"Wasn't that your old master's name?" asked the sheriff roughly.

"Co'se it war," was the reply.

"Well, then, ain't it yours too?"

"No, it ain't."

"Well, you just ask the gentleman if that ain't so," said the
sheriff, motioning to the chairman of the board.

"Well," said that officer, with a peculiar smile, "I do not know
that there is any law compelling a freedman to adopt his former
master's name. He is without name in the law, a pure _nullius
filius_--nobody's son. As a slave he had but one name.
He _could_ have no surname, because he had no family. He
was arraigned, tried, and executed as 'Jim' or 'Bill' or 'Tom.'
The volumes of the reports are full of such cases, as The State
_vs._ 'Dick' or 'Sam.' The Roman custom was for the freedman
to take the name of some friend, benefactor, or patron. I do not
see why the American freedman has not a right to choose his own
surname."

"That is not the custom here," said the sheriff, with some chagrin,
he having begun the controversy.

"Very true," replied the chairman; "the custom--and a very proper
and almost necessary one it seems--is to call the freedman by a
former master's name. This distinguishes individuals. But when the
freedman refuses to acknowledge the master's name as his, who can