Part 15

The claimant felt perfectly sure of his prey, and made no objection to the proposed arrangement. It was accordingly entered on the docket that Thomas Harrison and Isaac T. Hopper were bound to the United States, in the sum of one thousand dollars, to produce the woman for further trial at nine o'clock the next morning.

When Friend Hopper had obtained a copy of the recognizance, signed by the magistrate, he chuckled inwardly and marched out of the office. If there was a flaw in anything, Thomas Harrison had a jocose way of saying, "There is a hole in the ballad." As they went into the street together, his friend said, "Thomas, there's a hole in the ballad. The recognizance we have just signed is good for nothing. The United States have not the slightest claim upon that woman."

The next morning, at nine o'clock all parties, except the woman, were at the mayor's office. After waiting for her about an hour, the magistrate said, "Well gentlemen, the woman does not make her appearance, and I shall be obliged to forfeit your recognizance."

"A thousand dollars is a large sum to lose," rejoined Friend Hopper. "But if it comes to the worst, I suppose we must make up our minds to pay the United States all the claim they have upon us."

"The United States! The United States!" exclaimed the magistrate quickly. He turned to look at his docket, and after a slight pause he said to the claimant, "There is difficulty here. You had better employ counsel."

Thomas Ross, a respectable lawyer, who lived a few doors above, was summoned, and soon made his appearance. Having heard the particulars of the case briefly stated, he also examined the docket; then turning to Isaac T. Hopper, with a comical gesture and tone, he exclaimed, "Eh!" To the claimant he said, "You must catch your slave again if you can; for you can do nothing with these securities."

Of course, the master was very angry, and so was the magistrate, who had inadvertently written the recognizance just as it was dictated to him. They charged Friend Hopper with playing a trick upon them, and threatened to prosecute him. He told them he had no fears concerning a prosecution; and if he had played a trick, he thought it was better than to see a helpless woman torn from husband and children and sent into slavery.

The magistrate asked, "How could you say you believed the woman had a right to her freedom? You have brought forward no evidence whatever to prove your assertion."

He replied, "I did not say I believed she had a legal right to her freedom. That she had a just right to it, I did believe; for I think every human being has a just claim to freedom, unless guilty of some crime. The system of slavery is founded on the grossest and most manifest injustice."

"It is sanctioned by the law of the land," answered the claimant; "and you have no right to fly in the face of the laws."

Friend Hopper contented himself with saying, "If I have broken any law, I stand ready to meet the consequences. But no law can make wrong right."

The speculator spent several days in fruitless search after the fugitive. When he had relinquished all hopes of finding her, he called on Isaac T. Hopper and offered to manumit her for four hundred dollars. He replied, "At one time, we would gladly have given that sum; but now the circumstances of the case are greatly changed, and we cannot consent to give half that amount." After considerable controversy he finally agreed to take one hundred and fifty dollars. The money was paid, and the deed of manumission made out in due form. At parting, the claimant said, with a very bitter smile, "I hope I may live to see you south of the Potomac some day."

Friend Hopper replied, "Thou hadst better go home and repent of sins already committed, instead of meditating the commission of more."

When telling this story in after years, he was wont to say, "I am aware that some will disapprove of the part I acted in that case; because they will regard it as inconsistent with the candor which men ought always to practice toward each other. I can only say that my own conscience has never condemned me for it. I could devise no other means to save the poor victim."

Before we decide to blame Friend Hopper more than he blamed himself in this matter, it would be well to imagine how we ourselves should have felt, if we had been witnesses of the painful scene, instead of reading it in cool blood, after a lapse of years. If a handsome and modest woman stood before us with her weeping little ones, asking permission to lead a quiet and virtuous life, and a pitiless law was about to tear her from husband and children and consign her to the licentious tyrant from whom she had escaped, should we not be strongly tempted to evade such a law by any means that offered at the moment?

It would be wiser to expend our moral indignation on statesmen who sanction and sustain laws so wicked, that just and kind-hearted citizens are compelled either to elude them, or to violate their own honest convictions and the best emotions of their hearts.

THE TENDER MERCIES OF A SLAVEHOLDER.

In the year of 1808 a Southerner arrested a fugitive slave in Philadelphia and committed him to prison. When he called for him, with authority to take him back to the South, the poor fellow seemed dreadfully distressed. He told the keeper that his master was very severe, and he knew that terrible sufferings awaited him if he was again placed in his power. He hesitated long before he followed the keeper to the iron gate, through which he was to pass out of prison. When he saw his oppressor standing there with fetters in his hand, ready to take him away, he stopped and pleaded in the most piteous tones for permission to find a purchaser in Philadelphia. His owner took not the slightest notice of these humble entreaties, but in a peremptory manner ordered him to come out. The slave trembled all over, and said in the fainting accents of despair, "Master, I can't go with you!"

"Come out, you black rascal!" exclaimed the inexorable tyrant. "Come out immediately!"

The poor wretch advanced timidly a few steps, then turned back suddenly, as if overcome with mortal fear. The master became very impatient, and in angry vociferous tones commanded the keeper to bring him out by force.

All this time, the keeper had stood with his hand on the key of the iron door, very reluctant to open it. But at last he unlocked it, and told the poor terrified creature that he must go. He rushed to the door in the frenzy of desperation, gazed in his master's face for an instant, then flew back, took a sharp knife, which he had concealed about him, and drew it across his throat with such force, that he fell senseless near his master's feet, spattering his garments with blood. All those who witnessed this awful scene, supposed the man was dead. Dr. Church, physician of the prison, examined the wound, and said there was scarcely a possibility that he could survive, though the wind-pipe was not entirely separated. But even the terrible admonition of that ghastly spectacle produced no relenting feelings in the hard heart of the slaveholder. He still demanded to have his victim delivered up to him. When the keeper declined doing it, and urged the reason that the physician said he could not be moved without imminent danger to his life, the brutal tyrant exclaimed, "Damn him! He's my property; and I will have him, dead or alive. If he dies, it's nobody's loss but mine."

As he had the mayor's warrant for taking him, the keeper dared not incur the responsibility of disobeying his requisitions. He convened the inspectors for consultation; and they all agreed that any attempt to remove the wounded man would render them accessory to his death. They laid the case before the mayor, who ordered that the prisoner should remain undisturbed till the physician pronounced him out of danger. When the master was informed of this, he swore that nobody had any right to interfere between him and his property. He cursed the mayor, threatened to prosecute the keeper, and was in a furious rage with every body.

Meanwhile, the sympathy of Isaac T. Hopper was strongly excited in the case, and he obtained a promise from the physician that he would let him know if there was any chance that the slave would recover. Contrary to all expectation, he lingered along day after day; and in about a week, the humane physician signified to Friend Hopper, and Joseph Price, one of the inspectors, that a favorable result might now be anticipated. Of course, none of them considered it a duty to inform the master of their hopes. They undertook to negotiate for the purchase of the prisoner, and obtained him for a moderate price. The owner was fully impressed with the belief that he would die before long, and therefore regarded the purchase of him as a mere freak of humanity, by which he was willing enough to profit. When he heard soon afterward that the doctor pronounced him out of danger, he was greatly enraged. But his suffering victim was beyond the reach of his fury, which vented itself in harmless execrations.

The colored man lived many years, to enjoy the liberty for which he had been willing to sacrifice his life. He was a sober, honest, simple-hearted person, and always conducted in a manner entirely satisfactory to those who had befriended him in his hour of utmost need.

THE FOREIGN SLAVE.

Early in the year of 1808, a Frenchman arrived in Philadelphia from one of the West India Islands, bringing with him a slave, whom he took before one of the aldermen, and had him bound to serve him seven years in Virginia. When the indenture was executed, he committed his bondman to prison, for safe-keeping, until he was ready to leave the city. One of the keepers informed Isaac T. Hopper of the circumstance, and told him the slave was to be carried South the next morning.

Congress had passed an Act prohibiting the importation of slaves, which was to begin to take effect at the commencement of the year 1808. It immediately occurred to Friend Hopper that the present case came within the act; and if so, the colored man was of course legally entitled to freedom. In order to detain him till he could examine the law, and take advice on the subject, he procured a warrant for debt and lodged it at the prison, telling the keeper not to let the colored man go till he had paid his demand of a hundred dollars.

When the Frenchman called for his slave next morning, they refused to discharge him; and he obtained a writ of habeas corpus, to bring the case before the mayor's court. Friend Hopper was informed that the slave was on trial, that the Recorder did not think it necessary to notify him, and had made very severe remarks concerning the fictitious debt assumed for the occasion. He proceeded directly to the court, which was thronged with people, who watched him with lively curiosity, and made a lane for him to pass through. Mahlon Dickinson, the Recorder, was in the act of giving his decision on the case, and he closed his remarks by saying, "The conduct of Mr. Hopper has been highly reprehensible. The man is not his debtor; and the pretence that he was so could have been made for no other reason but to cause unnecessary delay, vexation, and expense." The lawyers smiled at each other, and seemed not a little pleased at hearing him so roughly rebuked; for many of them had been more or less annoyed by his skill and ready wit in tangling their skein, in cases where questions of freedom were involved. Friend Hopper stood before the Recorder, looking him steadfastly in the face, while he was making animadversions on his conduct; and when he had finished, he respectfully asked leave to address the court for a few minutes.