(For the benefit of a younger generation of readers, I will state that patrolers were organized bands of white men, appointed in each neighborhood, for the purpose of going about at night and keeping order among a doubtful element of colored people who left home without passes, or written permission from their owners. The unfortunate condition of affairs demanded it, and still more unfortunate was it, that the appointment, or office, too often fell into cruel and inhuman hands.) There lived at Port Royal, a fine looking colored man by the name of Dean Dancy, the property of the late John A. Dancy. It so happened that Dean was masquerading this particular Saturday night without a pass, and unluckily fell into the hands of the patrolers. Knowing they would deal roughly with him under such circumstances, he compromised the matter by telling them, if they’d let him off just this one time, he’d pilot them to a negro meeting, where they could find a housefull of people without passes, and this was why Uncle Horace’s meeting was so disturbed. Monday morning Mr. Fort ordered his saddle horse brought out unusually early; he rode over to Port Royal and informed Mr. Dancy of what his boy Dean had done, and the trickster had to make some pretty fair promises to escape punishment. On the same night that Dean Dancy led the patrolers to molest the quiet worshipers on Mr. Fort’s plantation, an amusing scene was enacted in a dry goods store at Port Royal. It was during the late fall, and several of the village clerks had put up a notice that they would pay liberally for a fat, well cooked o’possum, delivered at Dancy and Kirby’s store. Joe Gaines, a tall brown skinned man belonging to W. N. Gaines, gleaned the persimmon trees round about the Gaines premises, and failing to find an o’possum, conceived the idea of substituting a fat house-cat. After it was nicely cooked, he stepped out by the light of the moon, with his pass in his pocket, and hope in his heart of bringing back a silver dollar. The clerks from the other business houses assembled at Dancy and Kirby’s, where a spread was set for eight o’possum eaters. Dr. J. T. Darden a young physician from Turnersville, had a short time before located at Port Royal, and was invited to the feast. When the dish containing the supposed delectable marsupial was uncovered, it was observed that the young physician began to view it with a suspicious eye. He called Mr. T. M. Kirby to one side and told him the carcass was not that of an o’possum and they must not eat it. Upon closer examination it was very plain that it was a cat. Without a word, Mr. Dancy walked to the front door and turned the key, locking them in; a pistol was placed on the table, and Joe was informed that he must devour that cat, or suffer the consequences. It required the effort of his life, but he choked it down. If Dean and Joe ever had good intentions, Satan certainly run rough shod over them all that Saturday night.