After a great deal of talk, however, he offered to sell her to me, saying that he was tired of her.

So I bargained with the man and finally agreed for her purchase for three pounds of copper wire and eight yards of blue cloth.

Next morning she was produced, an extremely ugly person with a large, flat nose, who came from somewhere in the interior of Africa, having, I gathered, been taken captive by Arabs and sold from hand to hand.

Her name, as near as I can pronounce it, was Jeel.
I had great difficulty in establishing communication with her, but ultimately found that one of my newly hired Kaffirs could understand something of her language.

Even then it was hard to make her talk, for she had never seen a white man, and thought I had bought her for some dreadful purpose or other.