"My family in Accomac was harsh with the Methodists through a mistaken conservatism," Judge Custis said. "They are a good people; they seem to suit this peninsula like the peachtree."
A small funeral procession was turning into Barrett's chapel, and the Chancellor interrogated one of the more indifferent followers as to the dead person. Having mentioned the name, the citizen said:
"His death was mysterious. He was a Methodist and a good man, but it seems that avarice was gnawing his principles away. A slave boy, soon to become free by law, disappeared from his possession, and he gave it out that the boy had run away. But suddenly our neighbor began to drink and to display money, and they say he had the boy kidnapped. He died like one with an attack of despair."
As they turned again northward, in the genial afternoon, Judge Custis said:
"What a stigma on both sides, Chancellor, is this kidnapping!"
The old man meekly looked down and did not reply. Judge Custis, feeling that there was some sensitiveness on this and kindred subjects, yet why he could not recollect, continued, under the impulse of his feelings:
"The night before I left Princess Anne, Joe Johnson, one of your worst kidnappers, boldly came to my house for lodging. Why I let him stay there is a subject of wonder and contempt to myself. But there he was, perhaps when I came away."
"Not a prudent thing to permit," the old man groaned.
"I knew his wife was the widow of a gallows' bird, one Brereton—the name is Yankee. He was hanged for highway robbery."
A muffled sound escaped the sober old gentleman of Delaware.