1889-90.] SLAVERY IN CANADA. 103 



had been procured as slaves, and to remove doubts as to ownership, it 

 was ordained that all such Panis and negroes who had been so bought 

 or held should belong to the person so owning them in full proprietor- 

 ship. Attached to this is the certificate of one Cognet, that he had duly 

 published the ordinance by reading it after mass, in certain churches in 

 City of Quebec. The 47th article of the capitulation of Canada to the 

 English provides, that all such negroes and Panis should remain in their 

 condition of slavery. This was on September 8th, 1760. The negroes 

 so introduced were mostly from African cargoes landed at Jamaica, and 

 other West India Islands. Some were from the United States. 



Slaves were often cited and described in legal and other notices and 

 documents in Lower Canada as chattels, such as " negroes, effects, and 

 merchandise." By Act of the English Parliament in 1732, 5 Geo. II., 

 cap. 7, houses, lands, negroes, and real estate within the colony, were 

 liable to be sold as assets to satisfy their owner's debts. Both negroes 

 and Panis appear on the parish records. Thus on the 13th March, 1755, 

 at Longue Pointe, it is reported that Louise, a negress of M. de Cham- 

 bault, had been buried, and on the same register is the certificate of bap- 

 tism, dated 4th November, 1756, of Marie Judith, Pani, about twelve 

 years of age, belonging to the Sieur Preville. 



In the newspapers of the time are several advertisements for sale. In 

 the Montreal Gazette of i8th March, 1784, Madame Perrault offers a 

 negress for sale, and a week later is advertised " a negress about 25 years, 

 who has had the smallpox and goes under the name of Peg." 



In March, 1788, the Montreal Court of Common Pleas had before it 

 the case of Jacobs v. Fisher, claiming the delivery to the plaintiff of " two 

 negro wenches," and judgment was given that the slaves should be given 

 up or ^50 damages be paid. Several similar cases are on record in 

 Montreal and Quebec. 



BRITISH LEGISLATION TOUCHING COLONIAL SLAVERY. 



In July, 1797, an Imperial statute was passed which recited the Act 

 of George II. referred to, and that it was deemed expedient that change 

 should be made in the law in so far as the compulsory sale of slaves 

 under execution was provided. That provision of the Act was therefore 

 repealed as far as it referred to negroes in his Majesty's plantations. The 

 agitation against the slave system had then fully begun in England. 

 Lord Mansfield had decided the celebrated Somersett case, freeing the 

 negro slave brought from Jamaica to England. This, and the miscon- 

 struction of the last recited Act, soon had a marked effect on the future 



