renders it so far superior to the boasted independence of any
other nation in the world? If it were thought inexpedient to
admit twelve jurors, in consequence of the limited population of
the settlement, eight might be allowed in the first instance, and
the rest could be added when circumstances would permit; so that
the principle of the system would be established, and these could
be instructed in the laws of the land from the bench. In each of
the settlements there are a great many persons competent to fill
the office of jurors, and it is to be hoped that no long interval
will be suffered to elapse without the colony being permitted to
participate in those inestimable privileges which render the
mother country the envy of the world.

The admission of the bankrupt laws into the colony would tend
still more to the perfecting of the system of jurisprudence, and
appears to be a very desirable object of solicitude. For want of
some legal system of this kind, many families have been reduced
to the lowest extremes of misery and want, the heads being
immured in prison, without the ability to liquidate the claims of
their unfeeling creditors, or to provide support for their
perishing families. The necessary consequence was, the
individuals fell to the charge of the government, since they must
not be suffered to starve. The obduracy of the creditors may be
assigned as the sole cause of this wretchedness; for although, in
such circumstances, the unfortunate debtor had been willing to
relinquish all his possessions; to surrender his land, his
cattle, his stock, and every thing else of which he could boast
of the possession; nothing short of payment in money could
satisfy; and the ill-fated was doomed to experience the
accumulated horrors of personal suffering, in addition to that