the rainbow, adding every other little present they seemed fond of, or what we thought would be agreeable. As for our amiable Irepone, we had reserved for her the choicest of our presents, the most valuable of every article we had with us, and a large proportion of every one of them; we gave her, besides, some gold; but she, more generous and noble in her sentiments than us, seemed to pay little attention to these that announced to her the separation from her friends; she tore her fine hair, which she had every day before braided in a newer and more graceful manner; she threw herself upon the ground in the house, and refused to see us mount on horseback, or take our leave, and came not to the door till we were already set out, then followed us with her good wishes and her eyes, as far as she could see or be heard.

I took my leave of Kefla Abay, the venerable priest of the most famous river in the world, who recommended me, with great earnestness, to the care of his god, which, as Strates humorously enough observed, meant nothing else than that he hoped the devil would take me. All the young men in the village, with lances and shields, attended us to Saint Michael Sacala, that is, to the borders of their country, and end of my little sovereignty.

CHAPTER XII.

The Return from Geesh to Gondar.

ON the 10th November 1770, we left Geesh on our return to Gondar, and passed the Abay, as before, under the church of St. Michael Sacala. On the evening of the 11th we halted at the house of Shalaka Welled Amlac, with whom I was well acquainted at Gondar. I had cured him of the small-pox at Koscam, and dressed him and his servant in a new suit of clothes on their leaving me. We were here well entertained according to the customs of the Maitsha and the Galla by Welled Amlac, his sisters and mother, and Fasil's wife, who at my first request gave me a lock of her fine hair from the root, which has ever since been used to suspend a plummet of an ounce and a half at the index of my three-feet quadrant. A melancholy gloom often returned to her beautiful face, which seemed to indicate a mind ill at ease. I wondered that Fasil her husband had not carried her to Gondar. She said her husband had twenty other wives beside her, but took none of them to Gondar; which was a place of war, where it was the custom to marry the wives of their enemies that they had forced to fly: Fasil will be married therefore to Michael's wife Ozoro Esther.

In the afternoon we distributed our presents among the

ladies. On the morning of the | 13th we settled our account with our host, and set out on our journey. We had previously heard the noise of the falls in the river Jemma, and this morning we came to the ford of the Jemma, which is strong, rugged, and uneven. We crossed the Nile near the small town of Delakus, which is inhabited by Mahometans only, a frugal, intelligent, and industrious people. Pursuing our journey north, we passed the small town of Delakus, and alighted at Googue, a considerable village. We found the people of Googue the most savage and inhospitable we had yet met with. Upon no account would they suffer us to enter their houses, and we were obliged to remain without the greatest part of the night. They refused absolutely to give us meat for ourselves or horses. We contented ourselves with lighting a large fire in the middle of the house, which we kept burning all night, as well for guard as for drying ourselves, though we little knew at the time that it was probably the means of saving our lives, for in the morning we found the whole village sick of a fever, and two families had died out of the house where these people had put us.

This fever prevailed in Abyssinia, in all low grounds. Beginning immediately with the sunshine after the first rains, it ceases upon the earth being thoroughly soaked in July and

August, and begins again in September; but now, at the beginning of November, it finally ceases everywhere.

I took the precaution of infusing a dose of bark in a glass of aquavite and fumigating the place. Whether the bark prevented the disease or not, the aquavitæ certainly strengthened the spirits, and was a medicine to the imagination. Nothing remarkable occurred on the remainder of our journey, and my servants with the baggage reached Gondar on the 19th November.

Two things chiefly occupied my mind, and prevented me from accompanying my servants and baggage into Gondar. The first was my desire of instantly knowing the state of Ozoro Esther's health: the second was to avoid Fasil, till I knew a little more about Ras Michael and the king. Taking one servant along with me, I left my people at Azazo, and turning to the left, up a very craggy steep mountain, I made the utmost diligence I could till I arrived at the gate of Koscam, near two o'clock, without having met any one from Fasil, who was encamped opposite to Gondar, on the Kahha, on the side of the hill, so that I had passed obliquely behind him. He had, however, seen or heard of the arrival of my servants at Gondar, and had sent for me to wait upon him in his camp; and, when he was informed I had gone forward to

tered some words of discontent. I went straight to the Iteghe's apartment, but was not admitted, as she was at her devotions. In crossing one of the courts, however, I met a slave of Ozoro Esther, who, instead of answering the question I put to her, gave a loud shriek, and went to inform her mistress. I found that princess greatly recovered, as her anxiety about Fasil had ceased.

Fasil had been raised by Socinios, who had mounted the throne when king Tecla Haimanout and Ras Michael retired from Gondar to the dignity of Ras, in the hope that thus his powerful assistance might be secured in the coming contest. He dissembled for a while, but at length the usurper, having been informed of a secret compact existing between him and Michael, and having sent Powussen, one of his generals, to surprise him at Gondar, where he was attended by only about 1000 men, he threw off the mask, and publicly avowed that it was his intention to restore Tecla Haimanout to the throne. He declared that, rather than fail in it, he would replace Michael Subul in all his posts and dignities. Powussen of Begemder, meanwhile, did not disregard the orders of Socinios. Marching to surprise Fasil, he fell in with the troops of Aylo, dispersing them with little resistance. The news of this conflict however put Fasil

claimed Tecla Haimanout king; and, encamping within two miles of Gondar, he invited all who wished to escape the vengeance of Michael to join his standard. He then retreated to Dingleber, on the side of the lake, where he cut off the supplies of Socinios from that side, occasioning a great famine in Gondar, where many poor people perished. Hitherto I had no intercourse with Socinios, never having been in his presence, nor had I any reason to think he knew me, or cared for me more than any Greek that was in Gondar. On the morning of the 6th December, however, I had a message from him to come to the palace. Socinios was sitting, his eyes half closed, and red with his last night's debauch; he was apparently at that moment much in liquor; his mouth full of tobacco, and squirting his spittle over the floor, so that it was with difficulty I could get a clean place on which to kneel. He was dressed like the late king; but, in everything else, how unlike! My mind was filled with horror and detestation to see the throne on which he sat so unworthily occupied. I regarded him as I advanced with the most perfect contempt. Hamlet's lines described him exactly :

'A murtherer and a villain :

A slave, that is not twentieth part the tithe Of your preceding lord; a vice of kings; A cutpurse of the empire, and the rule,

And put it in his pocket;

A king of shreds and patches.' When I got up and stood before him, he seemed to be rather disconcerted.

'Wherefore is it,' said Socinios,' that you, who are a great man, do not attend the palace? You were constantly with Tecla Haimanout, the exile, or usurper, in peace and war; you used to ride with him, and divert him with your tricks on horseback, and, I believe, ate and drank with him.'

'I am no great man, even in my own country; one proof of this is my being here in yours. I arrived in the time of the late king, and I was recommended to him by his friends in Arabia. You are perfectly well informed as to the great kindness he did all along show me, but this was entirely from his goodness, and no merit of mine. I never did eat or drink with him; it was an honour I could not have been capable of aspiring to. Custom has established the contrary; and for me, I saw no pleasure or temptation to transgress this custom, though it had been in my option, as it was not. I have, for the most part, seen him eat and drink, an honour I enjoyed in common with his confidential servants, as being an officer of his household. The gold you mention, which I have several times got from the late king and Ras el Feel, I constantly spent for his service, and for my own honour.

birthright, derived from my ancestors; and with these, at his desire, I have often diverted the king, as an amusement worthy of him, and by no means below me.' The king!' says he in a violent passion, and who then am I a slave! Do you know, with a stamp of my foot I can order you to be hewn to pieces in an instant? You are a Frank, a dog, a liar, and a slave! Why did you tell the Iteghé that your house was robbed of 50 ounces of gold? Any other king but myself would order your eyes to be pulled out in a moment, and your carcase to be thrown to the dogs.'

What he said was true; bad kings have most executioners. I was not, however, dismayed. I was in my own mind, stranger and alone, superior to such a beast upon the throne.

At this time an old man, of a noble appearance, who sat in a corner of the room, said, 'I can bear this no longer; we shall become a proverb, and the hatred of all mankind. What have you to do with Yagoube, or why did you send for him?'

This person, I understood afterwards, was Ras Senuda, nephew to the Iteghé.

When Senuda stopped, he began with an air of drunken drollery, You are very angry to-day, Baba;' and, turning to me, said, 'To-morrow see you bring me that horse which Yasine sent you to Koscam, or

you will hear of it. Slave and Frank as you are, bring me the horse !'

Senuda took me by the hand, saying, in a whisper, Don't fear him, I am here; but go home. Next time you come here you will have horses enough along with you.'

The intelligence soon afterwards came to me that Michael was approaching with a large army, and that Socinios had fled, and his followers, afraid that his presence with them might get them into trouble, stripped him naked, and giving him only a rag to cover him, put him on a good horse, and dismissed him to seek his for

tune.

On the 21st of December a message came to me from Ozoro Esther, desiring I would attend her son Confu to meet the king. She presented me at the same time with a magnificent dagger mounted with gold, and assured me, as my former kindness to her and her son had been reported to Michael, I might expect a good reception. I accordingly repaired next day to Mariam-Ohha, where the king was encamped. My first business was to wait on Ras Michael, who admitted me immediately upon being announced. I approached near him to kiss the ground; this he prevented by stretching out his hand. As soon as I arose, without desiring me to sit down, he asked aloud, Have you seen the king? I said, Not yet. Have

I

you any complaint to make against any one, or grace to ask? I answered, None, but the continuance of your favour. He answered, That I am sure I owe you; go to the king. took my leave. I had been jostled and almost squeezed to death attempting to enter, but large room was made me for retiring.

The reception I had met with was the infallible rule according to which the courtiers were to speak to me from that time forward. Man is the same creature everywhere, although different in colour; the court of London and that of Abyssinia are, in their principles, one. I then went immediately to the king in the presence-chamber. His largest tent was crowded to a degree of suffocation. I resolved, therefore, to wait till this throng was over, and was going to my own tent, which my servants pitched near that of Kefla Yasous, by that general's own desire, but, before I could reach it, I was called by a servant from the king. Though the throng had greatly decreased, there was still a very crowded circle.

The king was sitting upon an ivory stool, such as are represented upon ancient medals; he had got this as a present from Arabia since he went to Tigré; he was plainly, but very neatly, dressed, and his hair combed and perfumed. When I kissed the ground before him,

There,' says he, 'is an arch