CHAPTERIII.
Staying at Farree with Mr. Scott.—Both placed under parole.—Description of the houses of Farree.—Of the flour mill.—Some remarks upon the origin of the Amhara.—Dr. Prichard upon identity of the Amhara with the Antomali of Herodotus.—Physical characters of the people.—Interview with the Wallasmah.—Saltpetre rock.—Province of Efat.—Take leave of Escort.—Tyrannical conduct of the Wallasmah.
Staying at Farree with Mr. Scott.—Both placed under parole.—Description of the houses of Farree.—Of the flour mill.—Some remarks upon the origin of the Amhara.—Dr. Prichard upon identity of the Amhara with the Antomali of Herodotus.—Physical characters of the people.—Interview with the Wallasmah.—Saltpetre rock.—Province of Efat.—Take leave of Escort.—Tyrannical conduct of the Wallasmah.
May 26, 1842.—After Mr. Scott joined me at Farree, I considered that all my troubles were at an end, although I had still to go above fifty miles before I could meet the members of the British Political Mission who had accompanied the King to his residence at Angolahlah, the most western town of his dominions. An establishment was still kept up at Ankobar, situated about one third of the way between Farree and Angolahlah, at the head of which was the naturalist attached to the Mission, Dr. Roth, with whom was Mr. Bernatz, the artist, and there also Mr. Scott was stationed. Captain Harris the Ambassador, Captain Graham, the second in command, and Mr. Assistant-Surgeon Kirk, lived at Angolahlah, where I now expected to be permitted to go by my gaoler the Wallasmah.I found, however, I was reckoning without my host, for a new difficulty had arisen, from the circumstance of Mr. Scott having come down to Farree without the permission of Walda-anna, the Governor of Ankobar. He was accordingly given to understand that he must consider himself a prisoner with me until the pleasure of the negoos should be known as to our disposal. It was in vain we expostulated with our surly gaoler; we were to be opposed by force if we attempted to leave Farree, and other sentinels were charged with the care of us. Something we did effect, and that was the liberation of the messenger who was detected bringing me a letter the day before, for as soon as this request was made to the Wallasmah it was at once acceded to, and the man was ordered to be set at liberty. Taking this as an evidence of some relaxation of the harsh treatment with which we had been treated, we sat sometime chatting with the old gentleman, and I hinted my intention of making him some present if he would honour me so far as to accept of my poor gifts. When we got up from the ground where we had been sitting, the Wallasmah directed his son, a fine young man about three or four and twenty years old, to accompany us to our residence; a sufficient intimation of his being graciously disposed, without the broad hint given by one of his followers, who whispered into the ears of Mr. Scott, “Give yourmemolageeto that man.” Our imprisoned servant not makinghis appearance before we left the Wallasmah, we asked where he was, and were surprised to hear that he had left Farree for Angolahlah without seeing us, but which we supposed he had been obliged to do, so that there should be no chance of our slipping a note into his hands for our friends in that town.
We returned to our house, and for the rest of the day amused ourselves with hearing and telling whatever most interested us, whether of home or foreign news. I must observe that a present of three pieces of calico and a pound of gunpowder was made to the Wallasmah, who sent us back his compliments, and that he was highly delighted with the present, but would be obliged for a little more gunpowder.
Mr. Scott and I were entertained and taken care of for four days in Farree, much to our discomfort and vexation. Fortunately this gentleman had brought with him two native servants, who made themselves useful by marketing and cooking during the term of our confinement, so we suffered nothing from want of food. We could also walk about the straggling town on pledging our word that we would not attempt to escape, although our parole was not deemed sufficient, for, like Buonaparte at St. Helena, two sentinels, on such excursions, always followed at a certain distance in our rear.
Many of the houses in Farree, instead of beingthe usual circle of closely placed sticks, some five feet high and surmounted by a high conical straw roof, are partial excavations in the soft trachytic stone, so as to leave a back and sides of natural rock. Over this is laid a flat roof, consisting of untrimmed rafters covered by a thick layer of brushwood, upon which is placed a layer of earth some inches in thickness, well stamped down with the feet. A front of wattled sticks, in which the entrance is made, completes the house, and in one such as this was I lodged during my stay in this town.
The internal arrangements were equally simple. A raised platform of stones and clay, about two feet high, occupied one half of the single apartment, and upon one end of this, reaching to the roof, stood a huge butt-like basket, smoothly plastered over inside and out with clay. This was the family granary, in which was preserved the teff seed, or wheat, from the depredations of the numerous mice that are a thorough pest in Abyssinia. In a corner below, stood side by side two of the peculiar handmills used in this country, each consisting of a large flat stone of cellular lava, two feet long and one foot broad, raised upon a rude pedestal of stones and mud, about one foot and a half from the ground. The rough surface of this stone sloped gradually down from behind forwards into a basin-like cavity, into which the flour falls as it is ground. A second stone, graspedin the hand of the woman who grinds, weighs about three pounds, beneath which, as it is moved up and down the inclined plane of the under millstone, the grain is crushed, and gradually converted into a coarse flour.
This is the same kind of mill that was used by the ancient Egyptians, and is represented in the excellent work upon those people, recently written by Sir G. Wilkinson, although he describes it as being used for fulling clothes, having mistaken, I suppose, the flour represented as falling into the cup-like recipient for a stream of water. I observe, also, in another plate in the same work, a representation of this mill, but without any allusion to its real purposes. Moses, in the fifth verse of the eleventh chapter of Exodus, describes exactly the character of the occupation, and the instrument, where he speaks “of the maid-servant that is behind the mill,” for women are only employed on this duty, and they always stand in the rear, leaning forward over their work. Very few houses, those only of the poorest people, have but one mill; generally two or more stand side by side in a row, and the number is always mentioned when the idea is wished to be conveyed of the large dependent retinue that the master of the house feeds.
A few large jars containing water, or ale, ranged along one side of the house, and a shield hung from the projecting end of one of the sticks that formed the front, were the only articles thatoccupied prominent positions as furniture in my residence. Three or four “maceroitsh,” or earthenware pots for cooking, generally lay upset in the white wood ashes contained in the large circular hearth that occupied a portion of the floor opposite to the mills; and some of the necessary but small instruments for clearing or spinning cotton were placed when not being used upon a skin bag, in which a quantity of that useful material was contained.
I was very much struck with the extreme contrasts that could be drawn between the inhabitants of Farree and the Dankalli Bedouins. The large and portly forms of the former, their apparent love of quiet, the affection they evinced for their children, and that of the children for their parents, were all points characteristic of these great differences. The physiognomy of the two people exhibited equally varying features, and as the men of Farree are a good type of the real Amhara population, I shall endeavour to give an idea of the form of the countenance and the head peculiar to this family of man, by a description drawn from my first observations in that town, where the people have less admixture of Galla blood, than the inhabitants of the table land of Shoa above and beyond them.
This will be preceded, however, by some necessary, and, I believe, novel information respecting the origin of the Amhara, which I became acquainted with during my residence inShoa, and which has been singularly confirmed by a comparison of the reports and prejudices I noted down while in that country, with recorded circumstances of the earlier history of Egypt, and of other powerful empires that once existed along the course of the Nile.
Amhara, which word is at present only used to designate the Christian population of Abyssinia, was, previous to the introduction of the Mahomedan religion, the descriptive appellation of an extensive red people, who principally occupied the eastern border of the Abyssinian table land, from the latitude of Massoah in the north to that of lake Zui in the south. To the west of these, and occupying the portion of the table land in that direction, lived a people decidedly different in their complexion, their features, their language, their religion, and their customs. These were the Gongas, or Agows, who I believe to have been the original possessors of the whole plateau, until a period remarkable in history, when the Emperor of Meroë or Ethiopia located upon a portion of their country, those disaffected soldiers of Psammeticus who had sought an asylum in his kingdom. Were I not convinced that the Amhara population of Abyssinia, at the present day, can be physically demonstrated to be the descendants of these fugitives from Egypt, I would not venture to advance such an innovation upon the generally received opinion, that the Amhara are aborigines of the country they now inhabit.
Under the term Abyssins, Dr. Prichard, in his invaluable work upon the natural history of man, includes all the different nations that now inhabit the lofty plain of Abisha or Abyssinia. Of one of these nations, the Amhara, he remarks, “So striking is the resemblance between the modern Abyssinians and the Hebrews of old, that we can hardly look upon them but as branches of one nation, and if we had not convincing evidence to the contrary, and knew not for certain that the Abramidæ originated in Chaldæa, and to the northward and eastward of Palestine, we might frame a very probable hypothesis, which would bring them down as a band of wandering shepherds from the mountains of Habesh, and identify them with the pastor kings, who, according to Manetho, multiplied their bands in the land of the Pharaohs, and being, after some centuries, expelled thence by the will of the gods, sought refuge in Judea, and built the walls of Jerusalem. Such an hypothesis would explain the existence of an almost Israelitish people, and the preservation of a language so nearly approaching to the Hebrew in intertropical Africa.” The learned ethnologist goes on to observe—“It is certainly untrue; and we find no other easy explanation of the facts which the history of Abyssinia presents, and particularly of the early extension of the Jewish religion and customs through that country, for the legend which makes the royal house ofMenilek descend from Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, is as idle a story as ever monks invented to abuse the reverent ignorance of their lay brethren.”
Herodotus, and other ancient historians and geographers, have recorded the migration of a vast body of discontented native soldiers from Egypt, in the time of Psammeticus. These, we are told, to the number of 240,000, retired to the country of Ethiopia, where they were kindly received by the Emperor. They assisted him in his wars, and in return were apportioned, as a residence, some country on the confines of Ethiopia, from which they were to drive a rebellious people to make room for themselves. Herodotus places this country “upon the Nile, at about the same distance beyond Meroë as this last is from Elephantine, or fifty days’ journey;” and he also adds, that “the Antomali (deserters) are known by the name of Asmach, which, being translated, signifies ‘standing on the left hand’ of the King.” It is a most remarkable circumstance that the reason or origin of the name of the country of Gurague, literally “on the left side,” has long been a question of interest with every Abyssinian traveller, but none have given any satisfactory explanation for what reason this particular, and evidently significant, name was first applied. The situation of the Amhara with respect to the Abi or Bruce’s Nile at once accounts for the designation, as they live upon the left hand of the stream as it flows southfrom lake Dembea, whilst that portion of this people still retaining their ancient name and purity of descent, the present Gurague occupy a country similarly situated with respect to the river Zebee, or Azzabi, or Assabinus, the Ethiopian Jupiter. Abi and Abiah, other names for branches of the Nile in Abyssinia, are expressive offatherorking, evidently from having been, at a former period, the chief objects of worship by the people inhabiting their banks. “Asmach,” and “Gurague,” bear, therefore, the same interpretation, “to the left of the king,” and none other can explain the circumstance of the latter name being given to the Amhara. It appears, however to have been bestowed in contra-distinction to the “Gongas,” or “Kongue,” a people who originally occupied the right banks solely of the Abi and Abiah.
This singular correspondence between “Asmach” of the Grecian historian, and “Gurague” of modern travellers, would be alone, perhaps, inconclusive evidence that these terms apply to the same people or country, but some additional evidence may be drawn from the account which Pliny gives of these Egyptian fugitives. On the authority of Aristocreon, he states, that “Seventeen days from Meroë is Esar, a city of those Egyptians who fled from Psammeticus, and entered the service of the monarch of that country, and in return received a considerable tract of territory upon the confines, from which the Ethiopianprince ordered them to expel a tribe of people, at that time in rebellion against him, and this migration of the Egyptian troops, introducing the arts and manners of a refined nation, had a very sensible effect in civilizing the Ethiopians.” The most interesting particulars we gather from this information, is the name of the city, or, as I presume, the chief seat of these fugitives, Esar.
By a singular coincidence in the Old Testament, we are told that Esau is Edom, and although I am not going to infer from this alone, any connexion between that patriarch and the Ethiopian city, Esar, yet the philological analogy between the scriptural proper names, curiously enough, also exists between those of profane history; for the Esar and Amhara of our subject, express the very same idea as Esau and Edom, which by all Biblical commentators, is allowed to be the colour red. “And the first came out red, all over like an hairy garment; and they called his name Esau.” (Genesisxxv.25.)
In the present Dankalli language, and I think also, in that of ancient Meroë, Assar signifies red. In the Persian, I am given to understand that the planet Mars is called Azer, from its characteristic colour, a circumstance of significant import when it is considered that the word Calla, from which is derived Galla, “Ab” the root of Abi, and “Nil,” from which comes Nile, with others I have yet to speak of, as designations ofplaces in Abyssinia, are all referable to the same language. To return, however, to Esar, and its connexion with the colour red, for it is the same with Esau, and that it is the same as Edom in Hebrew, I advance the testimony of Dr. Stukeley, who, speaking of the Red Sea, remarks, “That sea had its name from Erythras, as the Greeks and the same Pliny write; who is Edom, or Esau, brother of Jacob. The words are synonymous, signifying red.”[1]Amhara, also bears the same interpretation in Amharic, and although it has another meaning, that of beautiful, this is only because of the national taste directing the name of the favourite complexion among them, to be employed as the term for beauty itself. The Dankalli slave-merchant well understands this, for a light-red Abyssinian girl is the Circassian of oriental harems. In Arabia, where the original word still conveys the more common idea, we find “hamah” employed to express the colour red.
In this manner, I connect the “Asmach” of Herodotus, with Gurague of modern travellers, and the Esar of Pliny, with the Amhara of the present day, and from these two mutually corroborating correspondencies, the identity of the modern Abyssinians of Dr. Prichard with the Automali of Herodotus may perhaps be deduced, and the difficulty of accounting for a Hebrew people, situated on the Abyssinian plateau only requiresproof to be advanced that the revolted soldiers of Psammeticus were of the same family of man as the fugitive Israelites who sought a refuge, under nearly similar circumstances, in Syria, and built the walls of Jerusalem; and as their languages are nearly the same, as also their manners, customs, and ancient religion, previous to the introduction of Christianity, it will not, perhaps, be difficult to adduce such evidence. For my part, I am inclined to believe in this national relationship, because it is partly confirmed by the received account of the brothers, Esau and Jacob, contained in the book of Genesis, and the connexion between the two patriarchs, and the country of Egypt, will perhaps receive some illustration from the opinion I have ventured to advance upon the subject. In the elder brother, Esau, I perceive the father of the royal shepherds, and among the list of the dukes, his descendants may be found, perhaps the pastor kings who held for some time the sovereign power in Egypt.
The connexion also of the name Esau, or Esar, with the profession of soldiers, is evident, for in oriental mythology it is identified with the god Mars; whilst on the other hand, the wordIsrael, in Hebrew, I believe, as in Amharic has an immediate reference tolabour, as the name Jacob has also to theheel, which coincides very singularly with the idea prevalent in India, that the labouring class have all sprung from the foot of Brahmah. Itwould be very interesting, if future discoveries in hieroglyphics, or other cotemporary histories, which, I believe, do exist in central Africa, should prove that the appearance of the Jews as a family of man, under the patriarch Abraham, marks the disruption of an African community of castes, where the Priest class, excited by the ambition of a Psammeticus, should determine upon the expulsion of the soldiers, who thereupon fled to Ethiopia; and, also, that after a tyrannical and cruel oppression should ultimately occasion the flight of the workmen, or Israelites, into Palestine. I leave the question, however, now, to more profound ethnologists, and shall conclude this, I am afraid, very uninteresting subject, with a short but necessary description of the features and physical characteristics of the present Amhara population of Abyssinia.
In the British Museum are many Egyptian statues that possess exactly the features of the genuine Amhara race. One more, especially of a woman in the lower saloon marked 16, I will particularize, to enable those who have the opportunity of examining these relics of an extinct nation to form a proper idea of the physiognomy of the people I am speaking of.
Their general complexion cannot be better described by reference to a familiar object than comparing it with that of red unpolished copper. Their skin is soft and delicate; the general stature is below the middle height of Europeans. Theirforms are not fully developed until they have arrived at the same years of puberty as ourselves; and it is very uncommon for women under seventeen to bear children. The features of the women conform to a general characteristic type, and less variations from this are observed among them than in the men. This observation extends to other races besides the Amhara, for I have invariably found more consistency of countenance, more nationality preserved in the features of females than in the males of the many different people I have met with in my travels in Abyssinia.
The Amhara face is ovate, having a considerably greater expression of breadth in the upper than in the lower part. The scalp in front encroaches upon the forehead, making its length disproportionate to its height, and, in consequence, it appears exceedingly low. The eyes are long, but rather full, and the separation of the eyelids longitudinal, as in Europeans. Their cheeks are high, yet finely rounded, and sometimes, with the long forehead, giving to the countenance a nearly triangular form. The nose straight and well-formed, with a small and beautiful mouth, a finely-curved edge gradually rising from the commissure to the fulness of a most inviting pair of lips. A voluptuous fulness, in fact, pervades the whole countenance; a something more than muscular fibre, yet not exactly fat, giving a healthy fleshiness, that reminds you of the chubbiness of children; and I expect the fascinatingexpression so generally ascribed to Abyssinian beauties by all orientals is owing to the idea of innocence and simplicity, that inseparably connects itself with this infantile character of face. The hair is soft and long; it is neither woolly, like the negro, nor is it the strong, coarse, straight hair of the Gongas, or yellow inhabitants of the right bank of the Abi and Abiah branches of the Azzabi, or red Nile.
I saw few or no cases of distortion among the families I met with in Efat, and my impression is that they but rarely occur, the natural and simple lives of the people conducing to easy parturition and a healthy offspring. The Amhara, however, in their most unchanged condition in Gurague, and the neighbouring Christian states, have yet to be visited. The inhabitants of these countries may exhibit characteristic traits that I have had no opportunities of observing, for those I met with were the most favourable specimens of the imported slaves, or their immediate descendants, who were married to Mahomedans of Efat.
Individuals possessing what I believe to have been the characteristic features of the genuine Amharic countenance are but seldom seen on the high land of Shoa, although it might naturally be expected that their situation would favour a lighter complexion than the dark-brown Shoans exhibit. This is to be attributed to the very recent period that their Galla ancestorial relations intruded themselves into this former Amhara district, as Abyssinian history records that the first appearance of theseinvaders from the low plains of Adal occurred no later than the year 1537.
From the 27th to the 31st of May, Mr. Scott and I remained in easy durance at Farree. We were frequently summoned to the presence of the Wallasmah, whom we would amuse by firing off my gun, or teaching his son, a boy about fourteen years old, to let off percussion caps without shutting his eyes. The dreadful experiment would never be attempted by papa, but he wonderfully enjoyed the bright promise of his hopeful progeny, the child of his old age, who, on the other hand, annoyed us not a little by the unsatisfied pertness with which he demanded to be so indulged.
Day after day were we most solemnly promised that we should start upon the morrow, but without any intention of being permitted to do so, beyond the accident occurring of our being sent for by the King. Perhaps our importunity excited a desire to gratify us, and what they wished for our sake the kind-hearted people of Farree asserted would be, because of the great probability that the messenger who had been sent to the King to receive his commands, would return sooner than he did.
I am not going to acquit the Wallasmah on this plea, for his want of courtesy towards us; for from some incomprehensible antipathy, he would, had he dared, have placed us in irons, and even on occasions of our visiting him, when we endeavoured to do everything we could to please him, a surly smile was our only return for some little gratification we mightafford to his boy. His people frequently made excuses for the conduct of their chief, by stating that he either had been drinking, or else that he had not; so, drunk or sober, it seemed quite natural to them that the old fellow should be in a continual ill-humour from some undefined connexion with strong drink.
I took care to promise him another present on the occasion of our leaving Farree, as I conceived that it might be some expectation of the sort that was operating to cause our tiresome detention. I was wrong in this, for it was not his pleasure, but the King’s, his master, that we should be kept at Farree, although he tried to make us believe it was his own, and assuming an authority that did not belong to him, made our confinement more irksome than it needed to have been, on purpose to evince his power. With our sentinels behind us, however, we could wander all over the hill of Farree, and we accordingly amused ourselves by endeavouring to extend our information upon the various subjects of novel interest with which we were surrounded.
One observation I cannot do better than to insert here, respecting the rocks and soil of Farree, which abound with the nitrate of potass, the bald face of the former, in many places, being hollowed into deep grooves by the constant attrition of the tongues of the numerous flocks and herds, which seem to be as fond of this salt as the same animals are of common table salt in other countries; acircumstance that is well shown in those saline resorts of deer and buffaloes, called the “licks” of North America. The geological structure of the hills in this neighbourhood is a finely-grained trachytic rock; grey, save where the intrusion of narrow dykes of some blacker rocks, a few feet in thickness, and evidently heated on their first appearance, has changed the general colour to a deep red, which gradually recovers its natural hue at the distance of some yards on either side the dyke. This rock contains a considerable quantity of decomposing felt-spar, supplying the potass, and, I presume, deriving from the atmosphere, and the moisture it contains, the other necessary elements to form the thick efflorescence of saltpetre that covers in some places the surface of the rock.
The religion of Farree is exclusively Mahomedan, as is also that of more than three-fourths of the towns and villages of the province of Efat, all of which are under the hereditary viceregal Wallasmah, who boasts a descent from the famous Mahomed Grahnè, the Adal conqueror of many portions of the ancient Abyssinian empire, in the sixteenth century. Efat forms a portion of the valley country, or Argobbah, which extends from the edge of the table land of Shoa to the Hawash, that flows along the base of this slope, from the south towards the north. The northern boundary of Efat is the river Robee, the southern one being the Kabani; both of them flow into the Hawash.
Late in the afternoon of the 30th of May, themessenger returned from Angolahlah, with orders from the King that I should be allowed to proceed thither, and that the stores should be conveyed to his presence. Considerable bustle and confusion seemed thereupon to take possession of the previously quiet town. Vociferous proclamations were from time to time issued by the misselannee in person, standing upon the stone enclosure in the centre of the market-place. Numerous informants, willing to be the first bearers of good news, hurried to acquaint us with the cause of all the stir, and to assure us that we were to start in the morning; for that the requisite permission had arrived from the King, and the Wallasmah had directed our mules to be brought in from the grazing ground. The proclamations of the misselannee were to the effect that all persons owing suit and service to the Wallasmah, on account of land held of him, must present themselves; and either personally, or by their slaves, convey the boxes and other packages as far as Aliu Amba, on the road to Angolahlah, from which town a relief party would then take the duty of carrying them the remaining distance.
From the character of the road, badly constructed and in wretched condition, all the packages had to be conveyed up the long ascent to Shoa upon the shoulders of men. Besides, the only beasts of burden, except an occasional worn-out mule or horse, employed by the Abyssinians, are asses, and these were found to be unequal to the carriage of large angular-formed boxes, which, infact, could not have been properly secured upon the backs of these little animals.
In the evening the Hy Soumaulee came to bid me good-bye, objecting to the cold of Angolahlah, when I asked them if they did not intend to visit me there. They shuddered at the thought of it, and all business transactions, as regarded payment for their services, were referred to the agency of the two heads of the Kafilah, Ohmed Mahomed and Ebin Izaak, who were obliged, of course, to present themselves to the Negoos Sahale Selassee, and to the British ambassador.
I saw them depart with feelings of regret that I had no means in my power to reward the services of these faithful, and I will add, attached Bedouins; beyond bearing testimony to the great capabilities of their people, who are possessed certainly of the greatest virtues and of the noblest attributes of our nature, if judged by the standard of human excellence contained in the Iliad or Æneid, the heroes of which I would undertake to match with many Dankalli warriors of the present day. During my stay in this town, it was customary for them to come from Channo, where they were quartered, to sit with me an hour or so in the cool of the morning or the evening. On these occasions their appearance always gave me pleasure, bursting into sight all at once as they chased each other over the crest of the hill, their dark forms for a moment boldly relieved upon the bright sky behind them; down they would comefull speed along the tortuous, but easy sloping descent across the market-place and up the low bank to my residence, shouting as they came, “Ahkeem, ahkeem,” to give me notice of their approach. On entering, four or five of them, with their usual impetuosity, would extend their hands for the sliding contact with the palm of mine, at the same time calling out together the oft-repeated expression, “Negarsee,” or “Myhisee,” which respectively characterizes the evening or morning salutation.
It was after sunset of the last day we were at Farree, before the Wallasmah sent for us to communicate the pleasure of the King, or Negoos, as I shall call him for the future. We were ordered to proceed to Angolahlah; and whilst we were talking, our mules were brought up and delivered over to Mr. Scott’s servants, that we might start as early as we pleased the next morning. The Wallasmah also was ordered to attend at Angolahlah, which was one reason of his having withheld the information of our departure from us until the last moment. The summons which he was obliged to obey did not exactly accord with his wishes, and a two days’ journey for an old man of sixty years of age, we admitted was a sufficient reason for the increased ill-temper with which he received the causers of so much trouble when we visited him on the last occasion. I took with me another pound of gunpowder and some more coloured cotton cloth; and these had the goodeffect of restoring him to perfect good humour: indeed, to show his regard for us, much to our surprise, he directed some of his attendants to liberate the unfortunate messenger who had been detected bringing me a letter the day before Mr. Scott’s arrival, and who, we conceived, had returned to Ankobar, according as had been stated on one of our first visits by the Wallasmah himself. Instead of this being the fact, we now found that the poor fellow had been the whole time confined in his thatched lock-up, and supplied with a scanty fare of the worst kind of bread and water. I felt very sorry for him when he came staggering out of prison, with blood-shot eyes and squalid look; and it was with feelings of pity rather than of contempt, that I witnessed the broken spirited man, with shoulders bare, and with the most abject submission, stoop and kiss the earth at the feet of his unjust and tyrannical oppressor. The Wallasmah, with the penetrating glance of suspicious cunning, read in my countenance the detestation I felt at such unwarrantable conduct on his part, and muttered in excuse, something about the man having been “one of Krapf’s servants,” as if he considered that quite a sufficient pretext for the harshest treatment. The Mahomedans of Efat fully believe, that the exhortations of that zealous missionary alone prevented the Negoos from changing his religion; as, shortly before his arrival in Shoa, a Koran and a mollum to expound it to the Christian monarch, had been sent for to the palace.
Mr. Scott and I were so astonished at seeing the man whom we thought to be far distant, that we could not say anything. It would have been a great relief to my indignation if I could have told my thoughts to the old scoundrel, but this being out of the question, I walked away as quickly as possible from his presence, followed by Mr. Scott and our servants; and I do hope that our abrupt and unceremonious departure annoyed him a little, and thus retaliated in some measure for his contempt of, and disrespect towards us.
The politic Sahale Selassee, Negoos of Shoa, is well aware of the character of the Wallasmah, and the value of having such an imbecile ruling over the restless Mahomedan population of his kingdom. A governor, indeed, of whom he may truly say, as our Charles the Second did of himself and of his brother the Duke of York, “That his subjects would never kill him to make the other King.”
The inhabitants of Efat, much as they dislike the opprobrious position of living under a Christian monarch, never entertain an idea of revolting from the Negoos to place themselves under the power of that vindictive drunkard the Wallasmah Mahomed; whose only claim to their respect is his religion and his descent from the hero of modern Abyssinian history, Mahomed Grahnè, of whose extensive kingdom of Adal this little province of Efat, not so large as Middlesex, is all that has remained to his family, and even that is now a portion of the Christian state of Shoa.
FOOTNOTES:[1]Dr. Stukeley. “Stonehenge, a British Temple,” page 53.
[1]Dr. Stukeley. “Stonehenge, a British Temple,” page 53.