Chapter iii.

An odd accident which befel Mr Allworthy at his return home. The

decent behaviour of Mrs Deborah Wilkins, with some proper

animadversions on bastards.

I have told my reader, in the preceding chapter, that Mr Allworthy

inherited a large fortune; that he had a good heart, and no family.

Hence, doubtless, it will be concluded by many that he lived like an

honest man, owed no one a shilling, took nothing but what was his own,

kept a good house, entertained his neighbours with a hearty welcome at

his table, and was charitable to the poor, i.e. to those who had

rather beg than work, by giving them the offals from it; that he died

immensely rich and built an hospital.

And true it is that he did many of these things; but had he done

nothing more I should have left him to have recorded his own merit on

some fair freestone over the door of that hospital. Matters of a much

more extraordinary kind are to be the subject of this history, or I

should grossly mis-spend my time in writing so voluminous a work; and

you, my sagacious friend, might with equal profit and pleasure travel

through some pages which certain droll authors have been facetiously

pleased to call _The History of England_.

Mr Allworthy had been absent a full quarter of a year in London, on

some very particular business, though I know not what it was; but

judge of its importance by its having detained him so long from home,

whence he had not been absent a month at a time during the space of

many years. He came to his house very late in the evening, and after a

short supper with his sister, retired much fatigued to his chamber.

Here, having spent some minutes on his knees--a custom which he never

broke through on any account--he was preparing to step into bed, when,

upon opening the cloathes, to his great surprize he beheld an infant,

wrapt up in some coarse linen, in a sweet and profound sleep, between

his sheets. He stood some time lost in astonishment at this sight;

but, as good nature had always the ascendant in his mind, he soon

began to be touched with sentiments of compassion for the little

wretch before him. He then rang his bell, and ordered an elderly

woman-servant to rise immediately, and come to him; and in the

meantime was so eager in contemplating the beauty of innocence,

appearing in those lively colours with which infancy and sleep always

display it, that his thoughts were too much engaged to reflect that he

was in his shirt when the matron came in. She had indeed given her

master sufficient time to dress himself; for out of respect to him,

and regard to decency, she had spent many minutes in adjusting her

hair at the looking-glass, notwithstanding all the hurry in which she

had been summoned by the servant, and though her master, for aught she

knew, lay expiring in an apoplexy, or in some other fit.

It will not be wondered at that a creature who had so strict a regard

to decency in her own person, should be shocked at the least deviation

from it in another. She therefore no sooner opened the door, and saw

her master standing by the bedside in his shirt, with a candle in his

hand, than she started back in a most terrible fright, and might

perhaps have swooned away, had he not now recollected his being

undrest, and put an end to her terrors by desiring her to stay without

the door till he had thrown some cloathes over his back, and was

become incapable of shocking the pure eyes of Mrs Deborah Wilkins,

who, though in the fifty-second year of her age, vowed she had never

beheld a man without his coat. Sneerers and prophane wits may perhaps

laugh at her first fright; yet my graver reader, when he considers the

time of night, the summons from her bed, and the situation in which

she found her master, will highly justify and applaud her conduct,

unless the prudence which must be supposed to attend maidens at that

period of life at which Mrs Deborah had arrived, should a little

lessen his admiration.

When Mrs Deborah returned into the room, and was acquainted by her

master with the finding the little infant, her consternation was

rather greater than his had been; nor could she refrain from crying

out, with great horror of accent as well as look, “My good sir! what's

to be done?” Mr Allworthy answered, she must take care of the child

that evening, and in the morning he would give orders to provide it a

nurse. “Yes, sir,” says she; “and I hope your worship will send out

your warrant to take up the hussy its mother, for she must be one of

the neighbourhood; and I should be glad to see her committed to

Bridewell, and whipt at the cart's tail. Indeed, such wicked sluts

cannot be too severely punished. I'll warrant 'tis not her first, by

her impudence in laying it to your worship.” “In laying it to me,

Deborah!” answered Allworthy: “I can't think she hath any such design.

I suppose she hath only taken this method to provide for her child;

and truly I am glad she hath not done worse.” “I don't know what is

worse,” cries Deborah, “than for such wicked strumpets to lay their

sins at honest men's doors; and though your worship knows your own

innocence, yet the world is censorious; and it hath been many an

honest man's hap to pass for the father of children he never begot;

and if your worship should provide for the child, it may make the

people the apter to believe; besides, why should your worship provide

for what the parish is obliged to maintain? For my own part, if it was

an honest man's child, indeed--but for my own part, it goes against me

to touch these misbegotten wretches, whom I don't look upon as my

fellow-creatures. Faugh! how it stinks! It doth not smell like a

Christian. If I might be so bold to give my advice, I would have it

put in a basket, and sent out and laid at the churchwarden's door. It

is a good night, only a little rainy and windy; and if it was well

wrapt up, and put in a warm basket, it is two to one but it lives till

it is found in the morning. But if it should not, we have discharged

our duty in taking proper care of it; and it is, perhaps, better for

such creatures to die in a state of innocence, than to grow up and

imitate their mothers; for nothing better can be expected of them.”

There were some strokes in this speech which perhaps would have

offended Mr Allworthy, had he strictly attended to it; but he had now

got one of his fingers into the infant's hand, which, by its gentle

pressure, seeming to implore his assistance, had certainly out-pleaded

the eloquence of Mrs Deborah, had it been ten times greater than it

was. He now gave Mrs Deborah positive orders to take the child to her

own bed, and to call up a maid-servant to provide it pap, and other

things, against it waked. He likewise ordered that proper cloathes

should be procured for it early in the morning, and that it should be

brought to himself as soon as he was stirring.

Such was the discernment of Mrs Wilkins, and such the respect she bore

her master, under whom she enjoyed a most excellent place, that her

scruples gave way to his peremptory commands; and she took the child

under her arms, without any apparent disgust at the illegality of its

birth; and declaring it was a sweet little infant, walked off with it

to her own chamber.

Allworthy here betook himself to those pleasing slumbers which a heart

that hungers after goodness is apt to enjoy when thoroughly satisfied.

As these are possibly sweeter than what are occasioned by any other

hearty meal, I should take more pains to display them to the reader,

if I knew any air to recommend him to for the procuring such an

appetite.