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8 After six years' residence at S, my grandfather was prevailed on, by the solicitations of my father and mother, to return to London, and reside with them. My father, from whom I probably derived my disposition to instability, had by this time quitted the service of Sir Richard Hill, and established himself in the hat and hosiery business in Great Turnstile, Holborn. How this chimerical project occurred to him, I know not, as he certainly had been bred to no trade; however, he was sanguine in his hopes of success. He had taken a good house and shop, and on our arrival in town, we found the family very comfortably established. I was introduced to my two surviving sisters, who were pretty, lively girls, and my father and mother received me with a shew of great affection.

I was now turned of nine years old, and shortly after our arrival, was placed by my grandfather at a respectable boarding-school at Stockwell,in Surrey, and my sisters were soon afterwards settled by their father at one equally genteel at Oakingham, in Berkshire. As I shall not have occasion to say much more of these girls, I shall now briefly observe that they received a good female education, learning French and the other fashionable accomplishments of the age. Their capacities were good; they were both more than agreeable in their persons, and their dispositions uncommonly sweet.