From his home in the country Penn began to make short trips through Kent and Sussex and Surrey, preaching the Quaker doctrines, a free lance who served without pay and purely because he loved the work. Occasionally he took his wife with him on his travels. They went together to Bristol to welcome the Quaker leader George Fox on his return from America, and hear from him what progress the new faith was making in the strange new country across the Atlantic Ocean. By this time the Quakers had gained so many converts that the other sects were beginning to be afraid of them, and continually challenged them to more and more of those strange public debates in which the speakers did not hesitate to call their opponents harsh names. It was said of Penn that "he never turned his back in the day of battle," and he apparently threw himself into these arguments with the same ardor his ancestors had shown in warfare. Besides taking up the cudgel in defense of the new creed, he wrote many pamphlets and letters to people who disapproved of the Quakers. In this way he kept himself very busy during the two years he lived at his charming country home. Charles II.'s Declaration of Indulgence proved so unpopular with the Parliament that the king had soon to withdraw it, and then the old opposition to all rivals of the Church of England broke out more violently than ever. George Fox was arrested and kept in prison for a year. The king offered to give him a pardon, but the Quakers were unwilling to accept pardons, as that would imply that they had really done something that was wrong. But Fox was ill, and Penn and some others went to court and tried to secure the favor of the Duke of York in behalf of Fox. The duke was very friendly to Penn, as he had been to Penn's father, but he did nothing to free Fox. However, the Quakers soon afterward secured the release of their leader by an appeal to the law courts. Then a man named Richard Baxter happened to go to Rickmansworth and found the place "abounding with Quakers," as he put it, "because Mr. W. Penn, their captain, dwelleth there." Baxter wanted to redeem these people from their errors and challenged Penn to an argument. They debated from ten in the morning until five in the afternoon, before a great crowd, and at the end of that time all present held to their original views, although each debater claimed the victory. Penn enjoyed this argument immensely, for he told Baxter he would like to give him a room in his house, so "that I could visit and get discourse with thee in much tender love." But Baxter did not accept that invitation, and soon afterward Mrs. Penn inherited a house and estate at Worminghurst, in Sussex, so she and her husband moved their home to that place. A little later Penn, with George Fox and other Quakers, set out on a missionary visit to Holland and Germany. CHAPTER VII PENN IN POLITICS