gossiping doctor, and had chiefly conciliated
the Virginians by my talents as a listener. Of
course it was known that I frequently visited
the Quaker's house, but people probably con-
cluded that one of the girls, or perhaps one of
the two or three younger children, had a touch
of fever;
and as the Clays held little intercourse
with the townsfolk, nobody cared to ask questions
on that point.

When I got back to Morgan Town that afternoon, I found the place full of unusual bustle. On several stumps and walls, appeared flaring placards of red or blue paper, offering two thousand dollars reward for the apprehension of Cato Hammond, the property of Paul Randolph, of the Myrtles estate. Then, followed a minute description of the runaway, to which was appended these words: "Should the escaped mulatto resist, as, from his desperate character, is probable, citizens can have the same reward paid on production of his head, to be identified," &c.

"Gracious Heavens!" I gasped out, as I perused this atrocious manifesto; can such a notice as this be publicly posted in a Christian country ?"

'Halloa, there! Doctor, doctor!" cried a shrill voice from the open door of a neighbouring tavern ; 'come here, my gallant Britisher, and liquor."

upon, I guess. Our committee have come to tarms with Elkanah here, and he's come to rout out that rascal Cato."

And the major smiled benignly on two subordinate ruffians-a haggard white, and a treacherous-eyed Indian half-breed, who stood by: also well-armed, and booted for the road.

"You forget these, major," said the captain of negro-hunters, as he tossed off his julep and kicked his foot towards the dogs lying without. "No, I do not," replied the major, rubbing his hands; "no, indeed, I do not. Those pups, doctor, are the Cap.'s lapdogs, they are; bloodhounds of the true Spanish breed, and as true to a nigger's trail as my rifle-ball to a jumping squirrel."

"You may say that!" chimed in Captain Pogus:

And then he began to tell a number of boastful anecdotes concerning the exploits of his dogs, his assistants, and himself. For the credit of human nature, I can only hope that those sickening tales of cruelty and persecution were mostly fabulous. If half of them were true, Captain Pogus deserved hanging. Tired of listening to this miscreant's bragging concerning Maroons shot, stabbed, torn by dogs, smothered in quagmires, I was slipping out, when the following speech arrested my attention:

"Take my oath for it, gentlemen, there's a I turned my head, and saw Major Blight, cussed abolitionist at the bottom of this busirather flushed with drink, beckoning to me withness. Let me clap my eyes on the critter that excited gestures. He was not alone. Besides shelters that Cato, and I'll make him a caution the bar-keeper, the landlord, and two or three to Crockett, I will! Scalp me, but I'll treat the citizens, I saw more than one sinister-visaged stranger; and before the door stood three horses, while four huge dogs lay asleep in front of the house, secured by chains. The major, who had a real liking for me, would hear of no denial; I was obliged to enter on this scene of rough revelry.

66

Brandy cocktails or mint juleps, eh, doctor? Mint ju, eh? Juleps round, mister!"

The bar-keeper filled the glasses with his accustomed alacrity.

"Glad you're come," cried the half-tipsy officer; "glad you're here to welcome these gentlemen into the town. Let me introduce you, Dr. Mylner, to Elkanah Pogus-Captain Elkanah Pogus-who does us the favour to hunt down all tarnation black skulkers; don't ye, Cap. ?"

"I do my endeavours in my line, major," responded the redoubted Elkanah; showing his tobacco-stained teeth in a frightful grin.

I never saw a fiercer or more repulsive ruffian. He was a big rawboned Georgian of about forty, with a face marked by drink and evil passions, and scarred by several ill-healed wounds which his bushy beard but partially concealed. He had been a convict, it was said, and had committed many crimes before embracing his present calling. But he was at the head of his profession-the most ferocious and crafty hunter after men, in all the South. He was showily dressed, and wore his pistols and bowie knife ostentatiously displayed in his belt.

"Yes," cried the major, 'we won't be

traitor wuss than iver Red Injun polished off a prisoner! There's but one thing I hate wuss than rattlers and pison, and that's a nigger; and there's but one thing I hate wuss than a nigger, and that's a darned abolitionist."

The man-hunter ended his speech with a salvo of oaths, and the cordial applause of the company. I went home. Somehow, the savage threats of Elkanah Pogus rang in my ears, and chilled the blood in my veins, in spite of myself, I was no abolition agent. I ran no risk of incurring the wretch's vengeance; and yet, I was ill at ease. An hour later, as I came out of the stable where I had been inspecting my horses, and giving Sam, and Pompey my coachman, their orders for the next day, I saw a dark figure peering in at the open gateway. One glance, and it vanished; but I thought it bore a strong resemblance to the half-bred Indian, one of Captain Elkanah's subalterns. As I smoked my cigar in the verandah after dusk, Sam was whistling at the gate. A man came up with noiseless step, and conversed with him for some moments in an easy manner. The moonlight fell on his face and lank black hair. The halfbred Indian again!

He did not stay long, but wished Sam a gruff good night, and turned on his heel. And everything was quiet and peaceful, as usual, when I laid my head on my pillow to dream of England and Jane.

Next day, at the appointed hour, my carputriage came round to the door, and I took

I fully believed him. His firm lips, his frowning brow, and sparkling eye, confirmed his words. Pompey obeyed his orders, lashing, whipping, and jerking the reins, until the horses were stretching out at their utmost speed. It was a terrible race. I could see when I looked back, the negro-hunters spurring and flogging their steeds. Their yells and imprecations were horribly distinct. Once they were clearly "Three miles and a half,” I said. gaining upon us. The river was in sight. "Those white houses on the hill, then, are in Across it, lay free soil and comparative safety. Pennsylvania ?"

How could I ever face Morgan Town again? I, caught in flagrant delict of smuggling away an escaped slave! O cruel Quaker family-perfidious Clays who had made me their instrument and scapegoat. How had I deserved this? Bang! A rifle was fired; the ball perforated Pompey's hat, but did no harm. And now, the foaming horses rushed down with a splash into the ford, struggled through, dashing the water to left and right, panted up the slope, and galloped towards Union.

"Doctor, I owe you more than life. I am a free man!" said the runaway.

I looked back. The negro hunters, illmounted for such a chase, were giving up the pursuit. I saw their furious gestures, and heard their shouts of rage as they reined up at the river's edge. In an hour, we were in Union, where Cato left me with many excuses and thanks. I answered not a word, but I was the most miserable of men. I dared not go back to Morgan Town, where, indeed, I was burned in effigy in the same fire that consumed all my effects. What happened to the Clays I never heard. Cato Hammond rejoined his wife in safety, and is now a thriving engineer at Montreal, in Canada. My ruin was strangely compensated by a subscriptestimonial" from the abolitionists of Philadelphia and Boston; so that I was actually enabled to return home to buy a London practice, and become a Benedict, a whole twelvemonth earlier than I had pictured in my wildest dreams.

tion or

PORTABLE PROPERTY IN LAND.

the famous needle. This grand forging principle once established, it would be easy to multiply it in all manner of appliances, and even refinements; and now, Judge Longfield, who has been, so to speak, foreman of the works for many years back, comes to us with a little ingenious bit of mechanism of his own, and with his skill and experience has a very just title to our attention. It is proposed here, in a few words, to explain this rather novel scheme, which indeed seems no more than a legitimate corollary to the famous Incumbered Estates Act.

It will be borne in mind to what a very simple expression the intricate algebra of title in Ireland has been reduced. Abstracts of title, searches simple and negative, copies of deeds, settlements and counterparts of leases, charges and terms of years, the groping after a tenure by hapless chamber counsel through the brakes and quagmires of faded scrivenery, these things have all been swept away by the legal besonis. Stout navvies have been sent into those dungeon cellars, and have carted away load after load of the old bones, digging into the rotting adherent masses of discoloured vellum and decaying bales of scribbled paper. After which stable work, and a prodigious deal of winnowing and sifting, remains at the bottom a clear sediment or deposit, and we hold in our hands a clean bright square of vellum, which can be read through within a space of five minutes. Judge Prospero has waved his ruler; and the grim fortress of hideous old Giant Blunderbore comes crashing down in a dust and crumble of ruin, and discovers the amiable little Fairy, Good Title, standing unharmed in the middle.

A SHORT time back, was given in this journal That little square of parchment, as we all an account of a certain Irish Revolutionary know, is unimpeachable. It cannot be cut or Convention, which has confiscated, by way of shredded, or, morally speaking, have a hole picked public auction, the estates and interests of divers in it; still less can it be visited by the tremendous suspects who had traitorously incumbered them- operation of being driven through by a coachselves beyond their strength. The legal atroci-and-six. It s saturated with the parliamentary ties of this terrible tribunal, its rough and savage justice, and wholesale slaughter of innocent owners, mortgagers, and even unoffending solicitors, are now matters of history. Their guillotine their hammer, that is-descended with a fatal precision, and the executioners pursued their truculent task, steeped to the armpits in the gore of slaughtered mortgages, deeds, settlements, charges, and contingent terms. We actually slipped in the pool of innocent ink. While aloft sat the three pitiless Commissioners of Public Safety, Judge Robespierre (Chief Commissioner), Judges Marat and Danton, carrying out their frightful office.

Naturally, this machinery, based upon rough wholesale principles, and working with broad and sweeping strokes, came by-and-by to be regulated by nicer and more discriminating adjustments. The huge Nasmyth fulling hammers which kept pounding malleable mortgages, set tlements, and all the equities, into one monster mass, might be so far controlled as to be capable of the delicate manipulation of an airy leasehold interest, almost as inappreciable as

elixir, which is omnipotence. It bids defiance to the powers of darkness and to ingenious solicitors. It is victorious and unconquerable. No one, to use the proper technical phrase, can "go behind its back;" that is, apart from the small accommodation it would afford for such concealment, it has the power of healing all flaws and fatal errors prior to its own. That small sheet may be the adequate and most convenient token for a rental of fifty thousand as for fifteen pounds a year-a vellum bank-note whose specie is land, and which can be converted into specie at a moment's warning.

This facility of transfer is a very precious element in the value of any commodity; for the truth of which principle we have no need to visit the political economists. The old monster armoire that groans and strains as it is stirred, and can by no means be brought down stairs, is held in poor estimation beside that compact little casket which we can take to market with us and dispose of out of hand. Our estate, instead of being a huge unmanageable monster, which we can divest ourselves of only by slow

1

PORTABLE PROPERTY IN LAND.

[October 26, 1861.] 115

and solemn approaches, circumvallations, and Friendly solicitor, by-and-by and at his leisure, the tedious operations of a siege, has been now has a neat little abridgment or epitome of each miraculously transformed into a light and handy instrument made out-a sort of pretty tableau in chattel, which may be disposed of at an hour's miniature of all the links in our "chain of title," notice, like a horse, or furniture, or other port- now, by the way, sadly twisted and entangledable property. It is no longer as that huge un- which is sent with clean copies of the yellowwieldy present of an elephant, which, we are in-frayed deeds to Wyndebagge, Q.C., a notorious formed, Eastern sovereigns are in the habit of authority on these matters, for "advice and bestowing on unlucky subjects whom they have opinion." delighted to honour, and which must cleave to the borrower's, John Styles's, charges. These costly steps are all at ours, them whether they will or no, until, by its suitable maintenance in all dignity and magnificence, reporting that our title is faulty, and that someWyndebagge, Q.C., in all human probability it has ruined them. But the old spirits have not yet been wholly thirty-five, in the time of John Styles the elder, where towards the year seventeen hundred and exorcised. The grim ogre of mortgage still there was a rusty link which parted, the old walks the earth in all his clumsy and un-yellow bundles, the neat little tableau, and the wieldy terrors. for charging of lands, cumbersome as the old ture being in a rich and florid German text, All the ponderous apparatus clean copies in fine caligraphy (This Indenagricultural machinery, still lies in the legal bounded by red lines), all come back, being refarmsteads, and has to be dragged forth creak- turned, with an ill-disguised contempt, in another ing and groaning according as occasion serves. cab. Again the line is cast; and a new lender Furnished with the handiest of conveyances, you rises. The yellow bundles and pretty little abmay sell ere the familiar words "Jack Robin-stract are taken out for an airing, and left with son" have flown from the lips; but ere you can Boggs, Q.C., 3, Fig-tree Court, who, I need happily and successfully mortgage, you may scarcely mention in this place, is the eminent drone, as did lately the ingenious mnemonic gen-"opinion" of that name. The eminent "opitleman, through all the books of Milton's great epic. For sellers, there is the Happy Despatch; for borrowers, the slow lingering tortures of equity draughting. To redress this inequality has Judge Longfield, long one of the painstaking commissioners of the Court of the Happy Despatch, come forward with an ingenious scheme, conceded to be scarcely novel in principle, novel certainly in its details and application to the present crisis. To appreciate its full value, there must be focused in a very small object-glass a diminished picture of the labours of Hercules attendant on raising money by mortgage.

Blackacre and Whiteacre are the two spectral estates that Law, when she becomes playfully didactic and would illustrate her meaning by pleasant figures, is in the habit of using. are some spectral pawns and lay figures which she There takes out when giving a lesson to her children, and calls John Styles, John Doc, and Richard Roe. Supposing, then, that we, adopting this imagery, become John Styles, much pressed for money, and wishing to raise a loan by way of mortgage on our ancestral estate, known in the parish as Blackacre, the first step must be to explore the country diligently for a familiar spirit yet equitable, who asks no richer manna than legitimate five or six per cent. being is not ready to hand; he is not quoted This in the market; he has to be sought for and unearthed badgerwise; and, when found, to be humoured gently, and soothed by the tender offices of a friendly solicitor. In a surly grudg. ing way, then, he is content and will lend, and we then fetch down out of tin cases bursting with leases, charges, conveyances, judgments, and settlements, the whole frayed and tawny miscellany of unclean bundles which is happily epitomised in the words "OUR TITLE," and we pack them off in a cab to friendly solicitor.

nion" sees that rusted fracture already noticed by his brother Wyndebagge, but thinks something might be done in the way of tinkering or piecing; nay, will take that office on himself. And so perhaps after a decent delay, the thing may be at last accomplished; and we, John Styles, the borrower, are in possession of the money.

borrower, to obtain this little accommodation, And yet it is hard that we John Styles, the should have to be subject to one of the humiliating incidents of vulgar pawning. Those title-deeds on which Boggs, Q.C., the eminent

usually pass into the keeping of our creditor by opinion" has smiled a gracious approbation, way of gage or pledge. He becomes proprietor, good-naturedly allowing us a use and occupation. to be deprived of his deeds and papers, thus The pawner often finds it a heavy inconvenience rigorously detained by his Pawnee chief. So far it seems a weary troublesome business this raising of money upon that best foundation of all security-terra firma-land. The road seems to have been purposely roughened and broken up into pitfals, to facilitate the accommodation of the borrower.

moneys again before the time appointed, and offer And should the lender desire to have his security for a loan to him, he then becomes a that property of which he is titular owner as distressed borrower in his turn, and has to submit for fresh disembowelling at the hands of an eminent opinion that recently disembowelled title of which he has the custody. The old birdlime adherence goes with every change of real property. For borrower and lender and mortgagee, it becomes as a closely clinging shirt of Nessus that sticks to the very flesh, only to be drawn off very slowly and with protracted pains and tortures. Further, this ultimate mortgage, with all its intricate incidents-transfer, repay