profession I was now to enter upon, and passing thus from a private devotee to pleasure, into a public one, to become a more general good, with all the advantages requisite to put my person out to use, either for interest, or pleasure, or both. But then she observ'd, as I was a kind of new face upon the town, that it was an establish'd rule, and mystery of trade, for me to pass for a maid, and dispose of myself as such on the first good occasion, without prejudice however, to such diversions as I might have a mind to in the interim, for that nobody could be a greater enemy than she was to the losing of time. That she would, in the mean time, do her best to find out a proper person, and would undertake to manage this nice point for me, if I would accept of her aid and advice to such good purpose, that in the loss of a fictitious maiden-head, I should reap all the advantages of a native one.
As a great delicacy of sentiments did not extremely belong to my character at
