LETTER V
The Rev. Dr. Pringle to Mr. Micklewham, Schoolmaster and
Session-Clerk, Garnock
LONDON, 49 NORFOLK STREET, STRAND.
DEAR SIR--On the first Sunday forthcoming after the receiving hereof, you
will not fail to recollect in the remembering prayer, that we return
thanks for our safe arrival in London, after a dangerous voyage. Well,
indeed, is it ordained that we should pray for those who go down to the
sea in ships, and do business on the great deep; for what me and mine
have come through is unspeakable, and the hand of Providence was visibly
manifested.
On the day of our embarkation at Leith, a fair wind took us onward at a
blithe rate for some time; but in the course of that night the bridle of
the tempest was slackened, and the curb of the billows loosened, and the
ship reeled to and fro like a drunken man, and no one could stand
therein. My wife and daughter lay at the point of death; Andrew Pringle,
my son, also was prostrated with the grievous affliction; and the very
soul within me was as if it would have been cast out of the body.
On the following day the storm abated, and the wind blew favourable; but
towards the heel of the evening it again came vehement, and there was no
help unto our distress. About midnight, however, it pleased HIM, whose
breath is the tempest, to be more sparing with the whip of His
displeasure on our poor bark, as she hirpled on in her toilsome journey
through the waters; and I was enabled, through His strength, to lift my
head from the pillow of sickness, and ascend the deck, where I thought of
Noah looking out of the window in the ark, upon the face of the desolate
flood, and of Peter walking on the sea; and I said to myself, it matters
not where we are, for we can be in no place where Jehovah is not there
likewise, whether it be on the waves of the ocean, or the mountain tops,
or in the valley and shadow of death.
The third day the wind came contrary, and in the fourth, and the fifth,
and the sixth, we were also sorely buffeted; but on the night of the
sixth we entered the mouth of the river Thames, and on the morning of the
seventh day of our departure, we cast anchor near a town called
Gravesend, where, to our exceeding great joy, it pleased Him, in whom
alone there is salvation, to allow us once more to put our foot on the
dry land.
When we had partaken of a repast, the first blessed with the blessing of
an appetite, from the day of our leaving our native land, we got two
vacancies in a stage-coach for my wife and daughter; but with Andrew
Pringle, my son, I was obligated to mount aloft on the outside. I had
some scruple of conscience about this, for I was afraid of my decorum. I
met, however, with nothing but the height of discretion from the other
outside passengers, although I jealoused that one of them was a light
woman. Really I had no notion that the English were so civilised; they
were so well bred, and the very duddiest of them spoke such a fine style
of language, that when I looked around on the country, I thought myself
in the land of Canaan. But it's extraordinary what a power of drink the
coachmen drink, stopping and going into every change-house, and yet
behaving themselves with the greatest sobriety. And then they are all so
well dressed, which is no doubt owing to the poor rates. I am thinking,
however, that for all they cry against them, the poor rates are but a
small evil, since they keep the poor folk in such food and raiment, and
out of the temptations to thievery; indeed, such a thing as a common
beggar is not to be seen in this land, excepting here and there a sorner
or a ne'er-do-weel.