orf, by birth, I believe, a Swede. It
is almost unnecessary to mention, that she was personally acquainted
with the majority of the leaders in the French revolution.

But the house that, I believe, she principally frequented at this time,
was that of Mr. Thomas Christie, a person whose pursuits were
mercantile, and who had written a volume on the French revolution. With
Mrs. Christie her acquaintance was more intimate than with the husband.

It was about four months after her arrival at Paris in December 1792,
that she entered into that species of connection, for which her heart
secretly panted, and which had the effect of diffusing an immediate
tranquillity and cheerfulness over her manners. The person with whom it
was formed (for it would be an idle piece of delicacy, to attempt to
suppress a name, which is known to every one whom the reputation of
Mary has reached), was Mr. Gilbert Imlay, native of the United States of
North America.

The place at which she first saw Mr. Imlay was at the house of Mr.
Christie; and it perhaps deserves to be noticed, that the emotions he
then excited in her mind, were, I am told, those of dislike, and that,
for some time, she shunned all occasions of meeting him. This sentiment
however speedily gave place to one of greater kindness.

Previously to the partiality she conceived for him, she had determined
upon a journey to Switzerland, induced chiefly by motives of economy.
But she had some difficulty in procuring a passport; and it was probably
the intercourse that now originated between her and Mr. Imlay, that
changed her purpose, and led her to prefer a lodging at Neuilly, a
village three miles from Paris. Her habitation here was a solitary house
in the midst of a garden, with no other inhabitants than herself and the
gardener, an old man, who performed for her many of the offices of a
domestic, and would sometimes contend for the honour of making her bed.
The gardener had a great veneration for his guest, and would set before
her, when alone, some grapes of a particularly fine sort, which she
could not without the greatest difficulty obtain, when she had any
person with her as a visitor. Here it was that she conceived, and for
the most part executed, her Historical and Moral View of the French
Revolution[A], into which, as she observes, are incorporated most of the
observations she had collected for her Letters, and which was written
with more sobriety and cheerfulness than the to