and
daughter. He could not bear to make them a single flying visit. "Just to
come and look at you and retire immediately, 'tis a burden too heavy.
The parting will be a price beyond the enjoyment." But if they could find
a retired lodging for him at Enfield, "where he might not be known, and
might have the comfort of seeing them both now and then, upon such a
circumstance he could gladly give the days to solitude to have the
comfort of half an hour now and then with them both for two or three
weeks." Nevertheless, as if he considered this plan out of the question,
he ends with a touching expression of grief that, being near his
journey's end, he may never see them again. It is impossible to avoid
the conclusion that he did not wish to see his son-in-law, and that
Baker wished to see him about money matters, and suspected him of
evading an interview.

Was this evasion the cunning of incipient madness? Was his concealing
his hiding-place from his son-in-law an insane development of that
self-reliant caution, which for so many years of his life he had been
compelled to make a habit, in the face of the most serious risks? Why
did he give such an exaggerated colour to the infamous conduct of his
son? It is easy to make out from the passage I have quoted, what his
son's guilt really consisted in. Defoe had assigned certain property to
the son to be held in trust for his wife and daughters. The son had not
secured them in the enjoyment of this provision, but maintained them,
and gave them words and promises, with which they were content, that he
would continue to maintain them. It was this that Defoe called making
them "beg their bread at his door, and crave as if it were an alms" the
provision to which they were legally entitled. Why did Defoe vent his
grief at this conduct in such strong language to his son-in-law, at the
same time enjoining him to make a prudent use of it? Baker had written
to his father-in-law making inquiry about the securities for his wife's
portion; Defoe answers with profuse expressions of affection, a touching
picture of his old age and feebleness, and the imminent ruin of his
family through the possible treachery of the son to whom he has
entrusted their means of support, and an adjuration to his son-in-law to
stand by them with comfort and counsel when he is gone. The inquiry
about the securities he dismisses in a postscript. He will not sell the
house, and he does not know who has the policy of as