he captain;
and so they fell to straining their compliments one upon another; but,
in short, my spouse gave him three or four guineas, and made him take
it. And so the first discourse went off again, and they had no more of
it.

But it did not go off so easily with me, for now, in a word, the clouds
began to thicken about me, and I had alarms on every side. My husband
told me what the captain had said, but very happily took it that the
captain had brought a tale by halves, and having heard it one way, had
told it another; and that neither could he understand the captain,
neither did the captain understand himself, so he contented himself to
tell me, he said, word for word, as the captain delivered it.

How I kept my husband from discovering my disorder you shall hear
presently; but let it suffice to say just now, that if my husband did
not understand the captain, nor the captain understand himself, yet I
understood them both very well; and, to tell the truth, it was a worse
shock than ever I had yet. Invention supplied me, indeed, with a sudden
motion to avoid showing my surprise; for as my spouse and I was sitting
by a little table near the fire, I reached out my hand, as if I had
intended to take a spoon which lay on the other side, and threw one of
the candles off of the table; and then snatching it up, started up upon
my feet, and stooped to the lap of my gown and took it in my hand. "Oh!"
says I, "my gown's spoiled; the candle has greased it prodigiously."
This furnished me with an excuse to my spouse to break off the discourse
for the present, and call Amy down; and Amy not coming presently, I said
to him, "My dear, I must run upstairs and put it off, and let Amy clean
it a little." So my husband rose up too, and went into a closet where he
kept his papers and books, and fetched a book out, and sat down by
himself to read.

Glad I was that I had got away, and up I run to Amy, who, as it
happened, was alone. "Oh, Amy!" says I, "we are all utterly undone." And
with that I burst out a-crying, and could not speak a word for a great
while.

I cannot help saying that some very good reflections offered themselves
upon this head. It presently occurred, what a glorious testimony it is
to the justice of Providence, and to the concern Providence has in
guiding all the affairs of men (even the least as well as the greatest),
that the most secret crimes are, by the most unforeseen accidents,
brought to light and discovere