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scarce hear me to an end. I took my leave, cursed with every sentiment of horror which my situation could suggest.—I hired an apartment in a garret near St. Giles, at the rate of nine pence per week.
One day, while I sat musing in this solitary retreat, I was alarmed by a groan from the next apartment. I immediately ran, and found a woman stretched on a miserable bed, to all appearance dead: but what was my emotions, on her recovering, (on finding the individual lady who had triumphed over my heart? She knew me immediately, and casting a languishing look at me, said, with a feeble voice, “Dear Mr. Random, I do not deserve this concern from you; I am a vile creature, and death will overtake me in a few hours.” I encouraged her all I could; told her that I forgave her, and that I would share my last farthing with her. “You are too generous—but. alas! I perish for want.” and relapsed into another swoon. I called assistance, and she soon recovered, and informed me she had not tasted food for eight-and-forty hours. I was impatient to know her history. She told me, her father was a merchant in the city, and retired, at an advanced age, to the country. She was left at school and at the age of fifteen followed him. She had not been long in the country, till a gentleman paid his addresses to her; lamented the avaricious temper of his father,
