"Morning at last dawned, and our prison-door flew suddenly open. The governor's lady had learned our fate; and, even at the risk of giving offence to her lord, she had ordered us air and water, whilst _he still slept_. 'O woman, woman,' exclaims Mr Quentin Dick, in his MS. before me, 'thou art, and hast ever been, an angel. What does not man--what do not we owe thee?'"
In a word, more than the half perished on that dreadful night, and amongst those who were ultimately liberated by order in council, were the individuals who have been particularised in this narrative.
Reader, we inquire not into thy political creed--we ask not whether thou art a Whig or a Tory, a Conservative or a Radical--we can allow thee to be an honest and conscientious man, on all these suppositions: all we ask of thee is this, "_Art thou a man?_" The inference is inevitable.
Perhaps some may wish to know what became of Euphan Thriepland, Jamie M'Birnie, and Jeanie Wilson. We are happy that, owing to an accidental occurrence, we can throw some light upon the subject. Last time we were in Dumfries-shire, and in Closeburn, our native parish, we read upon the door of a change-house, in the village of Croalchapel, this inscription, "Whisky, Ale, and British Spirits, sold here, by James M'Birnie." The coincidence of the name revived my long-obscured recollection of the past, and led, in fact, ultimately to the whole of this narrative. We learned, from an old bedrid woman, the grandmother of this James, that he of Dunnottar celebrity had returned to Edinburgh and married Jeanie Wilson; that he had taken auld aunt Euphan home to their dwelling; and had been employed for several years after the Revolution, as a nursery and seeds-man, in Edinburgh; that, having realised a competency, they had ultimately retired to their native parish of Closeburn, and had tenanted a small farm called Stepends; that their son had been a drover, and unsuccessful even to bankruptcy; and that the family were now reduced to the condition which we beheld.
We believe there never was such a sad Sabbath witnessed, as that upon which nearly four hundred of the Established clergy of Scotland preached their farewell sermons and addresses to their several congregations. It was a day, as the historians of that period express it, of "wailing, and of loud lamentation, as the weeping of Jazer, when the lords of the heathen had broken down her principal plants; and as the mourning of Rachel, who wept for her children, and would not be comforted."