away from Sally, leaving her to bewail her own weakness; for it was that, indeed, and not any irresistible fate, which had been the cause of her ruin. To complete her misery, she herself was suspected of having stolen the silver cup which Rachel had pocketed. Her master, however, would not prosecute her, as she was falling into a deep decline, and she died in a few months of a broken heart, a sad warning to all credulous girls.

of them.

Rachel, whenever she got near home, used to drop her trade of fortune-telling, and only dealt in the wares of her basket. Mr. Wilson, the clergyman, found her one day dealing out some very wicked ballads to some children. He went up with a view to give her a reprimand; but had no sooner begun his exhortation than up came a constable, followed by several people. "There she is, that is she, that is the old witch who tricked my wife out of the five guineas," said one "Do your office, constable; seize that old hag. She may tell fortunes and find pots of gold in Taunton gaol, for there she will have nothing else to do!" This was that very farmer Jenkins, whose wife had been cheated by Rachel of the five guineas. He had taken pains to trace her to her own parish: he did not so much value the loss of the money, as he thought it was a duty he owed the public to clear the country of such vermin. Mr. Wilson immediately committed her. She took her trial at the next assizes, when she was sentenced to a year's imprisonment. In the meantime, the pawnbroker to whom she had sold

the silver cup, which she had stolen from poor Sally's master, impeached her; and as the robbery was fully proved upon Rachel, she was sentenced for this crime to Botany Bay; and a happy day it was for the county of Somerset, when such a nuisance was sent out of it. She was transported much about the same time that her husband Giles lost his life, in stealing the net from the garden wall, as related in the second part of poaching Giles.

I have thought it my duty to print this little history as a kind warning to all you young men and maidens not to have any thing to say to cheats, impostors, cunning women, fortune-tellers, conjurers, and interpreters of dreams. Listen to me, your true friend, when I assure you that God never reveals to weak and wicked women those secret designs of his providence, which no human wisdom is able to foresee. To consult these false oracles is not only foolish, but sinful. It is foolish, because they are themselves as ignorant as those whom they pretend to teach; and it is sinful, because it is prying into that futurity which God, in mercy as well as wisdom, hides from men. God, indeed, orders all things; but when you have a mind to do a foolish thing, do not fancy you are fated to do it. This is tempting Providence, and not trusting him. It is, indeed, charging God with folly. Prudence is his gift, and you obey him better when you make use of prudence, under the direction of prayer, than when you madly run into ruin, and think you are only submitting to your fate.

Never fancy that you are compelled to undo yourself, or to rush upon your own destruction, in compliance with any supposed fatality. Never believe that God conceals his will from a sober Christian who obey his laws, and reveals it to a vagabond gipsy who runs up and down breaking the laws both of God and man. King Saul never consulted the witch till he had left off serving God. The Bible will direct us what to do better than any conjurer, and there are no days unlucky but those which we make so by our own vanity, sin, and folly.

MORAL SKETCHES

OF

PREVAILING OPINIONS AND MANNERS,

Foreign and Domestic :

WITH

REFLECTIONS ON PRAYER.

Let us make a stand on the ancient ways, and then look about us, and discover what is the straight and right way, and walk in it.

Lord BACON on Innovation.

I know not which is the greater wonder, either that prayer, which is a duty so easy and facile, so ready and apted to the powers and skill and opportunities of every man, should have so great effects, and be productive of such mighty blessings; or that we should be so unwilling to use so easy an instrument of producing so much good. Bishop JEREMY TAYLOR.