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Rh sary to the owners and masters of the said coal heughs as the coal hewers and coal bearers, it is therefore statute and ordained, that they should come under exactly the same penalties as the others, in the event of quitting their masters without certificate ; and that it should be equally illegal, in the lack of such a document, for any person to employ them ?”

But even that was not considered sufficient. The poor coal worker, discontented and miserable, grumbled at his lot, and wanted wages ; but such an unreasonable demand, while it was nominally complied with, was practically denied, for it was further enacted that it should ‘‘not be lawful for any coal master in the kingdom to give any greater fee than the sum of twenty merks in fee or bountith ”—a clause which, according to the interpretation of Lord Kames, fixed the large sum of one pound two shillings sterling as the YEARLY wages of colliers and salters! It was found, however, that at times the poor men became uncontrollable, and refused to work on any terms, and so there was a further clause devised to deal with the difficulty, which ran as follows :—‘‘ Because coal hewers within the kingdom, and other workers within coal heughs, with salters, do ly from their works at Pasche, Yule, Whitsunday, and certain other times of the year, which times they employ in drinking and debauching to the great offence of God and prejudice of their masters, it is therefore statute and ordained that the said coal hewers and salters, and other workmen in coal heughs in the kingdom, work all the six days of the week, except the time of Christmas,”

Thus were these poor people—men and women—treated. The Habeas Corpus Act, introduced into Scotland in 1701, expressly declared in one of its clauses, that its provisions were not to be extended to workers in coal or makers of salt ; and for a hundred and fourteen years, men and women, born in Liberton, Inveresk, and Duddingston, within four miles of the Scottish capital, were held as strictly in thrall by their masters as the negroes of Cuba or Carolina. Says Hugh Miller, burning with indignation :—

"The letters of Junius had appeared, rousing the English people to resist even the slightest encroachment on their liberties ; the war of Independence in the American Colonies had begun; Robert Burns was cherishing, as a peasant lad in Ayrshire, those sentiments of a generous freedom which breathe from every stanza of his noble and manly verse ; nay, Granville Sharp had obtained his Act through which slavery, if that