Note 10 — ON THE STATE OF SLAVERY IN VIRGINIA.

The condition of a villein had most of the incidents I have before described in giving the idea of slavery, in general. His services were uncertain and indeterminate, such as his lord thought fit to require; or as some of our ancient writers express it, he knew not in the evening what he was to do in the morning, he was bound to do whatever he was commanded. He was liable to beating, imprisonment, and every other chastisement his lord could devise, except killing and maiming. He was incapable of acquiring property for his own benefit; he was himself the subject of property; as such saleable and transmissible. If he was a villein regardant he passed with the land to which he was annexed, but might be severed at the will of his lord; if he was a villein in gross, he was an hereditament, or a chattel real, according to his lord's interest; being descendible to the heir, where the lord was absolute owner, and transmissible to the executor where the lord had only a term of years in him. Lastly, the slavery extended to the issue, if the father was a villein, our law deriving the condition of the child from that of the father, contrary to the Roman law, in which the rule was, partus sequitur ventum. Hargrave's Case of Negroe Somerset, page 26 and 27.