Clotel, or The Presidents Daughter | Page 6

the breast, and some of
them very prolific in their generating qualities, affording a rare
opportunity to any one who wishes to raise a strong and healthy lot of
servants for their own use. Also several mulatto girls of rare personal
qualities: two of them very superior. Any gentleman or lady wishing to
purchase, can take any of the above slaves on trial for a week, for
which no charge will be made." Amongst the above slaves to be sold
were Currer and her two daughters, Clotel and Althesa; the latter were
the girls spoken of in the advertisement as "very superior." Currer was
a bright mulatto, and of prepossessing appearance, though then nearly
forty years of age. She had hired her time for more than twenty years,
during which time she had lived in Richmond. In her younger days
Currer had been the housekeeper of a young slaveholder; but of later
years had been a laundress or washerwoman, and was considered to be
a woman of great taste in getting up linen. The gentleman for whom
she had kept house was Thomas Jefferson, by whom she had two
daughters. Jefferson being called to Washington to fill a government
appointment, Currer was left behind, and thus she took herself to the
business of washing, by which means she paid her master, Mr. Graves,
and supported herself and two children. At the time of the decease of
her master, Currer's daughters, Clotel and Althesa, were aged
respectively sixteen and fourteen years, and both, like most of their
own sex in America, were well grown. Currer early resolved to bring
her daughters up as ladies, as she termed it, and therefore imposed little
or no work upon them. As her daughters grew older, Currer had to pay
a stipulated price for them; yet her notoriety as a laundress of the first
class enabled her to put an extra price upon her charges, and thus she
and her daughters lived in comparative luxury. To bring up Clotel and
Althesa to attract attention, and especially at balls and parties, was the
great aim of Currer. Although the term "Negro ball" is applied to most
of these gatherings, yet a majority of the attendants are often whites.
Nearly all the Negro parties in the cities and towns of the Southern

States are made up of quadroon and mulatto girls, and white men.
These are democratic gatherings, where gentlemen, shopkeepers, and
their clerks, all appear upon terms of perfect equality. And there is a
degree of gentility and decorum in these companies that is not
surpassed by similar gatherings of white people in the Slave States. It
was at one of these parties that Horatio Green, the son of a wealthy
gentleman of Richmond, was first introduced to Clotel. The young man
had just returned from college, and was in his twenty-second year.
Clotel was sixteen, and was admitted by all to be the most beautiful girl,
coloured or white, in the city. So attentive was the young man to the
quadroon during the evening that it was noticed by all, and became a
matter of general conversation; while Currer appeared delighted
beyond measure at her daughter's conquest. From that evening, young
Green became the favourite visitor at Currer's house. He soon promised
to purchase Clotel, as speedily as it could be effected, and make her
mistress of her own dwelling; and Currer looked forward with pride to
the time when she should see her daughter emancipated and free. It was
a beautiful moonlight night in August, when all who reside in tropical
climes are eagerly gasping for a breath of fresh air, that Horatio Green
was seated in the small garden behind Currer's cottage, with the object
of his affections by his side. And it was here that Horatio drew from his
pocket the newspaper, wet from the press, and read the advertisement
for the sale of the slaves to which we have alluded; Currer and her two
daughters being of the number. At the close of the evening's visit, and
as the young man was leaving, he said to the girl, "You shall soon be
free and your own mistress."
As might have been expected, the day of sale brought an unusual large
number together to compete for the property to be sold. Farmers who
make a business of raising slaves for the market were there;
slave-traders and speculators were also numerously represented; and in
the midst of this throng was one who felt a deeper interest in the result
of the sale than any other of the bystanders; this was young Green. True
to his promise, he was there with a blank bank check in his pocket,
awaiting with impatience to enter the list as a bidder for the beautiful
slave. The less valuable