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Their oath.

XVII. And whereas it has been found that many persons attending the ware-houses under the denomination of tobacco pickers, have been found guilty of great frauds, impositions, and abuses therein: For Pickers, remedy whereof, Be it enacted, That the courts of the several counties wherein any of the public ware-houses appointed. appointed by this act are established, shall, and they are hereby required, to nominate and appoint, from time to time, such and so many persons as to them shall seem necessary, who are willing to undertake the same, to attend the several ware-houses within this state, to turn up, sort, separate, and pick such tobacco as shall be refused by the inspectors. And every person so appointed a picker, shall make oath before the court at the time of his appointment, or at the next succeeding court, that he will carefully and diligently, without fraud or embezzlement, sort and separate all such tobacco as shall be refused by the inspectors, and the owner or proprietor thereof, or the inspectors, shall employ him to pick. And every picker of tobacco shall be allowed to demand and receive from the Allowance. respective proprietors, one shilling and three pence per hogshead for opening, and one fifteenth part of all the tobacco saved out of any refused hogshead by him picked, for his services in opening, sorting, and picking the same, and no more. And no picker of tobacco shall keep or employ any negro or mulatto slave at any public ware house, on any pretence whatsoever; nor shall any picker presume to hinder any person who may choose to open their own tobacco, or to pick what may be refused by the inspectors, from the free use of the picking house and prize for the conveniency of picking and prizing the same. And if any picker for misbeha. shall misbehave himself in his said office, it shall and may be lawful for the court of the county where such picker shall be appointed, on complaint and motion to them made, to remove such picker from his said office, and to appoint another person to act in his room, if to them it shall seem necessary; and every picker so removed, shall for ever after be rendered incapable of serving as picker at any public ware-house, provided such picker hath ten days previous notice of such motion; and any person who shall be aggrieved by any such misbehaviour in a picker, may make complaint thereof to any justice of the peace, who is hereby em

Duty.

Punishment

viour.

powered and directed to take depositions therein, provided such picker have notice thereof, and to transmit the same to the next court to be held for the county where the offence shall be committed, to be there given in evidence on the examination into such misbehaviour. And if any person, not being appointed and sworn as Penalty for aforesaid, shall presume to undertake the opening, sort- picking, ing, picking, or separating any such tobacco for hire without beor reward, every person so offending shall forfeit and ing so appointed, expay twenty shillings for every such offence; to be re- cept by the covered by the informer to his own use before any jus- proprietor,

or others.

tice of the peace. Provided, That any proprietor of his hands, tobacco who may choose to open, pick, and prize his own tobacco, may employ his own servants or slaves, or any other person or persons, other than the hands kept by the inspectors, to assist him in opening, picking, or prizing the same; and the person or persons so employed, shall not incur or be subject to the last mentioned or any other penalty or forfeiture for so doing; and the inspectors shall issue receipts for all tobacco saved by picking to the proprietors only of such tobacco, and not to the pickers of the same. And the inspectors shall not suffer or permit any picker to prize up any tobacco, that he shall have saved by picking, for his own use. And if any tobacco packed in any hogshead or cask by an overseer, or the hands under his care, shall be burnt by the inspectors by reason of its being bad, unsound, or not in good condition, the overseer who had the care of making and packing the same shall be at the loss of the tobacco so burnt, and make liable for to. satisfaction for the same out of his share of the crop, or ed & burnt, otherwise; and the inspectors shall be obliged to keep an account of all tobacco so burnt.

VIII. And be it further enacted, That where any tobacco shall be brought to any of the said ware-houses for the discharge of any public or private debt or contract, the said inspectors, or one of them, after they have viewed, examined, and weighed the said tobacco, according to the directions of this act, shall be obliged to deliver to the person bringing the same, as many receipts, under the hands of the said inspectors, as shall be required for the full quantity of tobacco received by them, in which shall be expressed whether the tobacco so received be sweet scented or Oronoko, stemmed or leaf; which receipt shall be in the form VOL. XI D 2

Overseers

bacco refus,

Form of tranfer receipts.

Their date

following, to wit: "

ware-house, the

17

river, number day of Received of pounds of transfer tobacco, to be delivered on demand to him or to his order, according to the directions of the act, intituled, "An act to amend and reduce the several acts of assembly for the inspection of tobacco, into one act. Witness our hands." And shall bear date the day the tobacco for and curren- which the same is given shall be received and passed, and shall be current in all tobacco payments, according to the species expressed in the receipt, within the county wherein such inspectors shall officiate, and in any other county next adjacent thereto, and not separate therefrom by any of the great rivers or bay herein after mentioned, that is to say:-James river, below the mouth of Appomattox; York, below West-Point; Rappahannock, below Taliaferro's Mount or by the bay of Chesapeake; and shall be transferable from one to another in all such payments, except as herein is excepted, and shall be paid and satisfied by the inspector or inspectors who signed the same upon demand.And for every hogshead of tobacco brought to any public ware-house and transferred, there shall be allowed by the inspectors thereof, to the person bringing the same, after the rate of four pounds of tobacco for every hundred pounds of tobacco the said hogshead shall contain, for the cask, so as such allowance do not exceed thirty pounds of tobacco, provided the cask or hogshead is good, and of such dimensions as is Weight of herein after expressed; and the said inspectors shall, tobaccopriz and they are hereby obliged, to make every hogshead ed in dis by them paid away in discharge of any receipt by them charge of notes. given as aforesaid, to contain one thousand pounds of 6s. inspec- nett tobacco at the least; and for every hogehead of totion, and 3s. bacco by them paid away, well lined and nailed, fit 6d. for priz. ing & nails. for shipping, there shall be paid by the person shipping such hogshead, six shillings for inspection, and three shillings and six pence for prizing and nails; which said sum of three shillings and six pence the inspectors may retain in their hands for their own use, to reimburse them the expense and trouble of providing nails and prizing. And the person demanding or receiving tobacco in discharge of receipts as aforesaid, shall allow to the inspectors thirty pounds of tobacco for each hogshead so received for the cask, and two

for cask and shrinkage,

pounds of tobacco for every hundred pounds of tobacco contained in such receipts, and so in proportion for a greater or lesser quantity, for shrinkage and wasting, if the said tobacco be paid within two months after the date of the receipt given for the same, and one pound of tobacco for every hundred for every month the same shall be unpaid after the said allowance, so Allowance as such allowance for shrinkage and wasting do not ex- to be made ceed in the whole six pounds of tobacco for hunevery dred. And if any inspector or inspectors, by whom any such receipts for tobacco as aforesaid shall be sign- Remedy a ed, shall refuse or delay to pay and satisfy the same gainst inwhen demanded, every inspector so refusing or delay- spectors. ing, shall forfeit and pay to the party injured double the tobacco so refused or delayed to be paid; to be recovered with costs, in any court of record within this state, if the receipt or receipts so refused or delayed to be paid exceed two hundred pounds of tobacco; and if the said receipt or receipts do not exceed two hundred pounds of tobacco, the double value aforesaid shall and may be recovered, before any justice of the peace of the county wherein the ware-house shall be at which the receipt or receipts ought to be paid.

How ro

be given for

crop tobac

XIX. And be it further enacted, That all tobacco brought to any of the said ware-houses in hogsheads, ceipts are to to be exported on account, and for the use of the owner thereof, after the same shall have been received, exa- co. mined, found to be good, and weighed, shall be stamped as herein before directed; and the said inspectors, or one of them, shall deliver to the person bringing the same, as many receipts signed as aforesaid, as shall be required for the number of hogsheads so brought and stamped, in which shall be expressed, whether the tobacco so received be sweet scented or Oronoko, stemmed or leaf, and whether the same be tied up in bundles or not; and where any hogshead hath part leaf and part stemmed, shall signify the same at the bottom of the receipt, and they shall not mix stemmed and leaf tobacco in any hogshead which they shall prize, and pay away in discharge of their transfer receipts; and for every hogshead brought to any of the said warehouses, to be exported by land or by water out of this Six shillings state, there shall be paid to the inspectors attending inspection at such ware-houses, by the exporter at the time of de- paid by e manding the same for exportation, the sum of six shil- porter.

tax to be

bacco.

Or failing to deliver it, when de. manded.

To transfer crop tobac

CD.

lings; and the owners of the tobacco shall find and provide nails sufficient for securing and nailing thereof, and where they shall fail so to do, the inspectors at such ware-house shall furnish nails for the purpose aforesaid, and shall be allowed and paid by the owner Penalty on eight pence for each hogshead so secured. And if any inspectors inspector or inspectors shall alter, change, or deliver changing to out, any hogshead of tobacco, other than the hogshead for which the receipt for crop tobacco to be taken in, was by him or them given; or shall alter or change any such tobacco, although no such receipt shall have been given, such inspector or inspectors shall forfeit and pay fifty pounds for every hogshead so altered, changed or delivered out. And if any inspector shall fail or refuse to deliver any hogshead of tobacco, when the same shall be demanded for exportation, such inspectors shall forfeit and pay to the owner thereof double the value of the tobacco which they shall so refuse or fail to deliver. And all inspectors shall, and they are hereby obliged, if required, to take in any receipt or receipts by them given for crop tobacco, and after having weighed such tobacco, to give transfer receipts for the same, with an allowance of four per centum for the cask, so as such allowance do not exceed thirty pounds of tobacco for every cask. Provided, That such hogshead shall contain at least one thousand pounds of nett tobacco, and not mixed leaf and stemmed. Provided nevertheless, That no inspectors shall give their receipt or receipts for any transfer or crop tobacco, which shall be opened or picked, by any picker legally appointed, until the proprietor of such tobacco, or his or her agent, shall have first paid or tendered to such picker his lawful charges for opening or picking the Rule as to same. And in the absence of any such picker, a payment paying pick or tender to any of the inspectors there attending, for the use of the picker, shall be as effectual as if made to such picker in person. And if any inspectors shall deliver their receipt or receipts for any such tobacco, so opened or picked, before such payinent or tender be made, they shall be liable to such picker for the amount of the same.

ers.

Stemed tobacco to be

XX. And for restraining the undue practice of mixlaid straight. ing trash with stemmed tobacco, and preventing the packing of tobacco in unsizeable casks, Be it enacted, That all stemmed tobacco, not laid straight, whether

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