prisoner the instant his foot touched the deck of the vessel, but the Captain and the officers behaved towards him with the greatest civility. He was a little shocked at first, but they made him so very welcome, treating him to the best of wine and brandy, that he soon lost the remembrance of his situation, and gave the Captain all the information he wanted, and it was of a nature to encourage him to proceed. He told him that the soldiers were dispersed throughout the Barony, without any commander, for the Captain and Lieutenant were both absent, as well as himself, and that he was sure it would be very easy to surprise my house, for I had no one near enough to help me but my own family. Upon the strength of this information, the Captain had the boats prepared for going ashore. He sent eighty men in three boats, commanded by two Lieutenants, who were both Irishmen, natives of the Barony.
A great portion of the crew were Irishmen, and amongst them was a man named Sullivan, whose life I had formerly been the means of saving, when he was proclaimed as a tory and a robber. He fled to France, and I had so much compassionate feeling for his wife, whom he had left behind with seven or eight children to maintain, that I allowed her to live rent-free on my farm, and fearing the family might perish with hunger, I returned to her a milch cow and ten or twelve sheep, which Sullivan had made over to me for rent due before he went away. This was the man who came to reward me for my kindness to him and his, by acting as a guide to the party. No one knew better than he the exact situation of my house, and every thing belonging to it.
They quitted the ship at midnight, landed before it was light, and commenced their march about daybreak, in perfect
