Moll Flanders

if she had not been careful and tender to me in my lying in, as if I had been her own child. I told her I owned she had. “Well, my dear,” says she, “and when you are gone, what are you to me? And what would it be to me if you were to be hanged? Do you think there are not women who, as it is their trade and they get their bread by it, value themselves upon their being as careful of children as their own mothers can be, and understand it rather better? Yes, yes, child,” says she, “fear it not; how were we nursed ourselves? Are you sure you was nursed up by your own mother? and yet you look fat and fair, child,” says the old beldam; and with that she stroked me over the face. “Never be concerned, child,” says she, going on in her drolling way; “I have no murderers about me; I employ the best and the honestest nurses that can be had, and have as few children miscarry under their hands as there would if they were all nursed by mothers; we want neither care nor skill.”

She touched me to the quick when she asked if I was sure that I was nursed by my own mother; on the contrary I was sure I was not; and I trembled, and looked pale at the very expression. “Sure,” said I to myself, “this creature cannot be a witch, or have any conversation with a spirit, that can inform her what was done with me before I was able to know it myself;” and I looked at her as if I had been frightened; but reflecting that it could not be possible for her to know anything about me, that disorder went off, and I began to be easy, but it was not presently.

She perceived the disorder I was in, but did not know the meaning of it; so she ran on in her wild talk upon the weakness of my supposing that children were murdered because they were not all nursed by the mother, and to persuade me that the children she disposed of were as well used as if the mothers had the nursing of them themselves.

“It may be true, mother,” says I, “for aught I know, but my doubts are very strongly grounded indeed.” “Come, then,” says she, “let’s hear some of them.” “Why, first,” says I, “you give a piece of money to these people to take the child off the parent’s hands, and to take care of it as long as it lives. Now we know, mother,” said I, “that those are poor people, and their gain consists in being quit of the charge as soon as they can; how can I doubt but that, as it is best for them to have the child die, they are not over solicitous about life?”

“This is all vapours and fancy,” says the old woman; “I tell you their credit depends upon the child’s life, and they are as careful as any mother of you all.”

“O mother,” says I, “if I was but sure my little baby would be carefully looked to, and have justice done it, I should be happy indeed; but it is impossible I can be satisfied in that point unless I saw it, and to see it would be ruin and destruction to me, as now my case stands; so what to do I know not.”

“A fine story!” says the governess. “You would see the child, and you would not see the child; you would be concealed and discovered both together. These are things impossible, my dear; so you must e’en do as other conscientious mothers have done before you, and be contented with things as they must be, though they are not as you wish them to be.”

I understood what she meant by conscientious mothers; she would have said conscientious whores, but she was not willing to disoblige me, for really in this case I was not a whore, because legally married, the force of former marriage excepted.

However, let me be what I would, I was not come up to that pitch of hardness common to the profession; I mean, to be unnatural, and regardless of the safety of my child; and I preserved this honest affection so long, that I was upon the point of giving up my friend at the bank, who lay so hard at me to come to him and marry him, that, in short, there was hardly any room to deny him.

At last my old governess came to me, with her usual assurance. “Come, my dear,” says she, “I have found out a way how you shall be at a certainty that your child shall be used well, and yet the people that take care of it shall never know you, or who the mother of the child is.”

“Oh mother,” says I, “if you can do so, you will engage me to you forever.” “Well,” says she, “are you willing to be a some small annual expense, more than what we usually give to the people we contract with?” “Ay,” says I, “with all my heart, provided I may be concealed.” “As to that,” says the governess, “you shall be secure, for the nurse shall never so much as dare to inquire about you, and you shall once or twice a year go with me and see your child, and see how ’tis used, and be satisfied that it is in good hands, nobody knowing who you are.”

“Why,” said I, “do you think, mother, that when I come to see my child, I shall be able to conceal my being the mother of it? Do you think that possible?”

“Well, well,” says my governess, “if you discover it, the nurse shall be never the wiser; for she shall be forbid to ask any questions about you, or to take any notice. If she offers it, she shall lose the money which