r, seeing
the freedom and the happiness of servants in this country, and considering
what would be their own hard fate on their return to the islands,
frequently absconded. Their masters of course made search after them, and
often had them seized and carried away by force. It was, however, thrown
out by many on these occasions, that the English laws did not sanction such
proceedings, for that all persons who were baptized became free. The
consequence of this was, that most of the slaves, who came over with their
masters, prevailed upon some pious clergyman to baptize them. They took of
course godfathers of such citizens as had the generosity to espouse their
cause. When they were seized they usually sent to these, if they had an
opportunity, for their protection. And in the result, their godfathers,
maintaining that they had been baptized, and that they were free on this
account as well as by the general tenour of the laws of England, dared
those, who had taken possession of them, to send them out of the kingdom.

The planters, merchants, and others, being thus circumstanced, knew not
what to do. They were afraid of taking their slaves away by force, and they
were equally afraid of bringing any of the cases before a public court. In
this dilemma, in 1729 they applied to York and Talbot, the attorney and
solicitor-general for the time being, and obtained the following strange
opinion from them:--"We are of opinion, that a slave by coming from the
West Indies into Great Britain or Ireland, either with or without his
master, does not become free, and that his master's right and property in
him is not thereby determined or varied, and that baptism doth not bestow
freedom on him, nor make any alteration in his temporal condition in these
kingdoms. We are also of opinion, that the master may legally compel him to
return again to the plantations."

This cruel and illegal opinion was delivered in the year 1729. The
planters, merchants, and others, gave it of course all the publicity in
their power. And the consequences were as might easily have been
apprehended. In a little time slaves absconding were advertised in the
London papers as runaways, and rewards offered for the apprehension of
them, in the same brutal manner as we find them advertised in the land of
slavery. They were advertised also, in the same papers, to be sold by
auction, sometimes by themselves, and at others with horses, chaises, and
harness. They were seized