ly favour that can be done to me on this occasion" by his
correspondent.[11]

On October 29, 1787, John Rapalje, a Royalist, sent from Brookligne
(Brookland or Brooklyn Ferry) to George Leonard by desire of his (R's)
father a Negro woman named Eve about 35 years and her child named Suke
about 15 to sell as he himself cannot go to Nova Scotia. Eve was one
of the best servants "perfectly sober, honest" and the only fault she
had was her near sight.

The records show occasional manumission also. In 1784 the inventory of
the estate of John Porter late of Cornwallis, a Negro man is valued at
L80. That same year Charles Montague of Halifax says: "I have only one
Negro, named Francis; he is to have his freedom." In May 1787,
Margaret Murray, widow of Halifax by her will manumitted her two
Negro women Marianne and Flora; and (when he was 21) her Negro boy
Brutus. From the records of a trial at Shelburne, in a magistrate's
court in 1788 it appears that one Jesse Gray of Argyle had sold a
Negro woman for 100 bushels of potatoes. At a trial the ownership by
Gray was proved and the sale confirmed.

We now come to the times of a Chief Justice whose heart was set on
destroying slavery in the province of Nova Scotia, therein wholly
differing from the Chief Justice of New Brunswick, George Duncan
Ludlow, who had received his appointment on the separation of that
province in 1784. The forward-looking jurist was Thomas Andrew Strange
who became Chief Justice of the Supreme Court in 1791.[12] The same
impulse for liberty which about this time was noted in the upper
country manifested itself from time to time by the sea. Slaves ran
away from their masters; the masters pursued and imprisoned them. Some
blacks claimed freedom without fleeing. When a writ of habeas corpus
came up in the Supreme Court, Chief Justice Strange did his best to
avoid giving a decision. He knew that slavery was lawful but he knew
it was detestable and he pursued a course which did not require him to
stultify himself but which would nevertheless confer substantial
benefits upon the black claiming liberty.

He endeavored in every case to bring the parties to an agreement to
sign articles whereby the master would have the services of the Negro
for a stated time, after the expiration of which the Negro received
his freedom. When the master refused this, as sometimes there was a
refusal, the Chief Justice required the matter to be tried by a jury,
which usually foun