If the woman had been required to remain in his service, then this would have constituted an additional inducement to a dissolute master to tamper with the virtue of his female servants. It was clearly recognized, at the same time, that to allow such a woman to go entirely free on the expiration of her first term, on the ground that the father of her bastard child was her employer, who used the influence of the relation to force her to yield to his solicitations, was to offer a strong temptation to all women in the same situation to lay their offspring at the doors of their masters, whether the latter were guilty or not.[1]
If the father of the bastard was a freeman, owning, however, no interest in the mother, he might satisfy the claim against him by paying fifteen hundred pounds of tobacco, or serving for one year the master of his paramour. He had also to give security to save the parish and her employer harmless, and was compelled to defray the whole charge imposed by the existence of the child.[2] If, on the other hand, the latter was the offspring of a servant who was unable to contribute to its support, the expense of maintaining it fell upon the parish until his term had expired; as soon as this was the case, he was compelled to reimburse the vestry for the amount which they had already been called upon to pay.[3]
In the latter part of the century, some alteration was made in these regulations. If a woman gave birth to a bastard, the sheriff, as soon as he learned of the fact, was required to arrest her, and whip her on the bare back until the blood came. Being turned over to her master, she was compelled to pay two thousand pounds of tobacco, or to remain in his employment two years after the termi-
