Engraving accompanies a fictional episode described in Letter XI, "The Marriage." Leaning over the staircase balustrade in the upper left, the story's narrator observes the scene taking place below, as does Cleopatra, an elderly slave, who watches from several steps down. In the center of the scene, mistress Rosalie forces the slaves Mima and Juniper to jump over a broomstick that stretches between two chairs. This is part of the forced marriage ceremony over which Rosalie presides. When the weeping Mima hesitates to jump, Rosalies boxes her ears with her slipper. In the background, another house-slave watches from behind a door., Plate in Emily C. Pearson's Cousin Franck's Household, or, Scenes in the Old Dominion (Boston: Upham, Ford, and Olmstead, 1853), p 168., Fels Afro-Americana Image Project, Scenes from Slave Life.
Creator
Hayes, George H., engraver
Date
[1853]
Location
Library Company of Philadelphia | Books & Other Texts | Rare Am 1853 Pear 73222.O p 168, https://digital.librarycompany.org/islandora/object/Islandora%3A2793
