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 if 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 bridge 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