Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 10.djvu/400

392 make the best of my way for Ireland. But I bethought me of the poor sentry (to whom the twelve days we staid there seemed no longer than two or three, so well was he plied with drink) and calling for him, asked whether he would choose to share with me and my fortunes, or go back to the regiment, perhaps to be shot for neglect of his duty? He readily answered, that he would go with me whither ever I went; and not long after we came into Ireland, I had the good luck to get him made a sergeant of grenadiers, in the regiment formerly commanded by my lord Dunbarton, by a captain who was then gone thither for recruits; in which regiment he died a lieutenant some years after.

The lady, at parting, made me a present of a good horse, with ten dollars, to bear my charges on the way; and moreover hired a tenant's horse to carry the sentry to the borders. I durst not be seen to pass through Galloway, and therefore went by Carlisle to Whitehaven. Here I found an acquaintance, who was minister of the town, of the name of Marr; a gentleman of great worth and learning. Before the Revolution, he had been minister of a parish in Scotland, near the borders: but about the time of that event, the rabble, as he told me the story, came to his house, in the night, to rob and murder him; having treated others of his brethren, the episcopal clergy, before in that inhuman manner. He was a single man, and had but one man servant, whose business was to dress his meat, and make his bed; and while the villains were breaking into the house, he had just time to put on his breeches, stockings, and shoes, and no more; for by that time they were got in; when he thought it better to leap out at