第 六十一 章 · 第61章

He expressed himself in a most tender manner upon that head. He told me

what money he had was not a great deal, but that he would never hide

any of it from me if I wanted it, and that he assured me he did not

speak with any such apprehensions; that he was only intent upon what I

had hinted to him before he went; that here he knew what to do with

himself, but that there he should be the most ignorant, helpless wretch

alive.

I told him he frighted and terrified himself with that which had no

terror in it; that if he had money, as I was glad to hear he had, he

might not only avoid the servitude supposed to be the consequence of

transportation, but begin the world upon a new foundation, and that

such a one as he could not fail of success in, with the common

application usual in such cases; that he could not but call to mind

that it was what I had recommended to him many years before and had

proposed it for our mutual subsistence and restoring our fortunes in

the world; and I would tell him now, that to convince him both of the

certainty of it and of my being fully acquainted with the method, and

also fully satisfied in the probability of success, he should first see

me deliver myself from the necessity of going over at all, and then

that I would go with him freely, and of my own choice, and perhaps

carry enough with me to satisfy him that I did not offer it for want of

being able to live without assistance from him, but that I thought our

mutual misfortunes had been such as were sufficient to reconcile us

both to quitting this part of the world, and living where nobody could

upbraid us with what was past, or we be in any dread of a prison, and

without agonies of a condemned hole to drive us to it; this where we

should look back on all our past disasters with infinite satisfaction,

when we should consider that our enemies should entirely forget us, and

that we should live as new people in a new world, nobody having

anything to say to us, or we to them.

I pressed this home to him with so many arguments, and answered all his

own passionate objections so effectually that he embraced me, and told

me I treated him with such sincerity and affection as overcame him;

that he would take my advice, and would strive to submit to his fate in

hope of having the comfort of my assistance, and of so faithful a

counsellor and such a companion in his misery. But still he put me in

mind of what I had mentioned before, namely, that there might be some

way to get off before he went, and that it might be possible to avoid

going at all, which he said would be much better. I told him he should

see, and be fully satisfied, that I would do my utmost in that part

too, and if it did not succeed, yet that I would make good the rest.

We parted after this long conference with such testimonies of kindness

and affection as I thought were equal, if not superior, to that at our

parting at Dunstable; and now I saw more plainly than before, the

reason why he declined coming at that time any farther with me toward

London than Dunstable, and why, when we parted there, he told me it was

not convenient for him to come part of the way to London to bring me

going, as he would otherwise have done. I have observed that the

account of his life would have made a much more pleasing history than

this of mine; and, indeed, nothing in it was more strange than this

part, viz. that he carried on that desperate trade full five-and-twenty

years and had never been taken, the success he had met with had been so

very uncommon, and such that sometimes he had lived handsomely, and

retired in place for a year or two at a time, keeping himself and a

man-servant to wait on him, and had often sat in the coffee-houses and

heard the very people whom he had robbed give accounts of their being

robbed, and of the place and circumstances, so that he could easily

remember that it was the same.

In this manner, it seems, he lived near Liverpool at the time he

unluckily married me for a fortune. Had I been the fortune he expected,

I verily believe, as he said, that he would have taken up and lived

honestly all his days.

He had with the rest of his misfortunes the good luck not to be

actually upon the spot when the robbery was done which he was committed

for, and so none of the persons robbed could swear to him, or had

anything to charge upon him. But it seems as he was taken with the

gang, one hard-mouthed countryman swore home to him, and they were like

to have others come in according to the publication they had made; so

that they expected more evidence against him, and for that reason he

was kept in hold.

However, the offer which was made to him of admitting him to

transportation was made, as I understood, upon the intercession of some

great person who pressed him hard to accept of it before a trial; and

indeed, as he knew there were several that might come in against him, I

thought his friend was in the right, and I lay at him night and day to

delay it no longer.

At last, with much difficulty, he gave his consent; and as he was not

therefore admitted to transportation in court, and on his petition, as

I was, so he found himself under a difficulty to avoid embarking

himself as I had said he might have done; his great friend, who was his

intercessor for the favour of that grant, having given security for him

that he should transport himself, and not return within the term.

This hardship broke all my measures, for the steps I took afterwards

for my own deliverance were hereby rendered wholly ineffectual, unless

I would abandon him, and leave him to go to America by himself; than

which he protested he would much rather venture, although he were

certain to go directly to the gallows.

I must now return to my case. The time of my being transported

according to my sentence was near at hand; my governess, who continued

my fast friend, had tried to obtain a pardon, but it could not be done

unless with an expense too heavy for my purse, considering that to be

left naked and empty, unless I had resolved to return to my old trade

again, had been worse than my transportation, because there I knew I

could live, here I could not. The good minister stood very hard on

another account to prevent my being transported also; but he was

answered, that indeed my life had been given me at his first

solicitations, and therefore he ought to ask no more. He was sensibly

grieved at my going, because, as he said, he feared I should lose the

good impressions which a prospect of death had at first made on me, and

which were since increased by his instructions; and the pious gentleman

was exceedingly concerned about me on that account.

On the other hand, I really was not so solicitous about it as I was

before, but I industriously concealed my reasons for it from the

minister, and to the last he did not know but that I went with the

utmost reluctance and affliction.

It was in the month of February that I was, with seven other convicts,

as they called us, delivered to a merchant that traded to Virginia, on

board a ship, riding, as they called it, in Deptford Reach. The officer

of the prison delivered us on board, and the master of the vessel gave

a discharge for us.

We were for that night clapped under hatches, and kept so close that I

thought I should have been suffocated for want of air; and the next

morning the ship weighed, and fell down the river to a place they call

Bugby’s Hole, which was done, as they told us, by the agreement of the

merchant, that all opportunity of escape should be taken from us.

However, when the ship came thither and cast anchor, we were allowed

more liberty, and particularly were permitted to come up on the deck,

but not up on the quarter-deck, that being kept particularly for the

captain and for passengers.

When by the noise of the men over my head, and the motion of the ship,

I perceived that they were under sail, I was at first greatly

surprised, fearing we should go away directly, and that our friends

would not be admitted to see us any more; but I was easy soon after,

when I found they had come to an anchor again, and soon after that we

had notice given by some of the men where we were, that the next

morning we should have the liberty to come up on deck, and to have our

friends come and see us if we had any.

All that night I lay upon the hard boards of the deck, as the

passengers did, but we had afterwards the liberty of little cabins for

such of us as had any bedding to lay in them, and room to stow any box

or trunk for clothes and linen, if we had it (which might well be put

in), for some of them had neither shirt nor shift or a rag of linen or

woollen, but what was on their backs, or a farthing of money to help

themselves; and yet I did not find but they fared well enough in the

ship, especially the women, who got money from the seamen for washing

their clothes, sufficient to purchase any common things that they

wanted.

When the next morning we had the liberty to come up on the deck, I

asked one of the officers of the ship, whether I might not have the

liberty to send a letter on shore, to let my friends know where the

ship lay, and to get some necessary things sent to me. This was, it

seems, the boatswain, a very civil, courteous sort of man, who told me

I should have that, or any other liberty that I desired, that he could

allow me with safety. I told him I desired no other; and he answered

that the ship’s boat would go up to London the next tide, and he would

order my letter to be carried.

Accordingly, when the boat went off, the boatswain came to me and told

me the boat was going off, and that he went in it himself, and asked me

if my letter was ready he would take care of it. I had prepared myself,

you may be sure, pen, ink, and paper beforehand, and I had gotten a

letter ready directed to my governess, and enclosed another for my

fellow-prisoner, which, however, I did not let her know was my husband,

not to the last. In that to my governess, I let her know where the ship

lay, and pressed her earnestly to send me what things I knew she had

got ready for me for my voyage.