INCHBALD, MRS. ELIZABETH, is the daughter of Mr. Simpson, a reputable farmer at Staningfield, near Bury St. Edmund's, in Suffolk, who had a numerous family. Having lost her father during her infancy, she was under the care of her mother, who, on her becoming a widow, continued to occupy the farm, and brought up her children with all due attention. Miss Simpson had an impediment in her speech, which prevented her from being much in company; for she was scarcely intelligible to any one who was not well acquainted with her. During her solitary hours, she applied herself to books; and, anxious to become acquainted with the customs and manners of the world, of which she had read so much, she formed the resolution of visiting the metropolis; and, finding that her intention was contrary to the wishes of her friends, she seized an opportunity, early one morning in February 1772, of eloping from her family. She had previously packed up a few necessaries in a bandbox; and, with these, ran about two miles across some fields, and there waited with impatience for the stage, which conveyed her to London. At this time she was about 16 years of age, and remarkable for beauty of features, and elegance of figure. Having often heard her family speak of a distant relation who lived opposite Northumberland House, in the Strand, on her arrival in London she took a hackney-coach, and sought this asylum; but, on reaching the place, was, to her great mor

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tification, told that her relation had retired from business, and was settled in Wales. Her alarm at these unexpected tidings, and her evident distress (it being near ten o'clock at night), moved the compassion of the people of the house where she inquired, who, at her request, generously accommodated her with a lodging. This civility, however, awakened suspicion : she had read in novels the various modes of seduction which were practised in London, and apprehended that she was in a dangerous house; this suspicion seemed confirmed by the entrance of a corpulent old lady, whose appearance exactly corresponded with the description she had read of a pro-. curess. While, therefore, they were whispering their pity for her youth, and extolling her beauty, she suddenly snatched up her bandbox, and, without saying a word, rushed out of the house, leaving the people to stare at each other, and repent of their compassion. Much fatigued and alarmed, she knocked at a house, where she saw a bill announcing "lodgings "to be let," pretending that she was a milliner's apprentice, whose mistress had unexpectedly a number of visitors from the country that occupied all her beds, and had therefore desired her to seek a temporary accommodation. The veracity of her story was naturally doubted; but she persisted in her tale, till, on turning about, to her great surprise and confusion, she perceived the identical tradesman, whose house she had so precipitately left, listening attentively

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