xx                   Introduction.

              fulfilled & he give good Security for his good Usage of her the said Jane
              Jones During her time of service with him” (post p. 40).

          John Hough petitioned the Court for his freedom from Mark Cordea, and said
          that Cordea refused to set him free, although he had served his time. Cordea
          replied that Hough had run away for fifteen days, so that he owed ten times
          fifteen days, but the servant said that for want of food and for bad usage suf
          fered under Cordea's overseer, James Lewis, his life had been in danger.
          Cordea retorted that Hough had been absent twenty-one days instead of fif
          teen, and that he therefor owed two hundred and ten days. The Court found
          for Cordea, without any notice of the cruelty charges (post, p. 455). John
          Staples was judged to serve Christopher Rousby for seven years from the day he
          came into the Province "wch being expired Yesterday being the day on wch he
          came into this Province and on wch he ought to be set free”. Rousby tried to
          get the Court to rule that the time be measured from his appearance in Court
          but the justices agreed with Staples, provided that he prove exactly when the
          vessel arrived (post, p. 41).
            Yet not all masters were cruel, just as not all the servants were the offscour
          ing of English jails or bawdy houses, though of course many of them were.
          When Darby Dunevan (Spell it any way you like) came to make his will, in
          Saint Mary's County in 1683, he left to his friends or to their sons, personality
          or land. Then to Dennis Hurley, Pierce Wall or Walley and to Cornelius Dune-
          van the residue of his estate and the position of executor of it. Who Cornelius
          Dunevan had been is not known. The only thing certain about him is that he
          was a “servt unto him the said Darby”, who must have had a great deal of
          confidence in him. Cornelius forthwith petitioned the Court to discharge him
          from his aforesaid service, and the Court juged that “the Peticoner is a freeman
          he being named one of the Executors in the will aforesaid” (post, p. 454).

                       WENLOCK CHRISTISON, QUAKER


            Just when Wenlock Christison, Quaker, came into the Province is uncertain.
          Likewise uncertain is the spelling of his surname, and for lack of a signature
          it cannot be decided. He had left New England in 1665 for the Barbadoes:
          he is known to have been in Maryland as early as 1670. On August I, 1670,
          Dr. Peter Sharpe and his wife Judith, both Quakers, gave to “our well beloved
          brother Wenlock Christison a hundred and fifty acres of land on Fausley
          Creek, Talbot County, known by the name of Ending of Controversie, and the
          consideration was entirely non-material: it was “true affection and brotherly
          love”. It would be pleasant and natural to think, as many have done, that
          Christison himself named the land, and named it out of his own experience, as
          well he might have done. But the fact is that the land was already patented
          under that name in 1667 (Talbot County Rent Roll, p. 42). A few months
          later, in late March 1671, Henry Wilcocks conveyed to him a manservant. In
          the course of time, Christison acquired other land, either by gift or by pur
          chase, and many other servants. When he married or who his first wife
          was is uncertain. Dr. Peter Sharpe, in giving him the “Ending of Contro