674 KENT COUNTY. [ART. 14.

141. They may seize and dispose of, as constables may do, all
guns found in the possession of free negroes or slaves contrary
to law.

142. They may arrest and take before some justice all persons,
white or colored, found stealing or committing any felony or mis-
demeanor, or who may be in possession of stolen property, or
which they may have under the circumstances strong and pro-
bable reasons to believe may have been stolen or improperly or
illegally obtained.

143. They may arrest and take before a justice of the peace
any free negro who may be found in company with absconding
slaves, and all persons who may aid or assist such slaves to
abscond, and the justice may commit them to jail.

144. The county commissioners shall have power to fill all
vacancies in such police, occasioned by death or removal from
the county, and may remove any member thereof for misbe-
havior, misconduct, neglect of duty or incompetency, and ap-
point others in their place.

145. They may levy annually on the county a sum of money
sufficient to pay such police, not exceeding the sum of one thou-
sand dollars in any one year.

146. If any person shall arrest and secure in the public jail
of the county, so that a sale may be made, any runaway or
absconding slave who may be leaving the service of his master
with the- intention to escape into another State; he shall be
entitled to receive from the proceeds of the sale of such slave,
twenty per cent. of the net amount after defraying the ordinary
or necessary expenses, if taken in the county; thirty per cent.
if taken out of the county and in the State, and fifty per cent.
if taken out of the State; such compensation shall be a lien
on the arrested slave, and have a precedence to all mortgages,
executions and encumbrances thereon, except a levy thereon for
public dues or taxes.

147. If any controversy arise between the owner, or his agent
or representative, and the arrester of such slave, as to whether
such slave was really absconding or running away and leaving
the service of his master, with an intention to escape into
another State, the Orphans' Court of the county shall, upon full