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208 him a more than ordinary respect for me, and made him very thoughtful for my good; that he was resolved for the present to do something to relieve me, and to employ his thoughts in the meantime, to see if he could for the future put me into a way to support myself.

While he found me change colour, and look surprised at his discourse, for so I did, to be sure, he turns to my maid Amy, and looking at her, he says to me, 'I say all this, madam, before your maid, because both she and you shall know that I have no ill design, and that I have, in mere kindness, resolved to do something for you if I can, and as I have been a witness of the uncommon honesty and fidelity of Mrs Amy here to you in all your distresses, I know she may be trusted with so honest a design as mine is; for I assure you, I bear a proportioned regard to your maid too, for her affection to you.'

Amy made him a curtsey, and the poor girl looked so confounded with joy that she could not speak, but her colour came and went, and every now and then she blushed as red as scarlet, and the next minute looked as pale as death. Well, having said this, he sat down, made me sit down, and then drank to me, and made me drink two glasses of wine together; 'For', says he, 'you have need of it'; and so indeed I had. When he had done so, 'Come, Amy', says he, 'with your mistress's leave, you shall have a glass too.' So he made her drink two glasses also; and then rising up, 'And now, Amy', says he, 'go and get dinner; and you, madam', says he to me, 'go up and dress you, and come down and smile and be merry'; adding, 'I'll make you easy if I can'; and in the meantime, he said, he would walk in the garden. When he was gone, Amy changed her countenance indeed, and looked as merry as ever she did in her life. 'Dear madam', says she, 'what does this gentleman mean?' 'Nay, Amy', said I, 'he means to do us good, you see, don't he? I know no other meaning he can have, for he can get nothing by me.' 'I warrant you, madam', says she, 'he'll ask you a favour by-and-by.' 'No, no, you are mistaken, Amy, I dare say', said I; 'you have heard what he said, didn't you?' 'Ay', says Amy, 'it's no matter for that, you shall see what he will do after dinner.' 'Well, well, Amy ,' says I, 'you have hard thoughts of him. I cannot be of your opinion: I don't see anything in him yet that looks like it.' 'As to that madam', says Amy, 'I don't see anything of it yet neither; but what should move a gentleman to take pity of us as he does?' 'Nay', says I, 'that's a hard thing too, that we should judge a man to be wicked because he's charitable, and vicious because he's kind.' 'Oh, madam', says Amy, 'there's abundance of charity begins in that vice; and he is not so unacquainted with things as not to know that poverty is the strongest incentive a temptation against which no virtue is powerful enough to stand out. He knows your condition as well as you do.' 'Well, and what then?' 'Why, then, he knows too that you are young and handsome, and he has the surest bait in the world to take you with.'

'Well, Amy', said I, 'but he may find himself mistaken too in such a thing as that.' 'Why, madam', says Amy, 'I hope you won't deny him if he should offer it.'

'What d'ye mean by that, hussy?' said I. 'No, I'd starve first.'

'I hope not, madam, I hope you would be wiser; I'm sure if he will set you up, as he talks of, you ought to deny him nothing; and you will Starve if you do not consent, that's certain.'