I now retraced my steps towards the village, but, being still absorbed in thought, I missed my way and presently entered it at the farther end, where I saw a group of children gathered round a blacksmith’s shop; and, being in an idle frame of mind, I halted to look on. It was a primitive affair--just a thatched roof on four posts--but the work was proceeding briskly enough. A sturdy boy sat on the ground between a pair of goat skins that served as bellows, and, though the forge was but a wide-mouthed jar sunk in the ground, with a hole in the bottom for the blast-pipe, the charcoal fire in it glowed brightly. The smith was at the moment fashioning a spear head on a flat slab of iron-stone that served as an anvil, holding it with queer little tongs and tapping it with an absurd little hammer, but shaping it quickly and skilfully nevertheless. I was about to move on, when my eye fell on the heap of crude iron--fresh from some native bloomery or furnace--and I observed an object that I decided to acquire if possible. This was a rough iron bar about ten inches long by an inch and a half thick--probably a half-wrought “pig.” It tapered somewhat to one end, and at the other it had an irregular cup-like hollow. The general shape--doubtless accidental--was that of a sounding lead, and for that purpose I proposed to use it, as will be seen hereafter; but it would be necessary to have a hole made in it to reeve the line through. The smith, having finished the spear head, put it aside to cool, and then observing me for the first time accosted me in very barbarous, but quite intelligible, Hausa. I returned his salutation, and, picking up the bar, asked him if he wished to sell it. “Yes. I will sell it,” he replied. “Canst thou make a hole through this end?” “Certainly I can.” “And what will the price then be?” I asked. He considered a moment, and then said, “A thousand kurdi.” “Very well,” I replied. “Make the hole and I will pay thee.” He seemed greatly astonished at my accepting his price without haggling--a thing unheard of in Africa--but he promptly stuck the rod in the fire and looked out a point to make the hole with, while the boy worked the bellows. I fished up out of my capacious pocket the remnants of my bag of cowries, and had hardly finished counting them out on the ground before the work was done and the hissing iron plunged into a calabash of water to cool.