“The surprise of the whole legal fraternity was so great, at this sudden revolution in the time honored practice of the Courts, that she had progressed considerably into the merits of the case, before his Honor recovered himself sufficiently to inform her, that it would be more regular to suspend her remarks until after the examination of witnesses was concluded. The lady readily assented to the proposition of his Honor, and the witnesses for the Commonwealth were called to the stand. By their testimony, it appeared that, some months ago, information reached his Honor, the Mayor, Simon S. Stubbs, Esq., of a school for the education of blacks, being in successful operation in the city of Norfolk, under the superintendence of Mrs. Douglass. A warrant was immediately issued, with directions to the officers to bring all parties concerned before him, in order that the matter might be investigated. Upon repairing to the residence of Mrs. Douglass, the officers found some eighteen or twenty youthful descendents of Ham engaged in literary pursuits, all of whom, with their teachers, Mrs. Douglass and her daughter, were taken into custody, and carried to the Mayor’s office. After a full investigation of the matter, his Honor decided to dismiss the complaint in order that a Grand Jury might have an opportunity of giving it consideration. At the meeting of the Grand Jury a true bill was found against Mrs. Douglass and her daughter, but the latter having previously gone to New York, process could not be served upon her. On the part of the defence, the lady examined several prominent and respectable gentlemen, members of the Church, for the purpose of showing that the practice of teaching blacks had been sanctified by the customs of the members of the different churches in the city in having Sunday-schools exclusively for that purpose. It did not appear from the evidence of any of the gentlemen called upon by Mrs. Douglass, that they had actually seen negroes taught _from books_ in any of the Sunday-schools of the City, but the fact, as stated by them, that nearly all of the negroes attending the Sunday-schools _could read_, gave rise to a violent suspicion that many of the ladies and gentlemen of our city, moving in the higher circles of society, had been guilty of as flagrant a violation of the law, as could be imputed to Mrs. Douglass and her daughter.