Kidnapped

Kidnapped

KIDNAPPED

BEING

MEMOIRS OF THE ADVENTURES OF

DAVID BALFOUR

IN THE YEAR 1751

HOW HE WAS KIDNAPPED AND CAST AWAY; HIS SUFFERINGS IN

A DESERT ISLE; HIS JOURNEY IN THE WILD HIGHLANDS;

HIS ACQUAINTANCE WITH ALAN BRECK STEWART

AND OTHER NOTORIOUS HIGHLAND JACOBITES;

WITH ALL THAT HE SUFFERED AT THE

HANDS OF HIS UNCLE, EBENEZER

BALFOUR OF SHAWS, FALSELY

SO CALLED

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF AND NOW SET FORTH BY

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON

WITH A PREFACE BY MRS. STEVENSON

PREFACE TO THE BIOGRAPHICAL EDITION

While my husband and Mr. Henley were engaged in writing plays in Bournemouth they made a number of titles, hoping to use them in the future. Dramatic composition was not what my husband preferred, but the torrent of Mr. Henley’s enthusiasm swept him off his feet. However, after several plays had been finished, and his health seriously impaired by his endeavours to keep up with Mr. Henley, play writing was abandoned forever, and my husband returned to his legitimate vocation. Having added one of the titles, The Hanging Judge, to the list of projected plays, now thrown aside, and emboldened by my husband’s offer to give me any help needed, I concluded to try and write it myself.

As I wanted a trial scene in the Old Bailey, I chose the period of 1700 for my purpose; but being shamefully ignorant of my subject, and my husband confessing to little more knowledge than I possessed, a London bookseller was commissioned to send us everything he could procure bearing on Old Bailey trials. A great package came in response to our order, and very soon we were both absorbed, not so much in the trials as in following the brilliant career of a Mr. Garrow, who appeared as counsel in many of the cases. We sent for more books, and yet more, still intent on Mr. Garrow, whose subtle cross-examination of witnesses and masterly, if sometimes startling, methods of arriving at the truth seemed more thrilling to us than any novel.

Occasionally other trials than those of the Old Bailey would be included in the package of books we received from London; among these my husband found and read with avidity:--

THE

TRIAL

OF

JAMES STEWART

in Aucharn in Duror of Appin

FOR THE

Murder of COLIN CAMPBELL of Glenure, Efq;

Factor for His Majefty on the forfeited

Estate of Ardfhiel.

My husband was always interested in this period of his country’s

history, and had already the intention of writing a story that should

turn on the Appin murder. The tale was to be of a boy, David Balfour,

supposed to belong to my husband’s own family, who should travel in

Scotland as though it were a foreign country, meeting with various

adventures and misadventures by the way. From the trial of James Stewart

my husband gleaned much valuable material for his novel, the most

important being the character of Alan Breck. Aside from having described

him as “smallish in stature,” my husband seems to have taken Alan

Breck’s personal appearance, even to his clothing, from the book.

A letter from James Stewart to Mr. John Macfarlane, introduced as evidence in the trial, says: “There is one Alan Stewart, a distant friend of the late Ardshiel’s, who is in the French service, and came over in March last, as he said to some, in order to settle at home; to others, that he was to go soon back; and was, as I hear, the day that the murder was committed, seen not far from the place where it happened, and is not now to be seen; by which it is believed he was the actor. He is a desperate foolish fellow; and if he is guilty, came to the country for that very purpose. He is a tall, pock-pitted lad, very black hair, and wore a blue coat and metal buttons, an old red vest, and breeches of the same colour.” A second witness testified to having seen him wearing “a blue coat with silver buttons, a red waistcoat, black shag breeches, tartan hose, and a feathered hat, with a big coat, dun coloured,” a costume referred to by one of the counsel as “French cloathes which were remarkable.”

CHAPTER I

I will begin the story of my adventures with a certain morning early in

the month of June, the year of grace 1751, when I took the key for the last time out of the door of my father’s house. The sun began to shine upon the summit of the hills as I went down the road; and by the time

I had come as far as the manse, the blackbirds were whistling in the

garden lilacs, and the mist that hung around the valley in the time of the dawn was beginning to arise and die away.

Mr. Campbell, the minister of Essendean, was waiting for me by the

garden gate, good man! He asked me if I had breakfasted; and hearing

that I lacked for nothing, he took my hand in both of his and clapped it

kindly under his arm.

“Well, Davie, lad,” said he, “I will go with you as far as the ford, to set you on the way.” And we began to walk forward in silence.

“Are ye sorry to leave Essendean?” said he, after awhile.

“Why, sir,” said I, “if I knew where I was going, or what was likely

to become of me, I would tell you candidly. Essendean is a good place

indeed, and I have been very happy there; but then I have never been

anywhere else. My father and mother, since they are both dead, I shall

be no nearer to in Essendean than in the Kingdom of Hungary, and, to

speak truth, if I thought I had a chance to better myself where I was

going I would go with a good will.”

“Ay?” said Mr. Campbell. “Very well, Davie. Then it behoves me to tell your fortune; or so far as I may. When your mother was gone, and your father (the worthy, Christian man) began to sicken for his end, he gave me in charge a certain letter, which he said was your inheritance. ‘So soon,’ says he, ‘as I am gone, and the house is redd up and the gear disposed of’ (all which, Davie, hath been done), ‘give my boy this letter into his hand, and start him off to the house of Shaws, not far from Cramond. That is the place I came from,’ he said, ‘and it’s where it befits that my boy should return. He is a steady lad,’ your father said, ‘and a canny goer; and I doubt not he will come safe, and be well liked where he goes.’”

“The house of Shaws!” I cried. “What had my poor father to do with the house of Shaws?”

“Nay,” said Mr. Campbell, “who can tell that for a surety? But the name of that family, Davie, boy, is the name you bear--Balfours of Shaws: an ancient, honest, reputable house, peradventure in these latter days decayed. Your father, too, was a man of learning as befitted his position; no man more plausibly conducted school; nor had he the manner or the speech of a common dominie; but (as ye will yourself remember)

I took aye a pleasure to have him to the manse to meet the gentry; and

those of my own house, Campbell of Kilrennet, Campbell of Dunswire,

Campbell of Minch, and others, all well-kenned gentlemen, had pleasure

in his society. Lastly, to put all the elements of this affair before

you, here is the testamentary letter itself, superscrived by the own

hand of our departed brother.”

He gave me the letter, which was addressed in these words: “To the hands of Ebenezer Balfour, Esquire, of Shaws, in his house of Shaws, these will be delivered by my son, David Balfour.” My heart was beating hard at this great prospect now suddenly opening before a lad of seventeen years of age, the son of a poor country dominie in the Forest of Ettrick.

“Mr. Campbell,” I stammered, “and if you were in my shoes, would you go?”