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[112] by telling him that if he would prove the Quakers like the Papists in one thing, by the help of God, he would prove him like them in ten. After a brief and sharp dispute, the priest, finding his adversary's wit too keen for his comfort, hastily took his leave. The next we hear of Roberts he is in Gloucester Castle, subjected to the brutal usage of a jailer, who took a malicious satisfaction in thrusting decent and respectable Dissenters, imprisoned for matters of conscience, among felons and thieves. A poor vagabond tinker was hired to play at night on his hautboy, and prevent their sleeping; but Roberts spoke to him in such a manner that the instrument fell from his hand; and he told the jailer that he would play no more, though he should hang him up at the door for it. How he was released from jail does not appear; but the narrative tells us that some time after an apparitor came to cite him to the Bishop's Court at Gloucester. When lie was brought before the Court, Bishop Nicholson, a kind-hearted and easy natured prelate, asked him the number of his children, and how many of them had been bishoped? ‘None, that I know of,’ said Roberts. ‘What reason,’ asked the Bishop, ‘do you give for this?’ ‘A very good one,’ said the Quaker: ‘most of my children were born in Oliver's days, when Bishops were out of fashion.’ The Bishop and the Court laughed at this sally, and proceeded to question him touching his views of baptism. Roberts admitted that John had a Divine commission to baptize with water, but that
Boston and New York, Houghton, Mifflin and company, 1888-89.
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