( 7 )
there was a report that the enemies were to send down thumbikins to keep them from rebelling: at the report of this they were discouraged; he came above the deck, and said, Why are ye so discouraged? You need not fear, there will neither thumbikins nor bootikins come here, lift up your hearts & heads for the day of your redemption draweth near; if we were once at London we will be all set at liberty. And when sailing in the voyage, praying publickly, he said, Lord such is the enemies hatred at thee, and malice at us, for thy sake, that they will not let us stay in thy land of Scotland to serve thee, tho some of us have nothing but the canopy of thy heavens above us, and thy earth to trade upon; but, Lord, we bless thy name, that will cut short our voyage & frustrate thy enemies of their wicked design, and will not get us where they intend, and some of us shall go richer home, than we came from home. James Pride, who lived at Fife, an honest man being one of them, he said, many times he could assert the truth of this; for he came safely home, beside other things, he bought two cows, and before that he never had one. I had these accounts both from the foresaid James Kay, and Robert Punton a known public man, worthy of all credit, who was also under the same sentence, who lived in the parish of Dalmeny, near the Queens Ferry.
9. When they arrived at London, the skipper who received them at Leith was to carry them no further; the skipper who was to receive them there, and to carry them to Virginia, came to see them, they being represented to him as thieves, robbers, and evil-doers, but when he found they were all grave Christian men, banished for presbyterian principles, he said, he would sail the sea with none such. In this confusion, that the one skipper would not receive them, and the other would keep them no longer, and being expensive to maintain them, they were all set at liberty. Others reported that both skippers got compliments by friends at London, however it is certain they were safely set free, without any imposition of bonds or oaths; & friends at London; and in their way homeward thro England shewed much kindness unto them.
10. That dismal day, the 22d of June, in the year 1679, at Bothwel bridge, that the Lord's people fell & fled before the enemy, he was forty miles distant, near the border, kept him retired until the middle of the day, that some friend laid t© him. Sir, the people are waitingfor
