the temptation for a needy slaveowner to divide families must be enormous; and if division of families was really forbidden by the moral sense of the public, it is pretty certain that the possibility of public sensibility being outraged by the unscrupulousness of any embarrassed slaveholder would be removed by a law interdicting divided sales. In no Slave State does any such law exist. As to the evidence of candid, intelligent, and high-minded slaveowners, it must be taken for what it is worth. Where evidence is conflicting one must judge by inherent probabilities. Let me give two particles of evidence on the subject which came under my own knowledge. A friend of mine, by no means an Abolitionist, resided for some time in the Slave States The subject of slavery was an unpleasant one, which he avoided; but on one occasion his host, a slaveowner, began to complain to him of the calumnies circulated against the South, and asserted that in the whole course of his experience he had never known an instance of a mother being separated from her children. My friend naturally enough believed the statement. On the very same day, however, it happened that some of the family began talking about a little negro boy of theirs who had been drowned a short time before, and describing how shocked they were when the poor child's corpse was carried up to the plantation. My friend asked whether the mother's grief was very terrible to witness? Oh," answered his informant, "the child's mother

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belongs to Mr., who lives at the other end of the State, so that we know nothing about her." The fact seemed difficult to reconcile with his host's assertion of the morning; and so, prudently enough, he did not ask for an explanation of the inconsistency in the two stories. The accuracy of this story I can answer for; and it is corroborated by an incident which happened to myself. One day, after the retreat of the Confederate army from Manassas, I fell in, near Alexandria, with a party of runaway slaves, working their way northwards. They asked our party about the road, and we put a few questions to them in return. One of them, the least helpless-looking of the lot, was a young worn woman carrying a child of some three years old. She was going to Washington, so she told us, to look after her husband, who, she believed, was in service there, though it was two years since she had been parted from him. Of course I shall be told this case was an exceptional one; I only hope it was; but, somehow or other, all cases of cruelty are always exceptional.

If breaches of the law or of public sensibility are exceptional, it can hardly be assumed that the laws themselves are exceptional. I have before me the Maryland code of slavery, which, till last April, was in force at Washington. If you want to know what slavery is by law, note the following specimens of slaveowners' justice: "No negro, or mulatto

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slave, or free negro, or mulatto born of a white 66 woman shall be admitted and received as good and valid evidence in law, in any matter or thing "whatsoever depending before any magistrate within "this province, wherein any white Christian person is "concerned."* This Act is not a dead letter. During the present session of Congress a bill was passed by the Senate, authorizing coloured persons to be employed as letter-carriers by the Government. The bill was thrown out by the House, upon the ground that, in a Slave State the evidence of a coloured man could not be received, and that, therefore, if a white post-office servant was to steal letters in a Slave State, it would be impossible to prove his guilt by the evidence of coloured letter-carriers.

Again, in order to suppress the assembling of slaves, it is ordained, that in case the constable shall find at any house within his district any slaves not belonging to the house, and not authorized by his master to be present, then "it shall and may be lawful for the said constable," and he is by this act required, to whip every such negro on the bare back, at his discretion, not exceeding thirtynine stripes. With the view of protecting the white man in execution of his duty, it is further ordained, that "if it shall so happen at any time that any negro, or "other slave, shall strike any white person, it shall and

* Maryland, Act 1717, c. xiii. § 2.

+ Ibid. 1719, c. ii. § 2.

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may be lawful, upon proof made thereof, either on the "oath of the party so struck, or otherwise, before any 'justice of the peace, for such justice to cause one of "the negro's or other slave's ears so offending to be cropt." ."* The penalties against any attempt to escape are equally severe: "Where any slave shall be guilty of rambling, riding, or going abroad in the night, or riding horses in the day-time without leave, or running

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away, it shall and may be lawful for the justices of "the county-court, and they are hereby obliged, upon the "application or complaint of the master or owner of "such slave, on his, her, or their order, or on the appli"cation or complaint of any other person, who shall be anyways damnified or injured by such slave, immediately such slave to punish, by whipping, cropping, or branding on the cheek with the letter "R," or "otherwise, not extending to life, or so as to render "such slave unfit for labour.+"

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It was found, however, that the justices did not always pay due regard to these last provisions, and that the owners of slaves were shy of subjecting themselves to the loss of their property, and that, therefore, many guilty slaves escaped punishment through their masters neglecting to commit them to justice. It was, therefore, enacted, that in case any slave should be condemned to

* Maryland, Act 1719, c. ii. § 4.

Ibid. 1751, c. xiv. § 2.

death, his value should be appraised by the court, and the amount due paid over at once to the owner, at the public expense.

These are some of the provisions of the so-called Black Code of Maryland, still in force in that State, and, till within a few months, in force at the Capitol. I am told that these provisions have fallen into disuse. Why, then, are they allowed to disgrace the statute book? And yet more, why did the Southerners in Congress always resist with success any attempt to modify the code on the part of the Anti-Slavery Party?

This legislation dates, undoubtedly, from Colonial days, when the whole of our English law was pervaded by a spirit of brutal ferocity. It was adopted, however, by the United States Government as the law for slaves in the District of Columbia, in 1801, and was never repealed till the abolition of slavery. The following, however, are somewhat later commentaries on its practical working, supplied by the legislation of the Washington municipality. By an act passed in 1827, for the better discipline of the coloured population, free blacks or mulattoes are prohibited from giving a party at their own house without permission, from gambling or being present at gambling, and from being at large without permission after ten o'clock at night, on penalty of being fined. All slaves found offending against these provisions "may be sentenced to receive any number of