Having baptized the old Quaker, and unnecessarily repudiated the stupid charge of being mad, because he had sung with uncovered head in the streets of Bristol, he set out for Cheltenham, accompanied by about a dozen of his friends. Until recently, Cheltenham had been a poor, straggling hamlet of a few thatched cottages, sheltered by the Cotswold Hills. The first Spa was discovered in 1716, and since then, during a period of twenty years, the insignificant village had been full of bustle, for its site was in the process of being transformed into the squares, crescents, terraces, and promenades of the fashionable Cheltenham of the present day. As Whitefield and his friends passed along, the rustic inhabitants, at the doors of their humble cottages, stood and stared. Whitefield applied for the use of the parish church. His application was refused; and therefore he preached, he says, "to near two thousand people,"[190] on the Plough Inn bowling-green. He adds, "Many were convicted. One woman wept greatly, because she had said I was crazy; and some were so filled with the Holy Ghost, that they were almost unable to support themselves under it." [190] This may seem incredible, after what has just been said of Cheltenham; but it must be borne in mind that Whitefield was now preaching according to a previous appointment, and that his congregation consisted of many others than the inhabitants of the prosperous village. The following is taken from the _Gloucester Journal_: "1738, April 24. Last Tuesday (having first baptized an aged Quaker), Mr. Whitefield set out _by appointment_ for Cheltenham and Evesham." From Cheltenham, Whitefield proceeded to Evesham, in the neighbourhood of which he spent three days among the relatives of his friend William Seward. He shall relate his own story.