's at nine
years of age, and that the youngest had been taken care of by an
old lady that kept her coach, whom he took to be his godmother. She
gave me a long history in what manner she was arrested and flung
into Whitechapel jail, how hardly she fared there; and at length
the keeper's wife, to whom she told her pitiful story, took
compassion of her, and recommended her to the bounty of a certain
lady who lived in that neighbourhood, that redeemed prisoners for
small sums, and who lay for their fees, every return of the day of
her nativity; that she was one of the six the lady had discharged;
that the lady prompted her to seek after her mother; that she
thereupon did seek thee in all the towns and villages between
London and Dover; that not finding thee at Dover she went to Deal;
and that at length, she being tired of seeking thee, she returned
by shipping to London, where she was no sooner arrived but she was
immediately arrested and flung into the Marshalsea prison, where
she lived in a miserable condition, without the use of pen, ink,
and paper, and without the liberty of having any one of her friends
come near her. 'In this condition I was,' continued she, 'when you
sent and paid my debt for me, and discharged me.' When she had
related all this she fell into such a fit of crying, sighing, and
sobbing, from which, when she was a little recovered, she broke out
into loud exclamations against the wickedness of the people in
England, that they could be so unchristian as to arrest her twice,
when she said it was as true as the Gospel that she never did owe
to any one person the sum of one shilling in all her life; that she
could not think who it was that should owe her so much ill-will,
for that she was not conscious to herself that she had any ways
offended any person in the whole universal world, except Mrs. Amy,
in the case of her mother, which, she affirmed, she was acquitted
of by all men, and hoped she should be so by her Maker; and that if
she (Mrs. Amy) had any hand in her sufferings, God would forgive
her, as she heartily did. 'But then,' she added, 'I will not stay
in England, I will go all over the world, I will go to France, to
Paris; I know my mother did once live there, and if I do not find
her there, I will go through Holland, to Amster