Evidence Type: Newspaper Report
10 May 1826
MARY DUNLEVEY, a professed maid of all work, assigned to one Mr. JOSEPH MOORE, was brought up on a charge of being absent from her service without leave. It was during the afternoon of Friday last that this maiden’s said master discovered that she had taken it into her head to have “a bit of a spree,” and this fertile idea, it would seem, was not alone confined to her “sconse,” for she soon set on “tooth and nail,” packed up, bag and baggage, and made so good a use of her “stumps” afterwards, that she speedily left master to shift for himself. This expeditious mode of doing business is not unworthy of remark, when MARY’s age and qualifications are taken into consideration. She was “fat, fair, and (over) forty,” and yet could run like a greyhound, and so she did, she left the good old house behind her.
But it would seem MARY was not over cautious in selecting a fit place for concealment. By the master’s directions constables were deputed to track her out, and within the space of one little day, these wights did manage to discover the fugitive’s hiding hole. They paid her a visit—an unwelcome visit. What pity that a
——— “(Constable’s) prying eye
Should e’er go thither such fruits to wither,
The flowers laid down their heads to die,
And hope fell sick as the wights drew night;” —
they led her away blushing like the morn—they led her away among high-ways and bye-ways, before the dread presence of her master, who attended at the office in person, for the purpose of uttering his grievances, and giving up his claim to her further services. The fly-away dame upon a little investigation by the bench, was pronounced incurable, or somewhat analagous [sic] to that, and was directed volens or nolens, to be forthwith immured within the factory walls, and then and there, to do penance in the second class.
CITATION
Female Factory Online, (femalefactoryonline.org), “Law Report of MARY DUNLEVEY,” https://femalefactoryonline.org/law-reports/p18260510/, accessed [insert current date].
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