Black Ivory | Page 6

he had received; "we're all friends here--leastwise we can't help ourselves."
Fortunately for our mariner the men did not understand him, and before they could make up their minds what to think of it, or how to act Harold rose, and, with a polite bow, invited them to enter.
"Do you understand English?" he asked.
A frown, and a decided shake of the head from both men, was the reply. The poor negro girl cowered behind her keepers, as if she feared that violence were about to ensue.
Having tried French with a like result, Harold uttered the name, "Yoosoof," and pointed in the direction in which the trader had entered the woods.
The men looked intelligently at each other, and nodded.
Then Harold said "Zanzibar," and pointed in the direction in which he supposed that island lay.
Again the men glanced at each other, and nodded. Harold next said "Boat--dhow," and pointed towards the creek, which remark and sign were received as before.
"Good," he continued, slapping himself on the chest, and pointing to his companion, "I go to Zanzibar, he goes, she goes," (pointing to the girl), "you go, and Yoosoof goes--all in the dhow together to Zanzibar--to-night--when moon goes down. D'ee understand? Now then, come along and have some rice."
He finished up by slapping one of the men on the shoulder, and lifting the kettle off the fire, for the rice had already been cooked and only wanted warming.
The men looked once again at each other, nodded, laughed, and sat down on a log beside the fire, opposite to the Englishmen.
They were evidently much perplexed by the situation, and, not knowing what to make of it, were disposed in the meantime to be friendly.
While they were busy with the rice, Disco gazed in silent wonder, and with intense pity, at the slave-girl, who sat a little to one side of her guardians on a mat, her small hands folded together resting on one knee, her head drooping, and her eyes cast down. The enthusiastic tar found it very difficult to restrain his feelings. He had heard, of course, more or less about African slavery from shipmates, but he had never read about it, and had never seriously given his thoughts to it, although his native sense of freedom, justice, and fair-play had roused a feeling of indignation in his breast whenever the subject chanced to be discussed by him and his mates. But now, for the first time in his life, suddenly and unexpectedly, he was brought face to face with slavery. No wonder that he was deeply moved.
"Why, Mister Seadrift," he said, in the confidential tone of one who imparts a new discovery, "I do honestly confess to 'ee that I think that's a pretty girl!"
"I quite agree with you," replied Harold, smiling.
"Ay, but I mean really pretty, you know. I've always thought that all niggers had ugly flat noses an' thick blubber lips. But look at that one: her lips are scarce a bit thicker than those of many a good-looking lass in England, and they don't stick out at all, and her nose ain't flat a bit. It's quite as good as my Nancy's nose, an' that's sayin' a good deal, I tell 'ee. Moreover, she ain't black--she's brown."
It is but justice to Disco to say that he was right in his observations, and to explain that the various negro tribes in Africa differ very materially from each other; some of them, as we are told by Dr Livingstone, possessing little of what, in our eyes, seems the characteristic ugliness of the negro--such as thick lips, flat noses, protruding heels, etcetera,--but being in every sense handsome races of humanity.
The slave-girl whom Disco admired and pitied so much belonged to one of these tribes, and, as was afterwards ascertained, had been brought from the far interior. She appeared to be very young, nevertheless there was a settled expression of meek sorrow and suffering on her face; and though handsomely formed, she was extremely thin, no doubt from prolonged hardships on the journey down to the coast.
"Here, have somethin' to eat," exclaimed Disco, suddenly filling a tin plate with rice, and carrying it to the girl, who, however, shook her head without raising her eyes.
"You're not hungry, poor thing," said the seaman, in a disappointed tone; "you look as if you should be. Come, try it," he added, stooping, and patting her head.
The poor child looked up as if frightened, and shrank from the seaman's touch, but on glancing a second time in his honest face, she appeared to feel confidence in him. Nevertheless, she would not touch the rice until her guardians said something to her sternly, when she began to eat with an appetite that was eloquent.
"Come, now, tell us what your name is, lass," said Disco, when she had finished the