The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders

sincere inviolable affectionfor me, but all along attested it to be with the utmost reserve for myvirtue and his own. I told him I was fully satisfied of it. Hecarried it that length that he protested to me, that if he was naked inbed with me, he would as sacredly preserve my virtue as he would defendit if I was assaulted by a ravisher. I believed him, and told him Idid so; but this did not satisfy him, he would, he said, wait for someopportunity to give me an undoubted testimony of it.

  It was a great while after this that I had occasion, on my ownbusiness, to go to Bristol, upon which he hired me a coach, and wouldgo with me, and did so; and now indeed our intimacy increased. FromBristol he carried me to Gloucester, which was merely a journey ofpleasure, to take the air; and here it was our hap to have no lodgingin the inn but in one large chamber with two beds in it. The master ofthe house going up with us to show his rooms, and coming into thatroom, said very frankly to him, 'Sir, it is none of my business toinquire whether the lady be your spouse or no, but if not, you may lieas honestly in these two beds as if you were in two chambers,' and withthat he pulls a great curtain which drew quite across the room andeffectually divided the beds. 'Well,' says my friend, very readily,'these beds will do, and as for the rest, we are too near akin to lietogether, though we may lodge near one another'; and this put an honestface on the thing too. When we came to go to bed, he decently went outof the room till I was in bed, and then went to bed in the bed on hisown side of the room, but lay there talking to me a great while.

  At last, repeating his usual saying, that he could lie naked in the bedwith me and not offer me the least injury, he starts out of his bed.'And now, my dear,' says he, 'you shall see how just I will be to you,and that I can keep my word,' and away he comes to my bed.

  I resisted a little, but I must confess I should not have resisted himmuch if he had not made those promises at all; so after a littlestruggle, as I said, I lay still and let him come to bed. When he wasthere he took me in his arms, and so I lay all night with him, but hehad no more to do with me, or offered anything to me, other thanembracing me, as I say, in his arms, no, not the whole night, but roseup and dressed him in the morning, and left me as innocent for him as Iwas the day I was born.

  This was a surprising thing to me, and perhaps may be so to others, whoknow how the laws of nature work; for he was a strong, vigorous, briskperson; nor did he act thus on a principle of religion at all, but ofmere affection; insisting on it, that though I was to him the mostagreeable woman in the world, yet, because he loved me, he could notinjure me.

  I own it was a noble principle, but as it was what I never understoodbefore, so it was to me perfectly amazing. We traveled the rest of thejourney as we did before, and came back to the Bath, where, as he hadopportunity to come to me when he would, he often repeated themoderation, and I frequently lay with him, and he with me, and althoughall the familiarities between man and wife were common to us, yet henever once offered to go any farther, and he valued himself much uponit. I do not say that I was so wholly pleased with it as he thought Iwas, for I own much wickeder than he, as you shall hear presently.

  We lived thus near two years, only with this exception, that he wentthree times to London in that time, and once he continued there fourmonths; but, to do him justice, he always supplied me with money tosubsist me very handsomely.

  Had we continued thus, I confess we had had much to boast of; but aswise men say, it is ill venturing too near the brink of a command, sowe found it; and here again I must do him the justice to own that thefirst breach was not on his part. It was one night that we were in bedtogether warm and merry, and having drunk, I think, a little more winethat night, both of us, than usual, although not in the least todisorder either of us, when, after some other follies which I cannotname, and being clasped close in his arms, I told him (I repeat it withshame and horror of soul) that I could find in my heart to dischargehim of his engagement for one night and no more.

  He took me at my word immediately, and after that there was noresisting him; neither indeed had I any mind to resist him any more,let what would come of it.

  Thus the government of our virtue was broken, and I exchanged the placeof friend for that unmusical, harsh-sounding title of whore. In themorning we were both at our penitentials; I cried very heartily, heexpressed himself very sorry; but that was all either of us could do atthat time, and the way being thus cleared, and the bars of virtue andconscience thus removed, we had the less difficult afterwards tostruggle with.

  It was but a dull kind of conversation that we had together for all therest of that week; I looked on him with blushes, and every now and thenstarted that melancholy objection, 'What if I should be with child now?What will become of me then?' He encouraged me by telling me, that aslong as I was true to him, he would be so to me; and since it was gonesuch a length (which indeed he never intended), yet if I was withchild, he would take care of that, and of me too. This hardened usboth. I assured him if I was with child, I would die for want of amidwife rather than name him as the father of it; and he assured me Ishould never want if I should be with child. These mutual assuranceshardened us in the thing, and after this we repeated the crime as oftenas we pleased, till at length, as I had feared, so it came to pass, andI was indeed with child.

  After I was sure it was so, and I had satisfied him of it too, we beganto think of taking measures for the managing it, and I proposedtrusting the secret to my landlady, and asking her advice, which heagreed to. My landlady, a woman (as I found) used to such things, madelight of it; she said she knew it would come to that at last, and madeus very merry about it. As I said above, we found her an experiencedold lady at such work; she undertook everything, engaged to procure amidwife and a nurse, to satisfy all inquiries, and bring us off withreputation, and she did so very dexterously indeed.

  When I grew near my time she desired my gentleman to go away to London,or make as if he did so. When he was gone, she acquainted the parishofficers that there was a lady ready to lie in at her house, but thatshe knew her husband very well, and gave them, as she pretended, anaccount of his name, which she called Sir Walter Cleve; telling them hewas a very worthy gentleman, and that she would answer for allinquiries, and the like. This satisfied the parish officers presently,and I lay in with as much credit as I could have done if I had reallybeen my Lady Cleve, and was assisted in my travail by three or four ofthe best citizens' wives of Bath who lived in the neighbourhood, which,however, made me a little the more expensive to him. I often expressedmy concern to him about it, but he bid me not be concerned at it.

  As he had furnished me very sufficiently with money for theextraordinary expenses of my lying in, I had everything very handsomeabout me, but did not affect to be gay or extravagant neither; besides,knowing my own circumstances, and knowing the world as I had done, andthat such kind of things do not often last long, I took care to lay upas much money as I could for a wet day, as I called it; making himbelieve it was all spent upon the extraordinary appearance of things inmy lying in.

  By this means, and including what he had given me as above, I had atthe end of my lying in about two hundred guineas by me, including alsowhat was left of my own.

  I was brought to bed of a fine boy indeed, and a charming child it was;and when he heard of it he wrote me a very kind, obliging letter aboutit, and then told me, he thought it would look better for me to comeaway for London as soon as I was up and well; that he had providedapartments for me at Hammersmith, as if I came thither only fromLondon; and that after a little while I should go back to the Bath, andhe would go with me.

  I liked this offer very well, and accordingly hired a coach on purpose,and taking my child, and a wet-nurse to tend and suckle it, and amaid-servant with me, away I went for London.

  He met me at Reading in his own chariot, and taking me into that, leftthe servant and the child in the hired coach, and so he brought me tomy new lodgings at Hammersmith; with which I had abundance of reason tobe very well pleased, for they were very hands
ome rooms, and I was verywell accommodated.

  And now I was indeed in the height of what I might call my prosperity,and I wanted nothing but to be a wife, which, however, could not be inthis case, there was no room for it; and therefore on all occasions Istudied to save what I could, as I have said above, against a time ofscarcity, knowing well enough that such things as these do not alwayscontinue; that men that keep mistresses often change them, grow wearyof them, or jealous of them, or something or other happens to make themwithdraw their bounty; and sometimes the ladies that are thus well usedare not careful by a prudent conduct to preserve the esteem of theirpersons, or the nice article of their fidelity, and then they arejustly cast off with contempt.

  But I was secured in this point, for as I had no inclination to change,so I had no manner of acquaintance in the whole house, and so notemptation to look any farther. I kept no company but in the familywhen I lodged, and with the