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the fame of our adventurer’s knowledge in phyſic began now to ſpread) when a perſon of Totneſs being accidentally preſent, happened to ſee and know her, and having heard upon enquiry, that the Doctor was married at Wells, as we have above mentioned, related the whole ſtory of Mr. Ivythorn’s daughter, and the whole adventure at Totneſs.
News of this kind ſeldom wants wings; it reached Wells, and the ears of the Doctor’s mother before her return from Glaſtonbury. Upon this the old woman immediately ſent for her daughter, and very ſtrictly examined her, telling her the great ſin ſhe would be guilty of, if ſhe concealed a fact of this kind, and the great diſgrace ſhe would bring on her own family, and even on her whole ſex, by living quietly and contentedly with a huſband who was in any degree leſs a man than the reſt of his neighbours.
Molly aſſured her mother of the falſehood of this report; and as it is uſual for perſons who are too eager in any cauſe, to prove too much, ſhe aſſerted ſome things which ſtaggered her mother’s belief, and made her cry out, O child, there is no ſuch thing in human nature.
Such was the progreſs this ſtory had made in Wells, that before the Doctor arrived there, it was in every body’s mouth; and as the Doctor rode through the ſtreets, the mob, eſpecially the women, all paid their compliments of congratulation. Some laughed at her, others threw dirt at her, and others made uſe of terms of reproach not fit to be commemorated. When ſhe came to her own houſe, ſhe found her wife in tears, and having aſked her the cauſe, was informed of the dialogue which had paſt between her and her mother. Upon which the Doctor, tho’ he knew not yet by what means the
