XXX11 
LIFE OF 
have you been at all this trouble ? These were the follies of my 
youth, and I sincerely wish they had never seen the light. Had I 
taken the advice of our kind and excellent father, I should have 
done well, and saved myself many an uneasy hour.” 
After these unfortunate circumstances, we might easily judge, 
that the keen feelings of our author would not allow him to 
remain in Paisley, and might fancy him resuming for a time 
his travelling occupations. His thoughts, however, took a wider 
range. An honourable fear of ruining his friends actuated him. 
He could not trust to his own strength of mind, to refrain from 
those satires, for which he was now under bail ; and, after using 
every argument to convince his father and favourite sister, Mary, 
of the propriety of his intentions, he at last observed, “ I am 
bound now, and cannot ruin Thomas Witherspoon, (his security,) 
and I must get out my mind.” He imagined, also, that his mis- 
fortunes would continue ; and the ideal charms of a free land, and 
of liberty, drew his attention to a more distant country. His 
mind had become gradually, but firmly, reconciled to seek a new 
fortune in America. 
By a little exertion at the loom, and some kind assistance from 
other quarters, he was enabled to earn the funds necessary to 
defray the expenses of his intended voyage ; and, bidding a long 
farewell to his parents, and those companions who had so often 
assisted him to the extent of their means — to the scenes where 
he had wandered from his boyhood — where every bush and tree 
had its story — every crag or bold feature in the landscape its 
associations and recollections, to be felt only by those who have 
been placed in similar circumstances, — he set out on foot from the 
land of his birth, and arrived at Belfast, where he had accidentally 
heard that a vessel was nearly ready to sail. His nephew, 
William Duncan, a lad of sixteen, was his companion. He had 
shared his confidence, and agreed to share his fortunes ; and, on 
the morning of the 23d May, 1794, the young men set sail from 
Ireland ; and, after a dangerous passage of twenty-two days, 
they arrived in safety at Newcastle, in the state of Delaware. 
We now find Wilson in the land where he imagined all his 
wrongs would cease. “ He had often,” says Mr Ord, in his 
excellent Memoirs , “ cast a wistful look towards the western 
