y friend," says I, "I will make you a present, if you will
accept of it;" and with that I laid the piece of Holland in her lap.

I could see she was surprised, and that she could hardly speak. "What
dost thou mean?" says she. "Indeed I cannot have the face to accept so
fine a present as this;" adding, "'Tis fit for thy own use, but 'tis
above my wear, indeed." I thought she had meant she must not wear it so
fine because she was a Quaker. So I returned, "Why, do not you Quakers
wear fine linen neither?" "Yes," says she, "we wear fine linen when we
can afford it, but this is too good for me." However, I made her take
it, and she was very thankful too. But my end was answered another way,
for by this I engaged her so, that as I found her a woman of
understanding, and of honesty too, I might, upon any occasion, have a
confidence in her, which was, indeed, what I very much wanted.

By accustoming myself to converse with her, I had not only learned to
dress like a Quaker, but so used myself to "thee" and "thou" that I
talked like a Quaker too, as readily and naturally as if I had been born
among them; and, in a word, I passed for a Quaker among all people that
did not know me. I went but little abroad, but I had been so used to a
coach that I knew not how well to go without one; besides, I thought it
would be a farther disguise to me, so I told my Quaker friend one day
that I thought I lived too close, that I wanted air. She proposed
taking a hackney-coach sometimes, or a boat; but I told her I had always
had a coach of my own till now, and I could find in my heart to have one
again.

She seemed to think it strange at first, considering how close I lived,
but had nothing to say when she found I did not value the expense; so,
in short, I resolved I would have a coach. When we came to talk of
equipages, she extolled the having all things plain. I said so too; so I
left it to her direction, and a coachmaker was sent for, and he provided
me a plain coach, no gilding or painting, lined with a light grey cloth,
and my coachman had a coat of the same, and no lace on his hat.

When all was ready I dressed myself in the dress I bought of her, and
said, "Come, I'll be a Quaker to-day, and you and I'll go abroad;" which
we did, and there was not a Quaker in the town looked less like a
counterfeit than I did. But all this was my particular plot, to be the
more completely concealed, and that I might depend upon being not known,
and yet