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| ARRIVAL FROM KENT COUNTY, IfD., 1858. 485 would be overcome and the proposition would be readily acceded to, if the water was not too cooj; on the other hand, if cool, a slight shudder might be visible, sufficient to fttise a hearty laugh. Yet) when through, the candidate always expressed a hearty sense of satisfaction, and was truly thankful for this attention. ARRIVAL FROM KENT COUNTY, MD., 1858. ASBURY IKWIN, EPHBAZM ESXIS, AND LYJHA ANN JOHNS. The party whose narratives are here given brought grave charges against a backsliding member of the Society of Friends—a renegade Quaker. Doubtless rare instances may be found where men of the Quaker persuasion, emigrating from free and settling in slave States and among slaveholders, have deserted their freedom-loving principle and led captive by the force of bad examples, have linked hands with the oppressor against the oppressed. It is probable, Low-ever, that this is the only case that may turn up in these records to the disgrace of this body of Christiana in whom dwelt in such a signal degree large sympathy for the slave aud the fleeing bondman. Many fugitives were indebted to Friends who aided them in a quiet way, not allowing tlieir left hand to know what their right hand did, and the result was that Underground Rail Road operations were always pretty safe and prosperous where the line of travel led through " Quaker settlements." We can speak with great confidence on this point especially with regard to Pennsylvania, where a goodly number might be named, if necessary, whose hearts, houses, horses, and money were always found ready and williug to assist the fugitive from the prison-house. It is with no little regret that we feel that truth requires us to connect the so-called owner of Asbury, Ephraim, and Lydia with the Quakers. ASBTJUY was first examined, and his story ran substantially thus: " I run away because I was used bad; three years ago I was knocked dead with an axe by my master; the blood run out of my head as if it had been poured out of a tumbler; you can see the mark plain enough—look here," (with his finger on the spot). I left Millington, at the head of Chester in Kent County, Maryland, where I had been held by a farmer who called himself Michael Xewbold. He was originally from Mount Holly, New Jersey, but had been living in Maryland over twenty years. He was called a Hickory Quaker, and he had a real Quaker for a wife. Before he was in Maryland five years he bought slaves, became a regular slave-holder, got to drinking and racing horses, and was very bad—treated all hands bad, his •wife too, so that she had to leave him and go to Philadelphia to her kinsfolks. It was because he was so bad we all had to leave," &c. |