Part 25

The next day she brought it, and the copy of her three bills was as follows:—

1. For three months’ lodging in her house, including my diet, at 10s. a week . . . . . . . . . . . 6£, 0s., 0d. 2. For a nurse for the month, and use of childbed linen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1£, 10s., 0d. 3. For a minister to christen the child, and to the godfathers and clerk . . . . . . . . . . . . 1£, 10s., 0d. 4. For a supper at the christening if I had five friends at it . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1£, 0s., 0d. For her fees as a midwife, and the taking off the trouble of the parish . . . . . . . . . . . . 3£, 3s., 0d. To her maid servant attending . . . . . . . . 0£, 10s., 0d. -------------- 13£, 13s., 0d.

This was the first bill; the second was the same terms:—

1. For three months’ lodging and diet, etc., at 20s. per week . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13£, 0s., 0d. 2. For a nurse for the month, and the use of linen and lace . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2£, 10s., 0d. 3. For the minister to christen the child, etc., as above . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2£, 0s., 0d. 4. For supper and for sweetmeats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3£, 3s., 0d. For her fees as above . . . . . . . . . . . . 5£, 5s., 0d. For a servant-maid . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1£, 0s., 0d. -------------- 26£, 18s., 0d.

This was the second-rate bill; the third, she said, was for a degree higher, and when the father or friends appeared:—

1. For three months’ lodging and diet, having two rooms and a garret for a servant . . . . . . 30£, 0s., 0d., 2. For a nurse for the month, and the finest suit of childbed linen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4£, 4s., 0d. 3. For the minister to christen the child, etc. 2£, 10s., 0d. 4. For a supper, the gentlemen to send in the wine . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6£, 0s., 0d. For my fees, etc. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10£, 10s., 0d. The maid, besides their own maid, only . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0£, 10s., 0d. -------------- 53£, 14s., 0d.

I looked upon all three bills, and smiled, and told her I did not see but that she was very reasonable in her demands, all things considered, and for that I did not doubt but her accommodations were good.

She told me I should be judge of that when I saw them. I told her I was sorry to tell her that I feared I must be her lowest-rated customer. “And perhaps, madam,” said I, “you will make me the less welcome upon that account.” “No, not at all,” said she; “for where I have one of the third sort I have two of the second, and four to one of the first, and I get as much by them in proportion as by any; but if you doubt my care of you, I will allow any friend you have to overlook and see if you are well waited on or no.”

Then she explained the particulars of her bill. “In the first place, madam,” said she, “I would have you observe that here is three months’ keeping; you are but ten shillings a week; I undertake to say you will not complain of my table. I suppose,” says she, “you do not live cheaper where you are now?” “No, indeed,” said I, “not so cheap, for I give six shillings per week for my chamber, and find my own diet as well as I can, which costs me a great deal more.”

“Then, madam,” says she, “if the child should not live, or should be dead-born, as you know sometimes happens, then there is the minister’s article saved; and if you have no friends to come to you, you may save the expense of a supper; so that take those articles out, madam,” says she, “your lying in will not cost you above £5, 3s. in all more than your ordinary charge of living.”

This was the most reasonable thing that I ever heard of; so I smiled, and told her I would come and be her customer; but I told her also, that as I had two months and more to do, I might perhaps be obliged to stay longer with her than three months, and desired to know if she would not be obliged to remove me before it was proper. No, she said; her house was large, and besides, she never put anybody to remove, that had lain in, till they were willing to go; and if she had more ladies offered, she was not so ill-beloved among her neighbours but she could provide accommodations for twenty, if there was occasion.

I found she was an eminent lady in her way; and, in short, I agreed to put myself into her hands, and promised her. She then talked of other things, looked about into my accommodations where I was, found fault with my wanting attendance and conveniences, and that I should not be used so at her house. I told her I was shy of speaking, for the woman of the house looked stranger, or at least I thought so, since I had been ill, because I was with child; and I was afraid she would put some affront or other upon me, supposing that I had been able to give but a slight account of myself.

“Oh dear,” said she, “her ladyship is no stranger to these things; she has tried to entertain ladies in your condition several times, but she could not secure the parish; and besides, she is not such a nice lady as you take her to be; however, since you are a-going, you shall not meddle with her, but I’ll see you are a little better looked after while you are here than I think you are, and it shall not cost you the more neither.”

I did not understand her at all; however, I thanked her, and so we parted. The next morning she sent me a chicken roasted and hot, and a pint bottle of sherry, and ordered the maid to tell me that she was to wait on me every day as long as I stayed there.

This was surprisingly good and kind, and I accepted it very willingly. At night she sent to me again, to know if I wanted anything, and how I did, and to order the maid to come to her in the morning with my dinner. The maid had orders to make me some chocolate in the morning before she came away, and did so, and at noon she brought me the sweetbread of a breast of veal, whole, and a dish of soup for my dinner; and after this manner she nursed me up at a distance, so that I was mightily well pleased, and quickly well, for indeed my dejections before were the principal part of my illness.

I expected, as is usually the case among such people, that the servant she sent me would have been some imprudent brazen wench of Drury Lane breeding, and I was very uneasy at having her with me upon that account; so I would not let her lie in that house the first night by any means, but had my eyes about me as narrowly as if she had been a public thief.

My gentlewoman guessed presently what was the matter, and sent her back with a short note, that I might depend upon the honesty of her maid; that she would be answerable for her upon all accounts; and that she took no servants into her house without very good security for their fidelity. I was then perfectly easy; and indeed the maid’s behaviour spoke for itself, for a modester, quieter, soberer girl never came into anybody’s family, and I found her so afterwards.

As soon as I was well enough to go abroad, I went with the maid to see the house, and to see the apartment I was to have; and everything was so handsome and so clean and well, that, in short, I had nothing to say, but was wonderfully pleased and satisfied with what I had met with, which, considering the melancholy circumstances I was in, was far beyond what I looked for.

It might be expected that I should give some account of the nature of the wicked practices of this woman, in whose hands I was now fallen; but it would be too much encouragement to the vice, to let the world see what easy measures were here taken to rid the women’s unwelcome burthen of a child clandestinely gotten. This grave matron had several sorts of practice, and this was one particular, that if a child was born, though not in her house (for she had occasion to be called to many private labours), she had people at hand, who for a piece of money would take the child off their hands, and off from the hands of the parish too; and those children, as she said, were honestly provided for and taken care of. What should become of them all, considering so many, as by her account she was concerned with, I cannot conceive.

I had many times discourses upon that subject with her; but she was full of this argument, that she save the life of many an innocent lamb, as she called them, which would otherwise perhaps have been murdered; and of many women who, made desperate by the misfortune, would otherwise be tempted to destroy their children, and bring themselves to the gallows. I granted her that this was true, and a very commendable thing, provided the poor children fell into good hands afterwards, and were not abused, starved, and neglected by the nurses that bred them up. She answered, that she always took care of that, and had no nurses in her business but what were very good, honest people, and such as might be depended upon.

I could say nothing to the contrary, and so was obliged to say, “Madam, I do not question you do your part honestly, but what those people do afterwards is the main question”; and she stopped my mouth again with saying that she took the utmost care about it.

The only thing I found in all her conversation on these subjects that gave me any distaste, was, that one time in discouraging about my being far gone with child, and the time I expected to come, she said something that looked as if she could help me off with my burthen sooner, if I was willing; or, in English, that she could give me something to make me miscarry, if I had a desire to put an end to my troubles that way; but I soon let her see that I abhorred the thoughts of it; and, to do her justice, she put it off so cleverly, that I could not say she really intended it, or whether she only mentioned the practice as a horrible thing; for she couched her words so well, and took my meaning so quickly, that she gave her negative before I could explain myself.

To bring this part into as narrow a compass as possible, I quitted my lodging at St. Jones’s and went to my new governess, for so they called her in the house, and there I was indeed treated with so much courtesy, so carefully looked to, so handsomely provided, and everything so well, that I was surprised at it, and could not at first see what advantage my governess made of it; but I found afterwards that she professed to make no profit of lodgers’ diet, nor indeed could she get much by it, but that her profit lay in the other articles of her management, and she made enough that way, I assure you; for ’tis scarce credible what practice she had, as well abroad as at home, and yet all upon the private account, or, in plain English, the whoring account.

While I was in her house, which was near four months, she had no less than twelve ladies of pleasure brought to bed within the doors, and I think she had two-and-thirty, or thereabouts, under her conduct without doors, whereof one, as nice as she was with me, was lodged with my old landlady at St. Jones’s.

This was a strange testimony of the growing vice of the age, and such a one, that as bad as I had been myself, it shocked my very senses. I began to nauseate the place I was in and, about all, the wicked practice; and yet I must say that I never saw, or do I believe there was to be seen, the least indecency in the house the whole time I was there.

Not a man was ever seen to come upstairs, except to visit the lying-in ladies within their month, nor then without the old lady with them, who made it a piece of honour of her management that no man should touch a woman, no, not his own wife, within the month; nor would she permit any man to lie in the house upon any pretence whatever, no, not though she was sure it was with his own wife; and her general saying for it was, that she cared not how many children were born in her house, but she would have none got there if she could help it.

It might perhaps be carried further than was needful, but it was an error of the right hand if it was an error, for by this she kept up the reputation, such as it was, of her business, and obtained this character, that though she did take care of the women when they were debauched, yet she was not instrumental to their being debauched at all; and yet it was a wicked trade she drove too.

While I was there, and before I was brought to bed, I received a letter from my trustee at the bank, full of kind, obliging things, and earnestly pressing me to return to London. It was near a fortnight old when it came to me, because it had been first sent into Lancashire, and then returned to me. He concludes with telling me that he had obtained a decree, I think he called it, against his wife, and that he would be ready to make good his engagement to me, if I would accept of him, adding a great many protestations of kindness and affection, such as he would have been far from offering if he had known the circumstances I had been in, and which as it was I had been very far from deserving.