Maria Martin was the young wife of an officer in the British East India Company. She accompanied him on a voyage in the Mediterranean in the summer of 1800 when their ship was staved in on the coast of Algeria. She and a few others made it to land and, near starvation, were found and taken captive by the native population who sold them into slavery. Martin writes well and provides detailed descriptions of the society, people, and customs of Algeria or Barbary.