e Province to any officer of the Proprietary.

On Sunday morning, the 2d of November, the city was thrown into a
state of violent ebullition--like a little red-hot tea-kettle--by the
circulation of a rumor that got wind about the hour the burghers were
preparing to go to church. It was brought from Patuxent late in the
previous night, and was now whispered from one neighbor to another, and
soon came to boil with an extraordinary volume of steam. Stripping it
of the exaggeration natural to such an excitement, the rumor was
substantially this: That Colonel Talbot, hearing of the arrival of
Captain Allen in the Patuxent on Thursday, and getting no message or
report from him, set off on Friday morning, in an angry state of mind,
and rode over to Patuxent, determined to give the unmannerly captain a
lesson upon his duty. That as soon as he reached Mattapony House,
he took his boat and went on board the ketch. That there he found
Christopher Rousby, the King's Collector, cronying with Captain Allen,
and upholding him in his disrespect to the government. That Colonel
Talbot was very sharp upon Rousby, not liking him for old grudges, and
more moved against him now; and that he spoke his mind both to Captain
Allen and Christopher Rousby, and so got into a high quarrel with them.
That when he had said all he desired to say to them, he made a move to
leave the ketch in his boat, intending to return to Mattapony House; but
they who were in the cabin prevented him, and would not let him go. That
thereupon the quarrel broke out afresh, and became more bitter; and it
being now in the night, and all in a great heat of passion, the parties
having already come from words to blows, Talbot drew his skean, or
dagger, and stabbed Rousby to the heart. That nothing was known on
shore of the affray till Saturday evening, when the body was brought to
Rousby's house; after which it became known to the neighborhood; and one
of the men of Major Sewall's plantation, which adjoined Rousby's, having
thus heard of it, set out and rode that night over to St. Mary's with
the news, which he gave to the Major before midnight. It was added, that
Colonel Talbot was now detained on board of the ketch, as a prisoner, by
Captain Allen.

This was the amount of the dreadful story over which the gossips of St.
Mary's were shaking their wise heads and discoursing on "crowner's quest
law" that Sunday morning.

As soon as Major Sewall received these unhappy midnigh