It is only a short time ago that New England was thrown into a fervor of patriotic indignation by the spectacle presented in one town of a native bringing a laborer in chains to the market-place to be sold. The owner regarded himself as entirely in the right, and explained his position very distinctly. He had obtained his vassal on a contract that a certain amount of labor would be given for a specified sum of money. The sum was small; nevertheless it was paid and accepted, and the man afterward imagined that he could escape from the terms of his contract. Consequently the employer, or purchaser, as he seemed to consider himself, put chains upon the fellow, and as literally brought him for sale as any slave was ever offered in any slave-mart in the world. The beholders rose in their wrath, dragged both men before the court, the slave was freed and the owner was fined. But the point is here: this was simply a case [Illustration: U. S. MAN-OF-WAR.] in which the slave-dealer, taking advantage of an ignorant, unthinking man, was found out. How many thousands of similar cases exist in the United States at the present time of which the public know nothing? All newspaper men at the principal sea-ports know that people come to this country by the thousand on contracts to do a certain amount of labor for specified prices. The prices may be below the cost of living, nevertheless the contracts hold good in all courts of law, and the men are obliged to do their duty. We are sorry for them, but, according to the practice of all countries, man seems to be made for the law and not the law for man. Do I really mean to say that slavery is possible in the United States? Why, such a question is behind the times, for slavery practically exists. What else but slavery can you call the condition of some of the coal-miners, tanners and factory hands of the United States? Men with their wives and families go to a small town which practically belongs to their employer. They live in houses owned by their employer, buy their household supplies at stores owned by their employer, take their pay in checks, tickets or orders signed by their employer, and get the remainder of their pay when their employer is ready. Suppose they wish to improve their condition and go away; how can they move at all unless they have saved some money, the saving of which, by a peculiarity well understood in all such localities, is simply impossible?