 her Power, in her own Principles and Practice; but she died when I was in the thirteenth Year, an Age when the Blood is in the Tide of flow, before I had acquired a due Relish for my Duty, before the Yoke of
Christ
became easy or his Burden delightsome.
My Father then provided me a Governess, a Woman well skilled in
French
and Needlework, and other such shewy Matters of Accomplishment; a Woman also of much apparent Modesty and Decorum, though inwardly of a debauched and lascivious Disposition.
There is nothing so pernicious to the Breeding and Morals of Children as their being permitted to keep kitchen Company, where high fed Husseys and pampered Fellows form a Hotbed of steaming Sensuality and Guilt.
My Governess, though something elderly, took a liking to my Father's Clerk, a modest young Man, whom, however, she had the Art to seduce to her wanton Purposes.
In order to promote her Intrigue, in my Father's Absence, at Evenings, she used to procure Collations, and after we had eat and drank, to propose Plays and other Matters of innocent Merriment, as she called them.
The Chief of our Men Servants was one
Guilliam Rampant,
the Butler, a comely robust Fellow, and one in whom my Father had placed great Trust.
One Night, as we were playing at
Hide and Seek,
this Man watched the Place where I sought to conceal myself, and coming softly and suddenly to me, he caught me up under one Arm, and running with me to a distant Apartment, he there ruined me.
A false Shame did not permit me to say any thing of the Matter, and the Villain had, afterward, the Insolence to threaten me that, if I did not admit him to further Familiarities, he would tell what had passed, and expose me to the Family.
At length, both the Governess and I proved with Child, of which the Housekeeper, in private, informed my Father; whereupon my Governess was turned, with Infamy, out of Doors, and I was locked up and confined in a waste Room.
On the third Day of my Imprisonment my Father entered, and having examined me with a stern though sedate Severity, on my Knees, and with a Flood of Tears, I confessed the whole Affair.
The Butler was then sent for.
Guilliam,
said my Father, if you do not directly marry this Strumpet, I will hang you for a Rape, but, if you marry her, I will give you two hundred Pounds to set you going in some poor Way, on Condition
