70 
JOURNAL OF THE PLYMOUTH INSTITUTION. 
the congregation" — one of the humours, I presume, of a press- 
gang — Kinsman seized the leader, and took him before the magis- 
trates. When Kinsman died he left the Tabernacle in trust for 
the purpose of perpetuating the gospel. The bequest was annulled 
by the Mortmain Act, and Kinsman's son became the owner. He 
was a very autocrat. The minister wished to get married. Kins- 
man preferred his celibacy. The minister got married. Kinsman 
padlocked the door of the Tabernacle, planted himself in a window 
opposite, armed with loaded pistols, and threatened to shoot any 
one who meddled with his property. So the congregation were 
ejected as well as their minister. For a while they met in the 
Baptist Chapel, which was placed at their service. At length 
Norley Chapel was built (then called the New Tabernacle), and 
opened December 8th, 1797. What became of the then Old 
Tabernacle for a few years I cannot say. There was a Mr. Cooper 
there in 1808, who formed his congregation into a Baptist church, 
and who was ejected by Kinsman in 1811. His congregation then 
divided, part going to the Moravian Chapel at the Old Mitre, and 
part to a currier's shop in Duck's Lane (Week Street), whence 
they moved, in 1812, to a chapel in Willow Street, built by the 
Universalists, first called the Philadelphian Church, but then the 
Befuge Chapel. 
The New Tabernacle, so far as I am aware, was the first dis- 
senting place of worship in the town in which an organ was 
placed. The instrument was built by a carpenter of Turnchapel 
named Bedstone, chiefly at the expense of Mr. Cater. Terrible 
was the discord which resulted. There was nothing that the old 
Baptists quarrelled about more fiercely than the propriety of 
singing hymns in public worship; and the organ has continued 
down to our own day to be the abomination of sundry Presby- 
terians, especially of the Free Kirkers. The organ in the New 
Tabernacle led to a division in the congregation, and in the end to 
the re-opening of the Old Tabernacle. The Friday before the 
organ was to be opened a letter was received, signed "David," 
announcing that Dagon had fallen before the ark, and that the 
writer had discovered the art of taking his guts out. On examina- 
tion it was found that all the pipes of one stop had been taken 
away, proving, as Harris, who records this incident, quaintly says, 
" that the thief was no musician." 
Wesleyan Methodism was established in a settled shape in Ply- 
