Moll Flanders

Moll meets the drunk man at the Bartholomew Fair in London. The drunk man is rich and obviously intoxicated, and he takes to flirting heavily with Moll. They have sex, after which she takes his gold watch and money and slips out the door. Moll returns home and tells the midwife, who, after a hearty laugh, insists she knows the man. The midwife goes to see him and finds him depressed and worried he has contracted a venereal disease. She gives back his watch and facilitates a meeting between him and Moll, at which time he tells Moll that since they have already committed the sin once, he doesn’t see the harm in doing it again. The drunk man is married, but he continues paying Moll for sex, which allows her to live rather comfortably. After about a year, he stops calling on Moll, and she never sees him again. The drunk man illustrates vice and immorality in the novel, and he also underscores the lengths women are forced to go to support themselves in 17th-century England. Furthermore, the character of the drunk man and Moll’s association with him highlight the ease with which sins can be repeated—once the thing is done once, it becomes easier to commit the next time, which basically sums up Moll’s entire career as “a Thief and a Whore.”