This week, we complete the serialization of the tale of Bet Whitson, who was captured by corsairs from Salé and wound up enslaved in Morocco. In last week’s excerpt, Bet was in the process of trying to escape from the Moroccan Sultan. We pick up the story there.
(This post is a continuation of The Tale of Bet Whitson – Parts 1 & 2. If you haven’t done so already, it’s best to read those posts before continuing on here.)
Shortly after Bet received the response from the English ship captain, the Emperor resolved to march against Morocco.
Bet claimed to have been taken suddenly ill and so rendered unable to sustain the fatigue of traveling. The Emperor expressed great concern at her illness and took his leave with a regret and tenderness that almost overcame her.
On the day appointed, Bet pretended to be much better, and she obtained leave from her physician to visit the seashore again. She now took a last farewell of her children, the youngest of whom was only ten months old, and confessed that the feelings of a mother had nearly induced her to abandon her project. She, however, at last vanquished the yearnings of nature and mounted her palanquin.
On reaching the spot by the sea that the English captain had specified as a meeting point, Bet requested her attendants to halt and permit her to walk alone in an adjoining grove. Taking a box containing her jewels, she walked off.
Passing a knoll, she perceived a boat on the shore, and in an instant the seamen advanced with drawn cutlasses. Her attendants, however, had entertained some kind of suspicion, for they followed her and overtook her before she reached the boat. Being, however, unarmed, they could not effect a rescue. Yet the chief eunuch, with great resolution, darted forward and seized the box containing Bet’s jewels, which a seaman had taken to carry on board. The boat rowed off with great expedition, and the English ship was underway before the guns of the fort began to fire.
Aboard the English ship and viewing the shore, Bet was struck with remorse for her unnatural and ungrateful conduct. She burst into tears and begged the captain to set her ashore again. He laughed at the folly of her request. Then, hearing that her jewels, which he had expected would at once enrich him, were lost, he was gripped by an anger violent beyond conception. He held a pistol to the head of the man who had been entrusted with the jewelry box and threatened to blow up the ship and all the cowardly scoundrels on board.
Bet now retired to the cabin assigned her, where she bitterly lamented the rashness and wickedness of her conduct.
She attempted to appease the captain’s rage at the disappointment he had experienced by presenting him with her earrings and valuable bracelets, but still he growled, and more than once during the passage he threatened to throw her overboard.
On arriving at the Downs, the ship dropped anchor near a Scotch vessel bound for Leith, the master of which, on hearing Bet’s story, kindly offered her passage, and she left the avaricious and brutal captain with great satisfaction.
On landing at Leith, the kindhearted seaman gave her money to carry her home to Dunse. But in Edinburgh, she accidentally met her own brother. Being an abandoned character, instead of receiving into his arms the unfortunate wanderer, he poured upon her the most horrid oaths and cutting reproofs and threatened to deliver her up to justice for returning from transportation before the expiration of her allotted term. A crowd was soon collected. Amongst others, the captain of a West Indiaman came up who, being struck with her beauty, drew the brother aside, gave him some money to walk off, and then conducted Bet on board his ship, pretending that his only motive was to save her from a prison.
During the voyage to London, however, where he had to complete his cargo, she discovered his intentions and despised him both on account of his bad principles and his disagreeable person.
On reaching London, she contrived to escape from her doting but disgusting lover and took private lodgings, where she continued only a few days before her beauty and genteel figure attracted the attention of an opulent mercer, who took her into keeping, as it is termed. She next lived under the protection of an unfeeling, rascally nobleman, whom she was obliged to fly from.
After enduring much in the way of this sort of distress, she eventually became a common prostitute.
The privations, misery, and anxiety she experienced in this situation at last brought on a violent fever, which she, contrary to all appearances, recovered from. But her intellect was irrecoverably injured.
After this, she wandered, during the remainder of her long life about the borders of Scotland, where she selected certain gentlemen’s and opulent farmers’ houses, which she visited regularly. Her wondrous adventures and brilliant sallies of wit always made her a welcome guest, and when she was in the humor, she could render herself extremely useful in household affairs.
The house of Mr. Johnson of Halton Hall, and of Mr. Renton·of Blackadder were favorite places of resort. Her clothes evinced her love of dress, and they were generally such as she received from ladies. But she always wore a large, tartan mantle and a round beaver hat. She addressed persons of the first rank with ease and propriety and seldom failed to obtain a handsome present. When she had collected a tolerable sum, she usually sought out a party of Gypsies, with whom she squandered her money.
The last account which this writer heard of this singular character was when she rested a week , about thirty years ago, at the house of Mr. Henry Atkinson, a weaver, in Newcastle, on her return from visiting a gentleman in the south. She was then upwards of seventy-five years of age, yet the remains of beauty were still visible.
The story of her life was once published, but this writer has not been able to obtain a copy.
This extract of Bet Whitson’s story comes from A New, Improved, and Authentic Life of James Allan, the Celebrated Northumberland Piper, Detailing his Surprising Adventures in Various Parts of Europe, Asia, and Africa, Including a Complete Description of the Manners and Customs of the Gipsy Tribes, collected from sources of genuine authority (as the title page has it) by James Thompson, published in 1828, pp. 390-394.
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