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had one or two letters from him, and no more. I did not see him
when he came home, for he having given me such instructions
as above, and I having made the best of my time, I had no more
business back again at the house, not knowing but I might have
been stopped there by the creditors; for a commission of
bankrupt being soon after issued, they might have stopped me
by orders from the commissioners. But my husband, having
so dexterously got out of the bailiff's house by letting himself
down in a most desperate manner from almost the top of the
house to the top of another building, and leaping from thence,
which was almost two storeys, and which was enough indeed
to have broken his neck, he came home and got away his goods
before the creditors could come to seize; that is to say, before
they could get out the commission, and be ready to send their
officers to take possession.

My husband was so civil to me, for still I say he was much
of a gentleman, that in the first letter he wrote me from France,
he let me know where he had pawned twenty pieces of fine
holland for #30, which were really worth #90, and enclosed
me the token and an order for the taking them up, paying the
money, which I did, and made in time above #100 of them,
having leisure to cut them and sell them, some and some, to
private families, as opportunity offered.

However, with all this, and all that I had secured before, I
found, upon casting things up, my case was very much altered,
any my fortune much lessened; for, including the hollands and
a parcel of fine muslins, which I carried off before, and some
plate, and other things, I found I could hardly muster up #500;
and my condition was very odd, for though I had no child (I
had had one by my gentleman draper, but it was buried), yet I
was a widow bewitched; I had a husband and no husband, and
I could not pretend to marry again, though I knew well enough
my husband would never see England any more, if he lived fifty
years. Thus, I say, I was limited from marriage, what offer
might soever be made me; and I had not one friend to advise
with in the condition I was in, least not one I durst trust the
secret of my circumstances to, for if the commissioners were
to have been informed where I was, I should have been fetched
up and examined upon oath, and all I have saved be taken away
from me.

Upon these apprehensions, the first thing I did was to go quite
out of my knowledge, and go by another name. This I did
effectually, for I went into the Mint too, took lodgings in a
very private place, dressed up in the habit of a widow, and

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