In the context of A Visit from the Old Mistress, discuss the Subject and message of the General.

The left side of the painting shows three Black women dressed in torn clothes, one of whom is sitting, one of whom is standing holding a Black baby, and the third of whom is standing in the middle of the composition. They face an old white woman (the titular Old Mistress) dressed in a widow's black dress with a white lace collar, standing upright and looking evenly at the other subjects. The scene takes place in the cabin belonging to the Black women, even though an alternate title of the piece would place it in the mistress's kitchen. The intended tone of the painting is debated by art historians, with earlier writers suggesting a level of "humor" inherent in the composition, and later commentators insisting that the composition is either intended to relate a message of stubborn resistance on the part of the former slaves to their former mistress, or to create an infantilized and harmless image of recently emancipated Blacks.
left