Cannon lives dar, too. She's
afraid to stay in Delawaw now."

"Why, what is the occupation of those terrible people at present?" asked
Mrs. Custis.

No answer was made for a minute, and then Dave said, in a low,
frightened voice, as he stole a glance at both of his companions out of
his fiery, scarred eyes:

"Kidnappin', I 'spect."

"It's everything that makes Pangymonum," Jimmy Phoebus explained;
"that old woman, Patty Cannon, has spent the whole of a wicked life, by
smoke!--or ever sence she came to Delaware from Cannady, as the bride of
pore Alonzo Cannon--a-makin' robbers an' bloodhounds out of the young
men she could git hold of. Some of' em she sets to robbin' the mails,
some to makin' an' passin' of counterfeit money, but most of 'em she
sets at stealin' free niggers outen the State of Delaware; and, when
it's safe, they steal slaves too. She fust made a tool of Ebenezer
Johnson, the pirate of Broad Creek, an' he died in his tracks a-fightin
fur her. Then she took hold of his sons, Joe Johnson an' young Ebenezer,
an' made 'em both outlaws an' kidnappers, an' Joe she married to her
daughter, when Bruington, her first son-in-law, had been hanged. When
Samson Hat, who is the whitest nigger I ever found, knocked Joe Johnson
down in Princess Anne, the night before last, he struck the worst man in
our peninsula."

Dave listened to this recital with such a deep interest that his breath,
strong with apple whiskey, came short and hot, and his hands trembled as
he guided the horses. At the last words, he exclaimed:

"Samson knocked Joe Johnson down? Den de debbil has got him, and means
to pay him back!"

"What's that?" cried Jimmy Phoebus.

The sweat stood on the big slave's forehead, as if his imagination was
terribly possessed, but before he could explain Mrs. Custis interrupted:

"I think it was said that old Patty Cannon corrupted Jake Purnell, who
cut his throat at Snow Hill five years ago. He was a free negro who
engaged slaves to steal other slaves and bring them to him, and he
delivered them up to the white kidnappers for money; and nobody could
account for his prosperity till a negro who had been beaten to death was
found in the Pocomoke River, and three slaves who had been seen in his
company were arrested for the murder. They confessed that they had
stolen the dead negro and he had escaped from them, and was so beaten
with clubs, to make him tractable, that when they gave him to Purnell
his life was