This accusation appeared to me so preposterous, that in spite of my indignation (for my fears had now subsided), I burst into a laugh; which only made them rail at me more furiously than I can express. "Hear him!" said they; "he laughs! He thinks, because he is a rich man, he can shoot any poor man he pleases, and buy himself off. But we will show him there's law in Jersey for aristocrats as well as poor men, and that we can hang a purse-proud man as soon as a beggar." And so they went on reviling me as if I had been the greatest criminal in the land, and dragging me, as they said, to a squire, who would soon show me what law was. I tried to reason with them, but it was all in vain; I then fell into a passion, and cursed and swore at them in a way which I am certain I never did before at any human being; having always had, while Sheppard Lee, a great horror of profanity; but this was just as fruitless an expedient as the other. They dragged me on until we reached the village, where we found all in a hubbub, men, women, and children running about as if mad, and exclaiming that "Squire Higginson had murdered Sheppard Lee, and hid the body in the Owl-roost Swamp." As soon as they saw me they set up a shout, and some low fellows among them raged in such a degree that I thought they would have massacred me in the street. They crowded round me, hustled me, seized me by the collar, shook their fists in my face, and, in general, testified such a vindictive concern for the murder of poor Sheppard Lee, as they called him, that I might have supposed there was never a man more widely beloved than myself, had I not known otherwise--or, rather, had I not been too closely occupied to suppose any thing about it.