have obtained the name of Robert the
Great! And I would have gone to war with the Great Turk, and the
Persian, and Mogul, for the seraglios; for not one of those eastern
monarchs should have had a pretty woman to bless himself with till I had
done with her.

And now I have so much leisure upon my hands, that, after having informed
myself of all necessary particulars, I am set to my short-hand writing in
order to keep up with time as well as I can; for the subject is now
become worthy of me; and it is yet too soon, I doubt, to pay my
compliments to my charmer, after all her fatigues for two or three days
past. And, moreover, I have abundance of matters preparative to my
future proceedings to recount, in order to connect and render all
intelligible.

I parted with the Captain at the foot of the hill, trebly instructed;
that is to say, as to the fact, to the probable, and to the possible. If
my beloved and I can meet, and make up without the mediating of this
worthy gentleman, it will be so much the better. As little foreign aid
as possible in my amorous conflicts has always been a rule with me;
though here I have been obliged to call in so much. And who knows but it
may be the better for the lady the less she makes necessary? I cannot
bear that she should sit so indifferent to me as to be in earnest to part
with me for ever upon so slight, or even upon any occasion. If I find
she is--but no more threatenings till she is in my power--thou knowest
what I have vowed.

All Will.'s account, from the lady's flight to his finding her again, all
the accounts of the people of the house, the coachman's information to
Will., and so forth, collected together, stand thus:

'The Hampstead coach, when the dear fugitive came to it, had but two
passengers in it. But she made the fellow to go off directly, paying for
the vacant places.

'The two passengers directing the coachman to set them down at the Upper
Flask, she bid him set her down there also.

'They took leave of her, [very respectfully, no doubt,] and she went into
the house, and asked, if she could not have a dish of tea, and a room to
herself for half an hour.

'They showed her up to the very room where I now am. She sat at the very
table I now write upon; and, I believe, the chair I sit in was her's.' O
Belford, if thou knowest what love is, thou wilt be able to account for
these minutiae.

'She seemed spiritless and fatigued. The gentlewoman herself chose