PREFACE.

In the following life of Mrs. CHRISTIAN DAVIES, taken from her own mouth, we may remark examples of uncommon intrepidity but rarely found in the fair sex. By her having been long conversant in the camp, she had lost that softness which heightens the beauty of the fair, and contracted a masculine air and behaviour, which however excusable in her, would hardly be so in any other of her sex.

She was long before her death afflicted with a complication of distempers, as dropsy, scurvy, &c., at length her husband being taken ill, she would sit up with him at nights, by which she contracted a cold that threw her into a continual fever, which carried her off in four days.

She died on the 7th of July, 1739, and was interred in the burying-ground belonging to Chelsea Hospital, with military honours.

THE LIFE

AND

ENTERTAINING ADVENTURES

OF

MRS. CHRISTIAN DAVIES,

COMMONLY CALLED MOTHER ROSS.

I was born in Dublin, in the year 1667, of parents whose probity acquired them that respect from their acquaintance, which they had no claim to from their birth. My father was both a malster and brewer; in which business he employed at least twenty servants, beside those under the direction of my mother, in a farm he hired of Arthur White, of Leslip, esq.; left entirely to her care. My father was remarkable for industry and vigilance in his affairs, which employing his whole time in town, he never saw my mother but on Sundays, except some extraordinary business required his visiting the farm, which, though of fourscore pounds a year, she managed with great prudence and economy. They were both very tender of me, and spared no cost in my education, though I did not make the best use of their care in this article I had pa

tience, indeed, to learn to read, and become a good needle-woman, but I had too much mercury in me to like a sedentary life, the reason that I was always at the farm to assist my mother; this I did as much

through inclination as duty, being delighted with a country life, it indulging to my love of ramping, and the pleasure I took in manly employments; for I was never better pleased than when I was following the plough, or had a rake, flail, or pitchfork in my hand, which implements I could handle with as much strength and dexterity, if not with more, than any of my mother's servants. I used to get astride upon the horses, and ride them bare-backed about the fields, leaped hedges and ditches, by which I once got a terrible fall, and spoiled a grey mare given to my brother by our grandfather. My father never knew how this mischief happened, which brought me under contribution to a cowherd, who saw me tumble the mare into a dry ditch, and whose secrecy I was obliged to purchase, by giving him, for a considerable time, a cup of ale every night. I shall pass by the wild girlish tricks I and my companions were constantly playing, as they can administer nothing entertaining, and mention one only, to show an odd curiosity in a nobleman. I and four of my companions, were rolling ourselves down a hill, and turning heels over head, when the earl of C-d was passing in his coach, drawn by six beautiful grey horses, by the road, divided from the scene of our diversion by a quickset hedge and a ditch. He stopped his coach to be a spectator of our gambols; but finding that we put an end to our pastime on our perceiving him, (for the youngest of us was seventeen, and consequently had sense enough to think the showing our naked tails not over-decent,) he called to us, and promising to give us a crown apiece, if we would begin and pursue our diversion; our modesty gave way to our avarice, we indulged his lordship's optics, and he, having been amply satisfied by the unreservedness of our performance, kept his word.

I said that I was as active and strong in all the labours of husbandry, as any of our servants; I will therefore give one instance of this. About the begin

ning of August, 1685, I was employed to stack wheat, and was on the top of one near fifty-four foot high, when I perceived in the road near our farm, the judges and other magistrates in their robes, preceded by kettle-drums, trumpets, and heralds, in their rich coats, coming up the hill, in order to proclaim king James. Animated by the martial music, and desirous to have a nearer view of this glorious sight, which, with the glare of the gold and silver coats, the heralds, trumpets, and kettle-drums wore, had, in a manner, dazzled my sight, I leaped down, ran to, and cleared with a leap a five-barred gate, which was between me and the road they passed, calling to my mother to come and see the show, as I imagined every man there at least a prince. My mother hearing the procession was to proclaim king James, went back, and wept bitterly for some time, but would never tell me the reason for her tears.

Nothing remarkable occurs to my memory from the time of this monarch's being proclaimed, to that in which he was forced to throw himself into the arms of his Irish subjects, having been driven from the throne of England by king William. The Irish very readily espoused his cause, and among others (from a consciousness of its being a duty incumbent on him to support his lawful sovereign, notwithstanding his being of a different religion, which he thought not reason sufficient to affect his loyalty) my father sold all his standing corn, and other things of value, to Mr. Ascham, a neighbouring farmer, and was thus enabled, with what ready money he had by him before, to raise a troop of horse, and provide them with accoutrements, and everything necessary to take the field; and having furnished himself with a fine horse, and whatever else was requisite, he set out at the head of this troop, which was called by his name, Cavenaugh's, to join the rest of the army. I remember I was very fond of riding this horse, for a reason which would have prevented any

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