of the bank, and had engaged to meddle with no other business
that that of his office, which I heard afterwards, but did not
understand then. He added, that his friend should take nothing
of me for his advice or assistance, and this indeed encouraged
me very much.
He appointed the same evening, after the bank was shut and
business over, for me to meet him and his friend. And indeed
as soon as I saw his friend, and he began but to talk of the
affair, I was fully satisfied that I had a very honest man to deal
with; his countenance spoke it, and his character, as I heard
afterwards, was everywhere so good, that I had no room for
any more doubts upon me.
After the first meeting, in which I only said what I had said
before, we parted, and he appointed me to come the next day
to him, telling me I might in the meantime satisfy myself of
him by inquiry, which, however, I knew not how well to do,
having no acquaintance myself.
Accordingly I met him the next day, when I entered more
freely with him into my case. I told him my circumstances at
large: that I was a widow come over from American, perfectly
desolate and friendless; that I had a little money, and but a
little, and was almost distracted for fear of losing it, having no
friend in the world to trust with the management of it; that I
was going into the north of England to live cheap, that my
stock might not waste; that I would willingly lodge my money
in the bank, but that I durst not carry the bills about me, and
the like, as above; and how to correspond about it, or with
whom, I knew not.
He told me I might lodge the money in the bank as an account,
and its being entered into the books would entitle me to the
money at any time, and if I was in the north I might draw bills
on the cashier and receive it when I would; but that then it
would be esteemed as running cash, and the bank would give
no interest for it; that I might buy stock with it, and so it would
lie in store for me, but that then if I wanted to dispose if it, I
must come up to town on purpose to transfer it, and even it
would be with some difficulty I should receive the half-yearly
dividend, unless I was here in person, or had some friend I
could trust with having the stock in him name to do it for me,
and that would have the same difficulty in it as before; and
with that he looked hard at me and smiled a little. At last, says
he, ‘Why do you not get a head steward, madam, that may take
you and your money together into keeping, and then you would
have the trouble taken off your hands?’ ‘Ay, sir, and the money
too, it may be,’ said I; ‘for truly I find the hazard that way is as
much as ’tis t’other way’; but I remember I said secretly to myself,
‘I wish you would ask me the question fairly, I would consider
very seriously on it before I said No.’
He went on a good way with me, and I thought once or twice
he was in earnest, but to my real affliction, I found at last he
had a wife; but when he owned he had a wife he shook his head,
and said with some concern, that indeed he had a wife, and no
wife. I began to think he had been in the condition of my late
lover, and that his wife had been distempered or lunatic, or
some such thing. However, we had not much more discourse
at that time, but he told me he was in too much hurry of
business then, but that if I would come home to his house after
their business was over, he would by that time consider what
might be done for me, to put my affairs in a posture of security.