ulness, and before I could reach him, one of the ladies was rolling
on the green carpet of luxuriant Nature. In the deep bosom of Bagley
Wood, impervious to the eye of authority, many a sportive scene occurs
which would alarm the ethics of the solemn sages of the cloistered
college. They were, I discovered, sisters, too early abandoned by
an unfeeling parent to poverty, and thus became an easy prey to the
licentious and the giddy, who, in the pursuit of pleasure, never
contemplate the attendant misery which is sure to follow the victim
of seduction. There was something romantic in their story: they were
daughters of the celebrated Mother Goose, whose person must have been
familiar to every Oxonian for the last sixty years prior to her decease,
which occurred but a short time since Of ~162~~ this woman's history
I have since gleaned some curious particulars, the most remarkable of
which (contained in the annexed note) have been authenticated by living
witnesses.{1} Her portrait, by a member of All Souls, is admirable, and
is here faithfully copied.

[Illustration: page162]

1 "_Mother Goose_," formerly a procuress, and one of the
most abandoned of her profession. When from her advanced
age, and the loss of her eye-sight, she could no longer
obtain money by seducing females from the path of virtue,
she married a man of the name of H., (commonly called
Gentleman H.) and for years was led by him to the students'
apartments in the different colleges with baskets of the
choicest flowers. Her ancient, clean, and neat appearance,
her singular address, and, above all, the circumstance of
her being blind, never failed of procuring her at least ten
times the price of her posy, and which was frequently
doubled when she informed the young gentlemen of the
generosity, benevolence, and charity of their grandfathers,
fathers, or uncles whom she knew when they were at college.
She had several illegitimate children, all females, and all
were sacrificed by their unnatural mother, except one, who
was taken away from her at a very tender age by the child's
father's parents. When of age, this child inherited her
father's property, and is now (I believe) the wife of an
Irish nobleman, and to this time is unconscious that Mother
Goose, of Oxford, gave her birth. The person who was
instrumental in removing the child is still living i