I had long waited for a letter from Amy, who, it seems, was just at that time gone to Rouen the second time, to make her inquiries about him; and I received a letter from her at this unhappy juncture, which gave me the following account of my business:—

I. That for my gentleman, who I had now, as I may say, in my arms, she said he had been gone from Paris, as I have hinted, having met with some great losses and misfortunes; that he had been in Holland on that very account, whither he had also carried his children; that he was after that settled for some time at Rouen; that she had been at Rouen, and found there (by a mere accident), from a Dutch skipper, that he was at London, had been there above three years; that he was to be found upon the Exchange, on the French walk; and that he lodged at St. Laurence Pountney's Lane, and the like; so Amy said she supposed I might soon find him out, but that she doubted he was poor, and not worth looking after. This she did because of the next clause, which the jade had most mind to on many accounts.

II. That as to the Prince ——; that, as above, he was gone into Germany, where his estate lay; that he had quitted the French service, and lived retired; that she had seen his gentleman, who remained at Paris to solicit his arrears, &c.; that he had given her an account how his lord had employed him to inquire for me and find me out, as above, and told her what pains he had taken to find me; that he had understood that I was gone to England; that he once had orders to go to England to find me; that his lord had resolved, if he could have found me, to have called me a countess, and so have married me, and have carried me into Germany with him; and that his commission was still to assure me that the prince would marry me if I would come to him, and that he would send him an account that he had found me, and did not doubt but he would have orders to come over to England to attend me in a figure suitable to my quality.

Amy, an ambitious jade, who knew my weakest part—namely, that I loved great things, and that I loved to be flattered and courted—said abundance of kind things upon this occasion, which she knew were suitable to me and would prompt my vanity; and talked big of the prince's gentleman having orders to come over to me with a procuration to marry me by proxy (as princes usually do in like cases), and to furnish me with an equipage, and I know not how many fine things; but told me, withal, that she had not yet let him know that she belonged to me still, or that she knew where to find me, or to write to me; because she was willing to see the bottom of it, and whether it was a reality or a gasconade. She had indeed told him that, if he had any such commission, she would endeavour to find me out, but no more.

III. For the Jew, she assured me that she had not been able to come at a certainty what was become of him, or in what part of the world he was; but that thus much she had learned from good hands, that he had committed a crime, in being concerned in a design to rob a rich banker at Paris; and that he was fled, and had not been heard of there for above six years.

IV. For that of my husband, the brewer, she learned, that being commanded into the field upon an occasion of some action in Flanders, he was wounded at the battle of Mons, and died of his wounds in the Hospital of the Invalids; so there was an end of my four inquiries, which I sent her over to make.

This account of the prince, and the return of his affection to me, with all the flattering great things which seemed to come along with it; and especially as they came gilded and set out by my maid Amy—I say this account of the prince came to me in a very unlucky hour, and in the very crisis of my affair.

The merchant and I had entered into close conferences upon the grand affair. I had left off talking my platonics, and of my independency, and being a free woman, as before; and he having cleared up my doubts too, as to his circumstances and the misfortunes he had spoken of, I had gone so far that we had begun to consider where we should live, and in what figure, what equipage, what house, and the like.

I had made some harangues upon the delightful retirement of a country life, and how we might enjoy ourselves so effectually without the encumbrances of business and the world; but all this was grimace, and purely because I was afraid to make any public appearance in the world, for fear some impertinent person of quality should chop upon me again and cry out, "Roxana, Roxana, by ——!" with an oath, as had been done before.

My merchant, bred to business and used to converse among men of business, could hardly tell how to live without it; at least it appeared he should be like a fish out of water, uneasy and dying. But, however, he joined with me; only argued that we might live as near London as we could, that he might sometimes come to 'Change and hear how the world should go abroad, and how it fared with his friends and his children.

I answered that if he chose still to embarrass himself with business, I supposed it would be more to his satisfaction to be in his own country, and where his family was so well known, and where his children also were.

He smiled at the thoughts of that, and let me know that he should be very willing to embrace such an offer; but that he could not expect it of me, to whom England was, to be sure, so naturalised now as that it would be carrying me out of my native country, which he would not desire by any means, however agreeable it might be to him.

I told him he was mistaken in me; that as I had told him so much of a married state being a captivity, and the family being a house of bondage, that when I married I expected to be but an upper servant; so, if I did notwithstanding submit to it, I hoped he should see I knew how to act the servant's part, and do everything to oblige my master; that if I did not resolve to go with him wherever he desired to go, he might depend I would never have him. "And did I not," said I, "offer myself to go with you to the East Indies?"

All this while this was indeed but a copy of my countenance; for, as my circumstances would not admit of my stay in London, at least not so as to appear publicly, I resolved, if I took him, to live remote in the country, or go out of England with him.

But in an evil hour, just now came Amy's letter, in the very middle of all these discourses; and the fine things she had said about the prince began to make strange work with me. The notion of being a princess, and going over to live where all that had happened here would have been quite sunk out of knowledge as well as out of memory (conscience excepted), was mighty taking. The thoughts of being surrounded with domestics, honoured with titles, be called her Highness, and live in all the splendour of a court, and, which was still more, in the arms of a man of such rank, and who, I knew, loved and valued me—all this, in a word, dazzled my eyes, turned my head, and I was as truly crazed and distracted for about a fortnight as most of the people in Bedlam, though perhaps not quite so far gone.

When my gentleman came to me the next time I had no notion of him; I wished I had never received him at all. In short, I resolved to have no more to say to him, so I feigned myself indisposed; and though I did come down to him and speak to him a little, yet I let him see that I was so ill that I was (as we say) no company, and that it would be kind in him to give me leave to quit him for that time.

The next morning he sent a footman to inquire how I did; and I let him know I had a violent cold, and was very ill with it. Two days after he came again, and I let him see me again, but feigned myself so hoarse that I could not speak to be heard, and that it was painful to me but to whisper; and, in a word, I held him in this suspense near three weeks.

During this time I had a strange elevation upon my mind; and the prince, or the spirit of him, had such a possession of me that I spent most of this time in the realising all the great things of a life with the prince, to my mind pleasing my fancy with the grandeur I was supposing myself to enjoy, and with wickedly studying in what manner to put off this gentleman and be rid of him for ever.

I cannot but say that sometimes the baseness of the action stuck hard with me; the honour and sincerity with which he had always treated me, and, above all, the fidelity he had showed me at Paris, and that I owed my life to him—I say, all these stared in my face, and I frequently argued with myself upon the obligation I was under to him, and how base would it be now too, after so many obligations and engagements, to cast him off.

But the title of highness, and of a princess, and all those fine things, as they came in, weighed down all this; and the sense of gratitude vanished as if it had been a shadow.

At other times I considered the wealth I was mistress of; that I was able to live like a princess, though not a princess; and that my merchant (for he had told me all the affair of his misfortunes) was far from being poor, or even mean; that together we were able to make up an estate of between three and four thousand pounds a year, which was in itself equal to some princes abroad. But though this was true, yet the name of princess, and the flutter of it—in a word, the pride—weighed them down; and all these arguings generally ended to the disadvantage of my merchant; so that, in short, I resolved to drop him, and give him a final answer at his next coming; namely, that something had happened in my affairs which had caused me to alter my measures unexpectedly, and, in a word, to desire him to trouble himself no farther.

I think, verily, this rude treatment of him was for some time the effect of a violent fermentation in my blood; for the very motion which the steady contemplation of my fancied greatness had put my spirits into had thrown me into a kind of fever, and I scarce knew what I did.

I have wondered since that it did not make me mad; nor do I now think it strange to hear of those who have been quite lunatic with their pride, that fancied themselves queens and empresses, and have made their attendants serve them upon the knee, given visitors their hand to kiss, and the like; for certainly, if pride will not turn the brain, nothing can.

However, the next time my gentleman came, I had not courage enough, or not ill nature enough, to treat him in the rude manner I had resolved to do, and it was very well I did not; for soon after, I had another letter from Amy, in which was the mortifying news, and indeed surprising to me, that my prince (as I, with a secret pleasure, had called him) was very much hurt by a bruise he had received in hunting and engaging with a wild boar, a cruel and desperate sport which the noblemen of Germany, it seems, much delight in.

This alarmed me indeed, and the more because Amy wrote me word that his gentleman was gone away express to him, not without apprehensions that he should find his master was dead before his coming home; but that he (the gentleman) had promised her that as soon as he arrived he would send back the same courier to her with an account of his master's health, and of the main affair; and that he had obliged Amy to stay at Paris fourteen days for his return; she having promised him before to make it her business to go to England and to find me out for his lord if he sent her such orders; and he was to send her a bill for fifty pistoles for her journey. So Amy told me she waited for the answer.

This was a blow to me several ways; for, first, I was in a state of uncertainty as to his person, whether he was alive or dead; and I was not unconcerned in that part, I assure you; for I had an inexpressible affection remaining for his person, besides the degree to which it was revived by the view of a firmer interest in him. But this was not all, for in losing him I forever lost the prospect of all the gaiety and glory that had made such an impression upon my imagination.

In this state of uncertainty, I say, by Amy's letter, I was like still to remain another fortnight; and had I now continued the resolution of using my merchant in the rude manner I once intended, I had made perhaps a sorry piece of work of it indeed, and it was very well my heart failed me as it did.

However, I treated him with a great many shuffles, and feigned stories to keep him off from any closer conferences than we had already had, that I might act afterwards as occasion might offer, one way or other. But that which mortified me most was, that Amy did not write, though the fourteen days were expired. At last, to my great surprise, when I was, with the utmost impatience, looking out at the window, expecting the postman that usually brought the foreign letters—I say I was agreeably surprised to see a coach come to the yard-gate where we lived, and my woman Amy alight out of it and come towards the door, having the coachman bringing several bundles after her.

I flew like lightning downstairs to speak to her, but was soon damped with her news. "Is the prince alive or dead, Amy?" says I. She spoke coldly and slightly. "He is alive, madam," said she. "But it is not much matter; I had as lieu he had been dead." So we went upstairs again to my chamber, and there we began a serious discourse of the whole matter.

First, she told me a long story of his being hurt by a wild boar, and of the condition he was reduced to, so that every one expected he should die, the anguish of the wound having thrown him into a fever, with abundance of circumstances too long to relate here; how he recovered of that extreme danger, but continued very weak; how the gentleman had been homme de parole, and had sent back the courier as punctually as if it had been to the king; that he had given a long account of his lord, and of his illness and recovery; but the sum of the matter, as to me, was, that as to the lady, his lord was turned penitent, was under some vows for his recovery, and could not think any more on that affair; and especially, the lady being gone, and that it had not been offered to her, so there was no breach of honour; but that his lord was sensible of the good offices of Mrs. Amy, and had sent her the fifty pistoles for her trouble, as if she had really gone the journey.

I was, I confess, hardly able to bear the first surprise of this disappointment. Amy saw it, and gapes out (as was her way), "Lawd, madam! never be concerned at it; you see he is gotten among the priests, and I suppose they have saucily imposed some penance upon him, and, it may be, sent him of an errand barefoot to some Madonna or Nôtredame, or other; and he is off of his amours for the present. I'll warrant you he'll be as wicked again as ever he was when he is got thorough well, and gets but out of their hands again. I hate this out-o'-season repentance. What occasion had he, in his repentance, to be off of taking a good wife? I should have been glad to see you have been a princess, and all that; but if it can't be, never afflict yourself; you are rich enough to be a princess to yourself; you don't want him, that's the best of it."

Well, I cried for all that, and was heartily vexed, and that a great while; but as Amy was always at my elbow, and always jogging it out of my head with her mirth and her wit, it wore off again.

Then I told Amy all the story of my merchant, and how he had found me out when I was in such a concern to find him; how it was true that he lodged in St. Laurence Pountney's Lane; and how I had had all the story of his misfortune, which she had heard of, in which he had lost above £8000 sterling; and that he had told me frankly of it before she had sent me any account of it, or at least before I had taken any notice that I had heard of it.

Amy was very joyful at that part. "Well, madam, then," says Amy, "what need you value the story of the prince, and going I know not whither into Germany to lay your bones in another world, and learn the devil's language, called High Dutch? You are better here by half," says Amy. "Lawd, madam!" says she; "why, are you not as rich as Crœsus?"

Well, it was a great while still before I could bring myself off of this fancied sovereignty; and I, that was so willing once to be mistress to a king, was now ten thousand times more fond of being wife to a prince.

So fast a hold has pride and ambition upon our minds, that when once it gets admission, nothing is so chimerical but, under this possession, we can form ideas of in our fancy and realise to our imagination. Nothing can be so ridiculous as the simple steps we take in such cases; a man or a woman becomes a mere malade imaginaire, and, I believe, may as easily die with grief or run mad with joy (as the affair in his fancy appears right or wrong) as if all was real, and actually under the management of the person.

I had indeed two assistants to deliver me from this snare, and these were, first, Amy, who knew my disease, but was able to do nothing as to the remedy; the second, the merchant, who really brought the remedy, but knew nothing of the distemper.

I remember, when all these disorders were upon my thoughts, in one of the visits my friend the merchant made me, he took notice that he perceived I was under some unusual disorder; he believed, he said, that my distemper, whatever it was, lay much in my head, and it being summer weather and very hot, proposed to me to go a little way into the air.

I started at his expression. "What!" says I; "do you think, then, that I am crazed? You should, then, propose a madhouse for my cure." "No, no," says he, "I do not mean anything like that; I hope the head may be distempered and not the brain." Well, I was too sensible that he was right, for I knew I had acted a strange, wild kind of part with him; but he insisted upon it, and pressed me to go into the country. I took him short again. "What need you," says I, "send me out of your way? It is in your power to be less troubled with me, and with less inconvenience to us both."

He took that ill, and told me I used to have a better opinion of his sincerity, and desired to know what he had done to forfeit my charity. I mention this only to let you see how far I had gone in my measures of quitting him—that is to say, how near I was of showing him how base, ungrateful, and how vilely I could act; but I found I had carried the jest far enough, and that a little matter might have made him sick of me again, as he was before; so I began by little and little to change my way of talking to him, and to come to discourse to the purpose again as we had done before.

A while after this, when we were very merry and talking familiarly together, he called me, with an air of particular satisfaction, his princess. I coloured at the word, for it indeed touched me to the quick; but he knew nothing of the reason of my being touched with it. "What d'ye mean by that?" said I. "Nay," says he, "I mean nothing but that you are a princess to me." "Well," says I, "as to that I am content, and yet I could tell you I might have been a princess if I would have quitted you, and believe I could be so still." "It is not in my power to make you a princess," says he, "but I can easily make you a lady here in England, and a countess too if you will go out of it."

I heard both with a great deal of satisfaction, for my pride remained though it had been balked, and I thought with myself that this proposal would make me some amends for the loss of the title that had so tickled my imagination another way, and I was impatient to understand what he meant, but I would not ask him by any means; so it passed off for that time.

When he was gone I told Amy what he had said, and Amy was as impatient to know the manner how it could be as I was; but the next time (perfectly unexpected to me) he told me that he had accidentally mentioned a thing to me last time he was with me, having not the least thought of the thing itself; but not knowing but such a thing might be of some weight to me, and that it might bring me respect among people where I might appear, he had thought since of it, and was resolved to ask me about it.

I made light of it, and told him that, as he knew I had chosen a retired life, it was of no value to me to be called lady or countess either; but that if he intended to drag me, as I might call it, into the world again, perhaps it might be agreeable to him; but, besides that, I could not judge of the thing, because I did not understand how either of them was to be done.

He told me that money purchased titles of honour in almost all parts of the world, though money could not give principles of honour, they must come by birth and blood; that, however, titles sometimes assist to elevate the soul and to infuse generous principles into the mind, and especially where there was a good foundation laid in the persons; that he hoped we should neither of us misbehave if we came to it; and that as we knew how to wear a title without undue elevations, so it might sit as well upon us as on another; that as to England, he had nothing to do but to get an act of naturalisation in his favour, and he knew where to purchase a patent for baronet—that is say, to have the honour and title transferred to him; but if I intended to go abroad with him, he had a nephew, the son of his eldest brother, who had the title of count, with the estate annexed, which was but small, and that he had frequently offered to make it over to him for a thousand pistoles, which was not a great deal of money, and considering it was in the family already, he would, upon my being willing, purchase it immediately.

I told him I liked the last best, but then I would not let him buy it unless he would let me pay the thousand pistoles. "No, no," says he, "I refused a thousand pistoles that I had more right to have accepted than that, and you shall not be at so much expense now." "Yes," says I, "you did refuse it, and perhaps repented it afterwards." "I never complained," said he. "But I did," says I, "and often repented it for you." "I do not understand you," says he. "Why," said I, "I repented that I suffered you to refuse it." "Well, well," said he, "we may talk of that hereafter, when you shall resolve which part of the world you will make your settled residence in." Here he talked very handsomely to me, and for a good while together; how it had been his lot to live all his days out of his native country, and to be often shifting and changing the situation of his affairs; and that I myself had not always had a fixed abode, but that now, as neither of us was very young, he fancied I would be for taking up our abode where, if possible, we might remove no more; that as to his part, he was of that opinion entirely, only with this exception, that the choice of the place should be mine, for that all places in the world were alike to him, only with this single addition, namely, that I was with him.

I heard him with a great deal of pleasure, as well for his being willing to give me the choice as for that I resolved to live abroad, for the reason I have mentioned already, namely, lest I should at any time be known in England, and all that story of Roxana and the balls should come out; as also I was not a little tickled with the satisfaction of being still a countess, though I could not be a princess.

I told Amy all this story, for she was still my privy councillor; but when I asked her opinion, she made me laugh heartily. "Now, which of the two shall I take, Amy?" said I. "Shall I be a lady—that is, a baronet's lady in England, or a countess in Holland?" The ready-witted jade, that knew the pride of my temper too, almost as well as I did myself, answered (without the least hesitation), "Both, madam. Which of them?" says she (repeating the words). "Why not both of them? and then you will be really a princess; for, sure, to be a lady in English and a countess in Dutch may make a princess in High Dutch." Upon the whole, though Amy was in jest, she put the thought into my head, and I resolved that, in short, I would be both of them, which I managed as you shall hear.

First, I seemed to resolve that I would live and settle in England, only with this condition, namely, that I would not live in London. I pretended that it would choke me up; that I wanted breath when I was in London, but that anywhere else I would be satisfied; and then I asked him whether any seaport town in England would not suit him; because I knew, though he seemed to leave off, he would always love to be among business, and conversing with men of business; and I named several places, either nearest for business with France or with Holland; as Dover or Southampton, for the first; and Ipswich, or Yarmouth, or Hull for the last; but I took care that we would resolve upon nothing; only by this it seemed to be certain that we should live in England.

It was time now to bring things to a conclusion, and so in about six weeks' time more we settled all our preliminaries; and, among the rest, he let me know that he should have the bill for his naturalisation passed time enough, so that he would be (as he called it) an Englishman before we married. That was soon perfected, the Parliament being then sitting, and several other foreigners joining in the said bill to save the expense.

It was not above three or four days after, but that, without giving me the least notice that he had so much as been about the patent for baronet, he brought it me in a fine embroidered bag, and saluting me by the name of my Lady —— (joining his own surname to it), presented it to me with his picture set with diamonds, and at the same time gave me a breast-jewel worth a thousand pistoles, and the next morning we were married. Thus I put an end to all the intriguing part of my life—a life full of prosperous wickedness; the reflections upon which were so much the more afflicting as the time had been spent in the grossest crimes, which, the more I looked back upon, the more black and horrid they appeared, effectually drinking up all the comfort and satisfaction which I might otherwise have taken in that part of life which was still before me.

The first satisfaction, however, that I took in the new condition I was in was in reflecting that at length the life of crime was over, and that I was like a passenger coming back from the Indies, who, having, after many years' fatigues and hurry in business, gotten a good estate, with innumerable difficulties and hazards, is arrived safe at London with all his effects, and has the pleasure of saying he shall never venture upon the seas any more.

When we were married we came back immediately to my lodgings (for the church was but just by), and we were so privately married that none but Amy and my friend the Quaker was acquainted with it. As soon as we came into the house he took me in his arms, and kissing me, "Now you are my own," says he. "Oh that you had been so good to have done this eleven years ago!" "Then," said I, "you, perhaps, would have been tired of me long ago; it is much better now, for now all our happy days are to come. Besides," said I, "I should not have been half so rich;" but that I said to myself, for there was no letting him into the reason of it. "Oh!" says he, "I should not have been tired of you; but, besides having the satisfaction of your company, it had saved me that unlucky blow at Paris, which was a dead loss to me of above eight thousand pistoles, and all the fatigues of so many years' hurry and business;" and then he added, "But I'll make you pay for it all, now I have you." I started a little at the words. "Ay," said I, "do you threaten already? Pray what d'ye mean by that?" and began to look a little grave.

"I'll tell you," says he, "very plainly what I mean;" and still he held me fast in his arms. "I intend from this time never to trouble myself with any more business, so I shall never get one shilling for you more than I have already; all that you will lose one way. Next, I intend not to trouble myself with any of the care or trouble of managing what either you have for me or what I have to add to it; but you shall e'en take it all upon yourself, as the wives do in Holland; so you will pay for it that way too, for all the drudgery shall be yours. Thirdly, I intend to condemn you to the constant bondage of my impertinent company, for I shall tie you like a pedlar's pack at my back. I shall scarce ever be from you; for I am sure I can take delight in nothing else in this world." "Very well," says I; "but I am pretty heavy. I hope you'll set me down sometimes when you are aweary." "As for that," says he, "tire me if you can."

This was all jest and allegory; but it was all true, in the moral of the fable, as you shall hear in its place. We were very merry the rest of the day, but without any noise or clutter; for he brought not one of his acquaintance or friends, either English or foreigner. The honest Quaker provided us a very noble dinner indeed, considering how few we were to eat it; and every day that week she did the like, and would at last have it be all at her own charge, which I was utterly averse to; first, because I knew her circumstances not to be very great, though not very low; and next, because she had been so true a friend, and so cheerful a comforter to me, ay, and counsellor too, in all this affair, that I had resolved to make her a present that should be some help to her when all was over.

But to return to the circumstances of our wedding. After being very merry, as I have told you, Amy and the Quaker put us to bed, the honest Quaker little thinking we had been abed together eleven years before. Nay, that was a secret which, as it happened, Amy herself did not know. Amy grinned and made faces, as if she had been pleased; but it came out in so many words, when he was not by, the sum of her mumbling and muttering was, that this should have been done ten or a dozen years before; that it would signify little now; that was to say, in short, that her mistress was pretty near fifty, and too old to have any children. I chid her; the Quaker laughed, complimented me upon my not being so old as Amy pretended, that I could not be above forty, and might have a house full of children yet. But Amy and I too knew better than she how it was, for, in short, I was old enough to have done breeding, however I looked; but I made her hold her tongue.

In the morning my Quaker landlady came and visited us before we were up, and made us eat cakes and drink chocolate in bed; and then left us again, and bid us take a nap upon it, which I believe we did. In short, she treated us so handsomely, and with such an agreeable cheerfulness, as well as plenty, as made it appear to me that Quakers may, and that this Quaker did, understand good manners as well as any other people.

I resisted her offer, however, of treating us for the whole week; and I opposed it so long that I saw evidently that she took it ill, and would have thought herself slighted if we had not accepted it. So I said no more, but let her go on, only told her I would be even with her; and so I was. However, for that week she treated us as she said she would, and did it so very fine, and with such a profusion of all sorts of good things, that the greatest burthen to her was how to dispose of things that were left; for she never let anything, how dainty or however large, be so much as seen twice among us.

I had some servants indeed, which helped her off a little; that is to say, two maids, for Amy was now a woman of business, not a servant, and ate always with us. I had also a coachman and a boy. My Quaker had a man-servant too, but had but one maid; but she borrowed two more of some of her friends for the occasion, and had a man-cook for dressing the victuals.

She was only at a loss for plate, which she gave me a whisper of; and I made Amy fetch a large strong-box, which I had lodged in a safe hand, in which was all the fine plate which I had provided on a worse occasion, as is mentioned before; and I put it into the Quaker's hand, obliging her not to use it as mine, but as her own, for a reason I shall mention presently.

I was now my Lady ——, and I must own I was exceedingly pleased with it; 'twas so big and so great to hear myself called "her ladyship," and "your ladyship," and the like, that I was like the Indian king at Virginia, who, having a house built for him by the English, and a lock put upon the door, would sit whole days together with the key in his hand, locking and unlocking, and double-locking, the door, with an unaccountable pleasure at the novelty; so I could have sat a whole day together to hear Amy talk to me, and call me "your ladyship" at every word; but after a while the novelty wore off and the pride of it abated, till at last truly I wanted the other title as much as I did that of ladyship before.

We lived this week in all the innocent mirth imaginable, and our good-humoured Quaker was so pleasant in her way that it was particularly entertaining to us. We had no music at all, or dancing; only I now and then sung a French song to divert my spouse, who desired it, and the privacy of our mirth greatly added to the pleasure of it. I did not make many clothes for my wedding, having always a great many rich clothes by me, which, with a little altering for the fashion, were perfectly new. The next day he pressed me to dress, though we had no company. At last, jesting with him, I told him I believed I was able to dress me so, in one kind of dress that I had by me, that he would not know his wife when he saw her, especially if anybody else was by. No, he said, that was impossible, and he longed to see that dress. I told him I would dress me in it, if he would promise me never to desire me to appear in it before company. He promised he would not, but wanted to know why too; as husbands, you know, are inquisitive creatures, and love to inquire after anything they think is kept from them; but I had an answer ready for him. "Because," said I, "it is not a decent dress in this country, and would not look modest." Neither, indeed, would it, for it was but one degree off from appearing in one's shift, but was the usual wear in the country where they were used. He was satisfied with my answer, and gave me his promise never to ask me to be seen in it before company. I then withdrew, taking only Amy and the Quaker with me; and Amy dressed me in my old Turkish habit which I danced in formerly, &c., as before. The Quaker was charmed with the dress, and merrily said, that if such a dress should come to be worn here, she should not know what to do; she should be tempted not to dress in the Quaker's way any more.

When all the dress was put on, I loaded it with jewels, and in particular I placed the large breast-jewel which he had given me of a thousand pistoles upon the front of the tyhaia, or head-dress, where it made a most glorious show indeed. I had my own diamond necklace on, and my hair was tout brilliant, all glittering with jewels.

His picture set with diamonds I had placed stitched to my vest, just, as might be supposed, upon my heart (which is the compliment in such cases among the Eastern people); and all being open at the breast, there was no room for anything of a jewel there.

In this figure, Amy holding the train of my robe, I came down to him. He was surprised, and perfectly astonished. He knew me, to be sure, because I had prepared him, and because there was nobody else there but the Quaker and Amy; but he by no means knew Amy, for she had dressed herself in the habit of a Turkish slave, being the garb of my little Turk which I had at Naples, as I have said; she had her neck and arms bare, was bareheaded, and her hair braided in a long tassel hanging down her back; but the jade could neither hold her countenance or her chattering tongue, so as to be concealed long.

Well, he was so charmed with this dress that he would have me sit and dine in it; but it was so thin, and so open before, and the weather being also sharp, that I was afraid of taking cold; however, the fire being enlarged and the doors kept shut, I sat to oblige him, and he professed he never saw so fine a dress in his life. I afterwards told him that my husband (so he called the jeweller that was killed) bought it for me at Leghorn, with a young Turkish slave which I parted with at Paris; and that it was by the help of that slave that I learned how to dress in it, and how everything was to be worn, and many of the Turkish customs also, with some of their language. This story agreeing with the fact, only changing the person, was very natural, and so it went off with him; but there was good reason why I should not receive any company in this dress—that is to say, not in England. I need not repeat it; you will hear more of it.

But when I came abroad I frequently put it on, and upon two or three occasions danced in it, but always at his request.

We continued at the Quaker's lodgings for above a year; for now, making as though it was difficult to determine where to settle in England to his satisfaction, unless in London, which was not to mine, I pretended to make him an offer, that, to oblige him, I began to incline to go and live abroad with him; that I knew nothing could be more agreeable to him, and that as to me, every place was alike; that, as I had lived abroad without a husband so many years, it could be no burthen to me to live abroad again, especially with him. Then we fell to straining our courtesies upon one another. He told me he was perfectly easy at living in England, and had squared all his affairs accordingly; for that, as he had told me he intended to give over all business in the world, as well the care of managing it as the concern about it, seeing we were both in condition neither to want it or to have it be worth our while, so I might see it was his intention, by his getting himself naturalised, and getting the patent of baronet, &c. Well, for all that, I told him I accepted his compliment, but I could not but know that his native country, where his children were breeding up, must be most agreeable to him, and that, if I was of such value to him, I would be there then, to enhance the rate of his satisfaction; that wherever he was would be a home to me, and any place in the world would be England to me if he was with me; and thus, in short, I brought him to give me leave to oblige him with going to live abroad, when, in truth, I could not have been perfectly easy at living in England, unless I had kept constantly within doors, lest some time or other the dissolute life I had lived here should have come to be known, and all those wicked things have been known too, which I now began to be very much ashamed of.

When we closed up our wedding week, in which our Quaker had been so very handsome to us, I told him how much I thought we were obliged to her for her generous carriage to us; how she had acted the kindest part through the whole, and how faithful a friend she had been to me upon all occasions; and then letting him know a little of her family unhappiness, I proposed that I thought I not only ought to be grateful to her, but really to do something extraordinary for her, towards making her easy in her affairs. And I added, that I had no hangers-on that should trouble him; that there was nobody belonged to me but what was thoroughly provided for, and that, if I did something for this honest woman that was considerable, it should be the last gift I would give to anybody in the world but Amy; and as for her, we were not agoing to turn her adrift, but whenever anything offered for her, we would do as we saw cause; that, in the meantime, Amy was not poor, that she had saved together between seven and eight hundred pounds. By the way, I did not tell him how, and by what wicked ways she got it, but that she had it; and that was enough to let him know she would never be in want of us.

My spouse was exceedingly pleased with my discourse about the Quaker, made a kind of a speech to me upon the subject of gratitude, told me it was one of the brightest parts of a gentlewoman, that it was so twisted with honesty, nay, and even with religion too, that he questioned whether either of them could be found where gratitude was not to be found; that in this act there was not only gratitude, but charity; and that to make the charity still more Christian-like, the object too had real merit to attract it; he therefore agreed to the thing with all his heart, only would have had me let him pay it out of his effects.

I told him, as for that, I did not design, whatever I had said formerly, that we should have two pockets; and that though I had talked to him of being a free woman, and an independent, and the like, and he had offered and promised that I should keep all my own estate in my own hands; yet, that since I had taken him, I would e'en do as other honest wives did—where I thought fit to give myself, I should give what I had too; that if I reserved anything, it should be only in case of mortality, and that I might give it to his children afterwards, as my own gift; and that, in short, if he thought fit to join stocks, we would see to-morrow morning what strength we could both make up in the world, and bringing it all together, consider, before we resolved upon the place of removing, how we should dispose of what we had, as well as of ourselves. This discourse was too obliging, and he too much of a man of sense not to receive it as it was meant. He only answered, we would do in that as we should both agree; but the thing under our present care was to show not gratitude only, but charity and affection too, to our kind friend the Quaker; and the first word he spoke of was to settle a thousand pounds upon her for her life—that is to say, sixty pounds a year—but in such a manner as not to be in the power of any person to reach but herself. This was a great thing, and indeed showed the generous principles of my husband, and for that reason I mention it; but I thought that a little too much too, and particularly because I had another thing in view for her about the plate; so I told him I thought, if he gave her a purse with a hundred guineas as a present first, and then made her a compliment of £40 per annum for her life, secured any such way as she should desire, it would be very handsome.

He agreed to that; and the same day, in the evening, when we were just going to bed, he took my Quaker by the hand, and, with a kiss, told her that we had been very kindly treated by her from the beginning of this affair, and his wife before, as she (meaning me) had informed him; and that he thought himself bound to let her see that she had obliged friends who knew how to be grateful; that for his part of the obligation he desired she would accept of that, for an acknowledgment in part only (putting the gold into her hand), and that his wife would talk with her about what farther he had to say to her; and upon that, not giving her time hardly to say "Thank ye," away he went upstairs into our bedchamber, leaving her confused and not knowing what to say.

When he was gone she began to make very handsome and obliging representations of her goodwill to us both, but that it was without expectation of reward; that I had given her several valuable presents before—and so, indeed, I had; for, besides the piece of linen which I had given her at first, I had given her a suit of damask table-linen, of the linen I bought for my balls, viz., three table-cloths and three dozen of napkins; and at another time I gave her a little necklace of gold beads, and the like; but that is by the way. But she mentioned them, I say, and how she was obliged by me on many other occasions; that she was not in condition to show her gratitude any other way, not being able to make a suitable return; and that now we took from her all opportunity, to balance my former friendship, and left her more in debt than she was before. She spoke this in a very good kind of manner, in her own way, but which was very agreeable indeed, and had as much apparent sincerity, and I verily believe as real as was possible to be expressed; but I put a stop to it, and bade her say no more, but accept of what my spouse had given her, which was but in part, as she had heard him say. "And put it up," says I, "and come and sit down here, and give me leave to say something else to you on the same head, which my spouse and I have settled between ourselves in your behalf." "What dost thee mean?" says she, and blushed, and looked surprised, but did not stir. She was going to speak again, but I interrupted her, and told her she should make no more apologies of any kind whatever, for I had better things than all this to talk to her of; so I went on, and told her, that as she had been so friendly and kind to us on every occasion, and that her house was the lucky place where we came together, and that she knew I was from her own mouth acquainted in part with her circumstances, we were resolved she should be the better for us as long as she lived. Then I told what we had resolved to do for her, and that she had nothing more to do but to consult with me how it should be effectually secured for her, distinct from any of the effects which were her husband's; and that if her husband did so supply her that she could live comfortably, and not want it for bread or other necessaries, she should not make use of it, but lay up the income of it, and add it every year to the principal, so to increase the annual payment, which in time, and perhaps before she might come to want it, might double itself; that we were very willing whatever she should so lay up should be to herself, and whoever she thought fit after her; but that the forty pounds a year must return to our family after her life, which we both wished might be long and happy.

Let no reader wonder at my extraordinary concern for this poor woman, or at my giving my bounty to her a place in this account. It is not, I assure you, to make a pageantry of my charity, or to value myself upon the greatness of my soul, that should give in so profuse a manner as this, which was above my figure, if my wealth had been twice as much as it was; but there was another spring from whence all flowed, and 'tis on that account I speak of it. Was it possible I could think of a poor desolate woman with four children, and her husband gone from her, and perhaps good for little if he had stayed—I say, was I, that had tasted so deep of the sorrows of such a kind of widowhood, able to look on her, and think of her circumstances, and not be touched in an uncommon manner? No, no; I never looked on her and her family, though she was not left so helpless and friendless as I had been, without remembering my own condition, when Amy was sent out to pawn or sell my pair of stays to buy a breast of mutton and a bunch of turnips; nor could I look on her poor children, though not poor and perishing, like mine, without tears; reflecting on the dreadful condition that mine were reduced to, when poor Amy sent them all into their aunt's in Spitalfields, and run away from them. These were the original springs, or fountain-head, from whence my affectionate thoughts were moved to assist this poor woman.

When a poor debtor, having lain long in the Compter, or Ludgate, or the King's Bench for debt, afterwards gets out, rises again in the world, and grows rich, such a one is a certain benefactor to the prisoners there, and perhaps to every prison he passes by as long as he lives, for he remembers the dark days of his own sorrow; and even those who never had the experience of such sorrows to stir up their minds to acts of charity would have the same charitable, good disposition did they as sensibly remember what it is that distinguishes them from others by a more favourable and merciful Providence.

This, I say, was, however, the spring of my concern for this honest, friendly, and grateful Quaker; and as I had so plentiful a fortune in the world, I resolved she should taste the fruit of her kind usage to me in a manner that she could not expect.

All the while I talked to her I saw the disorder of her mind; the sudden joy was too much for her, and she coloured, trembled, changed, and at last grew pale, and was indeed near fainting, when she hastily rung a little bell for her maid, who coming in immediately, she beckoned to her—for speak she could not—to fill her a glass of wine; but she had no breath to take it in, and was almost choked with that which she took in her mouth. I saw she was ill, and assisted her what I could, and with spirits and things to smell to just kept her from fainting, when she beckoned to her maid to withdraw, and immediately burst out in crying, and that relieved her. When she recovered herself a little she flew to me, and throwing her arms about my neck, "Oh!" says she, "thou hast almost killed me;" and there she hung, laying her head in my neck for half a quarter of an hour, not able to speak, but sobbing like a child that had been whipped.

I was very sorry that I did not stop a little in the middle of my discourse and make her drink a glass of wine before it had put her spirits into such a violent motion; but it was too late, and it was ten to one odds but that it had killed her.

But she came to herself at last, and began to say some very good things in return for my kindness. I would not let her go on, but told her I had more to say to her still than all this, but that I would let it alone till another time. My meaning was about the box of plate, good part of which I gave her, and some I gave to Amy; for I had so much plate, and some so large, that I thought if I let my husband see it he might be apt to wonder what occasion I could ever have for so much, and for plate of such a kind too; as particularly a great cistern for bottles, which cost a hundred and twenty pounds, and some large candlesticks too big for any ordinary use. These I caused Amy to sell; in short, Amy sold above three hundred pounds' worth of plate; what I gave the Quaker was worth above sixty pounds, and I gave Amy above thirty pounds' worth, and yet I had a great deal left for my husband.

Nor did our kindness to the Quaker end with the forty pounds a year, for we were always, while we stayed with her, which was above ten months, giving her one good thing or another; and, in a word, instead of lodging with her, she boarded with us, for I kept the house, and she and all her family ate and drank with us, and yet we paid her the rent of the house too; in short, I remembered my widowhood, and I made this widow's heart glad many a day the more upon that account.

And now my spouse and I began to think of going over to Holland, where I had proposed to him to live, and in order to settle all the preliminaries of our future manner of living, I began to draw in my effects, so as to have them all at command upon whatever occasion we thought fit; after which, one morning I called my spouse up to me: "Hark ye, sir," said I to him, "I have two very weighty questions to ask of you. I don't know what answer you will give to the first, but I doubt you will be able to give but a sorry answer to the other, and yet, I assure you, it is of the last importance to yourself, and towards the future part of your life, wherever it is to be."

He did not seem to be much alarmed, because he could see I was speaking in a kind of merry way. "Let's hear your questions, my dear," says he, "and I'll give the best answer I can to them." "Why, first," says I:

"I. You have married a wife here, made her a lady, and put her in expectation of being something else still when she comes abroad. Pray have you examined whether you are able to supply all her extravagant demands when she comes abroad, and maintain an expensive Englishwoman in all her pride and vanity? In short, have you inquired whether you are able to keep her?

"II. You have married a wife here, and given her a great many fine things, and you maintain her like a princess, and sometimes call her so. Pray what portion have you had with her? what fortune has she been to you? and where does her estate lie, that you keep her so fine? I am afraid that you keep her in a figure a great deal above her estate, at least above all that you have seen of it yet. Are you sure you han't got a bite, and that you have not made a beggar a lady?"

"Well," says he, "have you any more questions to ask? Let's have them all together; perhaps they may be all answered in a few words, as well as these two." "No," says I, "these are the two grand questions—at least for the present." "Why, then," says he, "I'll answer you in a few words; that I am fully master of my own circumstances, and, without farther inquiry, can let my wife you speak of know, that as I have made her a lady I can maintain her as a lady, wherever she goes with me; and this whether I have one pistole of her portion, or whether she has any portion or no; and as I have not inquired whether she has any portion or not, so she shall not have the less respect showed her from me, or be obliged to live meaner, or be anyways straitened on that account; on the contrary, if she goes abroad to live with me in my own country, I will make her more than a lady, and support the expense of it too, without meddling with anything she has; and this, I suppose," says he, "contains an answer to both your questions together."

He spoke this with a great deal more earnestness in his countenance than I had when I proposed my questions, and said a great many kind things upon it, as the consequence of former discourses, so that I was obliged to be in earnest too. "My dear," says I, "I was but in jest in my questions; but they were proposed to introduce what I am going to say to you in earnest; namely, that if I am to go abroad, 'tis time I should let you know how things stand, and what I have to bring you with your wife; how it is to be disposed and secured, and the like; and therefore come," says I, "sit down, and let me show you your bargain here; I hope you will find that you have not got a wife without a fortune."

He told me then, that since he found I was in earnest, he desired that I would adjourn it till to-morrow, and then we would do as the poor people do after they marry, feel in their pockets, and see how much money they can bring together in the world. "Well," says I, "with all my heart;" and so we ended our talk for that time.

As this was in the morning, my spouse went out after dinner to his goldsmith's, as he said, and about three hours after returns with a porter and two large boxes with him; and his servant brought another box, which I observed was almost as heavy as the two that the porter brought, and made the poor fellow sweat heartily; he dismissed the porter, and in a little while after went out again with his man, and returning at night, brought another porter with more boxes and bundles, and all was carried up, and put into a chamber, next to our bedchamber; and in the morning he called for a pretty large round table, and began to unpack.

When the boxes were opened, I found they were chiefly full of books, and papers, and parchments, I mean books of accounts, and writings, and such things as were in themselves of no moment to me, because I understood them not; but I perceived he took them all out, and spread them about him upon the table and chairs, and began to be very busy with them; so I withdrew and left him; and he was indeed so busy among them, that he never missed me till I had been gone a good while; but when he had gone through all his papers, and come to open a little box, he called for me again. "Now," says he, and called me his countess, "I am ready to answer your first question; if you will sit down till I have opened this box, we will see how it stands."

So we opened the box; there was in it indeed what I did not expect, for I thought he had sunk his estate rather than raised it; but he produced me in goldsmiths' bills, and stock in the English East India Company, about sixteen thousand pounds sterling; then he gave into my hands nine assignments upon the Bank of Lyons in France, and two upon the rents of the town-house in Paris, amounting in the whole to 5800 crowns per annum, or annual rent, as it is called there; and lastly, the sum of 30,000 rixdollars in the Bank of Amsterdam; besides some jewels and gold in the box to the value of about £1500 or £1600, among which was a very good necklace of pearl of about £200 value; and that he pulled out and tied about my neck, telling me that should not be reckoned into the account.

I was equally pleased and surprised, and it was with an inexpressible joy that I saw him so rich.

"You might well tell me," said I, "that you were able to make me countess, and maintain me as such." In short, he was immensely rich; for besides all this, he showed me, which was the reason of his being so busy among the books, I say, he showed me several adventures he had abroad in the business of his merchandise; as particularly an eighth share in an East India ship then abroad; an account-courant with a merchant at Cadiz in Spain; about £3000 lent upon bottomry, upon ships gone to the Indies; and a large cargo of goods in a merchant's hands, for sale at Lisbon in Portugal; so that in his books there was about £12,000 more; all which put together, made about £27,000 sterling, and £1320 a year.

I stood amazed at this account, as well I might, and said nothing to him for a good while, and the rather because I saw him still busy looking over his books. After a while, as I was going to express my wonder, "Hold, my dear," says he, "this is not all neither;" then he pulled me out some old seals, and small parchment rolls, which I did not understand; but he told me they were a right of reversion which he had to a paternal estate in his family, and a mortgage of 14,000 rixdollars, which he had upon it, in the hands of the present possessor; so that was about £3000 more.

"But now hold again," says he, "for I must pay my debts out of all this, and they are very great, I assure you;" and the first he said was a black article of 8000 pistoles, which he had a lawsuit about at Paris, but had it awarded against him, which was the loss he had told me of, and which made him leave Paris in disgust; that in other accounts he owed about £5300 sterling; but after all this, upon the whole, he had still £17,000 clear stock in money, and £1320 a year in rent.

After some pause, it came to my turn to speak. "Well," says I, "'tis very hard a gentleman with such a fortune as this should come over to England, and marry a wife with nothing; it shall never," says I, "be said, but what I have, I'll bring into the public stock;" so I began to produce.

First, I pulled out the mortgage which good Sir Robert had procured for me, the annual rent £700 per annum; the principal money £14,000.

Secondly, I pulled out another mortgage upon land, procured by the same faithful friend, which at three times had advanced £12,000.

Thirdly, I pulled him out a parcel of little securities, procured by several hands, by fee-farm rents, and such petty mortgages as those times afforded, amounting to £10,800 principal money, and paying six hundred and thirty-six pounds a-year. So that in the whole there was two thousand and fifty-six pounds a year ready money constantly coming in.

When I had shown him all these, I laid them upon the table, and bade him take them, that he might be able to give me an answer to the second question. What fortune he had with his wife? And laughed a little at it.

He looked at them awhile, and then handed them all back again to me: "I will not touch them," says he, "nor one of them, till they are all settled in trustees' hands for your own use, and the management wholly your own."

I cannot omit what happened to me while all this was acting; though it was cheerful work in the main, yet I trembled every joint of me, worse for aught I know than ever Belshazzar did at the handwriting on the wall, and the occasion was every way as just. "Unhappy wretch," said I to myself, "shall my ill-got wealth, the product of prosperous lust, and of a vile and vicious life of whoredom and adultery, be intermingled with the honest well-gotten estate of this innocent gentleman, to be a moth and a caterpillar among it, and bring the judgments of heaven upon him, and upon what he has, for my sake? Shall my wickedness blast his comforts? Shall I be fire in his flax? and be a means to provoke heaven to curse his blessings? God forbid! I'll keep them asunder if it be possible."

This is the true reason why I have been so particular in the account of my vast acquired stock; and how his estate, which was perhaps the product of many years' fortunate industry, and which was equal if not superior to mine at best, was, at my request, kept apart from mine, as is mentioned above.

I have told you how he gave back all my writings into my own hands again. "Well," says I, "seeing you will have it be kept apart, it shall be so, upon one condition, which I have to propose, and no other." "And what is the condition?" says he. "Why," says I, "all the pretence I can have for the making over my own estate to me is, that in case of your mortality, I may have it reserved for me, if I outlive you." "Well," says he, "that is true" "But then," said I, "the annual income is always received by the husband, during his life, as 'tis supposed, for the mutual subsistence of the family; now," says I, "here is £2000 a year, which I believe is as much as we shall spend, and I desire none of it may be saved; and all the income of your own estate, the interest of the £17,000 and the £1320 a year, may be constantly laid by for the increase of your estate; and so," added I, "by joining the interest every year to the capital you will perhaps grow as rich as you would do if you were to trade with it all, if you were obliged to keep house out of it too."

He liked the proposal very well, and said it should be so; and this way I, in some measure, satisfied myself that I should not bring my husband under the blast of a just Providence, for mingling my cursed ill-gotten wealth with his honest estate. This was occasioned by the reflections which, at some certain intervals of time, came into my thoughts of the justice of heaven, which I had reason to expect would some time or other still fall upon me or my effects, for the dreadful life I had lived.

And let nobody conclude from the strange success I met with in all my wicked doings, and the vast estate which I had raised by it, that therefore I either was happy or easy. No, no, there was a dart struck into the liver; there was a secret hell within, even all the while, when our joy was at the highest; but more especially now, after it was all over, and when, according to all appearance, I was one of the happiest women upon earth; all this while, I say, I had such constant terror upon my mind, as gave me every now and then very terrible shocks, and which made me expect something very frightful upon every accident of life.

In a word, it never lightened or thundered, but I expected the next flash would penetrate my vitals, and melt the sword (soul) in this scabbard of flesh; it never blew a storm of wind, but I expected the fall of some stack of chimneys, or some part of the house, would bury me in its ruins; and so of other things.

But I shall perhaps have occasion to speak of all these things again by-and-by; the case before us was in a manner settled; we had full four thousand pounds per annum for our future subsistence, besides a vast sum in jewels and plate; and besides this, I had about eight thousand pounds reserved in money which I kept back from him, to provide for my two daughters, of whom I have much yet to say.

With this estate, settled as you have heard, and with the best husband in the world, I left England again; I had not only, in human prudence, and by the nature of the thing, being now married and settled in so glorious a manner,—I say, I had not only abandoned all the gay and wicked course which I had gone through before, but I began to look back upon it with that horror and that detestation which is the certain companion, if not the forerunner, of repentance.

Sometimes the wonders of my present circumstances would work upon me, and I should have some raptures upon my soul, upon the subject of my coming so smoothly out of the arms of hell, that I was not ingulfed in ruin, as most who lead such lives are, first or last; but this was a flight too high for me; I was not come to that repentance that is raised from a sense of Heaven's goodness; I repented of the crime, but it was of another and lower kind of repentance, and rather moved by my fears of vengeance, than from a sense of being spared from being punished, and landed safe after a storm.

The first thing which happened after our coming to the Hague (where we lodged for a while) was, that my spouse saluted me one morning with the title of countess, as he said he intended to do, by having the inheritance to which the honour was annexed made over to him. It is true, it was a reversion, but it soon fell, and in the meantime, as all the brothers of a count are called counts, so I had the title by courtesy, about three years before I had it in reality.

I was agreeably surprised at this coming so soon, and would have had my spouse have taken the money which it cost him out of my stock, but he laughed at me, and went on.

I was now in the height of my glory and prosperity, and I was called the Countess de ——; for I had obtained that unlooked for, which I secretly aimed at, and was really the main reason of my coming abroad. I took now more servants, lived in a kind of magnificence that I had not been acquainted with, was called "your honour" at every word, and had a coronet behind my coach; though at the same time I knew little or nothing of my new pedigree.

The first thing that my spouse took upon him to manage, was to declare ourselves married eleven years before our arriving in Holland; and consequently to acknowledge our little son, who was yet in England, to be legitimate; order him to be brought over, and added to his family, and acknowledge him to be our own.

This was done by giving notice to his people at Nimeguen, where his children (which were two sons and a daughter) were brought up, that he was come over from England, and that he was arrived at the Hague with his wife, and should reside there some time, and that he would have his two sons brought down to see him; which accordingly was done, and where I entertained them with all the kindness and tenderness that they could expect from their mother-in-law; and who pretended to be so ever since they were two or three years old.