"Allowing that there are always to be inequalities of mind and condition, and that what we call menial services will need to be performed; that there must be those who will have a disposition and taste to work over a fire all day and prepare food; and that men of business or study will not all be able to groom their own horses and wash their vehicles; and that possibly the Coleridges and Southeys, and their friends the Joseph Cottles, may, from being absorbed in their ideal pursuits, still be ignorant of the way to get off a collar from a horse's neck, and must call upon a servant-girl to help them, we shall need those who will be glad to be servants forever, and who will require for their own security that their employers shall 'own' them, and thus be made responsible for their support and protection. This may always be necessary for the highest welfare of all concerned. But the history of this relationship in connection with our human nature has been such, to a great extent, that we associate with it only the idea of pillage, oppression, cruelty. Already there are cases without number in which no such idea would ever be suggested to a spectator, and they will increase in proportion as Christianity prevails. There is more real 'freedom' in thousands of these cases of nominal slavery than in thousands who are nominally free. How did it happen that the Hebrew servant, who chose to stay with his master rather than leave his wife and children, was not made nominally free, and apprenticed or hired? Why was his ear bored, and perpetual relations secured between him and his master?" "For the master's security, I presume," said Mr. North. "I should say," said I, "for the mutual benefit of both. The master then became responsible for him; his support was a lien on his estate, the children must always be responsible for his maintenance. The awl made its record in the master's door-post, as well as in the servant's ear.