you are not only the best, but the only
friend I have in the world; and no circumstance of life shall ever
dissolve my friendship." They would often condole each other's adverse
fortunes, and read together _Drelincourt upon Death_, and other good
books; and so, like two Christian friends, they comforted each other
under their sorrow.

Some time after, Mr. Veal's friends got him a place in the
custom-house at Dover, which occasioned Mrs. Veal, by little and
little, to fall off from her intimacy with Mrs. Bargrave, though there
was never any such thing as a quarrel; but an indifferency came on by
degrees, till at last Mrs. Bargrave had not seen her in two years and
a half, though above a twelvemonth of the time Mrs. Bargrave hath been
absent from Dover, and this last half-year has been in Canterbury
about two months of the time, dwelling in a house of her own.

In this house, on the eighth of September, one thousand seven hundred
and five, she was sitting alone in the forenoon, thinking over her
unfortunate life, and arguing herself into a due resignation to
Providence, though her condition seemed hard: "And," said she, "I have
been provided for hitherto, and doubt not but I shall be still, and am
well satisfied that my afflictions shall end when it is most fit for
me." And then took up her sewing work, which she had no sooner done
but she hears a knocking at the door; she went to see who was there,
and this proved to be Mrs. Veal, her old friend, who was in a
riding-habit. At that moment of time the clock struck twelve at noon.

"Madam," says Mrs. Bargrave, "I am surprised to see you, you have been
so long a stranger"; but told her she was glad to see her, and offered
to salute her, which Mrs. Veal complied with, till their lips almost
touched, and then Mrs. Veal drew her hand across her own eyes, and
said, "I am not very well," and so waived it. She told Mrs. Bargrave
she was going a journey, and had a great mind to see her first. "But,"
says Mrs. Bargrave, "how can you take a journey alone? I am amazed at
it, because I know you have a fond brother." "Oh," says Mrs. Veal,
"I gave my brother the slip, and came away, because I had so great a
desire to see you before I took my journey." So Mrs. Bargrave went in
with her into another room within the first, and Mrs. Veal sat her
down in an elbow-chair, in which Mrs. Bargrave was sitting when she
heard Mrs. Veal knock. "Then," says Mrs. Veal, "my dear friend, I am
come to