Page:Maria, or, The wanderer reclaim'd.pdf/16

Rh paid weekly for her lodgings; or ſhe muſt be obliged to part with me. I refuſed, in my raving, the laſt money from G**, which Mr. S* offered; and he kept from me for ſome time, the better, I ſuppoſe, to prey upon my neceſſities. In this diſtreſs I wrote to my father: and not willing to deſcribe my real caſe, ſued for a reconciliation; he ſent me an anſwer (the firſt I had received, afrer ſeveral letters to him) full of the moſt ſevere upbraidings; and ſoon after I received one not much leſs ſevere, from my mother; in which ſhe gave me but very poor hopes of my father’s forgiveness, adding how unable as I knew, ſhe was to do any thing on my behalf: and giving me much advice, which, alas, was weak and impracticable.

In this ſituation my landlady found me one day, weeping over my sweet unhappy babe, & feeding it, while, God knows, I had scarce any food for myself: when untouched by compaſſion, ſhe told me, that I muſt leave her house the next morning, as ſhe had let the lodgings to some people of credit. My spirits were gone, and while tears filled my eyes, I told her, “It was very well: I would prepare.” She left me to my sorrow. I bedewed my dear child, (who smiled, unconscious of diſtress, upon me) bedewed her with my tears: and resolved, as a wretched outcaſt, to take my babe, and throw myself with it at my father’s door. This was the resolution of despair.