He was acting as interpreter between Stephen Somers and Mavovo.
"This Zulu man declares, Mr.Somers," he said, "that he quite understands everything you have been explaining, and that it is probable that we shall all be butchered by this savage Bausi, if we cannot tell him when the white man, Dogeetah, whom he loves, will arrive here.

He says also that he thinks that by his magic he could learn when this will happen--if it is to happen at all--( which of course, Mr.Somers, for your private information only, is a mighty lie of the ignorant heathen).
He adds, however, that he does not care one brass farthing--his actual expression, Mr.Somers, is 'one grain of corn on a mealie-cob'-- about his or anybody else's life, which from all I have heard of his proceedings I can well believe to be true.

He says in his vulgar language that there is no difference between the belly of a Mazitu-land hyena and that of any other hyena, and that the earth of Mazitu-land is as welcome to his bones as any other earth, since the earth is the wickedest of all hyenas, in that he has observed that soon or late it devours everlastingly everything which once it bore.

You must forgive me for reproducing his empty and childish talk, Mr.Somers, but you bade me to render the words of this savage with exactitude.

In fact, Mr.Somers, this reckless person intimates, in short that some power with which he is not acquainted--he calls it the 'Strength that makes the Sun to shine and broiders the blanket of the night with stars' (forgive me for repeating his silly words), caused him 'to be born into this world, and, at an hour already appointed, will draw him from this world back into its dark, eternal bosom, there to be rocked in sleep, or nursed to life again, according to its unknown will'-- I translate exactly, Mr.Somers, although I do not know what it all means--and that he does not care a curse when this happens.