Page:Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure (1749, vol. 1).pdf/21

 by myself, and without any more difficulty than can be supposed of a young country-girl, barely fifteen, and to whom every sign or shop was a gazing trap, I got to the wish'd-for intelligence-office. It was kept by an elderly woman, who sat at the receipt of custom, with a book before her in great form and order, and several scrolls, ready made out, of directions for places. I made up then to this important personage, without lifting up my eyes, or observing any of the people round me, who were attending there on the same errand as myself, and dropping her curtsies nine-deep, just made a shift to stammer out my business to her. Madam having heard me out, with all the gravity and brow of a petty-minister of State, and seeing at one glance over my figure, what I was, made me no answer, but to ask me the preliminary shilling, on receipt of which she told me, places for women were exceedingly scarce, especially as I seemed too slight-built for hard-