ical from which the quotation comes is
"The Royal Magazine, or Gentleman's Monthly Companion" for 1765.

"A few weeks ago a gentlewoman, about twenty-five years of age,
applied to a farmer and broom-maker, near Hadleigh, in Hants [1] for
a lodging, telling them that she was the daughter of a nobleman,
and forced from her father's house by his ill-treatment. Her manner
of relating the story so affected the farmer that he took her in,
and kindly entertained her.

"In the course of conversation, she artfully let drop that she
had a portion of L90,000, of which she should be possessed as soon
as her friends in London knew where she was.

"After some days' stay she told the farmer the best return in her
power for this favor would be to marry his son, Thomas (a lad
about eighteen), if it was agreeable to him. The poor old man was
overjoyed at the proposal, and in a short time they were married;
after which she informed her father-in-law she had great, interest
at Court, and if he could for the present raise money to equip
them in a genteel manner, she could procure a colonel's commission
for her husband.

"The credulous farmer thereupon mortgaged his little estate for
L100, and everything necessary being bought for the new married
couple, they took the rest of the money and set out for London,
accompanied by three of the farmer's friends, and got to the Bear
Inn, in the Borough, on Christmas eve; where they lived for about
ten days in an expensive manner; and she went in a coach every
morning to St. James's end of the town, on pretence of soliciting
for her husband's commission, and to obtain her own fortune. But
it was at length discovered that the woman was an impostor; and
the poor country people were obliged to sell their horses by
auction towards defraying the expenses of the inn before they
could set out on their return home, which they did on foot, last
Saturday morning."

If the hundred pounds raised on mortgage had covered all the
expenses incurred, the Rocliffes might have been satisfied.

Unhappily they got further involved. They fell into the hands of
a lawyer in Portsmouth, who undertook to see them righted, but the
only advantage they gained from his intervention was the acquisition
of certain information that the woman who had married Thomas had
been married before.

Accordingly Thomas was free, and he used his freedom some years
later, when of a ripe age, to marry Sarah Kink, the sister of
Bideabout