But although the redemptioner sometimes fared very badly in the new country, it often happened that he came out very well in the end. Among the white people who came here as slaves there were often convicts and paupers; but even some of these succeeded in bettering their condition and establishing themselves as good citizens, and in founding families. It often happened that some of the Germans who came to buy land and settle, chose rather to put away their money, and sell themselves as redemptioners to English families, so that they might learn the English language and manner of living. Then, when they had educated themselves in this practical manner, and their time of service was over, they could buy land, and establish themselves on terms of equality with their English neighbors. But the trade in redemptioners gradually decreased; and by the middle of the eighteenth century there were not many of them left in New Jersey, although there were a few in the State until after the Revolution. Negro slavery, however, continued much longer. It grew and flourished until it became a part of the New Jersey social system; but it must not be supposed that all the people of the State continued to be satisfied with this condition of things. At first everybody who could afford it owned slaves, and the Friends or Quakers bought negroes the same as other people did; but about the end of the seventeenth century some of these Quakers began to think that property in human beings was not a righteous thing, and the Quakers of New Jersey united with those of Pennsylvania in an agreement recommending to the members of the Society of Friends that they should no longer employ negro slaves, or, if they thought it best to continue to do this, that they should at least cease to import them. A strong party among the Quakers of New Jersey opposed slavery for many years, and the system was denounced at some of their yearly meetings; and this went on until about the middle of the next century, when a law was made that no person owning slaves should continue in the Society of Friends. As years passed on, people other than Quakers began to consider slavery an injustice and an evil; and this feeling gradually increased, until in the beginning of the nineteenth century it became very strong, and in 1820 an act was passed by the Legislature for the emancipation of the slaves. They were not set free all at once, and turned into the world to take care of themselves; but a system of gradual emancipation was adopted, by which the young people obtained their freedom when they came of age, while the masters were obliged to take care of the old negroes as long as they lived. By this plan, slavery was very gradually abolished in New Jersey, so that in 1840 there were still six hundred and seventy-four slaves in the State; and even in 1860 eighteen slaves remained, and these must have been very old. A JERSEY TEA PARTY.