above, who always singled me out for the diversion of my
company, as he called it, which, as he was pleased to say, was
very agreeable to him, but at that time there was no more in it.
I had many melancholy hours at the Bath after the company
was gone; for though I went to Bristol sometime for the
disposing my effects, and for recruits of money, yet I chose to
come back to Bath for my residence, because being on good
terms with the woman in whose house I lodged in the summer,
I found that during the winter I lived rather cheaper there than
I could do anywhere else. Here, I say, I passed the winter as
heavily as I had passed the autumn cheerfully; but having
contracted a nearer intimacy with the said woman in whose
house I lodged, I could not avoid communicating to her
something of what lay hardest upon my mind and particularly
the narrowness of my circumstances, and the loss of my fortune
by the damage of my goods at sea. I told her also, that I had
a mother and a brother in Virginia in good circumstances; and
as I had really written back to my mother in particular to
represent my condition, and the great loss I had received,
which indeed came to almost #500, so I did not fail to let my
new friend know that I expected a supply from thence, and so
indeed I did; and as the ships went from Bristol to York River,
in Virginia, and back again generally in less time from London,
and that my brother corresponded chiefly at Bristol, I thought
it was much better for me to wait here for my returns than to
go to London, where also I had not the least acquaintance.
My new friend appeared sensibly affected with my condition,
and indeed was so very kind as to reduce the rate of my living
with her to so low a price during the winter, that she convinced
me she got nothing by me; and as for lodging, during the winter
I paid nothing at all.
When the spring season came on, she continued to be as king
to me as she could, and I lodged with her for a time, till it was
found necessary to do otherwise. She had some persons of
character that frequently lodged in her house, and in particular
the gentleman who, as I said, singled me out for his companion
the winter before; and he came down again with another
gentleman in his company and two servants, and lodged in the
same house. I suspected that my landlady had invited him
thither, letting him know that I was still with her; but she denied
it, and protested to me that she did not, and he said the same.
In a word, this gentleman came down and continued to single
me out for his peculiar confidence as well as conversation.
He was a complete gentleman, that must be confessed, and
his company was very agreeable to me, as mine, if I might
believe him, was to him. He made no professions to be but
of an extraordinary respect, and he had such an opinion of my
virtue, that, as he often professed, he believed if he should offer
anything else, I should reject him with contempt. He soon
understood from me that I was a widow; that I had arrived at
Bristol from Virginia by the last ships; and that I waited at Bath
till the next Virginia fleet should arrive, by which I expected
considerable effects. I understood by him, and by others of
him, that he had a wife, but that the lady was distempered in
her head, and was under the conduct of her own relations,
which he consented to, to avoid any reflections that might (as
was not unusual in such cases) be cast on him for mismanaging
her cure; and in the meantime he came to the Bath to divert his
thoughts from the disturbance of such a melancholy circumstance
as that was.
My landlady, who of her own accord encouraged the
correspondence on all occasions, gave me an advantageous