loss of, the clerk failed, and

the loss fell very heavy on my husband, yet it was not so great neither

but that, if he had had spirit and courage to have looked his

misfortunes in the face, his credit was so good that, as I told him, he

would easily recover it; for to sink under trouble is to double the

weight, and he that will die in it, shall die in it.

It was in vain to speak comfortably to him; the wound had sunk too

deep; it was a stab that touched the vitals; he grew melancholy and

disconsolate, and from thence lethargic, and died. I foresaw the blow,

and was extremely oppressed in my mind, for I saw evidently that if he

died I was undone.

I had had two children by him and no more, for, to tell the truth, it

began to be time for me to leave bearing children, for I was now

eight-and-forty, and I suppose if he had lived I should have had no

more.

I was now left in a dismal and disconsolate case indeed, and in several

things worse than ever. First, it was past the flourishing time with me

when I might expect to be courted for a mistress; that agreeable part

had declined some time, and the ruins only appeared of what had been;

and that which was worse than all this, that I was the most dejected,

disconsolate creature alive. I that had encouraged my husband, and

endeavoured to support his spirits under his trouble, could not support

my own; I wanted that spirit in trouble which I told him was so

necessary to him for bearing the burthen.

But my case was indeed deplorable, for I was left perfectly friendless

and helpless, and the loss my husband had sustained had reduced his

circumstances so low, that though indeed I was not in debt, yet I could

easily foresee that what was left would not support me long; that while

it wasted daily for subsistence, I had not way to increase it one

shilling, so that it would be soon all spent, and then I saw nothing

before me but the utmost distress; and this represented itself so

lively to my thoughts, that it seemed as if it was come, before it was

really very near; also my very apprehensions doubled the misery, for I

fancied every sixpence that I paid for a loaf of bread was the last

that I had in the world, and that to-morrow I was to fast, and be

starved to death.

In this distress I had no assistant, no friend to comfort or advise me;

I sat and cried and tormented myself night and day, wringing my hands,

and sometimes raving like a distracted woman; and indeed I have often

wondered it had not affected my reason, for I had the vapours to such a

degree, that my understanding was sometimes quite lost in fancies and

imaginations.

I lived two years in this dismal condition, wasting that little I had,

weeping continually over my dismal circumstances, and, as it were, only

bleeding to death, without the least hope or prospect of help from God

or man; and now I had cried too long, and so often, that tears were, as

I might say, exhausted, and I began to be desperate, for I grew poor

apace.

For a little relief I had put off my house and took lodgings; and as I

was reducing my living, so I sold off most of my goods, which put a

little money in my pocket, and I lived near a year upon that, spending

very sparingly, and eking things out to the utmost; but still when I

looked before me, my very heart would sink within me at the inevitable

approach of misery and want. Oh let none read this part without

seriously reflecting on the circumstances of a desolate state, and how

they would grapple with mere want of friends and want of bread; it will

certainly make them think not of sparing what they have only, but of

looking up to heaven for support, and of the wise man’s prayer, “Give

me not poverty, lest I steal.”

Let them remember that a time of distress is a time of dreadful

temptation, and all the strength to resist is taken away; poverty

presses, the soul is made desperate by distress, and what can be done?

It was one evening, when being brought, as I may say, to the last gasp,

I think I may truly say I was distracted and raving, when prompted by I

know not what spirit, and, as it were, doing I did not know what or

why, I dressed me (for I had still pretty good clothes) and went out. I

am very sure I had no manner of design in my head when I went out; I

neither knew nor considered where to go, or on what business; but as

the devil carried me out and laid his bait for me, so he brought me, to

be sure, to the place, for I knew not whither I was going or what I

did.

Wandering thus about, I knew not whither, I passed by an apothecary’s

shop in Leadenhall Street, when I saw lie on a stool just before the

counter a little bundle wrapped in a white cloth; beyond it stood a

maid-servant with her back to it, looking towards the top of the shop,

where the apothecary’s apprentice, as I suppose, was standing upon the

counter, with his back also to the door, and a candle in his hand,

looking and reaching up to the upper shelf for something he wanted, so

that both were engaged mighty earnestly, and nobody else in the shop.

This was the bait; and the devil, who I said laid the snare, as readily

prompted me as if he had spoke, for I remember, and shall never forget

it, ’twas like a voice spoken to me over my shoulder, “Take the bundle;

be quick; do it this moment.” It was no sooner said but I stepped into

the shop, and with my back to the wench, as if I had stood up for a

cart that was going by, I put my hand behind me and took the bundle,

and went off with it, the maid or the fellow not perceiving me, or any

one else.

It is impossible to express the horror of my soul all the while I did

it. When I went away I had no heart to run, or scarce to mend my pace.

I crossed the street indeed, and went down the first turning I came to,

and I think it was a street that went through into Fenchurch Street.

From thence I crossed and turned through so many ways and turnings,

that I could never tell which way it was, not where I went; for I felt

not the ground I stepped on, and the farther I was out of danger, the

faster I went, till, tired and out of breath, I was forced to sit down

on a little bench at a door, and then I began to recover, and found I

was got into Thames Street, near Billingsgate. I rested me a little and

went on; my blood was all in a fire; my heart beat as if I was in a

sudden fright. In short, I was under such a surprise that I still knew

not wither I was going, or what to do.

After I had tired myself thus with walking a long way about, and so

eagerly, I began to consider and make home to my lodging, where I came

about nine o’clock at night.

When the bundle was made up for, or on what occasion laid where I found

it, I knew not, but when I came to open it I found there was a suit of

childbed-linen in it, very good and almost new, the lace very fine;

there was a silver porringer of a pint, a small silver mug and six

spoons, with some other linen, a good smock, and three silk

handkerchiefs, and in the mug, wrapped up in a paper, 18s. 6d. in

money.

All the while I was opening these things I was under such dreadful

impressions of fear, and I such terror of mind, though I was perfectly

safe, that I cannot express the manner of it. I sat me down, and cried

most vehemently. “Lord,” said I, “what am I now? a thief! Why, I shall

be taken next time, and be carried to Newgate and be tried for my

life!” And with that I cried again a long time, and I am sure, as poor

as I was, if I had durst for fear, I would certainly have carried the

things back again; but that went off after a while. Well, I went to bed

for that night, but slept little; the horror of the fact was upon my

mind, and I knew not what I said or did all night, and all the next

day. Then I was impatient to hear some news of the loss; and would fain

know how it was, whether they were a poor body’s goods, or a rich.

“Perhaps,” said I, “it may be some poor widow like me, that had packed

up these goods to go and sell them for a little bread for herself and a

poor child, and are now starving and breaking their hearts for want of

that little they would have fetched.” And this thought tormented me

worse than all the rest, for three or four days’ time.

But my own distresses silenced all these reflections, and the prospect

of my own starving, which grew every day more frightful to me, hardened

my heart by degrees. It was then particularly heavy upon my mind, that

I had been reformed, and had, as I hoped, repented of all my past

wickedness; that I had lived a sober, grave, retired life for several

years, but now I should be driven by the dreadful necessity of my

circumstances to the gates of destruction, soul and body; and two or

three times I fell upon my knees, praying to God, as well as I could,

for deliverance; but I cannot but say, my prayers had no hope in them.

I knew not what to do; it was all fear without, and dark within; and I

reflected on my past life as not sincerely repented of, that Heaven was

now beginning to punish me on this side of the grave, and would make me

as miserable as I had been wicked.

Had I gone on here I had perhaps been a true penitent; but I had an

evil counsellor within, and he was continually prompting me to relieve

myself by the worst means; so one evening he tempted me again, by the

same wicked impulse that had said “Take that bundle,” to go out again

and seek for what might happen.

I went out now by daylight, and wandered about I knew not whither, and

in search of I knew not what, when the devil put a snare in my way of a

dreadful nature indeed, and such a one as I have never had before or

since. Going through Aldersgate Street, there was a pretty little child

who had been at a dancing-school, and was going home, all alone; and my

prompter, like a true devil, set me upon this innocent creature. I

talked to it, and it prattled to me again, and I took it by the hand

and led it along till I came to a paved alley that goes into

Bartholomew Close, and I led it in there. The child said that was not

its way home. I said, “Yes, my dear, it is; I’ll show you the way

home.” The child had a little necklace on of gold beads, and I had my

eye upon that, and in the dark of the alley I stooped, pretending to

mend the child’s clog that was loose, and took off her necklace, and

the child never felt it, and so led the child on again. Here, I say,

the devil put me upon killing the child in the dark alley, that it

might not cry, but the very thought frighted me so that I was ready to

drop down; but I turned the child about and bade it go back again, for

that was not its way home. The child said, so she would, and I went

through into Bartholomew Close, and then turned round to another

passage that goes into St. John Street; then, crossing into Smithfield,

went down Chick Lane and into Field Lane to Holborn Bridge, when,

mixing with the crowd of people usually passing there, it was not

possible to have been found out; and thus I enterprised my second sally

into the world.

The thoughts of this booty put out all the thoughts of the first, and

the reflections I had made wore quickly off; poverty, as I have said,

hardened my heart, and my own necessities made me regardless of

anything. The last affair left no great concern upon me, for as I did

the poor child no harm, I only said to myself, I had given the parents

a just reproof for their negligence in leaving the poor little lamb to

come home by itself, and it would teach them to take more care of it

another time.

This string of beads was worth about twelve or fourteen pounds. I

suppose it might have been formerly the mother’s, for it was too big

for the child’s wear, but that perhaps the vanity of the mother, to

have her child look fine at the dancing-school, had made her let the

child wear it; and no doubt the child had a maid sent to take care of

it, but she, careless jade, was taken up perhaps with some fellow that

had met her by the way, and so the poor baby wandered till it fell into

my hands.

However, I did the child no harm; I did not so much as fright it, for I

had a great many tender thoughts about me yet, and did nothing but

what, as I may say, mere necessity drove me to.

I had a great many adventures after this, but I was young in the

business, and did not know how to manage, otherwise than as the devil

put things into my head; and indeed he was seldom backward to me. One

adventure I had which was very lucky to me. I was going through Lombard

Street in the dusk of the evening, just by the end of Three King court,

when on a sudden comes a fellow running by me as swift as lightning,

and throws a bundle that was in his hand, just behind me, as I stood up

against the corner of the house at the turning into the alley. Just as

he threw it in he said, “God bless you, mistress, let it lie there a

little,” and away he runs swift as the wind. After him comes two more,

and immediately a young fellow without his hat, crying “Stop thief!”

and after him two or three more. They pursued the two last fellows so

close, that they were forced to drop what they had got, and one of them

was taken into the bargain, and other got off free.

I stood stock-still all this while, till they came back, dragging the

poor fellow they had taken, and lugging the things they had found,

extremely well satisfied that they had recovered the booty and taken

the thief; and thus they passed by me, for I looked only like one who

stood up while the crowd was gone.

Once or twice I asked what was the matter, but the people neglected

answering me, and I was not very importunate; but after the crowd was

wholly past, I took my opportunity to turn about and take up what was

behind me and walk away. This, indeed, I did with less disturbance than

I had done formerly, for these things I did not steal, but they were

stolen to my hand. I got safe to my lodgings with this cargo, which was

a piece of fine black lustring silk, and a piece of velvet; the latter

was but part of a piece of about eleven yards; the former was a whole

piece of near fifty yards. It seems it was a mercer’s shop that they

had rifled. I say rifled, because the goods were so considerable that

they had lost; for the goods that they recovered were pretty many, and

I believe came to about six or seven several pieces of silk. How they

came to get so many I could not tell; but as I had only robbed the

thief, I made no scruple at taking these goods, and being very glad of

them too.

I had pretty good luck thus far, and I made several adventures more,

though with but small purchase, yet with good success, but I went in

daily dread that some mischief would befall me, and that I should

certainly come to be hanged at last. The impression this made on me was

too strong to be slighted, and it kept me from making attempts that,

for ought I knew, might have been very safely performed; but one thing

I cannot omit, which was a bait to me many a day. I walked frequently

out into the villages round the town, to see if nothing would fall in

my way there; and going by a house near Stepney, I saw on the

window-board two rings, one a small diamond ring, and the other a gold

ring, to be sure laid there by some thoughtless lady, that had more

money than forecast, perhaps only till she washed her hands.

I walked several times by the window to observe if I could see whether

there was anybody in the room or no, and I could see nobody, but still

I was not sure. It came presently into my thoughts to rap at the glass,

as if I wanted to speak with somebody, and if anybody was there they

would be sure to come to the window, and then I would tell them to

remove those rings, for that I had seen two suspicious fellows take

notice of them. This was a ready thought. I rapped once or twice and

nobody came, when, seeing the coast clear, I thrust hard against the

square of the glass, and broke it with very little noise, and took out

the two rings, and walked away with them very safe. The diamond ring

was worth about £3, and the other about 9s.

I was now at a loss for a market for my goods, and especially for my

two pieces of silk. I was very loth to dispose of them for a trifle, as

the poor unhappy thieves in general do, who, after they have ventured

their lives for perhaps a thing of value, are fain to sell it for a

song when they have done; but I was resolved I would not do thus,

whatever shift I made, unless I was driven to the last extremity.

However, I did not well know what course to take. At last I resolved to

go to my old governess, and acquaint myself with her again. I had

punctually supplied the £5 a year to her for my little boy as long as I

was able, but at last was obliged to put a stop to it. However, I had

written a letter to her, wherein I had told her that my circumstances

were reduced very low; that I had lost my husband, and that I was not

able to do it any longer, and so begged that the poor child might not

suffer too much for its mother’s misfortunes.

I now made her a visit, and I found that she drove something of the old

trade still, but that she was not in such flourishing circumstances as

before; for she had been sued by a certain gentleman who had had his

daughter stolen from him, and who, it seems, she had helped to convey

away; and it was very narrowly that she escaped the gallows. The

expense also had ravaged her, and she was become very poor; her house

was but meanly furnished, and she was not in such repute for her

practice as before; however, she stood upon her legs, as they say, and

as she was a stirring, bustling woman, and had some stock left, she was

turned pawnbroker, and lived pretty well.

She received me very civilly, and with her usual obliging manner told

me she would not have the less respect for me for my being reduced;

that she had taken care my boy was very well looked after, though I

could not pay for him, and that the woman that had him was easy, so

that I needed not to trouble myself about him till I might be better

able to do it effectually.

I told her that I had not much money left, but that I had some things

that were money’s worth, if she could tell me how I might turn them

into money. She asked me what it was I had. I pulled out the string of

gold beads, and told her it was one of my husband’s presents to me;

then I showed her the two parcels of silk, which I told her I had from

Ireland, and brought up to town with me; and the little diamond ring.

As to the small parcel of plate and spoons, I had found means to

dispose of them myself before; and as for the childbed-linen I had, she

offered me to take it herself, believing it to have been my own. She

told me that she was turned pawnbroker, and that she would sell those

things for me as pawn to her; and so she sent presently for proper

agents that bought them, being in her hands, without any scruple, and

gave good prices too.

I now began to think this necessary woman might help me a little in my

low condition to some business, for I would gladly have turned my hand

to any honest employment if I could have got it. But here she was

deficient; honest business did not come within her reach. If I had been

younger, perhaps she might have helped me to a spark, but my thoughts

were off that kind of livelihood, as being quite out of the way after

fifty, which was my case, and so I told her.

She invited me at last to come, and be at her house till I could find

something to do, and it should cost me very little, and this I gladly

accepted of. And now living a little easier, I entered into some

measures to have my little son by my last husband taken off; and this

she made easy too, reserving a payment only of £5 a year, if I could

pay it. This was such a help to me, that for a good while I left off

the wicked trade that I had so newly taken up; and gladly I would have

got my bread by the help of my needle if I could have got work, but

that was very hard to do for one that had no manner of acquaintance in

the world.

However, at last I got some quilting work for ladies’ beds, petticoats,

and the like; and this I liked very well, and worked very hard, and

with this I began to live; but the diligent devil, who resolved I

should continue in his service, continually prompted me to go out and

take a walk, that is to say, to see if anything would offer in the old

way.

One evening I blindly obeyed his summons, and fetched a long circuit

through the streets, but met with no purchase, and came home very weary

and empty; but not content with that, I went out the next evening too,

when going by an alehouse I saw the door of a little room open, next

the very street, and on the table a silver tankard, things much in use

in public-houses at that time. It seems some company had been drinking

there, and the careless boys had forgot to take it away.

I went into the box frankly, and setting the silver tankard on the

corner of the bench, I sat down before it, and knocked with my foot; a

boy came presently, and I bade him fetch me a pint of warm ale, for it

was cold weather; the boy ran, and I heard him go down the cellar to

draw the ale. While the boy was gone, another boy came into the room,

and cried, “D’ ye call?” I spoke with a melancholy air, and said, “No,

child; the boy is gone for a pint of ale for me.”

While I sat here, I heard the woman in the bar say, “Are they all gone

in the five?” which was the box I sat in, and the boy said, “Yes.” “Who

fetched the tankard away?” says the woman. “I did,” says another boy;

“that’s it,” pointing, it seems, to another tankard, which he had

fetched from another box by mistake; or else it must be, that the rogue

forgot that he had not brought it in, which certainly he had not.

I heard all this, much to my satisfaction, for I found plainly that the

tankard was not missed, and yet they concluded it was fetched away; so

I drank my ale, called to pay, and as I went away I said, “Take care of

your plate, child,” meaning a silver pint mug, which he brought me

drink in. The boy said, “Yes, madam, very welcome,” and away I came.

I came home to my governess, and now I thought it was a time to try

her, that if I might be put to the necessity of being exposed, she

might offer me some assistance. When I had been at home some time, and

had an opportunity of talking to her, I told her I had a secret of the

greatest consequence in the world to commit to her, if she had respect

enough for me to keep it a secret. She told me she had kept one of my

secrets faithfully; why should I doubt her keeping another? I told her

the strangest thing in the world had befallen me, and that it had made

a thief of me, even without any design, and so told her the whole story

of the tankard. “And have you brought it away with you, my dear?” says

she. “To be sure I have,” says I, and showed it her. “But what shall I

do now,” says I; “must not carry it again?”

“Carry it again!” says she. “Ay, if you are minded to be sent to

Newgate for stealing it.” “Why,” says I, “they can’t be so base to stop

me, when I carry it to them again?” “You don’t know those sort of

people, child,” says she; “they’ll not only carry you to Newgate, but

hang you too, without any regard to the honesty of returning it; or

bring in an account of all the other tankards they have lost, for you

to pay for.” “What must I do, then?” says I. “Nay,” says she, “as you

have played the cunning part and stole it, you must e’en keep it;

there’s no going back now. Besides, child,” says she, “don’t you want

it more than they do? I wish you could light of such a bargain once a

week.”

This gave me a new notion of my governess, and that since she was

turned pawnbroker, she had a sort of people about her that were none of

the honest ones that I had met with there before.

I had not been long there but I discovered it more plainly than before,

for every now and then I saw hilts of swords, spoons, forks, tankards,

and all such kind of ware brought in, not to be pawned, but to be sold

downright; and she bought everything that came without asking any

questions, but had very good bargains, as I found by her discourse.

I found also that in following this trade she always melted down the

plate she bought, that it might not be challenged; and she came to me

and told me one morning that she was going to melt, and if I would, she

would put my tankard in, that it might not be seen by anybody. I told

her, with all my heart; so she weighed it, and allowed me the full

value in silver again; but I found she did not do the same to the rest

of her customers.

Some time after this, as I was at work, and very melancholy, she begins

to ask me what the matter was, as she was used to do. I told her my

heart was heavy; I had little work, and nothing to live on, and knew

not what course to take. She laughed, and told me I must go out again

and try my fortune; it might be that I might meet with another piece of

plate. “O mother!” says I, “that is a trade I have no skill in, and if

I should be taken I am undone at once.” Says she, “I could help you to

a schoolmistress that shall make you as dexterous as herself.” I

trembled at that proposal, for hitherto I had had no confederates, nor

any acquaintance among that tribe. But she conquered all my modesty,

and all my fears; and in a little time, by the help of this

confederate, I grew as impudent a thief, and as dexterous as ever Moll

Cutpurse was, though, if fame does not belie her, not half so handsome.

The comrade she helped me to dealt in three sorts of craft, viz.

shoplifting, stealing of shop-books and pocket-books, and taking off

gold watches from the ladies’ sides; and this last she did so

dexterously that no woman ever arrived to the performance of that art

so as to do it like her. I liked the first and the last of these things

very well, and I attended her some time in the practice, just as a

deputy attends a midwife, without any pay.

At length she put me to practice. She had shown me her art, and I had

several times unhooked a watch from her own side with great dexterity.

At last she showed me a prize, and this was a young lady big with

child, who had a charming watch. The thing was to be done as she came

out of church. She goes on one side of the lady, and pretends, just as

she came to the steps, to fall, and fell against the lady with so much

violence as put her into a great fright, and both cried out terribly.

In the very moment that she jostled the lady, I had hold of the watch,

and holding it the right way, the start she gave drew the hook out, and

she never felt it. I made off immediately, and left my schoolmistress

to come out of her pretended fright gradually, and the lady too; and

presently the watch was missed. “Ay,” says my comrade, “then it was

those rogues that thrust me down, I warrant ye; I wonder the

gentlewoman did not miss her watch before, then we might have taken

them.”

She humoured the thing so well that nobody suspected her, and I was got

home a full hour before her. This was my first adventure in company.

The watch was indeed a very fine one, and had a great many trinkets

about it, and my governess allowed us £20 for it, of which I had half.

And thus I was entered a complete thief, hardened to the pitch above

all the reflections of conscience or modesty, and to a degree which I

must acknowledge I never thought possible in me.

Thus the devil, who began, by the help of an irresistible poverty, to

push me into this wickedness, brought me on to a height beyond the

common rate, even when my necessities were not so great, or the

prospect of my misery so terrifying; for I had now got into a little

vein of work, and as I was not at a loss to handle my needle, it was

very probable, as acquaintance came in, I might have got my bread

honestly enough.

I must say, that if such a prospect of work had presented itself at

first, when I began to feel the approach of my miserable

circumstances—I say, had such a prospect of getting my bread by working

presented itself then, I had never fallen into this wicked trade, or

into such a wicked gang as I was now embarked with; but practice had

hardened me, and I grew audacious to the last degree; and the more so

because I had carried it on so long, and had never been taken; for, in

a word, my new partner in wickedness and I went on together so long,

without being ever detected, that we not only grew bold, but we grew

rich, and we had at one time one-and-twenty gold watches in our hands.

I remember that one day being a little more serious than ordinary, and

finding I had so good a stock beforehand as I had, for I had near £200

in money for my share, it came strongly into my mind, no doubt from

some kind spirit, if such there be, that at first poverty excited me,

and my distresses drove me to these dreadful shifts; so seeing those

distresses were now relieved, and I could also get something towards a

maintenance by working, and had so good a bank to support me, why

should I now not leave off, as they say, while I was well? that I could

not expect to go always free; and if I was once surprised, and

miscarried, I was undone.

This was doubtless the happy minute, when, if I had hearkened to the

blessed hint, from whatsoever had it came, I had still a cast for an

easy life. But my fate was otherwise determined; the busy devil that so

industriously drew me in had too fast hold of me to let me go back; but

as poverty brought me into the mire, so avarice kept me in, till there

was no going back. As to the arguments which my reason dictated for

persuading me to lay down, avarice stepped in and said, “Go on, go on;

you have had very good luck; go on till you have gotten four or five

hundred pounds, and then you shall leave off, and then you may live

easy without working at all.”

Thus I, that was once in the devil’s clutches, was held fast there as

with a charm, and had no power to go without the circle, till I was

engulfed in labyrinths of trouble too great to get out at all.

However, these thoughts left some impression upon me, and made me act

with some more caution than before, and more than my directors used for

themselves. My comrade, as I called her, but rather she should have

been called my teacher, with another of her scholars, was the first in

the misfortune; for, happening to be upon the hunt for purchase, they

made an attempt upon a linen-draper in Cheapside, but were snapped by a

hawk’s-eyed journeyman, and seized with two pieces of cambric, which

were taken also upon them.

This was enough to lodge them both in Newgate, where they had the

misfortune to have some of their former sins brought to remembrance.

Two other indictments being brought against them, and the facts being

proved upon them, they were both condemned to die. They both pleaded

their bellies, and were both voted quick with child; though my tutoress

was no more with child than I was.

I went frequently to see them, and condole with them, expecting that it

would be my turn next; but the place gave me so much horror, reflecting

that it was the place of my unhappy birth, and of my mother’s

misfortunes, and that I could not bear it, so I was forced to leave off

going to see them.

And oh! could I have but taken warning by their disasters, I had been

happy still, for I was yet free, and had nothing brought against me;

but it could not be, my measure was not yet filled up.

My comrade, having the brand of an old offender, was executed; the

young offender was spared, having obtained a reprieve, but lay starving

a long while in prison, till at last she got her name into what they

call a circuit pardon, and so came off.

This terrible example of my comrade frighted me heartily, and for a

good while I made no excursions; but one night, in the neighbourhood of

my governess’s house, they cried “Fire.” My governess looked out, for

we were all up, and cried immediately that such a gentlewoman’s house

was all of a light fire atop, and so indeed it was. Here she gives me a

job. “Now, child,” says she, “there is a rare opportunity, for the fire

being so near that you may go to it before the street is blocked up

with the crowd.” She presently gave me my cue. “Go, child,” says she,

“to the house, and run in and tell the lady, or anybody you see, that

you come to help them, and that you came from such a gentlewoman (that

is, one of her acquaintance farther up the street).” She gave me the

like cue to the next house, naming another name that was also an

acquaintance of the gentlewoman of the house.

Away I went, and, coming to the house, I found them all in confusion,

you may be sure. I ran in, and finding one of the maids, “Lord!

sweetheart,” says I, “how came this dismal accident? Where is your

mistress? Any how does she do? Is she safe? And where are the children?

I come from Madam —— to help you.” Away runs the maid. “Madam, madam,”

says she, screaming as loud as she could yell, “here is a gentlewoman

come from Madam —— to help us.” The poor woman, half out of her wits,

with a bundle under her arm, an two little children, comes toward me.

“Lord! madam,” says I, “let me carry the poor children to Madam ——,”

she desires you to send them; she’ll take care of the poor lambs;’ and

immediately I takes one of them out of her hand, and she lifts the

other up into my arms. “Ay, do, for God’s sake,” says she, “carry them

to her. Oh! thank her for her kindness.” “Have you anything else to

secure, madam?” says I; “she will take care of it.” “Oh dear! ay,” says

she, “God bless her, and thank her. Take this bundle of plate and carry

it to her too. Oh, she is a good woman. Oh Lord! we are utterly ruined,

utterly undone!” And away she runs from me out of her wits, and the

maids after her; and away comes I with the two children and the bundle.

I was no sooner got into the street but I saw another woman come to me.

“Oh!” says she, “mistress,” in a piteous tone, “you will let fall the

child. Come, this is a sad time; let me help you”; and immediately lays

hold of my bundle to carry it for me. “No,” says I; “if you will help

me, take the child by the hand, and lead it for me but to the upper end

of the street; I’ll go with you and satisfy you for your pains.”

She could not avoid going, after what I said; but the creature, in

short, was one of the same business with me, and wanted nothing but the

bundle; however, she went with me to the door, for she could not help

it. When we were come there I whispered her, “Go, child,” said I, “I

understand your trade; you may meet with purchase enough.”

She understood me and walked off. I thundered at the door with the

children, and as the people were raised before by the noise of the

fire, I was soon let in, and I said, “Is madam awake? Pray tell her

Mrs. —— desires the favour of her to take the two children in; poor

lady, she will be undone, their house is all of a flame,” They took the

children in very civilly, pitied the family in distress, and away came

I with my bundle. One of the maids asked me if I was not to leave the

bundle too. I said, “No, sweetheart, ’tis to go to another place; it

does not belong to them.”

I was a great way out of the hurry now, and so I went on, clear of

anybody’s inquiry, and brought the bundle of plate, which was very

considerable, straight home, and gave it to my old governess. She told

me she would not look into it, but bade me go out again to look for

more.

She gave me the like cue to the gentlewoman of the next house to that

which was on fire, and I did my endeavour to go, but by this time the

alarm of fire was so great, and so many engines playing, and the street

so thronged with people, that I could not get near the house whatever I

would do; so I came back again to my governess’s, and taking the bundle

up into my chamber, I began to examine it. It is with horror that I

tell what a treasure I found there; ’tis enough to say, that besides

most of the family plate, which was considerable, I found a gold chain,

an old-fashioned thing, the locket of which was broken, so that I

suppose it had not been used some years, but the gold was not the worse

for that; also a little box of burying-rings, the lady’s wedding-ring,

and some broken bits of old lockets of gold, a gold watch, and a purse

with about £24 value in old pieces of gold coin, and several other

things of value.

This was the greatest and the worst prize that ever I was concerned in;

for indeed, though, as I have said above, I was hardened now beyond the

power of all reflection in other cases, yet it really touched me to the

very soul when I looked into this treasure, to think of the poor

disconsolate gentlewoman who had lost so much by the fire besides; and

who would think, to be sure, that she had saved her plate and best

things; how she would be surprised and afflicted when she should find

that she had been deceived, and should find that the person that took

her children and her goods, had not come, as was pretended, from the

gentlewoman in the next street, but that the children had been put upon

her without her own knowledge.

I say, I confess the inhumanity of this action moved me very much, and

made me relent exceedingly, and tears stood in my eyes upon that

subject; but with all my sense of its being cruel and inhuman, I could

never find in my heart to make any restitution. The reflection wore

off, and I began quickly to forget the circumstances that attended the

taking them.

Nor was this all; for though by this job I was become considerably

richer than before, yet the resolution I had formerly taken, of leaving

off this horrid trade when I had gotten a little more, did not return,

but I must still get farther, and more; and the avarice joined so with

the success, that I had no more thought of coming to a timely

alteration of life, though without it I could expect no safety, no

tranquillity in the possession of what I had so wickedly gained; but a

little more, and a little more, was the case still.

At length, yielding to the importunities of my crime, I cast off all

remorse and repentance, and all the reflections on that head turned to

no more than this, that I might perhaps come to have one booty more

that might complete my desires; but though I certainly had that one

booty, yet every hit looked towards another, and was so encouraging to

me to go on with the trade, that I had no gust to the thought of laying

it down.

In this condition, hardened by success, and resolving to go on, I fell

into the snare in which I was appointed to meet with my last reward for

this kind of life. But even this was not yet, for I met with several

successful adventures more in this way of being undone.

I remained still with my governess, who was for a while really

concerned for the misfortune of my comrade that had been hanged, and

who, it seems, knew enough of my governess to have sent her the same

way, and which made her very uneasy; indeed, she was in a very great

fright.

It is true that when she was gone, and had not opened mouth to tell

what she knew, my governess was easy as to that point, and perhaps glad

she was hanged, for it was in her power to have obtained a pardon at

the expense of her friends; but on the other hand, the loss of her, and

the sense of her kindness in not making her market of what she knew,

moved my governess to mourn very sincerely for her. I comforted her as

well as I could, and she in return hardened me to merit more completely

the same fate.

However, as I have said, it made me the more wary, and particularly I

was very shy of shoplifting, especially among the mercers and drapers,

who are a set of fellows that have their eyes very much about them. I

made a venture or two among the lace folks and the milliners, and

particularly at one shop where I got notice of two young women who were

newly set up, and had not been bred to the trade. There I think I

carried off a piece of bone-lace, worth six or seven pounds, and a

paper of thread. But this was but once; it was a trick that would not

serve again.

It was always reckoned a safe job when we heard of a new shop, and

especially when the people were such as were not bred to shops. Such

may depend upon it that they will be visited once or twice at their

beginning, and they must be very sharp indeed if they can prevent it.

I made another adventure or two, but they were but trifles too, though

sufficient to live on. After this nothing considerable offering for a

good while, I began to think that I must give over the trade in

earnest; but my governess, who was not willing to lose me, and expected

great things of me, brought me one day into company with a young woman

and a fellow that went for her husband, though as it appeared

afterwards, she was not his wife, but they were partners, it seems, in

the trade they carried on, and partners in something else. In short,

they robbed together, lay together, were taken together, and at last

were hanged together.

I came into a kind of league with these two by the help of my

governess, and they carried me out into three or four adventures, where

I rather saw them commit some coarse and unhandy robberies, in which

nothing but a great stock of impudence on their side, and gross

negligence on the people’s side who were robbed, could have made them

successful. So I resolved from that time forward to be very cautious

how I adventured upon anything with them; and indeed, when two or three

unlucky projects were proposed by them, I declined the offer, and

persuaded them against it. One time they particularly proposed robbing

a watchmaker of three gold watches, which they had eyed in the daytime,

and found the place where he laid them. One of them had so many keys of

all kinds, that he made no question to open the place where the

watchmaker had laid them; and so we made a kind of an appointment; but

when I came to look narrowly into the thing, I found they proposed

breaking open the house, and this, as a thing out of my way, I would

not embark in, so they went without me. They did get into the house by

main force, and broke up the locked place where the watches were, but

found but one of the gold watches, and a silver one, which they took,

and got out of the house again very clear. But the family, being

alarmed, cried out “Thieves,” and the man was pursued and taken; the

young woman had got off too, but unhappily was stopped at a distance,

and the watches found upon her. And thus I had a second escape, for

they were convicted, and both hanged, being old offenders, though but

young people. As I said before that they robbed together and lay

together, so now they hanged together, and there ended my new

partnership.

I began now to be very wary, having so narrowly escaped a scouring, and

having such an example before me; but I had a new tempter, who prompted

me every day—I mean my governess; and now a prize presented, which as

it came by her management, so she expected a good share of the booty.

There was a good quantity of Flanders lace lodged in a private house,

where she had gotten intelligence of it, and Flanders lace being

prohibited, it was a good booty to any custom-house officer that could

come at it. I had a full account from my governess, as well of the

quantity as of the very place where it was concealed, and I went to a

custom-house officer, and told him I had such a discovery to make to

him of such a quantity of lace, if he would assure me that I should

have my due share of the reward. This was so just an offer, that

nothing could be fairer; so he agreed, and taking a constable and me

with him, we beset the house. As I told him I could go directly to the

place, he left it to me; and the hole being very dark, I squeezed

myself into it, with a candle in my hand, and so reached the pieces out

to him, taking care as I gave him some so to secure as much about

myself as I could conveniently dispose of. There was near £300 worth of

lace in the hole, and I secured about £50 worth of it to myself. The

people of the house were not owners of the lace, but a merchant who had

entrusted them with it; so that they were not so surprised as I thought

they would be.

I left the officer overjoyed with his prize, and fully satisfied with

what he had got, and appointed to meet him at a house of his own

directing, where I came after I had disposed of the cargo I had about

me, of which he had not the least suspicion. When I came to him he

began to capitulate with me, believing I did not understand the right I

had to a share in the prize, and would fain have put me off with £20,

but I let him know that I was not so ignorant as he supposed I was; and

yet I was glad, too, that he offered to bring me to a certainty.

I asked £100, and he rose up to £30; I fell to £80, and he rose again

to £40; in a word, he offered £50, and I consented, only demanding a

piece of lace, which I thought came to about £8 or £9, as if it had

been for my own wear, and he agreed to it. So I got £50 in money paid

me that same night, and made an end of the bargain; nor did he ever

know who I was, or where to inquire for me, so that if it had been

discovered that part of the goods were embezzled, he could have made no

challenge upon me for it.

I very punctually divided this spoil with my governess, and I passed

with her from this time for a very dexterous manager in the nicest

cases. I found that this last was the best and easiest sort of work

that was in my way, and I made it my business to inquire out prohibited

goods, and after buying some, usually betrayed them, but none of these

discoveries amounted to anything considerable, not like that I related

just now; but I was willing to act safe, and was still cautious of

running the great risks which I found others did, and in which they

miscarried every day.

The next thing of moment was an attempt at a gentlewoman’s gold watch.

It happened in a crowd, at a meeting-house, where I was in very great

danger of being taken. I had full hold of her watch, but giving a great

jostle, as if somebody had thrust me against her, and in the juncture

giving the watch a fair pull, I found it would not come, so I let it go

that moment, and cried out as if I had been killed, that somebody had

trod upon my foot, and that there were certainly pickpockets there, for

somebody or other had given a pull at my watch; for you are to observe

that on these adventures we always went very well dressed, and I had

very good clothes on, and a gold watch by my side, as like a lady as

other fold.

I had no sooner said so, but the other gentlewoman cried out “A

pickpocket” too, for somebody, she said, had tried to pull her watch

away.

When I touched her watch I was close to her, but when I cried out I

stopped as it were short, and the crowd bearing her forward a little,

she made a noise too, but it was at some distance from me, so that she

did not in the least suspect me; but when she cried out “A pickpocket,”

somebody cried, “Ay, and here has been another! this gentlewoman has

been attempted too.”

At that very instance, a little farther in the crowd, and very luckily

too, they cried out “A pickpocket,” again, and really seized a young

fellow in the very act. This, though unhappy for the wretch, was very

opportunely for my case, though I had carried it off handsomely enough

before; but now it was out of doubt, and all the loose part of the

crowd ran that way, and the poor boy was delivered up to the rage of

the street, which is a cruelty I need not describe, and which, however,

they are always glad of, rather than to be sent to Newgate, where they

lie often a long time, till they are almost perished, and sometimes

they are hanged, and the best they can look for, if they are convicted,

is to be transported.

This was a narrow escape to me, and I was so frighted that I ventured

no more at gold watches a great while. There was indeed a great many

concurring circumstances in this adventure which assisted to my escape;

but the chief was, that the woman whose watch I had pulled at was a

fool; that is to say, she was ignorant of the nature of the attempt,

which one would have thought she should not have been, seeing she was

wise enough to fasten her watch so that it could not be slipped up. But

she was in such a fright that she had no thought about her proper for

the discovery; for she, when she felt the pull, screamed out, and

pushed herself forward, and put all the people about her into disorder,

but said not a word of her watch, or of a pickpocket, for at least two

minutes’ time, which was time enough for me, and to spare. For as I had

cried out behind her, as I have said, and bore myself back in the crowd

as she bore forward, there were several people, at least seven or

eight, the throng being still moving on, that were got between me and

her in that time, and then I crying out “A pickpocket,” rather sooner

than she, or at least as soon, she might as well be the person

suspected as I, and the people were confused in their inquiry; whereas,

had she with a presence of mind needful on such an occasion, as soon as

she felt the pull, not screamed out as she did, but turned immediately

round and seized the next body that was behind her, she had infallibly

taken me.

This is a direction not of the kindest sort to the fraternity, but ’tis

certainly a key to the clue of a pickpocket’s motions, and whoever can

follow it will as certainly catch the thief as he will be sure to miss

if he does not.

I had another adventure, which puts this matter out of doubt, and which

may be an instruction for posterity in the case of a pickpocket. My

good old governess, to give a short touch at her history, though she

had left off the trade, was, as I may say, born a pickpocket, and, as I

understood afterwards, had run through all the several degrees of that

art, and yet had never been taken but once, when she was so grossly

detected, that she was convicted and ordered to be transported; but

being a woman of a rare tongue, and withal having money in her pocket,

she found means, the ship putting into Ireland for provisions, to get

on shore there, where she lived and practised her old trade for some

years; when falling into another sort of bad company, she turned

midwife and procuress, and played a hundred pranks there, which she

gave me a little history of in confidence between us as we grew more

intimate; and it was to this wicked creature that I owed all the art

and dexterity I arrived to, in which there were few that ever went

beyond me, or that practised so long without any misfortune.

It was after those adventures in Ireland, and when she was pretty well

known in that country, that she left Dublin and came over to England,

where, the time of her transportation being not expired, she left her

former trade, for fear of falling into bad hands again, for then she

was sure to have gone to wreck. Here she set up the same trade she had

followed in Ireland, in which she soon, by her admirable management and

good tongue, arrived to the height which I have already described, and

indeed began to be rich, though her trade fell off again afterwards, as

I have hinted before.

I mentioned thus much of the history of this woman here, the better to

account for the concern she had in the wicked life I was now leading,

into all the particulars of which she led me, as it were, by the hand,

and gave me such directions, and I so well followed them, that I grew

the greatest artist of my time and worked myself out of every danger

with such dexterity, that when several more of my comrades ran

themselves into Newgate presently, and by that time they had been half

a year at the trade, I had now practised upwards of five years, and the

people at Newgate did not so much as know me; they had heard much of me

indeed, and often expected me there, but I always got off, though many

times in the extremest danger.

One of the greatest dangers I was now in, was that I was too well known

among the trade, and some of them, whose hatred was owing rather to

envy than any injury I had done them, began to be angry that I should

always escape when they were always catched and hurried to Newgate.

These were they that gave me the name of Moll Flanders; for it was no

more of affinity with my real name or with any of the name I had ever

gone by, than black is of kin to white, except that once, as before, I

called myself Mrs. Flanders; when I sheltered myself in the Mint; but

that these rogues never knew, nor could I ever learn how they came to

give me the name, or what the occasion of it was.

I was soon informed that some of these who were gotten fast into

Newgate had vowed to impeach me; and as I knew that two or three of

them were but too able to do it, I was under a great concern about it,

and kept within doors for a good while. But my governess—whom I always

made partner in my success, and who now played a sure game with me, for

that she had a share of the gain and no share in the hazard—I say, my

governess was something impatient of my leading such a useless,

unprofitable life, as she called it; and she laid a new contrivance for

my going abroad, and this was to dress me up in men’s clothes, and so

put me into a new kind of practice.

I was tall and personable, but a little too smooth-faced for a man;

however, I seldom went abroad but in the night, it did well enough; but

it was a long time before I could behave in my new clothes—I mean, as

to my craft. It was impossible to be so nimble, so ready, so dexterous

at these things in a dress so contrary to nature; and I did everything

clumsily, so I had neither the success nor the easiness of escape that

I had before, and I resolved to leave it off; but that resolution was

confirmed soon after by the following accident.

As my governess disguised me like a man, so she joined me with a man, a

young fellow that was nimble enough at his business, and for about

three weeks we did very well together. Our principal trade was watching

shopkeepers’ counters, and slipping off any kind of goods we could see

carelessly laid anywhere, and we made several good bargains, as we

called them, at this work. And as we kept always together, so we grew

very intimate, yet he never knew that I was not a man, nay, though I

several times went home with him to his lodgings, according as our

business directed, and four or five times lay with him all night. But

our design lay another way, and it was absolutely necessary to me to

conceal my sex from him, as appeared afterwards. The circumstances of

our living, coming in late, and having such and such business to do as

required that nobody should be trusted with the coming into our

lodgings, were such as made it impossible to me to refuse lying with

him, unless I would have owned my sex; and as it was, I effectually

concealed myself. But his ill, and my good fortune, soon put an end to

this life, which I must own I was sick of too, on several other

accounts. We had made several prizes in this new way of business, but

the last would be extraordinary. There was a shop in a certain street

which had a warehouse behind it that looked into another street, the

house making the corner of the turning.

Through the window of the warehouse we saw, lying on the counter or

showboard, which was just before it, five pieces of silks, besides

other stuffs, and though it was almost dark, yet the people, being busy

in the fore-shop with customers, had not had time to shut up those

windows, or else had forgot it.

This the young fellow was so overjoyed with, that he could not restrain

himself. It lay all within his reach he said, and he swore violently to

me that he would have it, if he broke down the house for it. I

dissuaded him a little, but saw there was no remedy; so he ran rashly

upon it, slipped out a square of the sash window dexterously enough,

and without noise, and got out four pieces of the silks, and came with

them towards me, but was immediately pursued with a terrible clutter

and noise. We were standing together indeed, but I had not taken any of

the goods out of his hand, when I said to him hastily, “You are undone,

fly, for God’s sake!” He ran like lightning, and I too, but the pursuit

was hotter after him because he had the goods, than after me. He

dropped two of the pieces, which stopped them a little, but the crowd

increased and pursued us both. They took him soon after with the other

two pieces upon him, and then the rest followed me. I ran for it and

got into my governess’s house whither some quick-eyed people followed

me so warmly as to fix me there. They did not immediately knock, at the

door, by which I got time to throw off my disguise and dress me in my

own clothes; besides, when they came there, my governess, who had her

tale ready, kept her door shut, and called out to them and told them

there was no man come in there. The people affirmed there did a man

come in there, and swore they would break open the door.

My governess, not at all surprised, spoke calmly to them, told them

they should very freely come and search her house, if they should bring

a constable, and let in none but such as the constable would admit, for

it was unreasonable to let in a whole crowd. This they could not

refuse, though they were a crowd. So a constable was fetched

immediately, and she very freely opened the door; the constable kept

the door, and the men he appointed searched the house, my governess

going with them from room to room. When she came to my room she called

to me, and said aloud, “Cousin, pray open the door; here’s some

gentlemen that must come and look into your room.”

I had a little girl with me, which was my governess’s grandchild, as

she called her; and I bade her open the door, and there sat I at work

with a great litter of things about me, as if I had been at work all

day, being myself quite undressed, with only night-clothes on my head,

and a loose morning-gown wrapped about me. My governess made a kind of

excuse for their disturbing me, telling me partly the occasion of it,

and that she had no remedy but to open the doors to them, and let them

satisfy themselves, for all she could say to them would not satisfy

them. I sat still, and bid them search the room if they pleased, for if

there was anybody in the house, I was sure they were not in my room;

and as for the rest of the house, I had nothing to say to that, I did

not understand what they looked for.

Everything looked so innocent and so honest about me, that they treated

me civiller than I expected, but it was not till they had searched the

room to a nicety, even under the bed, in the bed, and everywhere else

where it was possible anything could be hid. When they had done this,

and could find nothing, they asked my pardon for troubling me, and went

down.

When they had thus searched the house from bottom to top, and then top

to bottom, and could find nothing, they appeased the mob pretty well;

but they carried my governess before the justice. Two men swore that

they saw the man whom they pursued go into her house. My governess

rattled and made a great noise that her house should be insulted, and

that she should be used thus for nothing; that if a man did come in, he

might go out again presently for aught she knew, for she was ready to

make oath that no man had been within her doors all that day as she

knew of (and that was very true indeed); that it might be indeed that

as she was abovestairs, any fellow in a fright might find the door open

and run in for shelter when he was pursued, but that she knew nothing

of it; and if it had been so, he certainly went out again, perhaps at

the other door, for she had another door into an alley, and so had made

his escape and cheated them all.

This was indeed probable enough, and the justice satisfied himself with

giving her an oath that she had not received or admitted any man into

her house to conceal him, or protect or hide him from justice. This

oath she might justly take, and did so, and so she was dismissed.

It is easy to judge what a fright I was in upon this occasion, and it

was impossible for my governess ever to bring me to dress in that

disguise again; for, as I told her, I should certainly betray myself.

My poor partner in this mischief was now in a bad case, for he was

carried away before my Lord Mayor, and by his worship committed to

Newgate, and the people that took him were so willing, as well as able,

to prosecute him, that they offered themselves to enter into

recognisances to appear at the sessions and pursue the charge against

him.

However, he got his indictment deferred, upon promise to discover his

accomplices, and particularly the man that was concerned with him in

his robbery; and he failed not to do his endeavour, for he gave in my

name, whom he called Gabriel Spencer, which was the name I went by to

him; and here appeared the wisdom of my concealing my name and sex from

him, which, if he had ever known I had been undone.

He did all he could to discover this Gabriel Spencer; he described me,

he discovered the place where he said I lodged, and, in a word, all the

particulars that he could of my dwelling; but having concealed the main

circumstances of my sex from him, I had a vast advantage, and he never

could hear of me. He brought two or three families into trouble by his

endeavouring to find me out, but they knew nothing of me, any more than

that I had a fellow with me that they had seen, but knew nothing of.

And as for my governess, though she was the means of his coming to me,

yet it was done at second-hand, and he knew nothing of her.

This turned to his disadvantage; for having promised discoveries, but

not being able to make it good, it was looked upon as trifling with the

justice of the city, and he was the more fiercely pursued by the

shopkeepers who took him.

I was, however, terribly uneasy all this while, and that I might be

quite out of the way, I went away from my governess’s for a while; but

not knowing wither to wander, I took a maid-servant with me, and took

the stage-coach to Dunstable, to my old landlord and landlady, where I

had lived so handsomely with my Lancashire husband. Here I told her a

formal story, that I expected my husband every day from Ireland, and

that I had sent a letter to him that I would meet him at Dunstable at

her house, and that he would certainly land, if the wind was fair, in a

few days, so that I was come to spend a few days with them till he

should come, for he was either come post, or in the West Chester coach,

I knew not which; but whichsoever it was, he would be sure to come to

that house to meet me.

My landlady was mighty glad to see me, and my landlord made such a stir

with me, that if I had been a princess I could not have been better

used, and here I might have been welcome a month or two if I had

thought fit.

But my business was of another nature. I was very uneasy (though so

well disguised that it was scarce possible to detect me) lest this

fellow should somehow or other find me out; and though he could not

charge me with this robbery, having persuaded him not to venture, and

having also done nothing in it myself but run away, yet he might have

charged me with other things, and have bought his own life at the

expense of mine.

This filled me with horrible apprehensions. I had no recourse, no

friend, no confidante but my old governess, and I knew no remedy but to

put my life in her hands, and so I did, for I let her know where to

send to me, and had several letters from her while I stayed here. Some

of them almost scared me out my wits but at last she sent me the joyful

news that he was hanged, which was the best news to me that I had heard

a great while.

I had stayed here five weeks, and lived very comfortably indeed (the

secret anxiety of my mind excepted); but when I received this letter I

looked pleasantly again, and told my landlady that I had received a

letter from my spouse in Ireland, that I had the good news of his being

very well, but had the bad news that his business would not permit him

to come away so soon as he expected, and so I was like to go back again

without him.

My landlady complimented me upon the good news however, that I had

heard he was well. “For I have observed, madam,” says she, “you hadn’t

been so pleasant as you used to be; you have been over head and ears in

care for him, I dare say,” says the good woman; “’tis easy to be seen

there’s an alteration in you for the better,” says she. “Well, I am

sorry the esquire can’t come yet,” says my landlord; “I should have

been heartily glad to have seen him. But I hope, when you have certain

news of his coming, you’ll take a step hither again, madam,” says he;

“you shall be very welcome whenever you please to come.”

With all these fine compliments we parted, and I came merry enough to

London, and found my governess as well pleased as I was. And now she

told me she would never recommend any partner to me again, for she

always found, she said, that I had the best luck when I ventured by

myself. And so indeed I had, for I was seldom in any danger when I was

by myself, or if I was, I got out of it with more dexterity than when I

was entangled with the dull measures of other people, who had perhaps

less forecast, and were more rash and impatient than I; for though I

had as much courage to venture as any of them, yet I used more caution

before I undertook a thing, and had more presence of mind when I was to

bring myself off.

I have often wondered even at my own hardiness another way, that when

all my companions were surprised and fell so suddenly into the hand of

justice, and that I so narrowly escaped, yet I could not all this while

enter into one serious resolution to leave off this trade, and

especially considering that I was now very far from being poor; that

the temptation of necessity, which is generally the introduction of all

such wickedness, was now removed; for I had near £500 by me in ready

money, on which I might have lived very well, if I had thought fit to

have retired; but I say, I had not so much as the least inclination to

leave off; no, not so much as I had before when I had but £200

beforehand, and when I had no such frightful examples before my eyes as

these were. From hence ’tis evident to me, that when once we are

hardened in crime, no fear can affect us, no example give us any

warning.

I had indeed one comrade whose fate went very near me for a good while,

though I wore it off too in time. That case was indeed very unhappy. I

had made a prize of a piece of very good damask in a mercer’s shop, and

went clear off myself, but had conveyed the piece to this companion of

mine when we went out of the shop, and she went one way and I went

another. We had not been long out of the shop but the mercer missed his

piece of stuff, and sent his messengers, one one way and one another,

and they presently seized her that had the piece, with the damask upon

her. As for me, I had very luckily stepped into a house where there was

a lace chamber, up one pair of stairs, and had the satisfaction, or the

terror indeed, of looking out of the window upon the noise they made,

and seeing the poor creature dragged away in triumph to the justice,

who immediately committed her to Newgate.

I was careful to attempt nothing in the lace chamber, but tumbled their

goods pretty much to spend time; then bought a few yards of edging and

paid for it, and came away very sad-hearted indeed for the poor woman,

who was in tribulation for what I only had stolen.

Here again my old caution stood me in good stead; namely, that though I

often robbed with these people, yet I never let them know who I was, or

where I lodged, nor could they ever find out my lodging, though they

often endeavoured to watch me to it. They all knew me by the name of

Moll Flanders, though even some of them rather believed I was she than

knew me to be so. My name was public among them indeed, but how to find

me out they knew not, nor so much as how to guess at my quarters,

whether they were at the east end of the town or the west; and this

wariness was my safety upon all these occasions.

I kept close a great while upon the occasion of this woman’s disaster.

I knew that if I should do anything that should miscarry, and should be

carried to prison, she would be there and ready to witness against me,

and perhaps save her life at my expense. I considered that I began to

be very well known by name at the Old Bailey, though they did not know

my face, and that if I should fall into their hands, I should be

treated as an old offender; and for this reason I was resolved to see

what this poor creature’s fate should be before I stirred abroad,

though several times in her distress I conveyed money to her for her

relief.

At length she came to her trial. She pleaded she did not steal the

thing, but that one Mrs. Flanders, as she heard her called (for she did

not know her), gave the bundle to her after they came out of the shop,

and bade her carry it home to her lodging. They asked her where this

Mrs. Flanders was, but she could not produce her, neither could she

give the least account of me; and the mercer’s men swearing positively

that she was in the shop when the goods were stolen, that they

immediately missed them, and pursued her, and found them upon her,

thereupon the jury brought her in guilty; but the Court, considering

that she was really not the person that stole the goods, an inferior

assistant, and that it was very possible she could not find out this

Mrs. Flanders, meaning me, though it would save her life, which indeed

was true—I say, considering all this, they allowed her to be

transported, which was the utmost favour she could obtain, only that

the Court told her that if she could in the meantime produce the said

Mrs. Flanders, they would intercede for her pardon; that is to say, if

she could find me out, and hand me, she should not be transported. This

I took care to make impossible to her, and so she was shipped off in

pursuance of her sentence a little while after.