pity and cruelty of that parting,
I have no power to write. We knelt with bowed heads while the mother
prayed for the son, expatriated, whom she never hoped to see again on
this earth. She gave us bannocks of her own baking, and her last words
were to implore me always to be a friend to John Paul.

Then we went out into the night and walked all the way to Dumfries in
silence.

We lay that night at the sign of the "Twa Naigs," where Bonnie Prince
Charlie had rested in the Mars year(1715). Before I went to bed I called
for pen and paper, and by the light of a tallow dip sat down to compose a
letter to my grandfather, telling him that I was alive and well, and
recounting as much of my adventures as I could. I said that I was going
to London, where I would see Mr. Dix, and would take passage thence for
America. I prayed that he had been able to bear up against the ordeal of
my disappearance. I dwelt upon the obligations I was under to John Paul,
relating the misfortunes of that worthy seaman (which he so little
deserved!). And said that it was my purpose to bring him to Maryland
with me, where I knew Mr. Carvel would reward him with one of his ships,
explaining that he would accept no money. But when it came to accusing
Grafton and the rector, I thought twice, and bit the end of the feather.
The chances were so great that my grandfather would be in bed and under
the guardianship of my uncle that I forbore, and resolved instead to
write it to Captain Daniel at my first opportunity.

I arose early to discover a morning gray and drear, with a mist falling
to chill the bones. News travels apace the world over, and that of John
Paul's home-coming and of his public renunciation of Scotland at the
"Hurcheon" had reached Dumfries in good time, substantiated by the
arrival of the teamster with the chests the night before. I descended
into the courtyard in time to catch the captain in his watchet-blue frock
haggling with the landlord for a chaise, the two of them surrounded by a
muttering crowd anxious for a glimpse of Mr. Craik's gardener's son, for
he had become a nine-day sensation to the country round about. But John
Paul minded them not so much as a swarm of flies, and the teamster's
account of the happenings at Kirkcudbright had given them so wholesome a
fear of his speech and presence as to cause them to misdoubt their own
wit, which is saying a deal of Scotchmen. But when the bargain had been
struck and John Paul gone with