Note 4 — The Fugitive Slave Act.

A late American traveller, in Germany, invited to an evening party at the house of a Professor, attempted to compliment the company by expressing his indignation at the oppression which "the dear old German fatherland" suffered at the hands of its rulers. The American's profferred sympathy was coldly received. "We admit," was the reply, "that there is much wrong here, but we do not admit the right of your country to rebuke it. There is a system now with you, worse than any thing which we know of tyranny—your slavery. It is a disgrace and blot on your free government and on a Christian State. We have nothing in Russia or Hungary which is so degrading, and we have nothing which so crushes the mind. And more than this, we hear you have now a law, just passed by your National Assembly, which would disgrace the cruel code of the Czar. We hear of free men and women, hunted like dogs on your mountains, and sent back, without trial, to bondage worse than our serfs have ever known. We have, in Europe, many excuses in ancient evils and deep-laid prejudices, but you, the young and free people, in this age, to be passing again, afresh, such measures of unmitigated wrong!"—Home life in Germany, by Charles Loving Brace. Mr. Brace honestly adds: "I must say that the blood tingled to my cheek with shame, as he spoke."