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Show 190 NOTES ON eluded to spare "the harmless albatross." I advise all my readers, however, to get the book, and if th.cy don't fi.nd lt a rich treat, then they have no relish for Ntck-~ottorms~n. I have now gone through the whole of PARI I., havmg, I believe, noticed every chapter. I might go on m the same way with the remaining "PAR'l'S," but I have not the space for it: I must, therefore, cohfine myself to a few of the more prominent points. . . r AR'.r II. is devoted to the slave-code, and here It IS that the author is so beholden to tlJC "lega.l gentlemen who hove given her their assistance and support." (Preface to the Key.) Who these "legal gentlemen" arc, I have a great curiosity to know, for they, or she, or all together, have certainly given some queer interpretations. However, out of r espect for the gentlemen of the grec? bag, I am i~clined to hold them innocent of the interpretatiOns aforesa~d, anrl to motlwr those interpretations upon lwr. A story is told of a preacher who, while delivering a sermon made up of shreds and patches from the old divines, was very much annoyed by an old gentleman in the pew below repeating in a semi-audible tone, as passage after passage came out, the name of its author-" Barrow!"" Tillotson!"-" Jeremy ~ray lor!" At last, provoked beyond all endurance, he called out, ·~rurn that man out! "'!,hat's his own,'' said the man. . . Now, though the portion of the work before us 1s evidently a hodge-podge, and jumbled together, too, m beautiful confusion, I think I can put my finger on passage after passngc, and say, without four of ~is take, :l~ha.t's her ~wn! and among these passages are ccrta.m odd mts mtcrpr~ta.tJOns, to two or three of which I must now call the rea.dcr s attention. 'l,I1C first is on pnge 70. , 1\Irs. Stowe cites the law of South Carolin:\ as enacting that "slaves shall be llccmcJ UNCLE TO.M'S CABIN. 101 soltl, (?) taken, reputed and adjudged in Jaw, to be chattels personal in the hands of their owners and possessors, and their executors, administrators, and assigns, 'fO ALL INTENTS, CONSTRUCTIONS AND PUHPOSES WHATSOEVEit," and then adds, "Let the reader rcflcct on the extent of the meaning in tltis la.st clause;" evidently showing that she understands "chattels personal" to be here used in opposition to "persons," whereas, any 1awycr, and one who is no lawyer, could have told her that it is used simply in opposition to "chattels real;'' that in :M<lryland and Virginia, and, I believe, in most of the Southern Sta.tcs, slaves arc, for ordinnry purposes, chattels personal, but, for testamentary and administrative purposes, chattels real; whereas, in South Carolina., and, perhaps, some other States, they arc cha-ttels personal, for all purposes, and chattels real, for none. This is tho simple meaning of the South Carolina law, in which J)Irs. Stowe has found such a mare's nest. Yet she will have it that, in Southern law, the negro is not a. person, or, at any rate, that it is a mooted point, and aceonlingly she cites (p. 75,) the case of \YITSI<:r.L vs. EARNEST AND PAHKER, whic!t the reader will find in the Appendix, (E. 3,) and on which she thus comments : "IE' we consider tlte negro a person, says the J udgc; and, from his decision in the case, he evidently intima-tes that he lms a strong leaning to tl1is opinion, though it has been contested by so many eminent lega.l authorities that he puts forth his sentiment modestly, and in an hypothetical form." - Now to place in a strong light the logic of tl1is comment, let m~ request the reader's attention, for a moment, to the fullowmg "Report of a Case not to be found in any of the Books." Professor Stowe, we will suppos~, having lately oecn in England, and seen how Engli~hmcn flog their wives, anJ. |