Page:The Wanderer (1814 Volume 4).pdf/258

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on foot, that she might not hazard being recognized, through the advertisement, by any coachman or postilion; and, to be less liable to detection from passing observers, she changed, over night, her bonnet, which was of white chip, for one the most coarse and ordinary of straw, with her young hostess; of whom, also, she bought a blue striped apron.

Shocking to all her feelings was this attempt to disguise, so imitative of guilt, so full of semblance to conscious imposture. But there are sometimes circumstances, great and critical, that call for all the energy of our courage, and demand all the resources of our faculties, for warding off impending and substantial evil, at whatever risk of transitory misconstruction.

Her account being already settled, she wished to depart unobserved, that she might less easily be traced. Her young hostess, sleeping late and tired, slept soundly, and was not disturbed by her