Page:An account of a savage girl.djvu/56

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28
The History of

the year 1747. As to what she has sometimes told of her having been long on sea, by reason of the ship's stopping at different islands, she is at present sensible that this was only a repetition of some commentary she has heard upon her adventures. I was informed by M. L—— that he heard a report about M. d'Epinoy's family, of the two little savages having been sold in some of the islands of America, where, being favourites of their mistress, but disliked by their master, the mistress was obliged to sell them again, and suffer them to be reimbarked either in the ship that had brought them, or in some other. These circumstances tally pretty well with those set forth in the letter already mentioned printed in the Mercury of France: But it is apparent, that these particulars arise altogether from conjectures more or less probable, formed upon the first signs and expressions that were obtained from the young girl, when she began to speak French, some months after being taken; and certainly so circumstantiate a relation, founded on no better authority than signs, is very little to be depended on.

Nor do I think we can have more dependence upon what Le Blanc pretends to remember of there having been aboard the ship in which she was transported, some people who understood her language, which was nothing butshrill