And as for young maids, this is my advice, if they will not try St. Agnes, let them be sure to chuse a clever man, who is able to do his work; for if she be fain to seek another to do that work, it may breed great dissension.
THE END OF THE SECOND PART.
The INTRODUCTION
TO THE
SECOND PART.
ON Michaelmas day, Mother Bunch, sitting on the bank of a river, joining to a neighbouring grove, beheld the late flourishing branches in their decay, whose sapless leaves were falling to the earth; from which she began seriously to consider her own. mortality; and since time had hurried on the winter of her age, and covered her aged head with snowy locks, she might expect, ere long, to fall, like the enfeebled leaves: Therefore, she resolved, as she had been a kind friend to young men and maids, to give a further testimony of her regard before she left this world. For as her painful study, and strict observation had made a large improvement in her stock of knowledge, she would not have it buried in the grave with her, but leave it to posterity for the benefit of young men and maids, whereby they might learn to understand their good and bad fortunes, and by the directions of this book, be thoroughly furnished with many secret rarities, never before published to the world.
Accordingly, the next day she wrote letters of invitation to the young men and maids, to repair to her house on St. Luke's day: The maids she ap-
