ity, nor incompatible with the most consummate villainy. A
monster, in human shape, was detected in the city of Philadelphia,
pursuing the occupation of courting and marrying mulatto women, and
selling them as slaves. In his last attempt of this kind, the fact
having come to the knowledge of the African population of this city, a
mob was immediately collected, and he was only saved from being torn in
atoms, by being deposited in the city prison. They have lately invented
a method of attaining their objects, through the instrumentality of the
laws:--Having selected a suitable free coloured person, to make a
_pitch_ upon, the _conjuring_ kidnapper employs a confederate, to
ascertain the distinguishing marks of his body and then claims and
obtains him as a slave, before a magistrate, by describing those marks,
and proving the truth of his assertions, by his well-instructed
accomplice.

78. From the best information that I have had opportunities to collect,
in travelling by various routes through the states of Delaware and
Maryland, and from statements of an ingenuous trader exclusively, (as I
believe,) in lawful slaves, I am fully convinced that there are, at this
time, within the jurisdiction of the United States, several thousands of
legally free people of colour, toiling under the yoke of involuntary
servitude, and transmitting the same fate to their posterity! If the
probability of this fact could be authenticated to the recognition of
the congress of the United States, it is presumed that its members, as
agents of the constitution, and guardians of the public liberty, would,
without hesitation, devise means for the restoration of those unhappy
victims of violence and avarice, to their freedom and constitutional
personal rights. This is a work, both from its nature and magnitude,
impracticable to individuals or benevolent societies to accomplish;
besides, it is perfectly a national business, and claims national
interference, equally with the captivity of our sailors in Algiers. The
most successful, economical, politic, and just method of effecting this
object would, perhaps, be to institute a board of commissioners, with
authority to redeem every individual satisfactorily ascertained to be
legally free, at a fair appraisal of the common value of a similar
slave. Inquiries might be made in those districts where many coloured
persons are known to have been kidnapped, and all possessors of slaves
might be required to repo