me, that it threw me into fits and swoonings several times a
day. I sent for my old governess, and she, give her her due,
acted the part of a true friend. She left no stone unturned to
prevent the grand jury finding the bill. She sought out one or
two of the jurymen, talked with them, and endeavoured to
possess them with favourable dispositions, on account that
nothing was taken away, and no house broken, etc.; but all
would not do, they were over-ruled by the rest; the two wenches
swore home to the fact, and the jury found the bill against me
for robbery and house-breaking, that is, for felony and burglary.
I sunk down when they brought me news of it, and after I came
to myself again, I thought I should have died with the weight
of it. My governess acted a true mother to me; she pitied me,
she cried with me, and for me, but she could not help me;
and to add to the terror of it, ’twas the discourse all over the
house that I should die for it. I could hear them talk it among
themselves very often, and see them shake their heads and say
they were sorry for it, and the like, as is usual in the place.
But still nobody came to tell me their thoughts, till at last one
of the keepers came to me privately, and said with a sigh,
‘Well, Mrs. Flanders, you will be tried on Friday’ (this was
but a Wednesday); ‘what do you intend to do?’ I turned as
white as a clout, and said, ‘God knows what I shall do; for my
part, I know not what to do.’ ‘Why,’ says he, ‘I won’t flatter
you, I would have you prepare for death, for I doubt you will
be cast; and as they say you are an old offender, I doubt you
will find but little mercy. They say,’ added he, ‘your case is
very plain, and that the witnesses swear so home against you,
there will be no standing it.’
This was a stab into the very vitals of one under such a burthen
as I was oppressed with before, and I could not speak to him a
word, good or bad, for a great while; but at last I burst out into
tears, and said to him, ‘Lord! Mr.—-, what must I do?’ ‘Do!’
says he, ‘send for the ordinary; send for a minister and talk
with him; for, indeed, Mrs. Flanders, unless you have very
good friends, you are no woman for this world.’
This was plain dealing indeed, but it was very harsh to me,
at least I thought it so. He left me in the greatest confusion
imaginable, and all that night I lay awake. And now I began
to say my prayers, which I had scarce done before since my
last husband’s death, or from a little while after. And truly I
may well call it saying my prayers, for I was in such a confusion,
and had such horror upon my mind, that though I cried, and
repeated several times the ordinary expression of ‘Lord, have
mercy upon me!’ I never brought myself to any sense of my
being a miserable sinner, as indeed I was, and of confessing
my sins to God, and begging pardon for the sake of Jesus
Christ. I was overwhelmed with the sense of my condition,
being tried for my life, and being sure to be condemned, and
then I was as sure to be executed, and on this account I cried
out all night, ‘Lord, what will become of me? Lord! what
shall I do? Lord! I shall be hanged! Lord, have mercy upon
me!’ and the like.
My poor afflicted governess was now as much concerned as
I, and a great deal more truly penitent, though she had no
prospect of being brought to trial and sentence. Not but that
she deserved it as much as I, and so she said herself; but she
had not done anything herself for many years, other than
receiving what I and others stole, and encouraging us to steal
it. But she cried, and took on like a distracted body, wringing