The redemptioners mainly sailed from the northern ports of Ireland, Belfast or Londonderry, though this country by no means enjoyed the unenviable monopoly of this traffic: Holland and Germany sending their wretched quota of white slaves. The particular class of vessels employed in this iniquitous trade were known by the name of ‘White Guineamen,’ and belonged to the ‘free and enlightened’ citizens of the sea-ports in America, who had their kidnappers stationed at certain parts of Scotland, Ireland, Wales, and also in Holland, to provide them with human cargoes. Seduced by the glowing descriptions of a trans-Atlantic paradise, with bright and alluring visions of American happiness and liberty, the miserable, the idle, and the unwary among the lower classes of Europe were entrapped into the voyage, the offer of gratuitous conveyance being an additional bait, which was eagerly accepted; but we have seen how, on their arrival at the promised land, they were speedily disillusioned. The difficulty of hiring tolerable servants was so great, that many persons were obliged to deal with their fellow-creatures in this way, who would otherwise have utterly abhorred the thought of being slave-dealers. Some of the laws for their regulation in the colonies are curious. For instance, in Virginia, after they had served their time, they were obliged to have a certificate from their master to say that they had done so, and if any person should entertain any hired servant running away without such a certificate, he had to pay the master of such servant thirty pounds weight of tobacco for every day and night he should so harbour him. Pursuit after runaway servants was made at the public expense, and, if caught, they had to serve for the time of their absence, and the charge disbursed. In case the master refused to pay the charge, the servant was sold, or hired out, until by their services they had reimbursed the amount expended in capturing them, after which they were returned to their master to serve out their time. Whoever apprehended them was to have as reward two hundred pounds weight of tobacco, if the capture took place about ten miles from the master’s house, or one hundred pounds weight if above five miles, and under ten. This reward was to be paid by the public, and the servant had to serve some one four months for every two hundred pounds weight of tobacco paid for him. ‘Every Master that hath a Servant that hath run away twice, shall keep his Hair close cut, and not so doing, shall be fined one hundred pounds weight of Tobacco for every time the said Fugitive shall, after the second time, be taken up.’ If they ran away in company with any negro, then they had to serve the master of that negro as long as the negro was at large. If any servant laid violent hands on his master, mistress, or overseer, and was convicted of the same in any court, he had to serve one year longer at the expiration of his term.