DECREE of the Conseil of Port-au-Prince, concerning the various marks with which criminal nègres shall be branded

HAVING SEEN the requisition of the Procureur-Général du Roi, stating that at the execution of Decrees rendered against nègres convicted of theft, the greatest abuses occur every day; that the fleur de lis is applied to their right shoulder for the offense of marronage; that the practice has also been introduced in the Juridictions of ordering the same fleur de lis mark for theft, when after the whipping and the brand the said nègres are returned to their enslavers without prior sentence to the galleys; that the same fleur de lis mark being used for two offenses differing in their nature and in the penalties assigned to them, the greatest inconveniences can arise when the same nègres find themselves in the case of a new accusation, almost always not knowing then for which offense they have already been branded; that it is essential to remedy this first disorder by fixing the imprint of the hot iron for each offense.