but at last concludes to let it go, "and chance it;" and the poor inventor has to go all over the same ground again with Moggs, who would fain try it, but money is tight, and the enlightened Moggs, who would have liked the thing well enough, is reluctantly obliged to give it up. There is another chance. Cloggs is in a mess. His mill is mortgaged and threatened with being shut up altogether, if something be not done and done quickly. He determines to "try the last," and adopts the invention, which is beginning to work admirably, just as his creditors close upon him and his mill. It is at once reported that the last straw which broke poor Cloggs's back was "that new 'dodge' he took up; no wonder he went to the bad-enough to ruin anybody." By this time the poor inventor is reduced to despair. His time has been cut to waste, and his money all spent. The friends, who, perhaps, helped him to small sums at the outset, are completely disgusted with him. Besides, the thing is not a commercial success. It broke Cloggs-the only man who tried it. Who is going to try it now? The stigma of failure is upon it. Pretty enough in theory, it has broken down in practice, and the poor inventor sees no resource but to go back to the work-bench, with a heavy heart, and curse the day when he was invaded by that rare commodity-an idea. But the third year of his patent is about to expire, and unless he can find fifty pounds, his invention becomes the property of the first comer. So once more the poor fellow, bowed now with trouble, and sick with hope deferred, once more, takes the field, and literally "hawks" his property about only too glad to part with it, or a share of it, on any terms. Ofttimes these will prove hard enough, and for a meagre royalty, or a minute share of profits, the poor inventor will gladly enough relinquish the child of his brain. The consideration of the natural difficulties which retard the development of an invention, lead to the conclusion that it is completely unnecessary for the nation to lay any first charge or embargo upon it. In this paper all reference to the cost of securing foreign patents has been purposely excluded, as these fall under the administration of other countries The main point to which it is sought to draw attention, is the inconsistency of taxing a pure brain product, before the author has had a chance of testing its commercial value. One hun than our own. dred pounds for the monopoly of a successful machine, and in a less degree fifty for an extension from three to seven years, appear small sums when compared with the original twenty-five paid for protection -a tax which comes upon the poor inventor, when he is at the end of his resources. Few financial reasons can be adduced against reducing expense in the initiatory stages of a patent-inasmuch as the exchequer practically makes a large profit out of the patent office. Out of a total of one hundred and forty-four thousand seven hundred and sixty-one pounds received for fees or stamps during 1873, ninety-five thousand two hundred and eighty-four pounds went to the treasury surely an enormous and most unjust tax upon the brains of the people. Judging from these figures, the present cost of patents might be reduced at least one half, without the slightest fear of making the patent office a charge upon the revenue. The poverty of a large majority of inventors can hardly be too strongly insisted on, as a reason for relieving them of a portion of their present burdens-unfairly diverted into the national cash box. In plain English, a large and clear profit is made out of the poor and needy-not in brains, but in pocket-a class, it should be remembered, to which England owes, to a large extent, her proud supremacy, as the cotton spinner, iron maker, telegraph constructor, and ocean carrier of the world. This important subject has, unfortu nately, been mixed up with a number of side issues. High authorities, such as Lords Derby and Selborne, have recorded their wish for the abolition of the patent law altogether; but their views, and those of more enthusiastic adherents of the same policy, have been so ably contested of late, that they may be said to have passed out of the sphere of discussion. Strangely enough, the present Lord Chancellor has chosen rather to impose a cumbrous official machinery upon the patent office, than to remit, in the smallest degree, the pecuniary pains and penalties imposed upon the inventor. More than this, the unhappy sufferer is to be worried by examiners and experts. Probably, this paternal care will be worth exactly nothing, for in the United States, where an enor mous patent office staff is maintained, the result of this organisation is perpetual and vexatious litigation. All the government examiners in the world cannot grant a title unassailable by the common law of the country; and it, therefore, appears a curious amendment of patent law, to divert into the pockets of examiners and referees the proceeds of a direct tax on knowledge and ingenuity. THE BLACK MAN. obtained? He would be a more popular figure, we may take for granted, than his solemn dark-skinned brother of the east. In the general idea the Nubian or the Ethiopian is the accepted type of the black man. Even Shakespeare's own view of his Moor, Othello, does not distinguish his physical aspect from that of the conventional African negro. Roderigo calls him "thick lips." Brabantio speaks of his sooty bosom." Iago implies his intense blackness, by demanding what delight Desdemona can have in "looking on the devil?" Othello himself says, "Haply, for I am black." So also, in the dreadful tragedy of Titus Andronicus, Aaron, the Moor, is referred to as "the coal-black Moor;" says himself, "Aaron will have his soul black like his face ;" and demands, "is black so base a hue ? The black of Shakespeare's time was, it is plain, of African blackness, without approach to olive or tawny tints-an unmitigated "nigger." WE have often heard and read of the bewildered and amazed condition of the swart-hned natives of some far-distant clime, when in their midst has appeared suddenly—a white man. They were scared at first; then-curiosity overcoming fear -they gradually approached to question him, to touch him and his attire, and to make sure, indeed, that for all his strangeness of aspect, he was yet human as themselves. Now, something very much of this kind must have happened, although no one seems to have been at hand to make note of the fact, when there stepped upon our shores, for the Some fifty years ago there was somefirst time-a black man. Who can doubt thing of a quarrel between Sir Walter that there was much crowding round Scott and the antiquaries, touching this him, that he was greatly stared and very question, of the first appearance of gaped at-poked and pinched, too, no the black man in England. The early doubt, that his reality might be ascertained pages of Ivanhoe narrate how Sir Brian beyond all dispute. Perhaps he was even de Bois-Guilbert is followed by two mobbed and maltreated, jeered at and attendants, Hamet and Abdulla by name, insulted by the street boy of the past; for whose dark visages, white turbans, and we may assume, as a matter of certainty, the Oriental form of their garments, that the British street-boy is of remote showed them to be natives of some distant origin, boasts a most ancient descent, eastern country. They are described as possibly flourished even before streets were wearing silver collars round their throats, for him to flourish in, and that he was and bracelets upon their swarthy arms and present upon this occasion, as assuredly as legs, "of which the former were naked upon all others. Can you not picture the from the elbow, and the latter from midscene? Is it not one well worthy the leg to ankle." Their dresses were of emregard of some painter-Mr. H. S. Marks broidered silk, and they were armed with let us say well skilled in the repro- crooked sabres and Turkish daggers of duction upon canvas of humour, and costly workmanship. Moreover, they character, and costume? That there is carried, at their saddle-bows, bundles of some difficulty about the matter must be darts or javelins, four feet in length, with owned. Doubts exist as to the time when, sharp steel heads, a weapon much in use and the place where, the first black man among Saracens, and of which the memory came amongst us. Nor is it distinctly is yet preserved in the martial exercise certain whence he came, or whether his called El Jerrid, still practised in the nationality was of Asia or of Africa. In eastern countries." Now, these early black the first case he would comport himself footmen were objected to as being totally with stately, stealthy impassiveness, doubt-"out of costume and propriety." less, amid all the turbulence of the English Walter, in reply-while urging that the mob of gazers and investigators. But, if author of a "modern antique romance" an African black, would not his ebon face was not obliged to confine himself to the gleam, his white teeth flash, and his round introduction of those manners only, which liquid eyes glisten with mirthfulness, and could be proved to have absolutely existed. intense self-satisfaction, and delight, at the in the times he is depicting, so that he general recognition his importance had restrain himself to such as are plausible. 66 Sir and natural, and contain no obvious that these early negroes were imported anachronism-yet maintained that negroes from the Portuguese colonial territories, must have been known in England in the as our own dealing in "blacks," as an dark ages. And, in proof of this he men- article of commerce, dates only from 1680. tions" an instance in old romance," and But the taste for negro servants increased, relates, on the authority of the disserta- until it became quite a passion, among the tion prefixed to Ritson's Ancient Metrical nobility and "quality" of England; and Romances, how John of Rampayne, an ex- then ensued quite a population of black-acellent juggler and minstrel, undertook to moors in the metropolis. When, in 1662, effect the escape of Audulf de Bruce, by Lord Sandwich brought over, from Porpresenting himself in disguise at the court tugal, Catherine of Braganza, to be the of the king where he was confined. For queen of Charles the Second, he carried this purpose, he stained his hair and (like in the same ship, by way of present Mr. Crummles's "first tragedy man," when to the young ladies of his family, he played Othello) his whole body entirely "a little Turke and a negroe," as Mr. as black as jet, so that nothing was white Pepys describes them. They were clearly but his teeth; and succeeded in imposing something of novelties in England. The himself on the king as an Ethiopian Diary runs: "(30th May, 1662.) Upon a minstrel, and so effected by stratagem the suddaine motion, I took my wife, and escape of the prisoner. Sarah, and Will by water, with some victuals with us, as low as Gravesend, intending to have gone in the Hope to the Royal James, to have seen the ship and Mr. Shepley; but, meeting Mr. Shepley in a hoy, bringing up my lord's things, she and I went on board, and sailed up with them, as far as half-way tree. Very glad to see Mr. Shepley. Here we saw a little Turke and a negroe, which are intended for pages to the two young ladies [Montagu]." Some seven years later, Mr. Pepys himself is found occasionally employing a negress in his household as cookmaid: "(5th April, For a cookmaid we have, ever since Bridget went, used a black-a-moor of Mr. Batelier's, Doll, who dresses our meat mighty well, and we mightily pleased with her." Whether or not we are to regard this John of Rampayne, in the disguise of an Ethiopian minstrel, as the progenitor or prototype of the popular Ethiopian Serenader of modern days, is a question we need not now pause to consider. Sir Walter fairly proved that he had, at any rate, some warrant for the introduction of his Hamet and Abdulla into the romance of Ivanhoe; and that need did not exist for his following the example of Mat Lewis, who, when his sable guards in the Castle Spectre were objected to as anachronistic, boldly averred that he had made the characters in ques-1669.) tion black solely to obtain a striking effect of contrast; and that could he have derived a similar advantage from making his heroine blue, blue she should have been. It does seem probable, however, The convenient term "black-a-moor” that the black man, either of East Indian which may be a corruption of "black as a or West Indian origin, was not a very Moor 99 -comprehended alike the darkfamiliar figure in England until the seven-skinned of both Africa and Asia. The teenth century. In a paper upon adver- fashion of engaging negro attendants was tisements, republished from the Quarterly probably due to the Venetian Republic; Review, Dr. Wynter quotes a notification the commerce of whose merchants with from the Mercurius Politicus, of August all parts of the globe naturally led to the 11th, 1659, as affording the earliest importation of black-a-moors. Moorish evidence furnished by the newspapers of pages are happily introduced into various the employment of negro serving-boys in paintings by Titian and other of the England. From the terms of the adver- greatest masters, who were quick to pertisement it has been conjectured that the ceive the picturesqueness of the black missing lad's hair was "polled," or cropped, man, and the enhanced brilliancy of colour after the Puritanical fashion of the time: obtained by contrast with his ebon face. "A negro-boy, about nine years of age, in English artists followed the mode, and a grey searge suit, his hair cut close to his the negro became a highly-esteemed head, was lost on Tuesday last, August model, lending important aid to many 9th, at night, in St. Nicholas Lane, a canvas. Here are specimens of "Hue London. If anyone can give notice of him and Cry" advertisements, relating to to Mr. Thomas Barker, at the Sugar Loaf, absconding black-a-moors, contained in in that Lane, they shall be well rewarded the London Gazette of 1685, 1688, and for their pains." It has been concluded 1694: should "Run away from his master, Captain ing under William the Third in Ireland St. Lo, the 21st inst., Obdelah Ealias Abraham, a Moor, swarthy complexion, short frizzled hair, a gold ring in his ear, in a black coat and blew breeches. He took with him a blew Turkish watchgown, a Turkish suit of clothing that he used to wear about town, and several other things. Whoever brings him to Mr. Lozel's house in Green-street shall have one guinea for his charges." "A black boy, an Indian, about thirteen years old, run away the 8th inst. from Putney, with a collar about his neck witht his inscription: The Lady Bromfield's black, in Lincoln's Inn Fields.' Whoever brings him to Sir Edward Bromfield's, at Putney, shall have a guinea reward." "Run away, a Tannymoor [tawnymoor?], with short bushy hair, very well shaped, in a grey livery lined with yellow, about seventeen or eighteen years of age, with a silver collar about his neck, with these directions: 'Captain George Hastings's boy, Brigadier in the King's Horse Guards.' Whoever brings him to the Sugar Loaf in the Pall Mall shall have forty shillings reward." It will be observed that the reward offered for the arrest of these runaway black-a-moors is not more than is now often given upon the recovery of a lost dog, and that there is something canine in that wearing of the inscribed collar by Lady Bromfield's black, and Captain Hastings's "Tannymoor." But the blacks at this time were the merest chattels; how freely and shamelessly they were bought and sold may be gathered from this advertisement in the Tatler of 1709: "A black boy, twelve years of age, fit to wait on a gentleman, to be disposed of at Denis's Coffee House in Finch Lane, near the Exchange;" and from this in the Daily Journal, 1728: "To be sold, a negro boy, aged eleven years. Inquire of the Virginia Coffee House in Threadneedle Street, behind the Royal Exchange." ." The metal collar was a badge of servitude of very ancient date. It was worn, let us note, by "Wamba, the son of Witless," and by "Gurth, the son of Beowulph," the born thralls of Cedric of Rotherwood, not less than by Sir Brian's attendants, Hamet and Abdulla. Dryden, in his prologue written on the reproduction of Beaumont and Fletcher's Prophetess in 1690, makes allusion to the custom of employing negro servants with collars of silver or copper, and proposes jestingly that the English fight Each bring his love a Bogland captive home; Such proper pages will long trains become; With copper collars and with brawny backs, Quite to put down the fashion of our blacks. This prologue, however, gave great offence, owing to the numerous political allusions it contained, and was suppressed after the first night. One of the characters in Cibber's comedy of the Double Gallant speaks of Lord Outside's "frightful black-a-moor coachman, with his flat nose, and great silver collar;" and in the Tatler, No. 245, for November 2nd, 1710, Steele writes: "As I am a patron of persons who have no other friend to apply to, I cannot suppress the following complaint: Sir-I am a black-moor boy, and have, by my lady's order, been christened by the chaplain. The good man has gone further with me, and told me a great deal of good news; as that I am as good as my lady herself, as I am a Christian, and many other things; but, for all this, the parrot who came over with me from our country is as much esteemed by her as I am. Besides this, the shock dog has a collar that cost almost as much as mine. I desire also to know whether, now I am a Christian, I am obliged to dress like a Turk and wear a turbant. I am, Sir, your most obedient servant, POMPEY."" Why such sounding classical names should have been bestowed upon these poor negro lads it is hard to say, unless the practice arose from a cruel inclination to mock at them by contrasting their grand appellations with their abject fortunes. But at an early date they came to be called Caesars and Scipios, Pompeys and Catos, and the custom continued even to the present century. The fashion of attiring them fancifully after an Eastern manner was less lasting. It was the duty of the little negro boy, in the service of the lady of quality in the last century, to attend his mistress's person and tea-table, to carry her train as she moved to and fro, to take charge of her fan and smelling-salts, to feed her parrots, and to comb her lap-dogs. Hogarth, in the fourth scene of his Marriage à la Mode, has portrayed a turbaned black-a-moor grinning overa basketful of antiquities and curiosities. In a scene of one of the "Progresses," there appears another negro boy, also wearing a turban, jewelled and plumed, and conveying to his mistress's tea-table her teakettle. It is this attendant Quin had in mind, doubtless, when, upon the entrance of Garrick in the character of Othello, the old actor and critic said wickedly to his companion, Dr. John Hoadley: "Here is Desdemona's little black boy, Pompey; but why does he not bring in the tea-kettle and lamp ?" Of Dr. Johnson's negro servant, Francis Barber, there is frequent mention in Boswell. It is probable, however, that if he wore a livery at all, Barber was dressed after a very homely fashion, and that his duties were light enough, for, as Sir John Hawkins says truly enough, Diogenes himself never wanted a servant less than Johnson seemed to do. "The great bushy wig which, throughout his life, he affected to wear, by that closeness of texture which it had contracted and been suffered to retain, was ever nearly as impenetrable by a comb as a quickset hedge; and little of the dust that had once settled on his outer garments was ever known to have been disturbed by the brush." But the success of the Rambler, the sums he was receiving for the Adventurer, and the fruits of his other literary labours, "had now exalted him to such a state of comparative affluence, as, in his judgment, made a man-servant necessary." It is more likely, however, that Johnson received Francis Barber into his house, out of charity and keen sympathy with an oppressed race. Johnson had always been a zealous opponent of slavery in every form-Boswell being of opinion "with all deference," that, in such wise, he discovered "a zeal without discretion;" and that the attempts then being made "to abolish so very necessary and important a branch of commercial interest" as the traffic in negroes, were "wild and dangerous.' Johnson had even shocked a company of some very grave men at Oxford by proposing as a toast, "Here's to the next insurrection of the negroes in the West Indies;" while in his pamphlet of "Taxation no Tyranny," he had demanded, his prejudices against our West Indian and American settlers being extreme, "How is it that we hear the loudest yelps for liberty among the drivers of negroes? It is plain, however, that he regarded Francis Barber as his property, if not exactly as his slave, albeit the law had not yet decided that, setting foot in this country, the slave was a slave no longer, when he wrote to one of the higher functionaries of the Admiralty: "I had a negro boy, named Francis Barber, given me by a friend whom I much respect, and treated by me for some years with great tender ness." This letter was written in 1759. "Being disgusted in the house, he ran away to sea, and was in the summer on board the ship stationed at Yarmouth to protect the fishery. It would be a great pleasure and some convenience to me if the Lords of the Admiralty would be pleased to discharge him, which, as he is no seaman, may be done with little injury to the king's service. You were pleased, sir, to order his discharge in the spring, at the request of Mr. Wilkes; but I left London about that time, and received no advantage from your favour. I, therefore, presume to entreat that you will repeat your order, and inform me how to co-operate with it, so that it may be made effective. I shall take the liberty of waiting at the Admiralty next Tuesday for your answer. I hope my request is not such as it is necessary to refuse. And what it is not necessary to refuse I doubt not but your humanity may dispose you to grant, even to one that can make no higher pretensions to your favour than, sir, your most obedient and most humble servant, SAM JOHNSON." Barber, who had in truth absconded for a while, was duly released from the navy, and returned to domestic service; he remained with the doctor until his death in 1784, benefiting considerably under his will. Altogether the connection between master and man was early and enduring. Johnson had placed his negro boy at a school in Northampton, and always manifested the warmest interest in his studies and advancement generally. In 1770 he wrote to Barber, who, at that date, could not have been much less than forty years of age:-"I am very well satisfied with your progress, if you really perform the exercises which you are set. Let me know what English books you read for your entertainment. You can never be wise unless you love reading. Do not imagine that I shall forget or forsake you ; for if, when I examine you, I find that you have not lost your time, you shall want no encouragement from yours affectionately, SAM JOHNSON. The negro footman is now rarely seen; and indeed it would appear that there has been a considerable departure of the "black man" from among us. He fills no longer the place he once occupied in our English domestic life. Can it be that when it was firmly established, not so very long since, that the negro was “a man and a brother," he forthwith ceased to be a friend? Caricatures, a generation |