75. To enumerate all the horrid and aggravating instances of men-stealing, which are known to have occurred in the state of Delaware, within the recollection of many of the citizens of that state, would require a heavy volume. In many cases, whole families of free coloured people have been attacked in the night, beaten _nearly_ to death with clubs, gagged and bound, and dragged into distant and hopeless captivity and slavery, leaving no traces behind, except the blood from their wounds. 76. During the last winter, since the seizure of the woman and infant, as related above, the house of a free black family was broken open, and its defenceless inhabitants treated in the manner just mentioned, except, that the mother escaped from their merciless grasp, while on their way to the state of Maryland. The plunderers, of whom there were nearly half a dozen, conveyed their prey upon horses; and the woman being placed on one of the horses, behind, improved an opportunity, as they were passing a house, and sprang off; and not daring to pursue her, they proceeded on, leaving her youngest child a little farther along by the side of the road, in expectation, it is supposed, that its cries would attract the mother, but she prudently waited until morning, and recovered it again in safety. 77. I consider myself more fully warranted in particularising this fact, from the circumstances of having been at New-Castle at the time that the woman was brought with her child, before the grand jury, for examination; and of having seen several of the persons against whom bills of indictment were found, on the charge of being engaged in the perpetration of the outrage; and also that one or two of them were the same who were accused of assisting in seizing and carrying off the woman and child whom I discovered at Washington. The ingenuity and stratagems employed by kidnappers, in effecting their designs, are such as to prove, that the most consummate cunning is no evidence of wisdom or moral purity, nor incompatible with the most consummate villainy. A monster, in human shape, was detected in the city of Philadelphia, pursuing the occupation of courting and marrying mulatto women, and selling them as slaves. In his last attempt of this kind, the fact having come to the knowledge of the African population of this city, a mob was immediately collected, and he was only saved from being torn in atoms, by being deposited in the city prison. They have lately invented a method of attaining their objects, through the instrumentality of the laws:--Having selected a suitable free coloured person, to make a _pitch_ upon, the _conjuring_ kidnapper employs a confederate, to ascertain the distinguishing marks of his body and then claims and obtains him as a slave, before a magistrate, by describing those marks, and proving the truth of his assertions, by his well-instructed accomplice.