The cultural taboo of white women having sex with black male slaves in "Mandingo" is filtered through the mind and experiences of Hammond Maxwell. The issue is not brought up until chapter 35, when Hammond sells a male slave to a German woman. The men Hammond is with understand and are amused by the fact that the woman is obviously buying the slave for sex. Hammond does not realize this at first and when he is made aware of it, his first instinct is denial: "'You gen'lemen wrong,' said Hammond. 'She white, an' ain't no white lady goin' to pester with no nigger buck. You wrong.'" When he comes to accept the obvious, he becomes physically ill: "He lay awake, obsessed and horrified by the fantasy of the German woman in the black man's arms." Hammond's repulsion foreshadows his own fate: his wife sleeping with and bearing the child of his own prize "nigger buck".