sent out by a Southern Emigrant Aid Society.  In this last mob I recognized only two that were citizens of Atchison or engaged in the former mob.  It is not reported that these emigrants from the Palmetto State seek out a claim, and make for themselves a home, neither do they enter into any legitimate business.  They very expressively describe themselves as having come out to see Kansas through. They yelled, “Kill him!  Kill him!  Hang the Abolitionist.”  One of their number bristled up to me and said, “Have you got a revolver?” I answered, “No.”  He handed me a pistol and said, “There, take that, and stand off ten steps; and I will blow you through in an instant.”  I replied, “I have no use for your weapon.”  I afterwards heard them congratulating themselves in reference to this, that they had acted in an honorable manner with me.  The fellow was furious; but his companions dissuaded him from shooting me, saying they were going to hang me.

They pinioned my arms behind my back, obtained a rope, but were interrupted by the entrance of a stranger—­a gentleman from Missouri, since ascertained to be Judge Tutt, a lawyer from St. Joseph.  He said:  “My friends, hear me.  I am an old man, and it is right you should hear me.  I was born in Virginia, and have lived many years in Missouri.  I am a slaveholder, and desire Kansas to be made a slave State, if it can be done by honorable means.  But you will destroy the cause you are seeking to build up.  You have taken this man, who was peaceably passing through your streets and along the public highway, and doing no person any harm.  We profess to be ‘Law and Order’ men, and ought to be the last to commit violence.  If this man has broken the law, let him be judged according to law; but for the sake of Missouri, for the sake of Kansas, for the sake of the pro-slavery cause, do not act in this way.”  They dragged me into another building, and appointed a moderator, and got up a kind of lynch law trial.  Kelley told his story.  I rose to my feet, and calmly and in respectful language began to tell mine; but I was jerked to my seat and so roughly handled that I was compelled to desist.  My friend from Missouri again earnestly besought them to set me at liberty.  Kelley turned short on him and said:  “Do you belong to Kansas?” Judge Tutt replied:  “No; but I expect to live here in Atchison next fall, and in this matter the interests of Kansas and Missouri are identical.”  Chester Lamb, a lawyer in Atchison, and Samuel Dickson, a merchant of the place, both pro slavery men, also united with Judge Tutt in pleading that I might be set at liberty.  While these gentlemen were speaking, I heard my keepers mutter, “If you don’t hush up, we will tar and feather you.”  But when Kelley saw how matters stood, he came forward and said he “did not take Butler to have him hung, but only tarred and feathered,” Yet in the saloon he had sad to the mob:  “You shall do as you please.” He dared not take the responsibility of taking my life, but when these unfortunate men, whose one-idea-ism on the subject of slavery and Southern rights has become insanity—­when these irresponsible South Carolinians, sent out to be bull dogs and blood hounds for Atchison and Stringfellow—­when they could be used as tools to take my life, he was ready to do it.