Sentence:  One saint's day in mid-term a certain newly appointed suffragan-bishop came to the school chapel, and there preached on “The Inner Life.”  He at once secured attention by his informal <WSD>method</WSD>, and when presently the coughing of Jarvis ... interrupted the sermon, he altogether captivated his audience with a remark about cough lozenges being cheap and easily procurable. 
Meaning of the word marked with <WSD> tags:  A process by which a task is completed; a way of doing something (followed by the adposition of, to or for before the purpose of the process):