502 HISTORY 



Enforcement of obedience.- — The employer had the same right to require 

 obedience to his commands that he had had under the old slave system, and in 

 case of resistance to apply to a special justice to supervise the infliction of the 

 penalties. There was for a time a disposition on the part of the masters to 

 regard the apprentices in the same light as they had their late slaves, as 

 if they would have recognized no changes in the relations between the two 

 classes. These self-deluded individuals were soon undeceived as to the ability 

 of a new judiciary to deal with such matters, and to effect a real as well as a 

 nominal change in relations. The Bahama auxiliary abolition act authorized 

 masters to punish boys under fourteen and girls under twelve years of age as 

 parents and guardians were accustomed to punish children in the mother 

 country.""" Evasive provision — Secretary Eice asked for its repeal, which was 

 accordingly granted in 1835.'" Indolence, drunkenness, fighting, and other 

 such conduct, were punishable on complaint by the employer and conviction 

 before a special justice of the peace.'"* 



ProMhitions on apprentices. — Apprentices were not allowed to leave the 

 plantations on which they were employed during working hours without the 

 consent of the masters.'''" Another prohibition on apprentices, which was also 

 disallowed by the King, was to the effect of forbidding the production by them 

 of things that were produced upon tlie plantations whore they were employed/" 

 It was also unlawful for an apprentice to l^ear arms without the consent of his 

 master.'" 



Children. — Persons entitled to the service of the mother of a child could 

 not be compelled to accept the latter as an apprentice in virtue of its relation 

 to its mother. Such children not apprenticed were supported by their parents 

 if not otherwise provi-ded for.''' Children under six years of age, born after 

 August 1, 1834, if not adequately provided for, could be bound out by special 

 justices to the persons in each case entitled to the services of their mothers for 



336 4 William IV, 21 (48). 



^"5 William IV, 8 (13). 



338 4 William IV, 21. 



^^ Lac. cit. Secretary Rice objected to this and the King disallowed it, but it 

 was renewed by the Colonial Statute, 5 William IV, 8 (8). 



^^" Sess. P., 1835, 50 (part 2), 516. Copy of the Order-in-council dating July 31, 

 1835, which disallowed the above mentioned section of the Colonial act, 4 Wil- 

 liam IV, 21. 



^" Loc. cit. This prohibition included swords, fire-arms and gun-powder, any 

 of which any master was authorized to seize, if found unaccountably in the posses- 

 sion of an apprentice. 



=>" 4 William IV, 21. 



