"SIR,--Some servants being lately fledd out of this colony, into yours, as is supposed, we could not promise ourselves from you that justice & faire correspondence betweene the two governments so neerly bordering & which are shortly like to be nearer neighbors in delaware bay, as to hope that vpon the receiving of these Outres & the demand of the parties interessted you will remand to us all such apprentice servants as are or shall run out of this government into yours; and will compell such other persons, as shall flie to you without a passe, being indebted or otherwise obnoxious to the justice of this place, to make such satisfaction to the parties endamaged by their unlawful departure, upon their complaints and proofe thereof, as you shall find justice to require. And you may promise yourself the like helpe and concurrence from this governm't in that or any other thing as shalbe in the power of it: And so we bid you heartilly farewell & rest. "To the hon'ble the Governor of the New Netherlands."[38] In 1659 the Dutch had occasion to ask the same favor of Maryland. Whether there had been trouble between the colonies since the earlier letter we do not know, but the spirit of the communication was quite different. Instead of assurances of good will, and expressions of a belief in the certainty of peaceful return, the Dutch threatened, if their servants were not secured to them, "to publish free liberty, access and recess to all planters, servants, negroes, fugitives, and runaways which may go into New Netherland."[39] Trouble was also constantly arising between the French and English, or French and Dutch, in regard to the many runaways who fled from the Eastern colonies northward to Canada. In 1750 there was a dispute about a certain negro belonging to the English, but at that time in possession of the Sieur de la Corne St. Luc; and, in a letter to a friend, one of the officers of the colony makes the following explanation concerning them: "In regard to the negro in possession of Sieur de la Corne St. Luc I thought proper not to send him back every negro being a slave wherever he be. Besides, I am only doing what the English did in 1747. Ensign de Malbronne on board Le Screux had a negro servant who was at first taken from him; I took pains to reclaim him, but the English refused to surrender him on ground as above."[40] =§ 12. Relations with the mother country.=--With only one country across the sea was any question of fugitives likely to arise. In England white slavery had long since died out, except as a punishment for crime; villeinage ceased about the time the colonies were settled. But the status of black slaves who were taken from the colonies to England was in practice unchanged.