Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 10.djvu/396

388 liberty. But I was so far from having money to bribe a courtier of the secretary's rank, that I had hardly enough to support myself. Whereupon my noble friend, the lord Kilsyth, who thought himself indebted to my fidelity for his life and fortune, was so extremely generous, as to make me a present of five hundred pounds, which I immediately sent to Melvil; who, thereupon, joining his interest with the good offices of the two dukes before mentioned, prevailed with king William to send down an order; upon the receipt of which, I was to be set at liberty by the council. But they would not obey it; alleging that the king was misinformed: and out of the abundance of their zeal, wrote to him, that if captain Creichton should obtain his liberty, he would murder all Scotland in one night.

Thus my hope and liberty vanished; for king William soon after going to Flanders, and not thinking it prudent to discredit the representation which the council had made of me, as so very dangerous a person, left me in the Tolbooth; though the two dukes, out of their great friendship (which I should be most ungrateful ever to forget) had both offered to answer body for body, for my peaceable demeanour. But notwithstanding all this, king William, for the reason before mentioned, left me prisoner in the Tolbooth, as I said; where I continued two years and a half longer, without one penny of money; though not without many fiends, whose charity and generosity supported me under this heavy affliction.

My wife and two boys, with as many daughters, were in town all the time of my confinement. The boys died young, but the mother and the two girls lived to endure many hardships; having been twice plun-