got acquainted with any one, to pretend that all fortune was equal between us; and if ever they wanted money, I lent it them (that is, when I had it). Thus I passed upon them for the most generous creature in the world, till I had got from them what I wanted. But at last I was catched in my own snare; for I met with a woman who was cunning enough to penetrate my scheme; and when she had got from me all the money I had, she would never see me more. Another woman, from whom I had got £500 in this treacherous manner, happened to have a brother, who loved her so sincerely that she was never afraid to let him know even her own indiscretions. He pulled me by the nose in a public coffee-house; and swore till I had returned his sister every farthing I owed her he would use me in that manner whereever he met with me. As it was impossible for me to raise the money, I was forced to lurk about in corners, that I might avoid him. These two disappointments made me weary of this project.
"'The next scheme I formed was to go canting amongst the men of the value of real friendship, to try if by that means I could draw any person into my net, in order to make a prey of them. Here, too, I followed my old maxim of frequenting those companies where fortune had not been lavish of her favours; for I always found that those people who had but little were most ready to part with their money. Here I flourished for a small time; but as I took care always to leave the persons I had fleeced, and converse no longer with them than I could gain by them, I soon became very scandalous; and as I happened to meet with some gentlemen who did not at all relish such treatment, I got two or three good beatings, and could show my head no longer in that neighbourhood.
"'Thus was I both poor and infamous; and yet
