Memoirs of Fanny Hill
graces of her person, than which nothing could be more exquisitely
touching; I repeat touching, as a just distinction from striking, which
is ever a less lasting effect, and more generally belongs to the fair
complexions; but leaving that decision to every one’s taste, I proceed
to give you Louisa’s narrative as follows:
“According to practical maxims of life, I ought to boast of my birth,
since I owe it to pure love, without marriage; but this I know, it was
scarce possible to inherit a stronger propensity to that cause of my
being than I did. I was the rare production of the first essay of a
journeyman cabinet-maker, on his master’s maid: the consequence of
which was a big belly, and the loss of a place. He was not in
circumstances to do much for her; and yet, after all this blemish, she
found means, after she had dropt her burthen, and disposed of me to a
poor relation in the country, to repair it by marrying a pastry-cook
here in London, in thriving business; on whom she soon, under favour of
the complete ascendant he had given her over him, passed me for a child
she had by her first husband. I had, on that footing, been taken home,
and was not six years old when this father-in-law died, and left my
mother in tolerable circumstances, and without any children by him. As
to my natural father, he had betaken himself to the sea; where, when
the truth of things came out, I was told that he died, not immensely
rich you may think, since he was no more than a common sailor. As I
grew up, under the eyes of my mother, who kept on the business, I could
not but see, in her severe watchfulness, the marks of a slip, which she
did not care should be hereditary; but we no more choose our passions
than our features or complexions, and the bent of mine was so strong to
the forbidden pleasure, that it got the better, at length, of all her
care and precaution. I was scarce twelve years old, before that part
which she wanted so much to keep out of harm’s way, made me feel its
impatience to be taken notice of, and come into play; already had it
put forth the signs of forwardness in the sprout of a soft down over
it, which had often fluttered, and I might also say, grown under my
constant touch and visitation, so pleased was I with what I took to be
a kind of title to womanhood, that state I pined to be entered of, for
the pleasures I conceived were annexed to it; and now the growing
importance of that part to me, and the new sensations in it, demolished
at once all my girlish play-things and amusements. Nature now pointed
me strongly to more solid diversions, while all the stings of desire
settled so fiercely in that little centre of them, that I could not
mistake the spot I wanted a playfellow in.
“I now shunned all company in which there was no hopes of coming at the
object of my longings, and used to shut myself up, to indulge in
solitude some tender meditation on the pleasure I strongly perceived
the overture of, in feeling and examining what nature assured me must
be the chosen avenue, the gates for unknown bliss to enter at, that I
panted after.
“But these meditations only increased my disorder, and blew the fire
that consumed me. I was yet worse when, yielding at length to the
insupportable irritations of the little fairy charm that tormented me,
I seized it with my fingers, teazing it to no end. Sometimes, in the
furious excitations of desire, I threw myself on the bed, spread my
thighs abroad, and lay as it were expecting the longed-for relief, till
finding my illusion, I shut and squeezed them together again, burning
and fretting. In short, this develish thing, with its impetuous girds
and itching fires, led me such a life, that I could neither, night or
day, be at peace with it or myself. In time, however, I thought I had
gained a prodigious prize, when figuring to myself that my fingers were
something of the shape of what I pined for, I worked my way in with one
of them with great agitation and delight; yet not without pain too did
I deflower myself as far as it could reach; proceeding with such a fury
of passion, in this solitary and last shift of pleasure, as extended me
at length breathless on the bed in an amorous melting trance.
“But frequency of use dulling the sensation, I soon began to perceive
that this work was but a paultry shallow expedient, that went but a
little way to relieve me, and rather raised more flame than its dry and
insignificant titillation could rightly appease.
“Man alone, I almost instinctively knew, as well as by what I had
industriously picked up at weddings and christenings, was possessed of
the only remedy that could reduce this rebellious disorder; but watched
and overlooked as I was, how to come at it was the point, and that, to
all appearance, an invincible one; not that I did not rack my brains
and invention how at once to elude my mothers vigilance, and procure
myself the satisfaction of my impetuous curiosity and longings for this
mighty and untasted pleasure. At length, however, a singular chance did
at once the work of a long course of alertness. One day that we had
dined at an acquaintance over the way, together with a
gentlewoman-lodger that occupied the first floor of our house, there
started an indispensable necessity for my mother’s going down to
Greenwich to accompany her: the party was settled, when I do not know
what genius whispered me to plead a headache, which I certainly had
not, against my being included in a jaunt that I had not the least
relish for. The pretext, however, passed, and my mother, with much
reluctance, prevailed with herself to go without me; but took
particular care to see me safe home, where she consigned me into the
hands of an old trusty maidservants, who served in the shop, for we had
not a male creature in the house.
“As soon as she was gone, I told the maid I would go up and lie down on
our lodger’s bed, mine not being made, with a charge to her at the same
time not to disturb me, as it was only rest I wanted. This injunction
probably proved of eminent service to me. As soon as I was got into the
bedchamber, I unlaced my stays, and threw myself on the outside of the
bedclothes, in all the loosest undress. Here I gave myself up to the
old insipid privy shifts of my self-viewing, self-touching
self-enjoying, in fine, to all the means of self knowledge I could
devise, in search of the pleasure that fled before me, and tantalized
with that unknown something that was out of my reach; thus all only
served to enflame myself, and to provoke violently my desires, whilst
the one thing needful to their satisfaction was not at hand, and I
could have bit my finger for representing it so ill. After then
wearying and fatiguing myself with grasping shadows, whilst that most
sensible part of me disdained to content itself with less than
realities, the strong yearnings, the urgent struggles of nature towards
the melting relief, and the extreme self-agitations I had used to come
at it, had wearied and thrown me into a kind of unquiet sleep: for, if
I tossed and threw about my limbs in proportion to the distraction of
my dreams, as I had reason to believe I did, a bystander could not have
helped seeing all for love. And one there was it seems; for waking out
of my very short slumber, I found my hand locked in that of a young
man, who was kneeling at my bed-side, and begging my pardon for his
boldness: but that being a son to the lady to whom, this bed-chamber,
he knew, belonged, he had slipped by the servant of the shop, as he
supposed, unperceived, when finding me asleep, his first ideas were to
withdraw; but that he had been fixed and detained there by a power he
could better account for, than resist.
“What shall I say? my emotions of fear and surprise were instantly
subdued by those of the pleasure I bespoke in great presence of mind
from the turn this adventure might take. He seemed to me no other than
a pitying angel, dropt out of the clouds: for he was young and
perfectly handsome, which was more than even I had asked for, man, in
general, being all that my utmost desires had pointed at. I thought
then I could not put too much encouragement into my eyes and voice; I
regretted no leading advances; no matter for his after-opinion of my
forwardness, so it might bring him to the point of answering my
pressing demands of present case; it was not now with his thoughts but
his actions that my business immediately lay. I raised then my head,
and told him, in a soft tone, that tended to prescribe the same key to
him, that his mamma was gone out and would not return till late at
night: which I thought no bad hint; but as it proved, I had nothing of
a novice to deal with. The impressions I had made on him from the
discoveries I had betrayed of my person in the disordered motions of
it, during his view of me asleep, had, as he afterwards told me, so
fixed and charmingly prepared him, that, had I known his dispositions,
I had more to hope from his violence, than to fear from his respect;
and even less than the extreme tenderness which I threw into my voice
and eyes, would have served to encourage him to make the most of the
opportunity. Finding then that his kisses, imprinted on my hand, were
taken as tamely as he could wish, he rose to my lips; and glewing his
to them, made me so faint with overcoming joy and pleasure, that I fell
back, and he with me, in course, on the bed, upon which I had, by
insensibly shifting from the side to near the middle, invitingly, made
room for him. He is now lain down by me, and the minutes being too
precious to consume in ultimate ceremony, or dalliance, my youth
proceeds immediately to those extremities, which all my looks, humming
and palpitations, had assured him he might attempt without the fear of
a repulse: those rogues the men, read us admirably on these occasions.
I lay then at length panting for the imminent attack, with wishes far
beyond my fears, and for which it was scarce possible for a girl,
barely thirteen, but tall and well grown, to have better dispositions.
He threw up my petticoat and shift, whilst my thighs were, by an
instinct of nature, unfolded to their best; and my desires had so
thoroughly destroyed all modesty in me, that even their being now naked
and all laid open to him, was part of the prelude that pleasure
deepened my blushes at, more than same. But when his hand, and touches,
naturally attracted to their center, made me feel all their wantonness
and warmth in, and round it, oh! how immensely different a sense of
things, did I perceive there, than when under my own insipid handling!
And now his waistcoat was unbuttoned, and the confinement of the
breeches burst through, when out started to view the amazing, pleasing
object of all my wishes, all my dreams, all my love, the king member
indeed! I gazed at, I devoured it, at length and breadth, with my eyes
intently directed to it, till his; getting upon me, and placing between
my thighs, took from me the enjoyment of its sight, to give me a far
more grateful one, in its touch, in that part where its touch is so
exquisitely affecting. Applying it then to the minute opening, for such
at that age it certainly was, I met with too much good will, I felt
with too great a rapture of pleasure the first insertion of it, to heed
much the pain that followed: I thought nothing too dear to pay for this
the richest treat of the sense; so that, split up, torn, bleeding,
mangled I was still superiorly pleased, and hugged the author of all
this delicious ruin. But when, soon after, he made his second attack,
sore as every thing was, the smart was soon put away by the sovereign
cordial; all my soft complainings were silenced, and the pain melting
fast away into pleasure. I abandoned myself over to all its transports,