poring over every book I could borrow, reading to my benefactress, or sitting down to ornamental needlework, but wholly ignorant of, and unable to mend my father's stockings, dress his dinner, or clean the house.

"I should not do justice to my mother, if I omitted acknowledging that she saw and reproved my conduct: she insisted that a sedentary genteel life was not proper for a girl with my humble prospects, and that to be fine-fingered, as she used to call it, was not calculated for poor people, particularly those who mean to live honest. I felt the truth of what she said, but had not the resolution to diminish the enjoyments of the present hour, by providing for circumstances in which I hoped never to be placed.

"When I was sixteen years of age, my valuable friend died; my sister, soon after, was married to a farmer, to whom she makes a good and useful wife, and I had no companions but my father and mother for I looked down with secret contempt on the young men and women of the village.

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My parents saw with concern that I was not qualified to go through the drudgery of a cottage. I lost my appetite and spirits; they frequently found me in tears; it was the struggle of pride and vanity rebelling against the duties imposed on me by Providence.

"After consulting with a distant relation, a shopkeeper in a neighbouring town, who was for every body's trying their luck in London, his opinion prevailed, and I was conveyed to town in a road waggon, resolving to better myself, as it is called, and if possible get an easy genteel place, with little work and high wages. Thus pride and laziness were my ruin.

"I soon got into a creditable family in the city, where I had an opportunity of qualifying myself for a better place, as my mistress was kind and indulgent; but the constant toil of a house, where only myself and a shop-boy were kept, did not suit a person used to an indolent life. I contrasted the dark back-kitchen, and dirty drudgery of my present situation, with my pleasant walks, my books, my plain work, and easy life in

the country. Awkwardness increased my difficulties, and I was severely mortified by the mother of my mistress, who sometimes visited her: she wondered how a girl at my age could have spent her time, not to know the common work of a house.

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Having occasion for a few common articles of dress, I was directed to one of those gossiping shopkeepers who infest most neighbourhoods, the confidants of servants, and diffusers of scandal, who attend to and know. more of other people's business than their own. She listened to my complaints, and enticed me to spend my money. After hearing much of charming places at the other end of the town, I left her, resolved to take the first opportunity of leaving my mistress, as the work was too much, and the situation in a vulgar part of the

town.

"I soon received a message from my officious new acquaintance, that she had procured an excellent situation for me, but that I must go without delay; and as to a character, if I would make her a present, she would give me one herself. Her reason for prevailing on me to go away without giving warning will soon be known; but I have been sufficiently punished for this breach of agreement.

"I took an opportunity of retreating with my things the following evening, and was introduced to a finedressed lady, with a carriage waiting at the door. After the general questions we agreed, and I was conveyed, with my box, to a large house in the neighbourhood of St. James's.

"The splendour of her equipage, and the tawdry, finery of the furniture, dazzled my eyes. I was told that my chief business would be to wait on my mistress in her own room, and work at my needle. I remember that the pride and haughtiness of my heart were highly gratified, when I was informed that I need not wear a coloured apron, must always appear neatly dressed, and that, if I did not stand in my own light, her place would be profitable as well as pleasant to me.

"My happy days were of short continuance: I did

not discover, till it was too late, that I was taken in a snare, that I was in a house of the most infamous description, a reproach to the nobility and gentry, who suffer many of them almost to elbow them in their magnificent abodes.

The woman who engaged me under false pretences, but for the most abominable purposes, is a wretch well known in the parish of St. James's, remarkable for staring eyes, a thundering voice, and face of brass; the seducer and ruiner of hundreds of her sex, whom she afterwards turns loose on the town, polluted and pennyless. I hope God Almighty will give her grace to repent of her monstrous crimes, or dreadful must be her punishment hereafter.

"Had I been at all acquainted with town manners, I must have perceived the odious nature of my mistress's employ, from the lateness of her hours, and the company she kept; in bed the greatest part of the day, and the house in an uproar during the whole of the night but London was a new world to me, and I had heard that it was common for ladies and gentlemen to turn night into day.

"The first alarm I received was from certain unwarrantable liberties taken with me by an hoary veteran, a constant visitor of my mistress, a well-known character, remarkable for his fondness of a new face. I left deep marks of my resentment on his countenance, which confined him to his room several weeks, under a pretence of the St. Anthony's fire. On mentioning the circumstance to my mistress, she smiled and told me, I must not be ill-natured, for that it would spoil my fortune. I replied firmly that I would not submit to such treatment, and that I would quit her house the moment daylight appeared, for it was already midnight.

"But she took effectual means to prevent the execution of my purpose. Watching an opportunity, she sent me up stairs on some trifling errand whilst I was taking a little refreshment, and conveyed certain drops into what I was going to drink. I swallowed them without

P 5

suspicion, and, finding myself remarkably heavy, soon retired to rest.

"From a deep, a death-like sleep, I awoke, and found myself undone. A cowardly villain, introduced by that perfidious and detestable monster *******, whose attempts I would have set at defiance with my senses and strength about me, took advantage of a state against which neither virtue nor prudence can guard.

"He attempted to pacify me with gold, and declared that he would make a handsome settlement on me the next morning. I rejected his offers with contempt; I drove him from my presence with abhorrence.

"The savage in a female shape soon came in with triumphant malignity in her eye, thinking she could now bring me to her own infamous terms. She begun by observing, that hands like mine were never made for hard work; that I might live like a fine ladyI interrupted her by throwing up the sash, and raising my voice to a pitch which alarmed her (for wickedness makes cowards of us all), told her, that if I was not suffered immediately to depart, I would raise the neighbours by my cries.

"I left her house directly, determining to have recourse to the laws to revenge my injuries; but a dread of appearing publicly on such an occasion shook my resolution. Not knowing whither to go, I applied to

my first mistress, with an intention of laying my case before her; but she shut her door in my face, and after my behaviour to her, what right had I to complain?

"I hid myself in silence and solitude, and passed a few weeks in a little obscure lodging, without resolution or spirit to seek another place. My London dream of finery and genteelness was now vanished; I dreaded the face of man, ar 1 suspected every woman ; I considered with envy the condition of the meanest drudge of the poorest farm-house in the country, who, notwithstanding her coarse fare and linsey gown, possessed those first of blessings, health, innocence, and peace of mind.

"I took a place in the same waggon which first brought me to town, and had reached a little market-town a few miles from the field where you found me; but fearing my small stock of money would be exhausted before I reached my father's house, I resolved to walk the remainder of my journey, contrary to the persuasions of the person who drove the waggon.

"Leaving my box with proper directions to be forwarded, I set out on foot, but had not travelled far, when a ruffian robbed me of the little I possessed, and would have proceeded to outrages still more cruel, but my cries excited the attention of a gentleman with a splendid equipage, who was travelling the road, and at no great distance from us.

The postillions were ordered to quicken their pace, and as they drew up, my terror and astonishment may be conceived, when I saw my dishonourable violator looking at me with savage joy as he jumped from the carriage, thinking that he might easily secure a friendless, unprotected woman, and convey her to what place and for whatever purpose he chose.

"But the robber was not disposed to part with his prey; adding falsehood to violence, and brandishing a bludgeon he had in his hand, he declared with an oath, that no man had a right to separate us, for though I was noisy and unmanageable, I was his wife.

"The gentleman said he knew the contrary; that he had followed me across the country from London, and rather than lose me, would pursue me to the end of the world: with these words he laid hold of one of my hands, when the footpad, at the first blow, laid him speechless on the ground. A desperate but unequal contest ensued; the servants fired several pistols, and in the hurry, smoke, and confusion, I darted from them.

"Terror gave me speed: I flew down a by lane, and after crossing several fields, plunged into a thick wood, wandering through thorns and underwood, as long as my strength permitted. I was thankful for my escape, and sat down on a bank to eat a crust fortu