She had often expressed a great desire to see London; but though they were only distant a very short day’s journey from it, she had never been able to satisfy her curiosity:  it was not therefore without reason, that she grew weary of the life she was forced to lead at Peckham.  The melancholy retired situation of the place was to her insupportable; and as she had the folly, incident to many other women, of believing sterility to be a kind of reproach, she was very much hurt to see that she might fall under that suspicion; for she was persuaded, that although heaven had denied her children, she nevertheless had all the necessary requisites on her part, if it had been the will of the Lord.  This had occasioned her to make some reflections, and then to reason upon those reflections; as for instance, that since her husband chose rather to devote himself to his studies, than to the duties of matrimony, to turn over musty old books, rather than attend to the attractions of beauty, and to gratify his own pleasures, rather than those of his wife, it might be permitted her to relieve some necessitous lover, in neighbourly charity, provided she could do it conscientiously, and to direct her inclinations in so just a, manner, that the evil spirit should have no concern in it.  Mr. Wetenhall, a zealous partisan for the doctrine of the casuists, would not perhaps have approved of these decisions; but he was not consulted.

The greatest misfortune was, that neither solitary Peckham nor its sterile neighbourhood, presented any expedients, either for the execution of the afore-mentioned design, or for the relief of poor Mrs. Wetenhall:  she was visibly pining away, when, through fear of dying either with solitude or of want, she had recourse to Miss Hamilton’s commiseration.

Their first acquaintance was formed at Paris, whither Mr. Wetenhall had taken his wife half a year after they were married, on a journey thither to buy books:  Miss Hamilton, who from that very time greatly pitied her, consented to pass some time in the country with her, in hopes by that visit to deliver her, for a short time at least, out of her captivity; which project succeeded according to her wish.

The Chevalier de Grammont, being informed of the day on which they were to arrive, borne on the wings of love and impatience, had engaged George Hamilton to go with him, and meet them some miles out of London.  The equipage he had prepared for the purpose, corresponded with his usual magnificence; and on such an occasion, we may reasonably suppose he had not neglected his person:  however, with all his impatience, he checked the ardour of the coachman, through fear of accidents, rightly judging that upon a road prudence is preferable to eagerness.  The ladies at length appeared, and Miss Hamilton, being in his eyes, ten or twelve times more handsome than before her departure from London, he would have purchased with his life so kind a reception as she gave her brother.