الفصل الفصل 38 · 第38章

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 bride 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 remembrance of past

follies, and the dreadful extravagances of a wicked life, and sometimes

I flattered myself that I had sincerely repented.

But there are temptations which it is not in the power of human nature

to resist, and few know what would be their case if driven to the same

exigencies. As covetousness is the root of all evil, so poverty is, I

believe, the worst of all snares. But I waive that discourse till I

come to an experiment.

I lived with this husband with the utmost tranquillity; he was a quiet,

sensible, sober man; virtuous, modest, sincere, and in his business

diligent and just. His business was in a narrow compass, and his income

sufficient to a plentiful way of living in the ordinary way. I do not

say to keep an equipage, and make a figure, as the world calls it, nor

did I expect it, or desire it; for as I abhorred the levity and

extravagance of my former life, so I chose now to live retired, frugal,

and within ourselves. I kept no company, made no visits; minded my

family, and obliged my husband; and this kind of life became a pleasure

to me.

We lived in an uninterrupted course of ease and content for five years,

when a sudden blow from an almost invisible hand blasted all my

happiness, and turned me out into the world in a condition the reverse

of all that had been before it.

My husband having trusted one of his fellow-clerks with a sum of money,

too much for our fortunes to bear the loss of, the clerk failed, and

the loss fell very heavy on my husband, yet it was not so great neither

but that, if he had had spirit and courage to have looked his

misfortunes in the face, his credit was so good that, as I told him, he

would easily recover it; for to sink under trouble is to double the

weight, and he that will die in it, shall die in it.

It was in vain to speak comfortably to him; the wound had sunk too

deep; it was a stab that touched the vitals; he grew melancholy and

disconsolate, and from thence lethargic, and died. I foresaw the blow,

and was extremely oppressed in my mind, for I saw evidently that if he

died I was undone.

I had had two children by him and no more, for, to tell the truth, it

began to be time for me to leave bearing children, for I was now

eight-and-forty, and I suppose if he had lived I should have had no

more.

I was now left in a dismal and disconsolate case indeed, and in several

things worse than ever. First, it was past the flourishing time with me

when I might expect to be courted for a mistress; that agreeable part

had declined some time, and the ruins only appeared of what had been;

and that which was worse than all this, that I was the most dejected,

disconsolate creature alive. I that had encouraged my husband, and

endeavoured to support his spirits under his trouble, could not support

my own; I wanted that spirit in trouble which I told him was so

necessary to him for bearing the burthen.

But my case was indeed deplorable, for I was left perfectly friendless

and helpless, and the loss my husband had sustained had reduced his

circumstances so low, that though indeed I was not in debt, yet I could

easily foresee that what was left would not support me long; that while

it wasted daily for subsistence, I had not way to increase it one

shilling, so that it would be soon all spent, and then I saw nothing

before me but the utmost distress; and this represented itself so

lively to my thoughts, that it seemed as if it was come, before it was

really very near; also my very apprehensions doubled the misery, for I

fancied every sixpence that I paid for a loaf of bread was the last

that I had in the world, and that to-morrow I was to fast, and be

starved to death.

In this distress I had no assistant, no friend to comfort or advise me;

I sat and cried and tormented myself night and day, wringing my hands,

and sometimes raving like a distracted woman; and indeed I have often

wondered it had not affected my reason, for I had the vapours to such a

degree, that my understanding was sometimes quite lost in fancies and

imaginations.

I lived two years in this dismal condition, wasting that little I had,

weeping continually over my dismal circumstances, and, as it were, only

bleeding to death, without the least hope or prospect of help from God

or man; and now I had cried too long, and so often, that tears were, as

I might say, exhausted, and I began to be desperate, for I grew poor

apace.

For a little relief I had put off my house and took lodgings; and as I

was reducing my living, so I sold off most of my goods, which put a

little money in my pocket, and I lived near a year upon that, spending

very sparingly, and eking things out to the utmost; but still when I

looked before me, my very heart would sink within me at the inevitable

approach of misery and want. Oh let none read this part without

seriously reflecting on the circumstances of a desolate state, and how

they would grapple with mere want of friends and want of bread; it will

certainly make them think not of sparing what they have only, but of

looking up to heaven for support, and of the wise man’s prayer, “Give

me not poverty, lest I steal.”

Let them remember that a time of distress is a time of dreadful

temptation, and all the strength to resist is taken away; poverty

presses, the soul is made desperate by distress, and what can be done?

It was one evening, when being brought, as I may say, to the last gasp,

I think I may truly say I was distracted and raving, when prompted by I

know not what spirit, and, as it were, doing I did not know what or

why, I dressed me (for I had still pretty good clothes) and went out. I

am very sure I had no manner of design in my head when I went out; I

neither knew nor considered where to go, or on what business; but as

the devil carried me out and laid his bait for me, so he brought me, to

be sure, to the place, for I knew not whither I was going or what I

did.

Wandering thus about, I knew not whither, I passed by an apothecary’s

shop in Leadenhall Street, when I saw lie on a stool just before the

counter a little bundle wrapped in a white cloth; beyond it stood a

maid-servant with her back to it, looking towards the top of the shop,

where the apothecary’s apprentice, as I suppose, was standing upon the

counter, with his back also to the door, and a candle in his hand,

looking and reaching up to the upper shelf for something he wanted, so

that both were engaged mighty earnestly, and nobody else in the shop.

This was the bait; and the devil, who I said laid the snare, as readily

prompted me as if he had spoke, for I remember, and shall never forget

it, ’twas like a voice spoken to me over my shoulder, “Take the bundle;

be quick; do it this moment.” It was no sooner said but I stepped into

the shop, and with my back to the wench, as if I had stood up for a

cart that was going by, I put my hand behind me and took the bundle,

and went off with it, the maid or the fellow not perceiving me, or any

one else.

It is impossible to express the horror of my soul all the while I did

it. When I went away I had no heart to run, or scarce to mend my pace.

I crossed the street indeed, and went down the first turning I came to,

and I think it was a street that went through into Fenchurch Street.

From thence I crossed and turned through so many ways and turnings,

that I could never tell which way it was, not where I went; for I felt

not the ground I stepped on, and the farther I was out of danger, the

faster I went, till, tired and out of breath, I was forced to sit down

on a little bench at a door, and then I began to recover, and found I

was got into Thames Street, near Billingsgate. I rested me a little and

went on; my blood was all in a fire; my heart beat as if I was in a

sudden fright. In short, I was under such a surprise that I still knew

not wither I was going, or what to do.

After I had tired myself thus with walking a long way about, and so

eagerly, I began to consider and make home to my lodging, where I came

about nine o’clock at night.

When the bundle was made up for, or on what occasion laid where I found

it, I knew not, but when I came to open it I found there was a suit of

childbed-linen in it, very good and almost new, the lace very fine;

there was a silver porringer of a pint, a small silver mug and six

spoons, with some other linen, a good smock, and three silk

handkerchiefs, and in the mug, wrapped up in a paper, 18s. 6d. in

money.