Unable to extricate himself, he endured the insults of malice and ignorance for five months, till the money which he had borrowed had been deducted from his stipend, and then D—— immediately discharged him. It would be no easy task to describe what he must have felt at this moment: he was not possessed of five shillings in the world, was in a strange country, and had no means, now that he was shut out from the theatre, of obtaining a livelihood. He saw nothing but misery and famine before him, and he uttered the bitterest exclamations against Macklin for the perfidiousness of his conduct. This he felt so strongly, that though Macklin by the severity of his manner had gained an almost entire ascendancy over him, he went to his house, and with the utmost firmness, after observing that he would rather starve than incur any further obligations to him, displayed the impropriety and injustice of his conduct in such animated terms, that all his wonted sternness fled, and the cynic stood abashed before the boy. There was another theatre open in Smock-Alley, under the direction of Mossop: but he was insolvent, and none of his people were paid. Here, however, as a last resource, Holcroft applied, and was engaged at the same nominal salary that he had in Capel-Street. It soon appeared that there was no probability of his being paid for his performance at Mossop’s theatre: he was therefore forced to quit Dublin, and went on board the Packet for Parkgate, in March, 1771. The wind was fair till they had lost sight of the hill of Hoath; but soon after sun-set, a hurricane came on, which in this narrow and rocky sea, put their lives in imminent danger. Of this, however, from the violent effects of the sea-sickness, Holcroft was insensible. They were driven during the storm, considerably to the north; and such was the ignorance of the master and his two or three superannuated mariners, that he still continued sailing to the northward, having no knowledge of navigation, but what he had gained by coasting between the two kingdoms. He was therefore on the present occasion quite at a loss; so that in all probability they might have made a voyage to Greenland, had not an intelligent Scotchman among the passengers known some of the headlands in his own country. The master would have contested the point, but that the passengers perceived his want of skill, and joined the North-Briton, who with a degree of warmth expressive of his attachment to his bleak hills, exclaimed, ‘What the de’el, mon, d’ye think I dinna ken the craig of Ailsa?’