a fellow of a smooth tongue, a handsome person and an immoderate assurance, it was not long before he became master of her affections.  The temper of Philip having been always too grave for her, in about three weeks’ time she let the captain into the truth of the whole story, and at his persuasion, during the time Philip was at Surrey assizes, sold off the furniture of her lodgings, and directing a letter to be left for him at his master’s house by the Penny Post, moved off with her new gallant.

It would be impossible, should I attempt to describe it, to describe the agony the poor young fellow was in at the receipt of Alice’s epistle, in which she told him flatly she was weary of him and had got another gallant; and saying that if he tried to look after her or give her any other uneasiness, she would send a full account of all things to his master.  The jilt was sensible this would keep him quiet, for as he depended solely upon his favour, so a story of this sort would have inevitably deprived him of it for ever.  It answered her intent, and the force he put upon his passions cost him a severe fit of sickness.

Alice, in the meanwhile, indulged for about a week with her Irish captain, at the end of which he beat her and turned her out of doors.  It was in vain for her to talk of her goods and her clothes; the captain had carried her amongst a set of his acquaintance, who on the first quarrel called her a thousand foolish English whores, and bid her go back to her Justice’s clerk again.  In the midst of her affliction, with nothing on but a linen gown, and about three shillings in her pocket, the watchman coming his rounds, found her sitting on the steps at the door where the captain lodged.  He asked her what she did there, she said her husband and she had quarrelled and he had shut her out.  The watchman was going away, satisfied with the answer, when the captain called out at the window, told him she was a street-walker, and bid him take her away.  The landlady confirmed this, and the fellow laying fast hold of her shoulder, compelled her to go with him to the watch-house.  However, a shilling procured her liberty and a favourable report to the constable that she was an honest young woman, who had the misfortune to be married to a bad husband, who turned her into the street, and she was afraid would not suffer her to come in again that night.  Upon hearing this, the constable bid her sit down by the fire, gave her a glass of brandy and promised her she should be as safe and as easy as the place would allow her for that night.

But unluckily for Alice, as she went to take the glass out of the constable’s hand, he knew her face, and happening to be the baker who served the mantua-maker with bread, where she lived, the next morning he conducted Mrs. Alice, much against her will, home to her mistress.  One of her fellow-apprentices ran with the news to the Justice’s, and one of the daughters whispered it in Philip’s ears, as he was writing a recognizance in the Justice’s book.  Philip no sooner heard it but he fell down in a swoon, and about half an hour was spent before they could bring him again to himself.  The young lady who had played him the trick, immediately quitted the room, and he opening his eyes, and perceiving her gone, pretended it was a sudden fit, and that he had been used to them when a child.