The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders

My husband was so civil to me, for still I say he was much of a

gentleman, that in the first letter he wrote me from France, he let me

know where he had pawned twenty pieces of fine holland for #30, which

were really worth #90, and enclosed me the token and an order for the

taking them up, paying the money, which I did, and made in time above

#100 of them, having leisure to cut them and sell them, some and some,

to private families, as opportunity offered.

However, with all this, and all that I had secured before, I found,

upon casting things up, my case was very much altered, any my fortune

much lessened; for, including the hollands and a parcel of fine

muslins, which I carried off before, and some plate, and other things,

I found I could hardly muster up #500; and my condition was very odd,

for though I had no child (I had had one by my gentleman draper, but it

was buried), yet I was a widow bewitched; I had a husband and no

husband, and I could not pretend to marry again, though I knew well

enough my husband would never see England any more, if he lived fifty

years. Thus, I say, I was limited from marriage, what offer might

soever be made me; and I had not one friend to advise with in the

condition I was in, least not one I durst trust the secret of my

circumstances to, for if the commissioners were to have been informed

where I was, I should have been fetched up and examined upon oath, and

all I have saved be taken away from me.

Upon these apprehensions, the first thing I did was to go quite out of

my knowledge, and go by another name. This I did effectually, for I

went into the Mint too, took lodgings in a very private place, dressed

up in the habit of a widow, and called myself Mrs. Flanders.

Here, however, I concealed myself, and though my new acquaintances knew

nothing of me, yet I soon got a great deal of company about me; and

whether it be that women are scarce among the sorts of people that

generally are to be found there, or that some consolations in the

miseries of the place are more requisite than on other occasions, I

soon found an agreeable woman was exceedingly valuable among the sons

of affliction there, and that those that wanted money to pay half a

crown on the pound to their creditors, and that run in debt at the sign

of the Bull for their dinners, would yet find money for a supper, if

they liked the woman.