by Daniel Defoe
astonishment she was in; she was notinclined to believe the story, or to remember the particulars, for sheimmediately foresaw the confusion that must follow in the family uponit. But everything concurred so exactly with the stories she had toldme of herself, and which, if she had not told me, she would perhapshave been content to have denied, that she had stopped her own mouth,and she had nothing to do but to take me about the neck and kiss me,and cry most vehemently over me, without speaking one word for a longtime together. At last she broke out: 'Unhappy child!' says she,'what miserable chance could bring thee hither? and in the arms of myown son, too! Dreadful girl,' says she, 'why, we are all undone!Married to thy own brother! Three children, and two alive, all of thesame flesh and blood! My son and my daughter lying together as husbandand wife! All confusion and distraction for ever! Miserable family!what will become of us? What is to be said? What is to be done?' Andthus she ran on for a great while; nor had I any power to speak, or ifI had, did I know what to say, for every word wounded me to the soul.With this kind of amazement on our thoughts we parted for the firsttime, though my mother was more surprised than I was, because it wasmore news to her than to me. However, she promised again to me atparting, that she would say nothing of it to her son, till we hadtalked of it again.
It was not long, you may be sure, before we had a second conferenceupon the same subject; when, as if she had been willing to forget thestory she had told me of herself, or to suppose that I had forgot someof the particulars, she began to tell them with alterations andomissions; but I refreshed her memory and set her to rights in manythings which I supposed she had forgot, and then came in so opportunelywith the whole history, that it was impossible for her to go from it;and then she fell into her rhapsodies again, and exclamations at theseverity of her misfortunes. When these things were a little over withher, we fell into a close debate about what should be first done beforewe gave an account of the matter to my husband. But to what purposecould be all our consultations? We could neither of us see our waythrough it, nor see how it could be safe to open such a scene to him.It was impossible to make any judgment, or give any guess at whattemper he would receive it in, or what measures he would take upon it;and if he should have so little government of himself as to make itpublic, we easily foresaw that it would be the ruin of the wholefamily, and expose my mother and me to the last degree; and if at lasthe should take the advantage the law would give him, he might put meaway with disdain and leave me to sue for the little portion that Ihad, and perhaps waste it all in the suit, and then be a beggar; thechildren would be ruined too, having no legal claim to any of hiseffects; and thus I should see him, perhaps, in the arms of anotherwife in a few months, and be myself the most miserable creature alive.
My mother was as sensible of this as I; and, upon the whole, we knewnot what to do. After some time we came to more sober resolutions, butthen it was with this misfortune too, that my mother's opinion and minewere quite different from one another, and indeed inconsistent with oneanother; for my mother's opinion was, that I should bury the wholething entirely, and continue to live with him as my husband till someother event should make the discovery of it more convenient; and thatin the meantime she would endeavour to reconcile us together again, andrestore our mutual comfort and family peace; that we might lie as weused to do together, and so let the whole matter remain a secret asclose as death. 'For, child,' says she, 'we are both undone if itcomes out.'
To encourage me to this, she promised to make me easy in mycircumstances, as far as she was able, and to leave me what she couldat her death, secured for me separately from my husband; so that if itshould come out afterwards, I should not be left destitute, but be ableto stand on my own feet and procure justice from him.
This proposal did not agree at all with my judgment of the thing,though it was very fair and kind in my mother; but my thoughts ranquite another way.
As to keeping the thing in our own breasts, and letting it all remainas it was, I told her it was impossible; and I asked her how she couldthink I could bear the thoughts of lying with my own brother. In thenext place, I told her that her being alive was the only support of thediscovery, and that while she owned me for her child, and saw reason tobe satisfied that I was so, nobody else would doubt it; but that if sheshould die before the discovery, I should be taken for an impudentcreature that had forged such a thing to go away from my husband, orshould be counted crazed and distracted. Then I told her how he hadthreatened already to put me into a madhouse, and what concern I hadbeen in about it, and how that was the thing that drove me to thenecessity of discovering it to her as I had done.
From all which I told her, that I had, on the most serious reflectionsI was able to make in the case, come to this resolution, which I hopedshe would like, as a medium between both, viz. that she should use herendeavours with her son to give me leave to go to England, as I haddesired, and to furnish me with a sufficient sum of money, either ingoods along with me, or in bills for my support there, all alongsuggesting that he might one time or other think it proper to come overto me.
That when I was gone, she should then, in cold blood, and after firstobliging him in the solemnest manner possible to secrecy, discover thecase to him, doing it gradually, and as her own discretion should guideher, so that he might not be surprised with it, and fly out into anypassions and excesses on my account, or on hers; and that she shouldconcern herself to prevent his slighting the children, or marryingagain, unless he had a certain account of my being dead.
This was my scheme, and my reasons were good; I was really alienatedfrom him in the consequences of these things; indeed, I mortally hatedhim as a husband, and it was impossible to remove that riveted aversionI had to him. At the same time, it being an unlawful, incestuousliving, added to that aversion, and though I had no great concern aboutit in point of conscience, yet everything added to make cohabiting withhim the most nauseous thing to me in the world; and I think verily itwas come to such a height, that I could almost as willingly haveembraced a dog as have let him offer anything of that kind to me, forwhich reason I could not bear the thoughts of coming between the sheetswith him. I cannot say that I was right in point of policy in carryingit such a length, while at the same time I did not resolve to discoverthe thing to him; but I am giving an account of what was, not of whatought or ought not to be.
In their directly opposite opinion to one another my mother and Icontinued a long time, and it was impossible to reconcile ourjudgments; many disputes we had about it, but we could never either ofus yield our own, or bring over the other.
I insisted on my aversion to lying with my own brother, and sheinsisted upon its being impossible to bring him to consent to my goingfrom him to England; and in this uncertainty we continued, notdiffering so as to quarrel, or anything like it, but so as not to beable to resolve what we should do to make up that terrible breach thatwas before us.
At last I resolved on a desperate course, and told my mother myresolution, viz. that, in short, I would tell him of it myself. Mymother was frighted to the last degree at the very thoughts of it; butI bid her be easy, told her I would do it gradually and softly, andwith all the art and good-humour I was mistress of, and time it also aswell as I could, taking him in good-humour too. I told her I did notquestion but, if I could be hypocrite enough to feign more affection tohim than I really had, I should succeed in all my design, and we mightpart by consent, and with a good agreement, for I might live him wellenough for a brother, though I could not for a husband.
All this while he lay at my mother to find out, if possible, what wasthe meaning of that dreadful expression of mine, as he called it, whichI mentioned before: namely, that I was not his lawful wife, nor mychildren his legal children. My mother put him off, told him she couldbring me to no explanations, but found there was something thatdisturbed me very much, and she hoped she should get it out of me intime, and in the meantime recommended to him earnestly to use me moretenderly, and win me with his usual good carriag
e; told him of histerrifying and affrighting me with his threats of sending me to amadhouse, and the like, and advised him not to make a woman desperateon any account whatever.
He promised her to soften his behaviour, and bid her assure me that heloved me as well as ever, and that he had no such design as that ofsending me to a madhouse, whatever he might say in his passion; also hedesired my mother to use the same persuasions to me too, that ouraffections might be renewed, and we might lie together in a goodunderstanding as we used to do.
I found the effects of this treaty presently. My husband's conduct wasimmediately altered, and he was quite another man to me; nothing couldbe kinder and more obliging than he was to me upon all occasions; and Icould do no less than make some return to it, which I did as well as Icould, but it was but in an awkward manner at best, for nothing wasmore frightful to me than his caresses, and the apprehensions of beingwith child again