On a memorable occasion, the Annual Meeting of the Anti-Slavery Society in New York, at which John G. Whittier and WIlliam Lloyd Garrison were present, was broken up by rowdies. Some of the speakers, as they left the hall, were roughly handled by the crowd. Perceiving this, Lucretia Mott asked the gentleman who was escorting her, to leave her and help some of the other ladies who were timid.
"But who will take care of you?" asked he.
"This man," she answered, quietly laying her hand on the arm of one of the roughest of the mob. "He will see me safe through."
Though taken aback for the moment by such unexpected confidence, the man responded by conducting her respectfully through the tumult to a place of safety.
The next day she went into a restaurant near the place of meeting, and, recognizing the leader of the mob at one of the tables, sat down by him, and entered into conversation with him. When he left the room, he asked a gentleman at the door who that lady was, and on hearing her name, remarked, "Well, she's a good, sensible woman."