Ill 



never without salt provisions, porter, and even 

 wine, to entertain their friends and their visiters 

 from the bay or the mountains. As I passed 

 through their grounds, many little requests were 

 preferred to me : one wanted an additional supply 

 of lime for the whitewashing his house; another was 

 building a new house for a superannuated wife (for 

 they have all so much decency as to call their 

 sexual attachments by a conjugal name), and 

 wanted a little assistance towards the finishing it ; 

 a third requested a new axe to work with ; and 

 several entreated me to negotiate the purchase of 

 some relation or friend belonging to another estate, 

 and with whom they were anxious to be reunited : 

 but all their requests were for additional indul- 

 gences ; not one complained of ill-treatment, 

 hunger, or over- work. 



Poor Nicholas gave me a fresh instance of his 

 being one of those whom Fortune pitches upon to 

 show her spite : he has had four children, none of 

 whom are alive ; and the eldest of them, a fine little 

 girl of four years old, fell into the mill-stream, and 

 was drowned before any one was aware of her 

 danger. His wife told me that she had had fifteen 

 children, had taken the utmost care of them, and 

 yet had now but two alive : she said, indeed, fifteen 

 at the first, but she afterwards corrected herself, 

 and explained that she had had " twelve whole 

 children and three half ones by which she meant 

 miscarriages. 



