qual sums, but every family to have according to their merit and
necessity. But this was not all. My son was tied down much harder; for
if it was known that he gave me any relief, let my condition be ever so
bad, either by himself, by his order, or in any manner of way, device,
or contrivance that he could think of, one-half of his estate, which was
particularly mentioned, was to devolve to the executors for ever; and if
they granted me ever so small a favour, that sum was to be equally
divided among the several parishes where they lived, for the benefit of
the poor.

Any person would have been surprised to have seen how we all sat staring
at each other; for though it was signed by all the executors, yet they
did not know the substance of it till it was publicly read, excepting
the chaplain; and he, as I mentioned before, had told me the codicil had
better never have been added.

I was now in a fine dilemma; had the title of a countess, with L500, and
nothing else to subsist on but a very good wardrobe of clothes, which
were not looked upon by my son and the executors to be my late lord's
property, and which were worth, indeed, more than treble the sum I had
left me.

I immediately removed from the lodgings, and left them to bury the body
when they thought proper, and retired to a lodging at a private
gentleman's house, about a mile from The Hague. I was now resolved to
find out Amy, being, as it were, at liberty; and accordingly went to the
house where she had lived, and finding that empty, inquired for her
among the neighbours, who gave various accounts of what had become of
her; but one of them had a direction left at his house where she might
be found. I went to the place and found the house shut up, and all the
windows broken, the sign taken down, and the rails and benches pulled
from before the door. I was quite ashamed to ask for her there, for it
was a very scandalous neighbourhood, and I concluded that Amy had been
brought to low circumstances, and had kept a house of ill-fame, and was
either run away herself, or was forced to it by the officers of justice.
However, as nobody knew me here, I went into a shop to buy some trifles,
and asked who had lived in the opposite house (meaning Amy's). "Really,
madam," says the woman, "I do not well know; but it was a woman who kept
girls for gentlemen; she went on in that wickedness for some time, till
a gentleman was robbed there of his watch and a diamond ring, on whi