The other thought there would be no difficulty; you could always see a slave girl quail when you looked in her eyes.
I asked if they thought the mulattoes or white slaves were weaker or less valuable than the pure negroes.
"Oh, no; I'd rather have them a great deal," said one. "Well, I had not," said the other; "the blacker the better for me." "The white ones," added the first, "are more active, and know more, and I think they do the most work." "Are they more subject to illness, or do they appear to be of weaker constitutions?" One said they were not, the other that they did not seem to bear the heat as well. The first thought that this might be so, but that, nevertheless, they would do more work. I afterwards asked the manager's opinion. He thought they did not stand excessive heat as well as the pure negroes, but that, from their greater activity and willingness, they would do more work. He believed they were equally strong and no more liable to illness; had never had reason to think them of weaker constitution. They often had-large families, and he had not noticed that their
- [Footnote: same county. Violet says that she protested against each sale made of her, declaring
herself a free woman. She names George Gilmer, Thomas Rogers, John Garret, and others, residents of Pike county, Alabama, as persons who have known her from infancy as the daughter of one Jeremiah Ludlow and Rene Martin, a widow at the time of her birth, and as being a free white woman, and her father a free white man. Violet is about instituting legal proceedings for her freedom."—Shreveport Southwestern.
"Some days since, a woman named Pelasgie was arrested as a fugitive slave, who has lived for more than twelve years in this city as a free woman. She was so nearly white that few could detect any traces of her African descent. She was arrested at the instance of a man named Raby, who claimed her as belonging to an estate of which he is heir-at-law. She was conveyed to the First District guard-*house for safe keeping, and while there she stated to Acting Recorder Filleul that she was free, had never belonged to Raby, and had been in the full and unquestioned enjoyment of her freedom in this city for the above-mentioned period. She also stated that she had a house, well furnished, which she was in the habit of letting out in rooms."—New Orleans Picayune.]
