C. Johnston dd. T. & E. Gilks, Lith^rs.
MULKUKUYU FORD OVER THE HAWASH.

TRAVELS
IN
SOUTHERN ABYSSINIA,

THROUGH

THE COUNTRY OF ADAL

TO

THE KINGDOM OF SHOA.

BY

CHARLES JOHNSTON, M.R.C.S.

IN TWO VOLUMES.

VOL. I.

LONDON:

J. MADDEN AND CO., LEADENHALL STREET.

M DCCC XLIV.

MACINTOSH, PRINTER,

GREAT NEW STREET, LONDON.

TO

M^R. THOMAS JOHNSTON, OF BIRMINGHAM,

THESE VOLUMES

ARE AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED,

BY HIS SON.

PREFACE.

As a young Author I may be allowed to make a few introductory remarks, for the purpose of propitiating that spirit of critical inquiry which will probably be directed to the examination of these volumes.

To undertake this journey into Africa I resigned a valuable medical appointment in the East, and voluntarily assumed the character of an adventurer. My taste and prudence were questioned much at the time by my friends. Whether the results of the ambition which prompted me to endeavour to be of service to others are, or are not, sufficient reward for the sacrifice I made, now depends upon the judgment of my reader.

In 1840 I held the appointment of Surgeon on board the iron armed steamer Phlegethon, on secret service, but presumed to be bound for the Eastern coast of Africa or India. I had long entertained the idea of travelling in Africa, and determined to carry this into effect by resigning at the end of the voyage out, and returning to England by a road across that continent. Accordingly, whilst in London, I prepared in some measure for the journey, by purchasing such instruments and outfit that I thought would be necessary. I also waited upon Captain Washington,[^[1]] then Secretary of the Geographical Society, who entered warmly into my views, and introduced me to Captains Trotter and Allen, who were about to proceed upon the Niger expedition.

[1]. Now commanding the Blazer steam-vessel, R. N.

In May 1841 the Phlegethon reached Calcutta, and my respected Commander, the late lamented R. F. Cleveland, Esq., R. N., aware of my intention to travel, introduced me to several members of the Indian Government, who afforded me every facility to enable me to enter Africa from the coast opposite to Aden, and from whence a Political Mission, under Captain Harris, was then on the eve of starting for the court of Shoa in Abyssinia.

I beg particularly to acknowledge the interest that the Governor-General, the Right Hon. the Earl of Auckland, took in my proposed expedition, and also the kindness and attention I received from T. Prinsep, Esq., First Member of the Council, and T. H. Maddock, Esq., Secretary to the Government. I take this opportunity also of expressing to Capt. Haines, the political resident in Aden, my lively feelings of respect and gratitude for kindnesses the most disinterested, and for that assistance without which I could never have undertaken my subsequent journey.

Of my reception in Abyssinia by Captain Harris, I speak elsewhere, but the spirit with which my arrival was hailed may be supposed by the fact that during the first evening I managed, according to the notes of our conversation taken by my very courteous entertainer, to assert a falsehood, to which, however, when I became aware of the circumstance I gave an unqualified contradiction, and so ended all friendly intercourse until some months after, when a peace was negotiated through the mediation of Capt. Graham.

The circumstances of this quarrel were most embarrassing to me, and have, I believe, occasioned considerable indignation on the part of those who had assisted me so far on my travels. Some respect, however, I do owe to myself, and feeling annoyed at being the subject of unworthy imputations, I have abstained from making any explanation whatever. Circumstances already have, in a great measure, exonerated me. The confidence of public men may be abused for a time, but it cannot long be imposed upon.

Before laying down my pen, I must remark that I am not learned either in the Arab or the Amharic tongues, and when I have ventured to insert a few words from either language, it is to add some little to the scene, not to lead any one to suppose that the smattering I picked up among the natives is paraded in affectation of great oriental learning.

In the orthography of proper names, I have used English letters, I know no other so well. Distrusting my ear and taste, I referred to the published works of three modern Abyssinian travellers, who affect to be directed by a foreign standard of pronunciation. Finding them all to disagree, I had no other resource but to fall back upon the despised alphabet of my mother tongue.

Of my views upon the geography of Abyssinia, I am glad to observe, that since I advocated them at the Royal Geographical Society’s Meetings, culminating points and anticlinal axes have given way to the proper idea of a table-land surrounded by a rampart-like scarp.

An earnest wish to be impressive, when I believe myself to be right, has occasioned me sometimes to assume a tone of overweening confidence. For this I ask to be excused; and in palliation for minor faults of composition, must advance my long-continued ill-health, which has prevented close application for the purposes of amending or correcting the manuscript.

London, June 1st, 1844.

CONTENTS TO VOL. I.

CHAPTER I.

CHAPTER II.

CHAPTER III.

CHAPTER IV.

CHAPTER V.

CHAPTER VI.

CHAPTER VII.

CHAPTER VIII.

CHAPTER IX.

CHAPTER X.

CHAPTER XI.

CHAPTER XII.

CHAPTER XIII.

CHAPTER XIV.

CHAPTER XV.

CHAPTER XVI.

CHAPTER XVII.

CHAPTER XVIII.

CHAPTER XIX.

CHAPTER XX.

CHAPTER XXI.

CHAPTER XXII.

CHAPTER XXIII.

CHAPTER XXIV.

CHAPTER XXV.

CHAPTER XXVI.

CHAPTER XXVII.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

CHAPTER XXIX.

CHAPTER XXX.

CHAPTER XXXI.

CHAPTER XXXII.

SKETCH MAP
SHEWING THE
WATERSHEDS OF ABYSSINIA
BY
CHARLES JOHNSTON
Published by J. Madden & C^o. June 3^rd. 1844

TRAVELS IN SOUTHERN ABYSSINIA, ETC.

CHAPTER I.

Arrival in Aden.—Preparations for my journey into Africa.—Departure for Tajourah.—Stay in that town.—Unsuccessful endeavours to proceed farther.—Return to Aden.—Time, from 24th of December to the 1st of March.

I arrived in Aden on the 24th of December, 1841, very ill indeed; having been suffering for nearly two months from a severe intermittent fever, contracted in Bombay. I was advised to proceed at once to England for the benefit of my health, but having letters of introduction from the Indian Government to Capt. Haines, the political agent in Aden, and also to Capt. Harris, our ambassador at that time to the court of Shoa, in Abyssinia, which were calculated to assist me materially in my intention of penetrating into Africa, I persisted in my determination, under all circumstances, to carry out a resolution formed two years before of exploring some portion of that interesting, but as yet little known continent.

Circumstances detained me in Aden nearly six weeks before I received the welcome intimation from Capt. Haines, that he was about to forward to Shoa despatches and stores for the use of the Mission, and as he kindly offered to put them under my charge, I gladly availed myself of the opportunity thus afforded me of commencing my journey most favourably as regarded both comfort and convenience; every requisite for such an undertaking being provided for me that the friendly care and the long experience of Capt. Haines and the assistant political agent, C. J. Cruttenden, Esq., could suggest. Mr. Hatchetoor, an active and intelligent agent, who had been appointed to transact all business with the chiefs connected with the transit of stores and despatches through the Adal country, was also instructed to accompany me to Tajourah, a small seaport, on the opposite African coast, from whence the two proceeding kafilahs connected with the Embassy had started into the interior.

A Portuguese servant, named Antonio, who had been engaged to accompany me, hearing of the sad fate of three European soldiers belonging to Capt. Harris’s party, and who were killed during the night, a few days’ journey inland, and of the still more recent murder of three of Mr. Hatchetoor’s native servants, when last he visited Tajourah, became so alarmed that he deserted; perhaps fortunately for me, as I was thus spared the trouble and risk of engaging in any quarrels that might have arisen with the natives on his account. As presents and peace-offerings to the numerous petty chieftains of the various tribes of Dankalli, among whom my road lay, I was provided with ten bags of rice, a large box containing several pieces of white and red calico, some figured chintz, and a few cotton handkerchiefs of every gaudy colour, besides an abundant supply of needles and paper, which constituted the material for minor gifts to be made to a more numerous class of supplicants, the women and inferior people.

Our arrangements being completed, Mr. Hatchetoor and myself proceeded on board the brig-of-war Euphrates, commanded by Lieut. John Young, of the Indian navy, who had received orders to convey us to Tajourah.

We were no sooner on board than the anchor was weighed, and we started on our short voyage across the Sea of Babel Mandeb. In consequence of the weak state of my health, I remained on deck no longer than to witness our passage out of the beautiful and commodious harbour called Back Bay, which extends to the westward of the low narrow isthmus, and nearly circular base of the extinct volcano razè of Aden. We arrived in sight of Tajourah by sunrise the next morning; but it was not until nearly three o’clock in the afternoon that we anchored in front of that town. The sails being furled, a salute of seven guns was fired by the brig, but some time elapsed before any notice was taken of the honour by the people on shore, a delay which was soon accounted for by Sultaun Ebin Mahomed, the Sheik of the town, sending on board for some gunpowder to enable him to return the compliment.

Capt. Young and Mr. Hatchetoor landed almost immediately. I remained for the present on board, as it was considered impolitic for me to appear desirous of passing through the Adal country until some positive information could be obtained respecting the second division of stores which had been sent up to Abyssinia some months before under the charge of Mr. Bernatz, the artist, and the assistant surveyor, Mr. Scott, respecting which none but the most disastrous accounts had been received in Aden. On the return of Capt. Young to the brig, I found, much to my disappointment, that he did not feel himself justified, under present circumstances, in trusting into the hands of the people of Tajourah, several boxes and packages which were to constitute my charge. He also considered it would be highly injudicious in me to make any attempt to pass through the country in the disturbed state it was then represented to be. Part of the mail, however, he determined to forward, if possible, and had fixed the next day for another interview with the Sultaun to conclude some arrangements with him and his people that should at least secure the transmission of the public despatches to Capt. Harris in Shoa.

Tajourah is a small straggling town consisting of a number of low mat houses standing on the northern shore of a narrow bay which extends about twenty miles inward, nearly due east and west. The opposite coast is at least ten miles distant. From Tajourah, the bay contracts inland to a channel scarcely four hundred yards wide, when, suddenly expanding again, it terminates in a large irregularly formed lagoon, called Goobat ul Khhrab (the bad haven). In modern maps no appearance of this deep inlet, a very particular feature of the sea-coast in this neighbourhood, can be found, though in the older Portuguese maps it is accurately enough laid down. The ancients seem to have been well aware of the existence of the Bay of Tajourah, for it can be easily identified with the Sinus Avalitæ of the Periplus.

The sea immediately in front of Tajourah has received, from the generally unruffled state of its stormless waters, the name of Bahr ul Barateen, “The sea of Maidens;” which struck me as a singular correspondence with the name of the sea surrounding the ancient city of Carthage, which from the map appended to an old school edition of Virgil, we learn was called by the Romans, Mare Nympharum, the poetical Latin translation of the Arabic, Bahr ul Barateen. Tajourah, it must be observed, also being the present name of a village situated very near to the ruins of that once powerful seat of Phœnician commerce.

On the occasion of this visit, much opportunity was not afforded me of observing the character either of the country or of the people, as I landed but twice, and then under the closest surveillance of a brother of the Sultaun, named Isaak, who professed to be greatly alarmed for my safety during these visits; and although at the time I deemed his attendance to proceed from any but generous motives, I have since had reason to believe that his representations of the danger I incurred by rambling about the neighbourhood without the protection of some powerful native were founded upon truth, and from a desire that no cause of ill-feeling between their little town and the English should occur, if by any possibility it could be avoided. As I before observed, three of Mr. Hatchetoor’s servants were murdered during the night, on the last occasion of our intercourse with the inhabitants; and Isaak, though I felt his presence to be a restraint upon my actions, was quite right for thus persisting to accompany me on even the most trifling occasions, to prevent the recurrence of what he, half savage as he was, felt to be an untoward event.

An opportunity offering itself, Capt. Young introduced me to the Sultaun of Tajourah. He was a man at least sixty years of age; round his closely shaven head was wrapped a dirty white muslin turban, beneath which was a very light Arab skull cap of open wicker-work, made of the mid rib of the palm leaf. Naked to his waist, over the right shoulder and across his chest, was slung a broad belt of amulets, consisting of numerous packages the size of a small cartouche-box, alternately of red cloth and of leather, each of which contained some written charm against every evil that he feared, or for every desirable good. A common checked cotton fotah, or cloth, reaching to the knees, was fastened around his middle by a leathern belt, in which was secured a very handsome sword of silver, and completed his dress. In his hand he held a light spear, that served to support his long spare figure as he walked, or sometimes to chastise a rebellious urchin, or vituperative female of his household, by dropping the heavily iron tipped end not very gently on their heads and shoulders. But little attention was paid to him by his tribe beyond the simple acknowledgment of him as their chief, and the title was only valuable as a legal excuse for demanding from merchants and strangers some paltry present, which alone constitutes, as far as I could observe, the revenue of the state of Tajourah.

Beyond the limits of the town, the authority of the Sultaun was disclaimed; and, in fact, it was very evident that to hold quiet possession of the town, a species of black mail was extorted from him and the inhabitants by the Bedouins of the surrounding country.

The palace of the Sultaun Ebin Mahomed, who was familiarly styled by his subjects, “Shabah” (old man), consisted of two rooms, placed at right angles to each other, the walls of which consisted of mats made of the plaited palm leaf, stretched upon a slight frame of sticks. The roofs also were of similar material. The whole was enclosed by a fence about six feet high, consisting of dry sticks, also covered with mats.

Screens of these suspended mats divided the larger of the two rooms into four compartments, which were severally used as the harem, store-room, the family sleeping-room, and the audience-chamber, if such imposing designations may with propriety be bestowed upon the squalid menage of the chief of Tajourah. In the other room was the oven, or rather kiln, for baking; a coarse earthen construction, which resembled in form a large jar, inside of which was placed the fuel; when it was properly heated, large layers of unleavened dough, made from the meal of jowahree mixed with water, was plastered upon the outside, where it remained until it had dried into a heavy substance, well finger-marked, and looked sufficiently like a cake to satisfy the eaters, that they were, really, as they frequently boasted, so far in advance of their Bedouin neighbours, as to use baked bread.

There were also in this room a few wooden couches upon which the slave women were accustomed to repose during the heat of the day, when not engaged in grinding the jowahree meal, or carrying water from the well. At a short distance from these apartments, but within the enclosed court, was a singularly constructed wooden building that towered some six feet above the usual height of houses in Tajourah, being the cabin of a large bogalow, or native ship, wrecked in the bay, and which had been elevated upon untrimmed trunks of the date palm-tree.[^[2]] A wall of matting carried round these posts formed a convenient lower room, which, with the cabin above, was usually apportioned to strangers visiting the town. To this extraordinary effort of native architectural genius, was attached a small yard, separated by a mat screen from the larger court; and here, at a broken jar, that stood in one corner, under the shade of a miserable looking henna-tree, the faithful of the household were always to be found at the stated times of prayer, performing their ablutions. At small apertures along the lower edge of the screen, close to the ground, were frequently to be seen rows of white teeth of startling extent, as the amused slave girl and female branches of the royal family sought to gratify their curiosity by taking sly peeps at the Engreez whenever they visited the Sultaun. The law court, if it may be so termed, was nothing more than an expansion of the lane in the front of the Sultan’s residence, carefully strewed with the small pebbly shingle of the neighbouring beach. In form it was oblong, and around it were placed several large stones, an old ship beam, and a trunk of the date tree, to serve for the seats of the principal men of the town on occasions of their public kalahims or councils, which were always held in this place. The Sultaun generally presided over these assemblies, his chief business being to distribute the coffee, which was rather stingily supplied to the parties present.

[2]. With respect to this wooden building, a recent traveller asserts that it is made of the hull of a British ship, the Mary Ann, which was attacked and burned during the night, in the port of Berberah, more than twenty years ago. To paint the evil one blacker than he really is, is not considered fair; and I do not see why the treachery and the violence of the inhabitants of a town nearly one hundred and fifty miles distant should be thus attached to the people of Tajourah without any foundation whatever. Another error that demands a positive contradiction is the statement that the fops of Tajourah are Soumaulee, with their hair stained red. One of the principal distinguishing characteristics between the Dankalli, by whom Tajourah is exclusively inhabited, and the Soumaulee of the opposite coast of the bay, is this custom among the latter people to change the natural colour of the hair, by a solution of quick-lime applied to it. Any Dankalli doing this would be certainly assassinated by his countrymen.

Capt. Young having succeeded in his endeavour to forward the despatches, this being undertaken by the son of my friend Isaak, on payment of seventy dollars, made immediate preparations for returning to Aden, in order to report the unsafe character of the road, and the disinclination of the Tajourah people to forward the stores to Shoa. I, of course, felt much disappointed; but could not object to the reasonableness of the only course that could be taken, and made up my mind to remain in Aden until a better opportunity should be afforded me of prosecuting my determination of travelling in Africa.

Feb. 26.—After a detention of four days at Tajourah, we weighed anchor, and proceeded on our voyage back to Aden; the wind, however, being contrary and very light, we did not reach Back Bay until the 1st of March, during which time I amused myself on board comparing the present condition of the coast of that part of Africa we had just visited, with some notes I had collected respecting the ancient geography, as contained in the Periplus of Arrian, and other works of the same character I had read.

The present name among the Arabs of the opposite coast of the country in which Tajourah is situated is Burr Adgem, “the land of fire;” and it must be observed, that this is also the Arab designation of the present kingdom of Persia; a significant name, acknowledged to be, and is evidently derived from the volcanic character of both these districts. The Burr Adgem, on the south of the Red Sea, is of indefinite extent, but may be considered as applied to the country reaching from Suakin in the north, to Mogadishe in the south, and as far west as the high lands of Abyssinia.

Among the ancients, this country was known as that of the Avalites; in which word may perhaps be recognised, Affah, the present native name of the Dankalli tribes, living on the western coast of the Red Sea, but which formerly had a far more extensive application, and included the numerous Soumaulee tribes, who inhabited the country to the south of the Sea of Babel Mandeb as far as Cape Guardefoi, and from thence southward along the eastern coast of Africa as far as Malinda.

Another name for these Affah tribes is Adal; given to them by the Abyssinians inland, and which, according to some recent authorities, has arisen from the circumstance of the principal tribe with whom the Abyssinians have any intercourse being the Adu Alee, living in the immediate vicinity of Massoah, which name has gradually become to be used as the designation of the whole people. I confess that I do not see the propriety of this derivation, as it appears more natural to derive the Abyssinian name from that of the chief part of this country at an early period, when a powerful Egyptian monarch made the Affah port, Adulis, the capital of an extensive country. The terminal letter of this proper name, I have been informed, may be the usual Grecian affix to adapt it to the genius of their language; and I think the probability is, that the ς has been thus added, and that the word Aduli was the origin of the Greek Adulis, and of the modern name Adal.

Another very common name for these people is Dankalli, a word which appears to be of Persian origin; but one that is also acknowledged by the Affah themselves, as the proper name of their country, or of their people collectively. In the time of Ludolph, Dankalli was known as the name of a large kingdom or province, situated on the sea-coast, extending from the port of Adulis to the confines of the country of the Assobah Galla, who then dwelt in the country immediately to the north of Tajourah. The Assobah are now, however, considered to be a Dankalli tribe, a change which I conceive has taken place in consequence of this tribe having since become Gibbertee, or “strong in the Islam faith;” for a religious distinction, I find, has for some centuries separated the original Affah nation into Dankalli and Soumaulee. The latter, whose name is derived from the Abyssinian word soumahe, or heathens, being supposed by the strict Mahomedan Dankalli, still in a great proportion to adhere to their ancient Sabian faith, and only partially to profess the Islam belief. Soumaulee corresponds with the Arabic word, kafir, or unbeliever, the name by which alone Edresi, the Arabian geographer, knew and described the inhabitants of the Affah coast, to the east of the straits of Babel Mandeb.

It also appears to me that the word Dankalli connects the history of these people with the empire of the true Ethiopia, or Meroe, which was situated between the branches of the Tacazze and the Assareek, or the Red Nile, for it may be that in the Odyssey, where Homer conducts Neptune into Ethiopia, and places him between two nations of blacks, perfectly distinct from each other, the poet alludes to the two very different people, the Shankalli and the Dankalli, inhabiting the low countries of Africa within the tropics; the former living to the west of Abyssinia, the latter towards the east. This will be more evident when, in a future chapter, I connect the elevated table-land of Abyssinia with the scene of the annual festivities of the gods in Ethiopia.

It may be as well in this place, perhaps, to advance my own opinion as to the probable derivation of the name Galla, which has been so generally given to the numerous, divided, and barbarous tribes which I believe have arisen from the ruins of the once civilized and extensive empire of Meroe. The word Galla appears to be merely another form of “Calla,” which in the ancient Persian, Sanscrit, Celtic, and their modern derivative languages, under modified, but not radically changed terms, is expressive of blackness, and which was originally conferred upon a dark-coloured people, as descriptive of their appearance, by the affrighted nations of a lighter complexion, whom their boldness and ferocity have nearly extinguished. Thus the original inhabitants of the high table-land of Abyssinia, a much lighter-coloured race than the Greeks, called the people of the surrounding low countries Galla, for the same reason that the Greeks gave them the name of Ethiopians. In the Geez, or Ethiopic language, these people are styled Tokruree, blacks, and their country Tokruah; and we find that the Arabs and Indians, also influenced by external appearance, call them Seedee, and their country Soudan, from the word asward, which signifies black. The Romans, in like manner, gave them the name of Nigritæ; and we ourselves call them Blacks. Two nations of Calla or blacks, very different in physical character and social condition from each other, are now found in the country of ancient Ethiopia; the Shankalli, or the true negro, and the Dankalli, who belong decidedly to the Circassian variety of mankind, possessing round skulls, high full foreheads; the position of the eyes rectilinear; the nose, mouth, and form of countenance being in every respect concordant with the characters assigned to that type of the human race, excepting their colour, which was a dark brown, or sometimes quite black. Their hair, which is much frizzled and worn very full, is a savage caricature of a barrister’s wig. I could perceive no other difference in features or in the form of the head between ourselves and several individuals of this people; indeed, there was often such a striking resemblance between them and some of my European acquaintances, that it was not unusual for me to distinguish them by bestowing the names of some of my far distant friends upon their Dankalli counterparts.

Respecting the numerous savage tribes, known in Europe under the general term Galla, I will not anticipate the results of my subsequent journey, which afforded me better opportunity of forming an opinion as to the real character of these people, and of comparing them with others, who seemed to me to have one common origin, but who differ very materially in the historical circumstances which have marked the period of their long separation. I shall, therefore, return for the present to Aden, which we reached early in the morning of the first of March, three days after having left Tajourah.

From Back Bay, a joint report was immediately forwarded to Capt. Haines by Lieut. Young and Mr. Hatchetoor, announcing the return of the brig, and the ill success that had attended their endeavours to forward the stores and myself to Shoa. Fortunately, I was not long permitted to remain at Steamer Point, off which the Euphrates was anchored, for before noon of the same day we arrived, I received fresh instructions from Capt. Haines to embark again in the evening, and proceed in company with the assistant political agent, C. J. Cruttenden, Esq., to Berberah, where the great annual fair was then being held; from which place it was arranged a native boat should be engaged to take that gentleman, his two servants, and myself back to Tajourah. Capt. Haines rightly supposing that some little jealousy had been excited on the previous occasion by the appearance of the brig before the town which might have implied that compulsion would be resorted to, should the inhabitants refuse their required assistance to communicate with the Embassy in the interior. One great benefit had resulted from the voyage—my health having considerably improved. The sea air, fresh scenes, and above all, the considerate kindness with which I was treated on board the Euphrates confirmed the restorative reaction which had commenced in Aden. The depressing influence that for several months had held me in sick durance, yielded before the excitement of hope, and a new principle of life seemed to reanimate my nearly worn-out frame.

CHAPTER II.

Arrival at Berberah.—Description of the Town and Fair.—Departure for Zeila.—The Town of Zeila.—Second Visit to Tajourah.—Time, from the 1st to the 6th of March.

Berberah is situated on the same coast of the sea of Babel Mandeb, but about 130 miles to the eastward of Tajourah. It is remarkable for having been a mart for the exchange of African and Asiatic products between the merchants of either continent, from the earliest antiquity.

For the greater part of every year, during the S. W. Monsoon, from September to March, this place is the busy scene of an extensive commerce, and a deserted wilderness for the remaining months; after which interval, again the ships of foreign and the caravans of native products begin to arrive. Another temporary town rises as if by the wand of some magician, and thousands of huts and mat houses are erected upon the beach, where but a few weeks before nothing was to be seen but bare sands; nothing to be heard save the howling of numerous wild beasts, as they prowled in search of food, amongst the heaps of filth and animal remains collected during the preceding fair.

We came in sight of Berberah on the afternoon of the 4th of March. As the brig rounded a low sandy point, and entered the narrow harbour, several of the natives, who had been long watching our slow advance, the wind being very light, leaped into the sea, and swam on board. I could not avoid noticing immediately the apparent difference in disposition between them and the people of Tajourah; for a most sullen and distrustful bearing seemed to characterize the latter, while the Soumaulee on the contrary, at least those of Berberah, seemed confident that no violence or injury would be offered to them, they seized the ropes thrown over the sides of the vessel to assist them as they climbed up, and in high glee they passed along the deck and on to the poop, laughing, arranging their wet waist-cloths, and shaking hands, as if they were among old friends.

We anchored within a short distance of the town, and several of the leading people came immediately on board. The business connected with my journey to Berberah was transacted at once in the cabin, the principal native authority, Allee Shurmalkee, being requested by Mr. Cruttenden to provide a boat and other necessaries, which he readily consented to do. As it was late, we none of us went on shore; although I do not believe any danger would have been incurred by so doing, a very friendly feeling evidently existing on the part of the natives towards the English, without that abundant protestation of friendship pressed upon you, as it is by the people of Tajourah, which you cannot help feeling is altogether feigned.

During the earlier part of the next day, I amused myself upon deck, making observations on the temporary town, and speculating on the different national characters of the mixed multitude which inhabit it.

The mere appearance of Berberah is most uninteresting, except, certainly, the harbour, which, if not a very prominent feature, is still a most singular one for its peculiar construction and admirable convenience. A long low spit or raised bank of sand and coral extends nearly a mile into the sea towards the west, parallel with, and at the distance of about half a mile from, the real line of coast. Within the enclosed space of water good anchorage in four or six fathoms is found nearly up to the town, which is situated around the bite of this little narrow inlet. The rise and fall of the tide is sufficient to admit of very large bogalows, as the native boats are called, to be beached for repair, or other purposes; and, in fact, during the fair, a great number of these vessels do lie upon the shore, or in the shallow water close up to the town, giving to the whole a regular, dock-like, appearance.

So apparently accordant with the rules of art is the direction of the outer sea-wall, and its position so admirably convenient, that even a reflecting observer cannot altogether divest himself of the idea, that it is not a pre-concerted work of art rather than the casual production of nature. This was certainly my first impression; and for some time I considered it to have been constructed in a remote period of antiquity, when the whole of this coast was the busy scene of an extensive and lucrative commerce, but that in the revolution of time and the everchanging pursuits of man, the origin of this sea-protecting mole had been forgotten, and the only remembrance of the people who raised it was to be found in its name, which certainly recalls to the mind that of a long-lost nation, the Berbers of Africa. This was theory, of course, and my opinion soon changed, when I found that no other evidence of man’s residence existed in this neighbourhood; no traces whatever of that industry and wealth which must have characterized the people who could have projected and completed such an extensive marine defence for their navy and commerce. Subsequently also, geological examinations, and comparison with other older reefs of sand and coral, now forming part of, and which extend some distance inland, enabled me to establish its identity with them in structure and mineral composition. Finally, therefore, I became convinced that this was another of those beautiful and benevolent works that Nature—“our kindest mother still”—has provided for the security of her favourite, man; for with an anticipating care she has here constructed for him, by a curious yet simple economy, a safe retreat whenever in his frail bark he might be exposed to the violence of the winds and waves, on this otherwise inhospitable and dangerous coast.

In the afternoon a party, consisting of A. Nesbitt, Esq., First Lieut. of the Euphrates, the Purser, Mr. Powell, and myself, was formed for the purpose of more closely examining Berberah and its curiosities. One of the brig’s boats was ordered alongside, and we soon found ourselves carefully threading a winding course, amidst the numerous fleet of bogalows moored along-shore, greeted as we passed beneath their huge misshapen sterns, by the joking salutations and laughing faces of numerous almè, or slave-girls, who crowded the cabin windows, and the most striking features of whose dark countenances were rows of pearly teeth. The boat grounded about thirty yards from dry land, and we were obliged to be carried upon the shoulders of the crew over a black muddy beach, being set down amidst heaps of dirt; the rotting debris of the sea and of the land, drift wood, loose spars, the bones of animals, and excrements of man, formed a barrier of filth, over which it was impossible to choose a path, so we at once struck boldly across to the narrow entrance of what we imagined must be a street, and entered the town of Berberah.

I should suppose there were at least from four to five thousand huts placed closely together, uniform in size and elevation, being generally of an oblong form, about six feet broad, by nine feet in length, and five feet in height. They consisted of a roof of mats, made of the doom palm leaf, or of a long dried grass, or else merely half-dried skins badly preserved, stretched over the usual stick skeleton of a wigwam. There was not much architectural display, for being all roof, they did not well admit of it. Nor does convenience appear to be consulted in laying out streets, or even regular passages, only in so much, that a small spot on one side of the entrance of each hut is left vacant for purposes that may be imagined, and a succession of these sweet and pleasant places make a narrow lane, into which all doors open, and thus a convenient but dirty street is formed by which alone the visitor is enabled to perambulate this justly celebrated aromatic yielding fair.

The residences of the few foreign merchants, principally Banians and Arabs, are exceptions to this general style in the construction of the houses, and have some pretensions both to appearance and convenience, usually having mat walls to the height of four or five feet, with a long slanting roof of grass securely fastened down by sticks of bamboo laid transversely. The entrance is a kind of hall, opening into the centre of a room at right angles, and which extends to the right and left, perhaps ten or twelve feet on each side; its breadth is about ten feet. Behind this room is another apartment of equal dimensions, which serves as a store or warehouse, and one end partitioned off by mats, contains the secluded inmates of the harem.

One of the objects we had in view in visiting the fair was, to procure some few additional articles I required for my journey into the interior, namely, a bed carpet, two Arab frocks of yellow nankeen, and a black camaline or cloak. We accordingly bent our steps towards the quarter where lived our native friend, Shurmalkee, who was to assist us in making our purchases, but whose residence we should never have found but for the crowd of armed idlers who soon surrounded us, and led us with a kind of barbarous state into the presence of their respected chief.

The well-known Shurmalkee, or Allee Allee, his real name, is now upwards of fifty years old, tall, thin, with slightly stooping shoulders; his face long, with small quickly moving eyes, and thin white beard. The only deviation from the usual dress of his countrymen is a white cotton cloth turban, a distinction, with the title of sheik, generally assumed by those who can read the Koran, or have performed the pilgrimage to Mecca. Some fifteen or twenty years since, Shurmalkee was chiefly instrumental in saving part of the crew of the English brig, Mary Anne, then lying at anchor in the harbour of Berberah, which was attacked and burned during the night by the natives. He was himself wounded on the occasion, and the mate and three or four of the brig’s people murdered. The Indian Government rewarded him munificently at the time for his generous interference; and since then, finding him honest, intelligent, and grateful, they have always patronised him, allowing him in our eastern parts the privilege of a British subject, with liberty to hoist our flag in his bogalows. He is now our native agent in all transactions with the Soumaulee inhabitants of Berberah and Zeila. By his industry and enterprise he has become the richest man along this coast; nor is there scarcely a prince or petty chief in the adjoining countries who is not indebted to this African Rothschild.

We rested ourselves upon the only piece of furniture in the mat-walled room, a rude couch of wood with a bottom of interlaced palm-leaf rope, covered with a coarse Arab carpet of as many colours as Joseph’s jacket. We refused to take any refreshment, and sent immediately for the articles we wanted. As usual, the Islam spirit of despoiling the Christian exhibited itself in the exorbitant demands of the Arab merchants, but which in this case was defeated by the prompt interference of Shurmalkee, who dismissed them very summarily as much to ours as to their surprise. As soon as they were gone, however, he explained the cause, and promised to obtain the things himself, before we went on board, at half the price that had been demanded, desiring us not to take any farther trouble about them, but to proceed at once to view the town, at the same time supplying us, as is the custom of these people, with two natives for guides, and also as sureties for our safety and freedom from molestation during our walk.

The appointment of these sureties, or Abbahn, as each calls himself, to every stranger who enters the town, is a singular but very necessary characteristic of the social condition of the inhabitants of Berberah, and is deserving of particular notice. Convenience on the one hand and enterprise on the other, have here brought together the Hindoo Banyan, the Mahomedan Arab, and the Pagan Soumaulee; for even now scarcely one half of this latter people profess the Islam faith. With no generally acknowledged superior, no established law, each inhabitant depends upon his own keen knife, or that of his Abbahn, for personal safety and the security of his property. All are equally ready to resort to a bloody appeal upon the least cause of dispute, so that every day is marked by some fatal quarrel, and every night by some robbery and violent death. Even the murdering Danakil shakes his head when he speaks of the Fair of Berberah, denouncing it as being “shatan, shatan;” whilst the wisest and the best men of every nation or tribe, who are here assembled, speak openly their desire, that some powerful Islam, or even Feringee Government, should take actual possession, both of this port and of Zeila also. Under such circumstances, the foreign merchant, accustomed in his own country to the protection of law, or of some regularly established authority, consents but reluctantly, and then only from the prospect of immense gains, to risk his person among a people so violently barbarous as are the Adal tribes occupying this portion of Africa, who have lost none of their ancient character significantly recorded in the Periplus, as being “uncivilized, and under no restraint.” To protect himself in some measure the trader has recourse to the system of procuring the constant attendance of one or more of the natives, whose duty it is to guard their employer from molestation. Two-thirds of the Soumaulee population of the town are engaged in this manner. No sooner does a stranger arrive than he is surrounded by natives, each soliciting to be employed as his Abbahn, and are almost as importunate and as troublesome as the hotel-barkers who infest the piers of our watering-places. The important privilege of supplying strangers with Abbahns is monopolized by one tribe living in the neighbourhood of Berberah, called Raree-good-Hadé, but not without considerable opposition from another tribe called Raree-Abdullah, with whom serious conflicts sometimes take place within the town, when all business is suspended for three or four days in consequence.

Every ship, or bogalow, arriving at the port is boarded, at least a mile from the shore, by a crowd of Soumaulee Abbahns, and on the occasion of the Euphrates approaching Berberah, a number of these naked visitors, as I have before mentioned, swam from shore a very long distance and were taken on board.

Following Shurmalkee’s advice, we started, but certainly not to see the town, though we passed through it; for with eyes bent upon the ground, we carefully picked our way along the narrow street, not four feet wide, the tops of the stinking skin wigwams and mat-huts presenting one uniform dark level, just the height of our noses. The outskirts of the town were equally offensive, but more particularly marked by the vast quantity of bones of all eatable animals strewed about, and the vestiges of numerous cooking fires, everywhere telling of the sites of former houses, and that a few weeks before the fair must have been even more extensive. About half a mile to the left of the town, on a slightly elevated mound of sand and coral, was a ruined mosque, the only appearance of a stone building in the neighbourhood. To this we proceeded, our conversation turning upon the dirtiness of the town, its low flat appearance from every point of view, the singular character of its inhabitants, and the great importance Berberah might assume in the possession of some highly civilized country, (we meant Britain, of course,) as one point from whence to spread through Africa the benefits arising from science, and the happiness attendant upon a knowledge of the Christian faith.

Around the mosque were numerous graves, each consisting of a low heap of stones in a line six feet long, enclosed in a large circle of single stones, the diameter of which sometimes exceeded twenty feet. The direction of the graves were due east and west, and a small space or opening in the circle invariably to the south, formed a kind of entrance into its area. They differed from the strictly Islam tomb in not having the two little flat stones at the head and foot, in their less conical form, and in the circular enclosure. Their vicinity to the ruined mosque told, however, of the profession of the Islam faith during the life of the deceased, whilst in the manner of the burial it appeared that surviving friends had still adhered to the customs of their forefathers. I might, too, have been mistaken in the real character of the building, and that which I hastily concluded to be a mosque, may have been some remains of a temple of the ancient faith professed by the Affah nation, and which I believe was Sabianism.

From the burial-place looking towards the south-east, we had a view of the town and shipping of Berberah, situated at one extremity of a spacious triangular plain, which we were told extended one hundred miles one way in the direction of Zeila, and inland towards Hurrah nearly the same distance. On our return to Shurmalkee’s house, we walked along the beach in front of the town, where were numerous women drying sheep-skins, by stretching them in the sun, pinning them down upon the hot sands by broken pieces of bones in the absence of sticks. Tobes, or the large cotton cloths worn by the natives over the shoulders and around the body, were also bleaching upon the beach after a careless wash in the sea. As we came nearer to the town we disturbed, as we passed, several large bodies of men squatting upon the ground in deep conversation, each armed with a large heavy knife and a spear. We were also continually being jostled by busy native porters, who were conveying loads of gum and coffee on board the bogalows, or else laden with their return burdens of cotton and cotton goods for the stores of their employers.

We had taken our guns with us, having started with the intention of proceeding some short distance inland, but the sun was so very powerful, and the prospect so apparently hopeless, of either instruction or amusement being derived from the walk, that it was resolved, as I started on the morrow for Tajourah, that we should proceed immediately on board the brig, from the deck of which we had a more extensive view of the town and surrounding country, than any point afforded on shore, and from our numerous visitors, Arab and native, had excellent opportunities of deriving information respecting the manners and customs of the Soumaulee population.

The appearance of the surrounding country seems to indicate that at a period not very remote, the whole of it has either been upheaved from beneath the sea, or that the retreat of the latter has left the plain, extending to the westward and southward of Berberah, the dry land we now find it. At one time the coast about here must have been of a somewhat similar character to that which is now presented by the harbour of Zeila, deep narrow channels existing between extensive coral reefs, which, at the distance of three miles from the town, have not one fathom in depth of water over them. At the time of such submersion of the plain of Berberah, the sea must then have come up to the nearly regular line of low volcanic hills, which, commencing a few miles distant from the town, stretch in a south-western direction for many miles inland. This portion of the then sea of Aden included a considerable part of the country between Zeila and Hurrah, for the present coast-line, from the former town to Berberah, assumed as a base, whilst Hurrah may represent the apex, will give some idea of the triangular form of this now habitable tract, which, I conclude, has been raised above the level of the sea by the operation of some vast upheaving force. Whatever testimony is required for this opinion is presented by the geological character of the numerous small hills to the south of Berberah: old coral reefs studding the place with eminences about twenty-five feet high as far as the eye can reach. If these formations are considered as insufficient authority for my founding an opinion upon the submarine origin of this country and its recent elevation, I can only excuse myself upon the plea of endeavouring to give a better idea of its appearance by this allusion to its geological character, and which will at least, I hope, assist the reader in forming a more complete picture of Berberah and its environs.

The next day was occupied in placing the boxes and packages of the Mission into the native boat, hired from Shurmalkee. This was effected by noon, and after a parting dinner with our kind friends on board the brig, Mr. Cruttenden and myself proceeded to take possession of our fresh berths in the bogalow.

The little cabin of our new craft was about three feet high, and six or seven feet long, with a roof and floor of bamboo canes, over which were placed a few mats. Two servants of Mr. Cruttenden’s being on board, they were told to prepare the evening meal; and anticipating by the direction and force of the wind that we should be off the town of Zeila by the next morning, we spread our carpets on the cabin-floor, and composed ourselves to reflection or repose, no sufficient inducement offering, to tempt us to expose ourselves in the sun upon the frail unsheltered deck above us. After supper a conversation, in which I could not join, was entered into with the ras, or captain of the boat, by Mr. Cruttenden, whose knowledge of Arabic admitted of this amusement; but as he generally interpreted to me the most useful and interesting portions, and added some most valuable information which he had collected in his long intercourse with these people, I had reason to feel happy that circumstances had thus thrown me, upon the eve of the commencement of my own travels, into the society of an experienced and clever voyageur.

March 6th.—We found ourselves this morning, on awakening, anchored at some distance from Zeila, at least six miles. The shallowness of the sea over the outstanding coral reef prevented even our small vessel from approaching nearer to the town, and I could see from the deck several natives wading from our own and other vessels towards the shore. In about one hour, the keeper of the principal gate seaward came on board in a small boat, bringing three sheep as a present from the governor. He was accompanied by two or three of the Arab soldiers, of whom sixty or seventy are employed to defend the town, in case of its being attacked by the Soumaulee of the surrounding countries.

From what I could learn, Zeila was held by Arab and native merchants; the Dowlar, or governor, being appointed by the Sheriff of Mocha, who formerly received some small tribute from the town. Allee Shurmalkee has since my visit either seized or purchased this town, and hoisted independent colours upon its walls; but as I know little or nothing save the mere fact of its possession by that Soumaulee chief, and as this change occurred whilst I was in Abyssinia, I shall not say anything more upon the subject.

The officer who visited us in our boat, carried rather ostentatiously at his belt, two large and very rudely made wooden keys, with projecting bits of iron wire, which formed a kind of apology for wards. From their appearance, I should suppose that the locks they fitted were not either of a very intricate or very substantial character, and not such as were calculated, without other aids, to effect the exclusion of unwelcome visitors. I had not an opportunity of examining the defences of Zeila, beyond a sight of its wall, twenty or thirty feet high, over which could be seen certain whitewashed and grey stone houses, with flat roofs. Besides two old guns, which we could see from the boat, lying dismounted upon the sands, I was told there were a very few others placed on that part of the wall looking inland.

Mr. Cruttenden forwarded to the governor some few pounds of gunpowder in return for the sheep, but declined on this occasion his polite invitation to visit him, promising to see him on his return to Berberah, which he hoped would be in a few days, after settling affairs for me in Tajourah. During the night, we took advantage of the land breeze, and made Tajourah by the middle of the next day. The difficulty of fixing upon our anchorage was not so nice an affair as with the brig. The narrow and confined opening on the sunken coral reef forms a kind of submarine haven, directly in front of Tajourah, in which is the only secure anchorage. It was easily found by our vessel, whose light draught of water admitted of its going over the reef in search of it; and when found, allowed of our bringing up within a very few yards from the shore. This was no little convenience, for our bogalow only carried for communication with the land a small canoe made out of a single tree, and barely able to carry two persons. Mr. Cruttenden’s sword was trusted to the hands of one of the crew, an excellent swimmer, who took rather a novel mode of conveying his bright burden to the shore, swimming the whole way completely immersed, save the hand and arm bearing the sword, which was thus carried perpendicularly to the body, with an intuitive knowledge of the mechanical relief to the muscles of the arm afforded by a weight being carried in that manner.

Mr. Cruttenden trusted himself into the frail and ticklish canoe, which bobbled upon the surface of the water as if its ill-adjusted centre of gravity would upset itself. He, however, was placed, not without a certain degree of wetting, safely upon the land; and the dexterous paddler of this tiny craft returned for me. I really do not know how I managed to convey myself into it, nor can I account reasonably for its doing so much for me to the shore; but I recollect very well that I considered it a regular escape, for had I been upset in my then weak state from my previous illness, I should certainly have finished my African travels in the Bay of Tajourah.

CHAPTER III.

Reception in Tajourah.—Arrangements for our stay.—Occupation.—Amusements.—Geological character of the country.—Engaging camels for the journey.—Customs of the townspeople.—Public buildings.—Religious ceremonies, law, and justice.

I joined Mr. Cruttenden at the house of the Sultaun, being directed on my way by a party of little slave children, who formed a rather troublesome train, as they kept importuning me for buttons and beads. The younger girls and infants, however, could not by any inducement be prevailed upon to come near me; and what with the shouting plaguing boys, who followed behind, and the screaming flying children before me, I began to think myself more of a curiosity than I had before believed myself to be.

The Sultaun of Tajourah with considerable politeness placed us, immediately on our arrival, in possession of the elevated cabin before mentioned, and the room below, and then left us to hasten forward the preparation of a meal, consisting of boiled rice, which was soon after brought in. It was placed before us in a large saucer-like dish, with a quantity of milk in a curious kind of basket, made of the larger nerves of the doom palm leaf, sewed very closely together with a finer description of the same material; the inside was overlaid by some black vegetable matter, but of what character I could never properly understand.

Having arranged our legs as decently as we could around the table, which was merely a large mat of the palm leaf, we had nearly satisfied ourselves before the arrival of some promised lumps of meat, which, strong and tough, challenged the integrity of our teeth, in the vain endeavours we made to do justice to this part of our host’s hospitality, for we might almost as well have attempted to devour the piece of round leather upon which it was brought. The latter piece of furniture, at all events, afforded some degree of pleasure, for I saw immediately an explanation of the obscure passage in Æneid, where the Harpy Celæno is made to say—

... “Ambesas subigat malis absumere mensas,”

which has been by commentators considered improbable and absurd, from the difficulty of supposing how tables, according to our ideas of them, could be eaten. By the sailors in the Red Sea, and among the Arabs, these leathern interpositions between the ground and the food are very general indeed; and I do not see why, in the extremity of a castaway crew, or in a time of famine, these tables, which they certainly are, should not be devoured for want of other food; and parallel cases have frequently occurred in modern times, in the numerous recorded incidents where shoes and even the leathern peaks of soldiers’ caps have formed the only sustenance that could be obtained under similar distressing circumstances.

In accordance with the usual custom in Arabia, and which custom has probably been imported from that country with the Mahomedan religion, the first day of our arrival was spent in friendly conversation with the people of the town, who were acquainted with Mr. Cruttenden from previous intercourse. All allusion to the business we had come upon was carefully avoided, the established etiquette of hospitable politeness leaving to the stranger the first day of arrival for rest after his journey, and for making him welcome on the part of his entertainers.

I now assumed the dress which had been recommended as the most appropriate for my journey. Over a pair of loose drill trousers, I donned a long yellow frock of nankeen, with sleeves narrowing to the wrist, of a kind which has been used by the Arabs from the time in which the Periplus was written, for among the articles of the commerce of the Red Sea there enumerated, are these very frocks, and the material of which they are made was then principally imported by Indian vessels, as at the present day. A large straw hat, of the double Manilla kind, with a thick layer of cotton wool between the two walls, formed a very light covering for the head, and being quite impenetrable to the direct rays of an almost vertical sun, was a sufficient protection against the evil most to be feared, “a coup de soleil.”

The morning after our arrival, a survey was taken of the stores which, during the past night, had been brought from the bogalow, and placed, part in the lower room of our house, and part in the little court adjoining, so that they might be under the eye of Nassah, one of the Arab servants of Mr. Cruttenden, who was appointed to watch over, and who in fact slept among and upon, the boxes and packages. The apartment occupied by Mr. Cruttenden and myself was the elevated cabin, immediately adjoining the residence of the Sultaun. It was rather a long room, with a sloping roof, the centre of which was a few inches above our heads, but at the sides was only two feet high from the floor. The walls consisted of frames, in which were sliding shutters of most irregular construction, and of every dirty colour that can be conceived. The floor of the upper end was raised about a foot into a kind of dais, or, as Mr. Cruttenden styled it, a spare bed, not being more than five feet in its longest direction, and upon which had been spread his sleeping carpets for the night. The entrance into our novel residence was a square hole in the farther corner of the floor, through which we ascended and descended, like stage ghosts, carefully inserting our toes in any little crevices we could see among sundry dry and rotten sticks, which assisted the mats in forming the wall of our lower apartment.

Besides Nassah and a young man named Abdullah, a native of Mocha, who officiated as cook, we had another attendant, a slave who had been lent to us by Shurmalkee, on account of his acquaintance with the Arabic and Dankalli languages, and who was of considerable use to us as our private interpreter.

Whilst we staid in Tajourah, our daily occupations were not of a very varied character, yet still they were such that did not fatigue us with their sameness. Every morning at sunrise, attended by Nassah, we strolled down to the beach, and indulged ourselves in the health-giving bath. Towards evening, accompanied by some of the chief men of the town, we amused ourselves and astonished them by our dexterity with the rifle. The Tajourah people themselves only boasted the possession of a solitary matchlock, and the daring proprietor of this not unfrequently joined us, trying his piece with a new silver mounted one which we had brought with us as a present from Capt. Haines to Izaak, but as no inducement could prevail either upon him or his son to discharge it, Nassah was always called upon to relieve these gentlemen from the danger and honour of firing.

The features of our orderly Nassah were a good specimen of those which characterize a numerous class of Arabs, living on the sea-coast of Arabia, who are decidedly of negro origin. The word which designates them, in fact, expresses this; Seedee being derived from the word Assuard, which signifies in the Arabic language, black. His face was nearly triangular, the apex at the chin, the base a long flat forehead, whilst his nose was the exact reverse of this, the apex being between the eyes, and its base below spreading out into two large and flat-like nostrils, which seemed to repose upon, rather than arise from, his dusky cheeks. His mouth was an awful gap; but all the deformity of his countenance was more than compensated by the pleasing expression of his humorous looking little eyes, that told of single purposeness, fidelity, and contentment; and that quiet resignment to circumstances, which was a great characteristic of his manner and mode of expressing himself, “If it please Allah,” “Allah has me in his keeping,” being favourite replies of his. Tall and erect; his posture graceful without effort, in his well arranged Arab costume his appearance was very picturesque. Always on his guard from any surprise, and proud of his occupation, I could see that he was sincerely attached to his master, Mr. Cruttenden. He acquitted himself very well as a marksman, with the clumsy but handsome matchlock, and was certainly the “magnus Apollo” of the black beauties of Tajourah.

Our rendezvous on occasions of these shooting matches, was generally on the summit of a low cliff of coral limestone, which stood a few hundred yards in rear of the town, and which extended two miles inland to the base of a gravel bank, perhaps 100 feet high, capped by a thin stratum of coarse black lava. The undermining of this bank is very rapid and considerable during the rainy season, so that large masses of the superincumbent lava are continually breaking off and rolling into the beds of numberless temporary torrents below. The period of the first appearance of this lava cannot have been more than a few hundred years ago, and volcanoes have certainly existed on this coast within the recorded history of the earth. A few miles in the interior, between Raheita and Tajourah, is still a range of hills evidently of igneous origin, called by the natives Jibel Jann, or Demon Mountains. The same name is also given to a more recently active, but very small volcano situated on the road to Shoa; and which was represented by the natives to be the residence of some turbulent genius confined there by Soloman, in accordance with some of the commonly received Arabic traditions.

This coral reef, however, afforded the most interesting proof of the raising of the coast having occurred during the present existing state of things, as regards the direction of winds and currents in the surrounding sea, as also of its being constructed by the same species of Zoophites, who are now producing its counterpart in the present bay. I have stood on this old inland reef during the afternoon, when the reflection of the sun’s rays from the surface of the present immersed bed of coral, in front of Tajourah, has plainly showed the parallelism of its outer edge with that of the reef upon which I was standing, and a separation or indenture in the latter also corresponded exactly with the narrow channel in which anchorage is now found near to the present shore, and which must have been produced, in both cases, by the operation of similar natural causes, acting under exactly similar circumstances. More alteration in this part of the world has been produced by volcanic action than can be conceived by endeavouring to form an idea of it by comparison with the changes effected by the occasional outbreaks of Vesuvius or Etna. Convulsions of the earth, and ejection of molten lava upon a most extensive scale, can only account for the great alteration which has evidently, in modern times, taken place in the physical geography of the whole country of Arabia, the eastern shore of Africa, and probably over a considerable portion of the bed of the Indian Ocean in this neighbourhood.

Sir G. M‘Kenzie’s description of the phenomena which have attended volcanic action in Iceland, approaches somewhat to that which may be supposed was here once exhibited, or that a succession of convulsions, similar to the great earthquake of Kutch, in Scinde, of which Sir S. Raffles gives such an interesting account, have here, at some former period, exerted the same appalling agents, and produced the extensive alterations in the previous character of this once blessed land, abounding with life and with natural beauty, but which is now, even by the Arab, wandering over his almost equally miserable desert, designated, and most appropriately, as the “deserted quarter of the world.”

The day after our arrival was occupied in preparing and presenting such presents as were intended for the chief people of Tajourah, generally consisting of long robes or body-cloths of white calico, and fotahs, or finely manufactured parti-coloured waistcloth, much prized by both the Arabs and the Dankalli. After this important business was concluded to the satisfaction of all, some conferences were held respecting the number of camels we should require, to apportion fairly among the numerous owners of them, the stores to be conveyed up; for the remuneration that was determined upon being very high, plenty of applicants were found putting in their claim to be employed. The competition would have been very beneficial, could it have been brought to bear upon the price required for each camel; but the unsophisticated Adal savage was as acute upon such matters as the craftiest Chinese, and the system of the Hong merchants of monopolizing the trade was fully acted upon by the chief men of Tajourah. Mr. Cruttenden, as Wakeel of the English Government, was obliged to transact all business through the hands of the Sultaun’s agents, who were Izaak, the brother of the Sultaun, and his friend and seconder on all matters of State policy, Mahomed Cassim. These worthies really deserved whatever present they received subsequently to my departure from Mr. Cruttenden, for the trouble, anxiety, and real danger they must have incurred in satisfying, pacifying, and denying the crowd of bullying murderers, who all required a share of the hard, bright dollars, which were always sure to be poured into the town in payment of those services the English Government might require from them. Calahms, or councils, were being continually held, now to settle quarrels arising out of the discussion, and then to discuss again some other subject, until another quarrel had arisen.

Nearly a month was spent in this unsatisfactory manner, when Mr. Cruttenden resolved upon immediately returning to Aden, taking with him the packages, thus putting an end to the deception and procrastination we had submitted to so long. He accordingly sent a letter to Captain Young, who was still at Berberah, requesting him to send again Shurmalkee’s boat to receive us. Immediately this transpired, which it did only so soon as the messenger had departed, we observed a remarkable increase of energy on the part of Izaak and Cassim, for during that day we were disturbed by the continual succession of parties coming to examine, and endeavouring to form some judgment as to the weight of, the different boxes, favouritism showing itself in allowing friends to make these surreptitious visits by night also, to determine the choice of loads for their camels. Excuses the next day were also made for our long detention, and assurances that we should certainly start the first propitious day, which was considered to be the next Friday, at the time of the afternoon prayer.

During the four weeks we had been compelled to reside in Tajourah, few incidents occurred worthy of being recorded. Most of our time we were sitting below in the court, on a rude, cord-bottomed couch, covered with a mat. Close to the ends were placed two large pillows, belonging to Mr. Cruttenden, for us to recline upon; whilst, before us, squatting upon the ground, and ranged along the opposite wall, were generally some of our Dankalli acquaintances, who seemed to be anxious to learn something of our institutions and manners. Discussions upon the Christian religion were very frequent; and they soon were made to understand the difference between us and the Roman Catholic nations, whom they include under one name—Feringee.

I also became acquainted with a singular mode of descent, or manner in which the power and title of Sultaun is transmitted to the next possessor. It appears that Tajourah is principally inhabited by two subdivisions of the great Adu Allee tribe, the same from whom it has been asserted the Abyssinian name of this people (Adal) is derived. These two families (the Burhanto and the Dinsarrah) have each their own Chief, who alternately assumes the supremacy of the town on the death of the other, whilst the next expectant fills the office of Vizier, or chief adviser. This mode of succession does not appear to be peculiar to Tajourah, but to be a general principle of state economy through all the important tribes; for, in the same manner, I had an opportunity of observing, was determined the possession of the chief dignity among the Debenee; and I was given to understand it was also the custom of the Wahamah, and the Muditee of Owssa. The present Sultaun of Tajourah is named Mahomed, and belongs to the Burhanto family; the Vizier, who was absent on a pilgrimage to Mecca when we first arrived, was the principal man of the Dinsarrah. He returned in time to receive a present, to prevent him interfering in the arrangements, which were then just completed, and a promise of future patronage on the next occasion of a kafila being required by our Government. His arrival accelerated, in some measure, our departure; for had we remained any time afterwards, he would certainly, with his friends, have compelled a change in the distribution of the stores, and thus have led to another detention, or perhaps would have entirely prevented their going up to Shoa. Izaak and Cassim, who had had it so far in their own hands, were therefore interested in hastening the departure of the kafila; and from the day of the Vizier’s first appearance in Tajourah, I found the boxes were gradually removed from under our own care to the houses of the carriers. On occasions of counsel, it was usual for the principal men of the town (Hukells, as I heard them called) to assemble in front of the Sultaun’s residence, where they sat upon their heels, or upon the large stones and trunks of the date trees placed for that purpose. With his back leaning against the enclosure of his own house, the Sultaun Mahomed occupied a stone, with Izaak generally sitting on another by his side, together helping the parties present to small cups of strong black coffee. This was poured out of a long-necked, globular, earthenware vessel, of common red clay, into the mouth of which was stuffed a quantity of dried grass, to act as a strainer. The cups were of the same coarse manufacture, being exactly in form and appearance like the very smallest flower-pots in a green-house, except that the latter, without the aperture at the bottom, would, I think, be much more elegant and convenient.

The usual dress of the males of Tajourah was the fotah, or waist-cloth, and the sarree, which is an Indian term for part of a woman’s dress, exactly corresponding to it in use and shape. It is a long robe, worn round the body, generally of white calico, with a red or blue border at the two extremities; it is usually among the townspeople seven cubits long—that is, seven times the length of the hand and arm from the elbow. Among the Bedouins—the people inhabiting the country—it is but three and a-half, or about the same size as a Scotch plaid, which I noticed one day, as I saw the two distinct and yet similar formed garments drying together upon the ground after a shower of rain.

The ladies wear a long blue chemise with short sleeves, and a very heavy necklace, made of beads, shells, or of large carved pieces of mother of pearl, reposes upon their delicate bosoms. Ear-rings are a very extraordinary vanity amongst them. They consist of large loops of twisted brass wire, five or six in number, placed each through its own perforation in the outer lobe of the ear; whilst depending from each of these is one, sometimes two oblong plates of tin, or pewter, at least an inch broad, and one and a-half inch in length. Bracelets and anklets of brass and pewter, large and heavy, were very common among them; and as they chanted their monotonous songs of prayer or grief, they clattered them against each other as a kind of accompaniment to their voices. They dressed their hair in a number of small plaits, which were connected round the back of the head by parallel bands of red or white cotton, interwoven with and crossing the hair transversely, and in this manner forming a kind of tippet upon the neck and shoulders. I was once a witness to the difficulty of unravelling or combing out this intangled mass, which reminded me of the hair of Samson, interwoven with the web of the loom. The lady whose hair was to be operated upon sat upon a stone in the court, beneath one of our windows, and behind her, on her knees, was a stout hale slave girl, who held in both hands a long-handled wooden fork-like comb, having four very strong prongs, which she dragged through the woolly, greasy, and black hair of her mistress with the force of a groom currying a horse’s tail.

When not attired in their full dress, or are occupied in household duties, the women wear nothing else but the fotah, or waistcloth, which appears to be a garment common both to male and female Dankalli. The better kind of fotah passes twice round the body, and the ends are secured by the women by merely tucking them under a fold of the upper edge; but the men fasten it up with the belt of their never absent short knife. Sandals made of several layers of cow-skin, prepared with the hair on and sewed together by a thong of leather, sometimes in a very neat and ornamental manner, are worn by both sexes, and are secured to the foot by a loop for the second toe, and slight strips of leather crossing the ancle are attached to the heel, and to two small lappels on the sides.

The slave children, who live in the houses of their owners merely for the purpose of recruiting after their long and painful journey from Abyssinia, live happily enough whilst in Tajourah; for too young to comprehend the evils of their destiny, and their bodily wants being carefully attended to, they soon regain their lost condition and health, and are then forwarded to the markets of Mocha and other parts of the Red Sea. They are nearly all dressed in a long dirty frock of very coarse calico, which constitutes the whole of their apparel. The male inhabitants of Tajourah have no other occupation than the traffic in slaves, which they exchange for the merchandise of India and Arabia, but principally the former, whose traders they meet at the fair of Berberah.

The women occupy themselves with household duties, and carrying water from a well about half a mile from the town. The water is carried in large entire skins of the goat, which they tan with the pounded bark of a mimosa, very common in the jungle near the town, and which, moistened with a little water, they rub well into the skin. If it be designed to be divested of the hair, the skin, before being tanned, is left for two or three days until slight putrefaction has commenced, and the hair is then easily detached. The most laborious occupation of the women is grinding the jowaree, or millet, which is imported into Tajourah from Aden and the Persian Gulf. They use for this purpose a large flat stone, concave from above downwards, and placed upon the ground, behind this upon her knees, the woman, half-naked, with long depending skinny breasts, hangs over the mill, passing and repassing the grain beneath a large heavy rolling-pin of stone. During the progress of the operation, she frequently sprinkles the bruised mass with water, until a fine powdered paste is produced, which, without more preparation, is carried away to be baked upon the kiln-like oven I have before described. It requires some time to make a few pounds of bread in this manner; and when baked into flat cakes of about one pound each in weight, they are, as might be expected, very heavy, and of a disagreeable acid taste. Whilst grinding, two or three slaves, or women, (for the same term is applied to all,) relieve each other, so that labour, except in the house of a poor man, is not great.

I saw in Tajourah two old men weaving, who had learned the art in Abyssinia; also an Arab blacksmith. It is usual for all the young men to be able to make their own sandals. One of their principal occupations in-doors is to make wooden spoons, sometimes carved in a most elegant manner, and fedeenahs, or rests for the head during the night, and which are the constant companion of the Dankalli when journeying. They differ considerably in form from the wooden pillows of the New Zealanders; but still it is singular that a somewhat similar manner of resting the head during the night is in use among these two distant and distinct nations. The ancient Egyptians employed the fedeenah exactly of the shape of those of the Dankalli; but these, it seems, were sometimes made of alabaster, and covered with hieroglyphics.

The principal mosque of the place stood at the further end of a large open space, reaching to the sea-shore, in the centre of which was the solitary cannon used as a saluting battery on particular occasions, and the touchhole of which vied in extent with the bore of the piece. Occupying one side of the open space was the square enclosure of mats, with little huts of the same material, which had been erected for the use of the English agent in Tajourah, Mr. Hatchetoor, on the occasion of the last kafila, or second division of the stores, being sent up to Shoa with Messieurs Bernatz and Scott. Here, during one night, three of the native servants were treacherously murdered as they lay asleep, by some of the inhabitants of the town. On the other side were a few native houses, standing in the usual compounds, or courts, and out of the doors of which peeped, with a mixture of curiosity and alarm, several little slave children whenever we passed by.

This mosque stood between the commencement of two narrow lanes, the one leading through the town, the other to the Sultaun’s house, and completed the third side of the irregular square, which was open towards the sea. The mosque was built in a square form, with the untrimmed branches of trees, as they were cut off in the jungle, and thatched with leaves of the palm-tree, fastened down by the common string of the country, made of the leaf of the doom palm split and twisted by the hand into a strong rope; a small fence of stones, two or three feet high, enclosed in front a little semicircular court, in which were planted four palm-trees, two on each side of the entrance. In this court, squatting under the shade of the trees, or idly lounging upon the top of the wall, were collected all the idlers of the town; and as these, besides gossiping and dozing, were particularly attentive to the daily prayers and ablutions as prescribed in the Koran, I had not a doubt that they were the worst characters in Tajourah, for I never met among the Mahomedans a strict observer of the stated hours and forms of prayer, but I always found him to be crafty, designing, and treacherous. The only man I ever met with during my subsequent journey, who deliberately, and for days, watched for an opportunity to assassinate me, was one of these pharisaical rascals, who always chose the largest boulder or detached piece of rock he could find, on which to exalt himself above every one else during the performance of his prostrations or prayers.

Two other mosques, the only stone buildings in Tajourah, were much inferior in size to the one I have just described, being but a foot or two higher than the devotees; the roofs were flat, and a white lime-wash, prepared from the roasted shell coral reef behind the town, slacked with water, had been freely applied to the walls outside, but having no windows, the interiors looked like open sepulchres. One of these stood at a short distance behind the house of the Sultaun, the other flanked the sea front of the town, at the opposite extremity of which was a ruined stone building, of a square form, standing close to the water’s edge, and which, I suppose, was meant originally for a protecting tower, but nothing except the remains of the walls were left to enable us to form any idea of its original character. The mosque on the sea-shore was much frequented at the time of the morning prayers, immediately before and after sunrise, great numbers of the inhabitants taking advantage of the sea to indulge in a more extensive ablution than they could conveniently perform during the rest of the day.

Although I always professed to be of the same religion as Mahomed, that we both could have worshipped God together, and as regarded the stated number of times, I might also have been an advocate for the first proposal made to him by the angel Gabriel, of at least five hundred prayers per day being necessary, still I objected to the laws and regulations he had established, and preferred, with all deference to the opinions of my Dankalli friends the institutes of Jesus; and as they admitted he was a prophet sent from God, I contended that I could not be much in error in following his instructions, even if judged by the Koran. I did not find it necessary, therefore, to become, a convert to Islamism, or I might, as the enterprising Burckhardt has done, dilate upon their belief and form of worship.

I noticed, that they prayed very regularly five times a-day, with their faces turned towards Mecca; once immediately before and again after sunrise; then came the Assair, or afternoon prayer, between three and four o’clock; and again before and after sunset. Each service is preceded by carefully washing all parts of the body that are not covered by the clothes. The ceremony commences by several devotees standing up in one long row in front of the mosque, which is always so built as to have a proper regard to the situation of Mecca. Their open hands are first brought closely up to the ears, whilst they repeat some short ejaculations respecting the greatness of God, the compassionate, the only one; then stooping in the attitude of a low bow, the hands resting on the knees, something of the same sort is again repeated, and down they all sit together, in the Arab fashion, on the bent legs, not crossed in front, like the Turks, but turned under them the contrary way. After sundry satisfactory looks about them, and stroking their beards, if they have any, all bend their heads to the earth, pressing the forehead hard upon the ground two or three times successively; then, after a little more sitting, turning to their right and left hands, they repeat, in each position, protestations of peace with all the world, and rising up, depart to their several avocations, meeting again at the next stated hour of prayer, to repeat exactly the same devout ceremonial.

On one occasion, I had a good laugh at the little play of some boys of the Sultaun’s household, who pretended to go through the ceremony of circumcision, and in which they performed their parts with great gravity, and all attention, no doubt, to the details of that, to them, very interesting operation. It must be observed, that circumcision among the Dankalli, as among other Mahomedans, is frequently deferred to a very late period, the boys, or young men rather, being sometimes sixteen or eighteen years old before they are thus made eligible for reception into the paradise of the faithful. To proceed, however, with a description of the ceremony, as it was acted in the little court before our house. The door being thrown open by the attendants, a boy, representing the grave old Kadee, with the operator, entered side by side, followed by the father and the candidate for circumcision, and these by a crowd of friends who, when the operation began, formed a circle before the Kadee and the father, who sat very sedately upon a couch. The operator, with a piece of stick, then commenced acting his part, whilst the boy laid upon his back on the ground, kicking and shrieking, pretended to suffer great pain, which, as in our pantomimes, was, of course, the fun of the whole thing. He, unfortunately, overdid his part, at least did it so naturally and with so much noise, that some of the neighbours came rushing in to see what accident had happened. Their appearance put to flight the whole company of juvenile actors, who got off, however, with some tumbles over each other through the narrow doorway, except the circumcised one, who being caught by Shurmalkee’s slave, Abdullah, got a few cuffs upon the head, and a kick or two behind, with a polite request that he should convey them to the mock Kadee, as part payment of his expenses on the occasion. I took a note of this as it afforded me an opportunity of completing the account of the ceremonials of the Mahomedan religion by Burckhardt, all of which, excepting the circumcision, and which, by the by, he must have submitted to, he has so admirably described. Without compromising myself, I had an opportunity in this farce of witnessing the principal features of the first necessary step of Mahomedan proselytism, as performed according to law.

I frequently observed a religious ceremony that seemed to be a spontaneous outbreak of religious fervour on the part of individuals, rather than a generally recognised portion of their devotions. Towards evening, a large circle of some twenty or thirty men would commence a loud and long-continued repetition of the word Allah, for nearly a quarter of an hour; and then being served, each drank a small cup of coffee, whilst one of their number, with an open Koran on the ground before him, read a portion of one of the chapters, at the termination of which would commence again the calling upon the name of Allah, rocking themselves backwards and forwards in the most violent manner until nearly exhausted, when another supply of coffee being ready, and a portion of the Koran read as before, they prepared themselves for another bout of the vociferation. This they called a zekar, and would sometimes keep it up the whole night, much to the disturbance of their less devout neighbours.

The Dankalli women are greater apparent devotees of Islamism than those of any other eastern country I visited. Continually, whilst at work, they chant some sacred passages of the Koran, or assemble in each other’s houses to join in domestic zekars; and here I must observe, that though somewhat attempted on the part of the Sultaun’s family, from an affectation of Arab customs, the women are not precluded, except by their own feelings of propriety, from the freest intercourse with the men.

In their judicial proceedings, they affect to be directed entirely by the law of the Koran, and have a very quiet fat old Kadee, who superintends marriages, circumcisions, and other civil and religious ceremonies; but from what I could learn from a conversation held by Mr. Cruttenden with Cassim, very summary proceedings sometimes characterize their administration of justice.

Ohmed, the eldest son of the Sultaun, had with real Eastern cunning, obtained a present from us on the plea of his going to Abasha with me. On the near approach of our departure he intimated, in reply to our asking him if he were ready, that when he said he was going to Abasha he meant to Gondah, and not with me to Shoa; and seemed highly pleased at having thus outwitted Mr. Cruttenden. who supposed that by Abasha, Ohmed meant to say that he was to accompany me to Shoa. Of course, under our circumstances, Mr. Cruttenden could only take this deception in good part; but in the evening, Ohmed and a good number of the principal men being in our place, Mr. Cruttenden commenced the conversation by asking Cassim, if there were justice to be procured in Tajourah? “Of course; certainly. Do we not profess Islamism?” was the prompt and almost offended reply. “Then how do you punish theft?” asked Mr. Cruttenden. “Oh,” replied Cassim, “we drag the thief down to the beach, and haul him about in the sea-water till his stomach is quite full, we then drag him along the sand till he throws it up again; after that, we kill an ox, eat him, and make the thief pay for it; and he then is received into society again.” This was too amusing a relation not to be interpreted to me by the kindness of Mr. Cruttenden, who postponed the application of the reason of his inquiry, to the deceit practised upon him by Ohmed, for the purpose of enjoying with me this account of the wild justice of the Dankalli.

CHAPTER IV.

Reception of visitors by the Sultaun of Tajourah.—Arrival in that town, from Shoa, of Demetrius and Joannes.—Ruins and remains of antiquity.—Preparations for our departure.—The day fixed for our start.—Leave Tajourah on the 27th of March.

During my stay in Tajourah, the fair at Berberah broke up, and three or four boats belonging to the town returned, some of them firing guns to announce their approach, the reports of which, as was justly observed by Nassah, being very thin compared to good fat English ones.

As each boat anchored, the rais and passengers, if there were any, dressed in their cleanest and best apparel, proceeded to the Sultaun’s house, escorted by a mob of the townspeople, to an audience with his Majesty, who received them with great formality. Every one touched his hand, and then kissed their own, placing the ends of their fingers immediately afterwards on their foreheads, the usual mode of Arab salutation. After this, the whole assembly repeated the opening chapter of the Koran called the Fahtah, to intimate the peaceable nature of the meeting. The latest news of the fair were now discussed, the ever-circulating coffee sent round, the Fahtah again was joined in; and so terminated the business of welcoming the return of the parties home.

Some three or four days previous to our starting, a kafila from Abyssinia came in, and with it arrived two Greeks, who had long been residing at the court of Salie Selassie, the Negus, or King of Shoa. Their names were Demetrius and Joannes; whilst in Abyssinia they had professed Christianity, but now found it convenient to be very devout Mahomedans, and called themselves, the former, Hadjji Mahomed, the latter, Hadjji Yoseph. They were in no very good condition, having been robbed on this side the Hawash, by one of the tribes of the Dankalli people living near that river. They reported also, that three discharged Indian servants of Capt. Harris’s were killed at the same time, and accounted for their own escape by their being Mahomedans. They farther informed us that only one half of the stores last sent up had reached Shoa, the rest having been plundered by the Bedouins. All the English party had, however, arrived in safety. They begged to be given a passage to Aden, and also for any article of clothing we might have to spare.

Our interview with these men took place in the usual court of audience, before the Sultaun, Isaak, and Cassim; and Mr. Cruttenden having in the meantime sent his servant for two shirts, Cassim, to prevent any dispute between the two men, very gravely undertook to decide by lot which shirt each should have. Placing his face in his cloth he received from Demetrius a piece of stick, and from Joannes a small stone, without of course knowing the choice of either, then uncovering his face, he placed upon each shirt the representative of the individual that should have it; and who, accordingly, received from the hands of the Sultaun the, to them, very welcome present. After our interview with these men, and we had returned to our own courtyard, Cassim came in and remarked, it was very foolish of Demetrius and his friend affecting Mahomedanism in Tajourah, when their religion and situation in Shoa were so well known to him, he having frequently seen them in that country. He seemed rather vexed at the mistrust evinced by this circumstance; and, appealing to us, asked if we thought they would have been any the worse treated had they come in the character of Christians. We found afterwards, that with all their protestations of poverty, these men had brought down several slave-girls, whom they were desirous of carrying over to Mocha, and by their sale obtain funds to carry them to Constantinople. This coming to the ears of Mr. Cruttenden, he peremptorily refused them a passage in his boat, and told them that if they brought their slaves to Aden, their relative positions would certainly be reversed, that they would be imprisoned, and their bondswomen be made free.

Having heard in Aden from conversations with a missionary who had visited Tajourah that some ruins existed near that town, which could only be referred to the labours of some highly civilized people in a condition far superior to the present state of the inhabitants, I was particular in my inquiries concerning the traditional history of the place. The Sultaun, who appeared to be one of the oldest men, informed me that in his younger days stone walls of some extent, but completely in ruins, were to be seen on the road to the well, and offered to accompany Mr. Cruttenden and myself to point out their situation. Their site was about half way between the town and the well. All traces of them above ground had long since disappeared; but by raking over the spot with the butt-end of a spear very evident marks of the foundations of some extensive buildings were to be seen, but still were too indistinct to enable us to form any idea as to their character. A few yards distant from them we found, nearly perfect, a regular formed millstone of extraordinary dimensions, made of a black coarse volcanic rock, and weighing at least 600 pounds; the Sultaun could give us no other account of its origin than that it had been brought down from the hills by the rain. Respecting the stone houses, foundations of which we had been examining, he told us that he had been informed by his father, that the Turks had erected them when they had possession of the country.

It is necessary, however, to observe, that there are no remains of ancient buildings, either in this country or that of the Soumaulee, concerning which the natives will not tell the same tale, that they were towns once occupied by the Turks. I was often told during my journey through the Adal country of ruined houses built of stone and lime, being in the neighbourhood, and my informants invariably added that they had formerly belonged to the Turks; sometimes, as if correcting themselves, explaining that they meant the Feringees, for that the old possessors had not been Mahomedans but Christians.

Proceeding to the well, we found the mouth of it surrounded with a low fence of stones, about two feet high. The shaft was about fifteen or sixteen feet deep to the surface of the water, which is always plentiful and sweet. At some little distance, their extremities placed in the earth, were six upright halves of the same kind of mill-stone we had just before seen; all of which, according to the statements of the numerous slave-girls who were filling their water-skins, had been brought from some place among the hills by the torrents in the wet season, so far according with the Sultaun’s story, and perhaps originating from the same sources of information.

The questions that naturally arise are, to what people must we attribute these works of art, so superior to the capabilities of the present inhabitants of Tajourah, are even these rude mill-stones, and for what purpose of manufacture could they have been originally designed. The climate of the country in which we find them precludes the idea of their being used for the grinding of wheat; nor would the jowaree, I think, be used as food by people so advanced in civilization as these stones indicate. I am quite at a loss to account for their presence, for no production of this country, as it now exists, could require their employment, and the difficulty can only be surmounted by supposing them to have been the product of a period anterior to the volcanic era which has made the whole of this country a desert. Some examination of the country to the north and east of Tajourah may, perhaps, at a future day prove the existence of extensive ruins in the neighbourhood; and this I feel more inclined to believe from the name of Tajourah itself, which appears to me to signify the dependent village of the black population, of some once great and flourishing city.

The time was now approaching for my departure. The Arab blacksmith had been two or three days at work making me a crooked dagger to be carried with three small pistols in my belt, and which enabled me to present a very warlike front. The rumours of assassinations and Bedouin attacks, made me wish to be ready in cases of extremity. I am fully convinced that the greatest danger in travelling among savage and lawless tribes is fancied security, and to be really safe, the traveller must be always prepared to meet their attacks. He will find his best protection to be a constant suspicion of every man’s intentions until fully convinced of his peaceable character, or that he is quite aware of the ability to reward him for his protection and friendship, or to punish him for any attempts upon life or property.

Two saddle-bags of cowskin dressed with the hair on, were made also by the blacksmith; they had no pretensions to elegance, certainly, but as they were capacious enough for me to stow in them all the wardrobe I had selected for the journey, and also several pounds of biscuit, and a small cheese, I did not mind their not being of a make that would have commanded the entire approbation of a bagsman accustomed to travel only on English roads. A mule was also purchased for my use, a good old Shabah, as my Dankalli servant Allee used to delight in calling her. She was a remarkably staid steady-going animal of a sober grey colour, and had been so accustomed to travel up and down the road we were going, that I really believe she could have taken me to Shoa without a guide, and had become so used to the regular slow two miles an hour pace of the camels, that she never could be induced to go on any faster, and always seemed most happy when she was at the very end of the line walking close under the tail of the last camel.

Mr. Cruttenden and myself were hard at work with our needles for two days previous to the start, he kindly undertaking to manufacture a skin-case for my watch, pocket-compass, and ammunition; whilst I attempted to vie with him in his workmanship by stitching together two strips of ox-hide into a belt, which, for want of the necessary buckles, was made to button in front. To this the sheath of my Adal knife, or dagger, was secured, as also a little bag for caps and bullets. When finished, the Sultaun very graciously pronounced the belt to be a very creditable effort of genius, with which encomium I felt highly flattered.

March 27th, the last day in Tajourah.—The night before, all the boxes were taken to the open place beyond the little stone mosque in the rear of the Sultaun’s house, preparatory for the grand start to our first halt this day, which I was positively informed would be at the distance of at least seven miles. It was not until late in the afternoon, that I was called to witness the camels loaded for the first time, and to count them, as they one by one proceeded on their march. Mr. Cruttenden was present to take farewell; and a whole circle of the principal hukells of the town, who here held their last calahm, to place me particularly under the care of Ohmed Mahomed, the brother of Cassim and Mahomed, or as he was commonly called Ebin Izaak, the son of Izaak, upon whom jointly now devolved the charge of the Kafilah and myself. Cassim, one of the chief men of the town, and Ibrahim Shaitan, “the devil,” (a very appropriate name,) had agreed to accompany us for three days, and see us fairly started on our journey.

The camels having already got out of sight, the Fahtah was recited by all present, and a general leave-taking followed. I shook hands with Mr. Cruttenden, and after sincerely thanking him for his kindness and the trouble he had taken in providing everything necessary for my journey, mounted my mule, and went on my way rejoicing at having at last turned my back upon Tajourah, a town I was most heartily tired of.

CHAPTER V.

Journey to Ambabboo, distance three miles, general direction south-west, along the sea-shore.—Halt for the night.—Journey to Dulhull, distance seven miles, general direction nearly south-west.—Staying at Dulhull.

We first passed a small stream which a shower among the hills during the preceding night had produced, and which was now running directly into the sea: then the well, with the usual crowd of laughing water-bearers, who in groups were commenting upon the Feringee Kafilah, and as I passed saluted me with an abundance of salaams (peace). Cassim was the only one of the group of five natives that accompanied me who was mounted, and he was unarmed, except with the common dagger of his countrymen. The remainder, excepting Ibrahim Shaitan, who had made himself particularly disagreeable in Tajourah, were strangers to me. I was given to understand they formed a part of the escort of ten men who were engaged to accompany me on the journey. They were certainly the most cut-throat looking individuals I had ever seen; their suspicious glances, low whispers, and rumoured characters, for they were some Bedouins of the interior, made me feel rather uncomfortable at first, and I almost felt inclined to get off my mule, and go to prayers with Cassim, when I saw him dismount as we rode along the beach and commence his ablutions for that purpose. As, however, he made no signal for me to halt, I proceeded quietly along with the rest of the party till we passed a broad current, some feet wide, of small hermit crabs, that were marching along, at a great pace, from the sea, towards the north, in which direction, it must be observed, Mecca lay. I pulled up my mule to observe what could possibly be the reason of such an array passing along, and my wild-looking friends coming up, Ibrahim, whose knowledge of Arabic rivalled mine, looked in my face inquiringly, and pointing to the crabs, remarked, “fennah rah?” (where go) to which I replied in equally good Arabic, “hadge” (pilgrimage), at which he raised a loud laugh, and telling his friends in their language, they seemed to enjoy the joke exceedingly. After this incident I got a little more confidence, and was just going to ask Ibrahim some question relative to the time we should be on the journey, when a sudden turn brought us to a little savannah, surrounded with date and mimosa trees, whilst beyond, rising high above the bright green foliage, was a pretty regular amphitheatre of high conical hills. As we had been scarcely an hour reaching this place, and I saw by the boxes being piled up that a halt was intended, I was rather astonished at finding our first day’s march so very short, and Cassim riding up, I put the question to him if it were intended to start again in the night, as is frequently the case with Kafilahs to avoid the heat of the day. Cassim, however, told me that we should not start again until the next morning very early, a number of camels and men not having joined who intended to accompany us to Abasha. My new servant Zaido, a slave of Ohmed Mahomed, was here introduced to me. He had been engaged to attend me on the road for twenty dollars, to be paid on our arrival in Shoa. He was a tall good-natured sort of a fellow, but the greatest coward I ever met among these brave people, and the very reverse in this respect to his much shorter fellow-slave, Allee Ohmed, who also had been ordered by his master to look after my mule, and who was ever ready to perform other services for me in the expectation of a few gilt buttons, and a boxeish, or present, at parting. Neither of them was much more than twenty years old, but Allee had proved himself a man of some courage in a battle with the Issah Soumaulee, in which he had killed his opponent.

Immediately on arriving at the halting-place, Allee took my mule, and Zaido brought me my carpet, with my Scotch plaid and Arab cloak, which were rolled up in it, and arranged my bed for the night in an open part of the savannah, placing my saddle under my head to serve for a pillow. Cassim took up his position on one side of me, and Ibrahim on the other side of Cassim, whilst during the night Alee and Zaido lay, one at my feet, and the other at my head, to guard against any attempt to assassinate me during the night, it being known that many of the Debenee tribe had declared that no white man should pass again through their country, owing to a dispute about the division of five or six thousand dollars they asserted the Sultaun had received from the English, in payment for the purchase of some small islands in the Bay of Tajourah. The murder of three of Capt. Harris’s European escort, eight or nine days’ journey inland, was a painful evidence of the vindictive spirit thus excited. From the Debenee I was afterwards told I had more to fear than from any other tribe I should have to pass through.

During the night, I received a note from Mr. Cruttenden, which I read and answered by the light of the moon. A slight shower of rain gave promise of an abundant supply of water during our journey, and was hailed by all as a very propitious omen.

March 28th.—Up and off two hours before sunrise. I would not wait for my mule, but walked on with Cassim and Ibrahim whilst the camels were being loaded. Our march lay along the sands, where, for a short time, I sat under the shade of some date-palms, whilst my companions bathed and performed their first prayers for the day. I saw an abundance of game, chiefly guinea-fowl, and the small antelope mentioned by Salt, a graceful little thing, scarcely twelve inches high, of a greyish fawn-colour, with beautifully formed head and large prominent black eyes. My double-barrelled carabine being loaded with ball, I would not shoot at them, fearing that I might miss, and I could not well afford to lose my character as a marksman among the people I was now living with, who consider every white man to be naturally a good shot.

Prayers being over, we again started, and soon passed a small native village of about eight houses, called Ambabboo, where we met some Bedouins with two or three camels who had come with the intention of joining our Kafilah. A little girl here brought me some milk in one of their curiously constructed baskets, and her brother, dragging along a young kid, wanted me to accept it. Cassim, who suspected the real meaning of all this generosity, objected to the kid on the plea of inconvenience. I, however, made them both happy by giving them a few beads and a couple of needles.

Leaving the coast, we entered a wood of low mimosa-trees, the thorny boughs of which I was obliged to be continually throwing from before my face. We soon came to a fordable part of a small creek communicating with the sea, and which I then found had caused the detour. The water where we passed was about two feet deep, and after crossing we reached the sea-shore again in a short time, and travelled along the sands until we came to an open bare spot, over which I could see, by the drift wood and large rolled stones, that during the wet season a torrent must rush into the sea. Here we were to halt for the rest of the day. A large Kafilah of natives going to Tajourah had spent the night in the same place, and were just leaving as our small party of pedestrians arrived, the time being the dawn of day, and we having been two hours on the march.

The name of this halting-place was Dulhull. I sat down on a large stone, at a short turn in the otherwise nearly direct line of the sea-shore from east to west, which admitted of a fine view of the Bay of Tajourah and the distant sea. The sun, “from ocean rising,” quickly dissolved the last shades of night, and one of the most lovely scenes my eyes ever beheld extended before me. All the azure and golden tinting of that imaginative painter, Turner, was realized, and I silently acknowledged the injustice of my premature judgment, in considering his pictures very pleasing, but most unnatural. The gorgeous apparel of the cloud-robed sun, the silvery play of the nearly calm reflecting surface of the sea; the blue rocks of the opposite Soumaulee shore; the palm-tree fringe of the waving line of coast, along which I had just been travelling; the distant view of Tajourah, and the quiet of its little merchant fleet, aided in producing an effect of enjoyment in my mind, that perhaps owed some portion of its charm to the feeling of having at last entered upon the long wished-for life of novel and wild adventure which, from a boy, I had so ardently desired. Behind me rose a succession of bare rugged hills, gradually increasing in height till at the peak of Jibel Goodee, about six miles off, they attained an elevation of 6,000 feet, all evidently of volcanic origin, save the little low heaps of recent sandstone close to the shores of the bay which had been upheaved, probably at the same period with the more imposing rocks beyond them.

One of these hills of stratified sandstone had been impregnated with the vapour of a cupras sublimation, until it had assumed a light green colour; and upon the strength of about five per cent. of copper, some travellers had represented that it was a Jibel Narse, or hill of copper. Many of the natives were firmly impressed with an idea that it was for the promise thus held out of an abundant supply of this metal, that had induced the English to attempt the purchase of Tajourah and the neighbouring country from the Sultaun Mahomed. I may here observe, that a purchase had been effected between this chief and the Indian Government of the two islands; one at the entrance of the bay, and another much smaller, lying in the little channel leading into Goobatul Khhrab, and for which, I believe, the Sultan received some five or six thousand dollars.

I was now joined by some of our Kafilah, which had in the meantime come up and commenced unlading. Zaido placed two mats under the shade of some closely-growing mimosa-trees, and one or two of the escort, who seemed willing to patronize me for the sake of the few buttons or needles I could bestow upon them, brought their mats and laid them down all around me. A rude sense of politeness seemed to prevent their pressing inconveniently near me; but I suspected that it was merely the hollow affectation of courtesy by the most cold-blooded assassins I ever met or ever read of. By their own showing, not one of them that wore a small tuft of hair upon the boss of his shield but had killed and murdered ten or twelve individuals, which, if only understood as two or three, the men surrounding me must have caused the death of at least a score of their fellow-beings; and the delight and evident zest with which they spoke of or listened to the several struggles in which they had been engaged, told the fierce and cruel character of these demons in human shape. “Neither the hospitality nor the high sense of honour that characterizes the savage of America or of the Oceanic Islands, is to be found among the Dankalli tribes. Murder is equally productive of renown as is the most honourable fight; and the same triumphant badges are worn by the valiant soldier and the cowardly assassin. The companion of the day and the sharer of your food will, under cover of night, strike without remorse his knife into your throat; and of all the savage people that inhabit this benighted land of Africa, the Dankalli are allowed by all to be the most treacherous and cruel.” This was the character I had received of my present companions; and it was necessary therefore that I should be careful to give them no excuse for attempting my life, acting as courteously as possible, distributing needles and bits of paper, loading and firing my pistols repeatedly for their amusement during the day. Having smashed, on one occasion, an earthen coffee-pot that the owner had challenged me to fire at, they were quite satisfied that I could as easily demolish an elephant with one of the little insignificant looking things that they saw I always wore at my waist, and this feeling I did not endeavour to dissipate, as I saw it had a very good effect upon the bearing of these men towards me. An accident that happened also, by which one of them was nearly shot, made them not over anxious to trust themselves too near to me, or my pistols, and turned out to be a fortunate circumstance, by preventing them from closing and crowding around me.

As evening drew on, Zaido, who had prepared me a breakfast in the morning of boiled rice and dates, now cooked me some kid’s flesh, a portion of another present I had received in the course of the day from some Bedouin shepherds who were tending their flocks of sheep and goats in the neighbourhood, and who had sent it in by some of their children. The men did not appear themselves, for among our Kafilah were some individuals of a tribe with whom this Bedouin family had a blood feud. During the whole day I observed several of them assembled on a spur of Jibel Goodee, awaiting the result of our arrival with spear and shield in hand, as if they expected an attack. After supper I directed Allee and Zaido to make a little fort of boxes, as I saw I had nothing to trust to but the greatest precaution on my part. I was only afraid of night attacks, for during the day I felt pretty well assured that I should be quite free from any molestation, but even this partial idea of security led me subsequently into considerable danger; and, as I hope my experience may be of service to future travellers, my errors shall be duly paraded with the same fairness as those incidents I shall no doubt speak of, from which I expect any credit may arise.

The roof of my box-fort or hut was made by placing the long camel saddle-sticks across from side to side, over which I threw my carpet, and on this piled camel saddles, mats, and everything calculated to awaken me by making a noise in case of any one attempting to uncover my retreat. A good palanquin with locks on the doors would not be a bad carriage for such a country as Adal. The dilemma would be to procure bearers, for I do not think the native Dankalli could by any means be induced to the exercise of such a long-continued labour as the patient dauk carriers upon the roads of India.

Neither Ohmed Mahomed nor Ebin Izaak was to be seen to-day, and I found that they had returned during the past night to Tajourah, to spend another last day with their families, leaving Cassim in charge of the Kafilah. He sometimes walked up to the trees under which I lay during the day, to see that everything was right with me. A Bedouin, who had kept close to me the entire day, had placed himself at the entrance of my hut when I retired; and Zaido told me he was one of the escort who had sworn to Izaak not to let me go out of his sight, upon the promise of receiving a cloth from his son in Abasha. As he was a very superior-looking man, at least forty years of age, very quiet, and less importunate for trifles than the rest of his countrymen, I thanked him, as well as I could, for his attention, and gave him a cotton handkerchief.

After looking suspiciously to the right and left, creeping a little way into my hut he secured the gift in a dirty rag to the handle of his shield, which he hung up in my hut to be taken care of, by signs intimating that it would rain, and also that he was my very good friend, insisting at the same time, that I should write his name, Garahmee, down in my note-book. He then turned away to get some boiled rice with Zaido and Allee, whilst I turned in upon my mat, covered myself with my plaid and Arab cloak, and composed myself to sleep.

March 29.—I found we should not leave Dulhull to-day; neither Ohmed Mahomed, nor Ebin Izaak, having yet arrived, Garahmee and a new Bedouin friend, Moosa Gra, proposed to accompany me if I chose to bathe in the sea, but as it was in front of and in sight of the Kafilah, I told them I did not require their attendance. After bathing I took my yesterday morning’s position upon the stone on the sea-shore, and again looked with pleasure upon the lovely picture before me. While still enjoying the scene, a sudden flash from the beach in front of Tajourah followed in a few minutes by a booming report, told the departure of Mr. Cruttenden for Berberah, and scarcely had his little vessel returned the salute of the town, and raised her long lateen sail, than she flew as if impatient from the land, and at our distance seemed not unlike a large white bird scudding over the surface of the sea.

Mr. Cruttenden having left Tajourah, Cassim and Ibrahim, who had been, I could see, anxiously awaiting the report, thought they could go back to their homes without further trouble. Their protestations of anxiety for my safety, and desire to see me well started on my journey, having been sheer humbug, but by which of course they had secured proportionate rewards. I had scarcely recovered from the fit of musing, the circumstance of my having witnessed the departure of Mr. Cruttenden had occasioned, when these worthies came up to announce their own intention of immediately returning to Tajourah. Ibrahim, who had a raw kidney in his hand, offered part of it to me with the most innocent politeness, but which I having with a graceful bow declined, he handed to Cassim, who made but two mouthfuls of it. They amused themselves with my evident surprise at their indulging in such a delicacy as they undoubtedly considered it; and having put me, as they thought, into a good humour with them, proposed their return. I made no observation in reply, for I was only too glad to get Ibrahim away, as he very evidently disliked me, and all that were of my colour. I had nearly quarrelled with him the evening before, through resisting his attempts to cut the leaves out of a copy of Mr. M‘Queen’s survey of Africa, in an Appendix of which was contained an extract of the route through this country, from the journals of Messrs. Isenberg and Krapf, and which I had been comparing with the accounts I was receiving of the road from the natives who surrounded me. Upon learning that the account was that of the missionaries, Ibrahim, for some reason or other, drew his knife, and stated his intention of cutting the book up, but upon my putting it immediately into my saddle-bag, with a very significant expression, the by-standers took Ibrahim away. To all appearance, the circumstance was soon forgotten, for he appeared in a short time afterwards, and asked me to give him some lucifer matches, with which request I immediately complied, and in this manner established peace again between us.

On the present occasion Cassim began the conversation by saying, how anxious he was for the Kafilah to proceed, which was false; as Zaido had told me but a short time before that we were waiting for some friends of Cassim himself, who were going to join our Kafilah with a few camels, which they intended to load with salt for the Shoan market at the Bahr Assal, and that they would not be ready till the next day. Cassim, however, went on to state, that he was exceedingly angry with his brother, Ohmed Mahomed, for detaining us, and that it was his intention to go back to Tajourah to hasten him on to rejoin the Kafilah; and added, that Ibrahim would also accompany him for mutual protection on the road. He concluded, by representing that the smallest offering would be gladly accepted, but hinted his expectation of a considerable boxeish for his attendance so far, and proportionate to the very important position he held among the Tajourah people, which, he said, would be considerably diminished, if what I should give him were not what his admirers might expect. As I was not in a humour to understand all this, my little knowledge of Arabic wonderfully diminished, and it was absurd to see the grave personage Cassim, in consequence, throwing his hands and arms about, strutting and looking pompous, and then most benign, to convey to my obtuse understanding the impression most favourable for his wishes. Ibrahim stood very quietly by, cleaning his extremely white teeth with the ever accompanying stick of a singular kind of tree called Woomen, growing in the neighbourhood of Dulhull. He, however, made no observation until Cassim had finished, and had seen him receive four dollars, then his turn came.

Ibrahim was a little spare man, but commenced with saying, that he was quite as good as Cassim, that he was my friend, and, besides, was going to introduce me to another friend of his who would accompany me all the way, and sooner die than see me injured. This friend’s name he made me write down in my book with a particular note, that I should not forget to give him also a boxeish on our arrival in Abasha. As for himself, he added, he was convinced I should do him justice. To my sense of what was due to his numerous excellences, therefore, and to the goodness of Allah, he left all consideration of what bounty I intended to bestow upon him.

I had made up my mind to divide ten dollars between them at Segallo, the halting-place where it was originally intended they should leave me, but as that was at some distance, I thought they should get nothing by the little deceit they had practised in keeping me at Dulhull until Mr. Cruttenden had sailed, and then saving themselves any farther trouble, by returning immediately to Tajourah. As has been observed, I gave Cassim only four, and to Ibrahim I presented three dollars, observing to the latter, that I had given him more than the extra dollar Cassim had received, in beads, needles, buttons, and matches; for of all the natives, Bedouin, or townspeople, Ibrahim was the most bothering, and greedy in begging everything he could set his eyes upon. When he could obtain nothing else, he asked for medicine, and if I had taken him at his word, and done him full justice, I think I could not have done less than have seized this opportunity of poisoning him, and so have sent him to that place from whence he derived his very unamiable “nom de guerre,” among his own countrymen, of “Shaitan.”

Our grief at parting, not being of that excessive kind that would interfere with any opportunities I had of making observations on the people I was amongst, as soon as they were gone I had my mat spread again under the trees, and was soon surrounded by others, who were retreating from the hot sun to the same friendly shelter.

Some women also came down from among the hills with small skins of clotted milk, which they gladly exchanged for needles. The younger ones are very beautiful girls, but of exceedingly slender form, reminding me strongly of the appearance of the Indian girls in Calcutta, and strikingly different in figure from the female slaves brought down from Abyssinia. These latter are particularly plump, with roundly formed and fleshy limbs, and of rather short stature, whilst the Adal women are thin, muscular, and tall. The latter, too, were considerably more vivacious and active, and the characters of their features were as decidedly different as the chief points of their figure. I have before observed, that the genuine Dankalli belongs to the Circassian variety; but I shall not stay here to form farther comparisons with the Abyssinians, but will wait till I arrive in that country, and can bring my subjects properly before the reader.

The older women were repulsive looking witches with dependent breasts, like old black butter skins, lying empty and flat upon the chest. This disgusting appearance is produced by the constant pressure of the band placed over the shoulders, and across the breast, and which secures whatever burden the woman is carrying behind her. They invariably have something stowed away in this manner, either a child, a bundle of split doom leaves for plaiting, an odd bundle of salt, or a large skin full of milk. It is generally suspended from the chest upon the loins, and the constant pressure, in the course of time has the effect of completely obliterating the glandular portion of the breasts, leaving only two long double flaps of black skin, to tell where once the fountains of life had been. They had a constant habit of tapping the mouth with the tips of their fingers to express astonishment, and pressing both hands to the lower part of the face was the very modest manner in which they walked off their nearly naked bodies, when we came suddenly up to a party of them, for it was seldom they volunteered to stay in my neighbourhood unless called upon to do so. A white skin evidently had no charms for them, and I could only smile at their prejudice and bad taste. The same kind of feeling makes many a negro happy in London, who, if the truth were known, looks with an eye of pity or contempt upon the pale faces that turn in disgust from him.

Mothers, towards evening, came bringing their diseased children into camp, and when I could be of service, it was some pleasure to assist them with what little medicine I possessed; but to some who were irrecoverable, I only suggested such dietary treatment I considered might be palliative, for I would not risk the danger of having their death laid to my charge, as it would have been had I administered any drug, or held out any hopes of recovery. One or two blind people went away very much disappointed at my not being able to restore them their sight.

My usual evening meal of rice and kid-flesh being duly prepared, I returned into my hut, drew out in secret my pewter spoon, the only remaining one of three, and made a hearty supper. All illness having apparently left me, appetite and a buoyancy of spirit I had long been a stranger to, had returned, enabling me fully to enjoy all the pleasures, if there can be any imagined, of the life I was now leading.

CHAPTER VI.

Staying at Dulhull.—March 31st, Journey to Segallo, distance one and a-half miles, general direction S.S.W.—Halt for the night.—Journey to Daddahue, distance ten miles, general direction W.S.W.—Attack of the Bursane subdivision of the Ad’alee tribe.—Halt for the night.

March 30th.—During the night, Ohmed Mahomed made his appearance, and at day-break his loud voice, calling to load the camels, awakened me with a start. Zaido, with a small kid-skin filled with very dirty water, poured a little into my hands, which I then threw over my face, wiped it dry with my silk handkerchief (my napkin having been stolen the night before), and thus finished my hasty toilet. After having troubled myself to saddle my own mule, I found that the camels were being unloaded again, and on inquiry, learned that there was a division in the camp. One party wishing to remain for some more camels to join us, and the other desirous of starting without any delay. It was at length agreed that the camels going to take up salt at Bahr Assal should go on to that place one day in advance of the Kafilah I belonged to, so as to give them time to load. We were to follow the next morning, to enable the camels to come up, belonging to some parties who had sent a messenger from Tajourah to say they would join us in the course of the day. To this course no reasonable objection could be raised, as it was the interest of the Ras, or head of the Kafilah, and of every camel-owner that composed it, to get as great a number of people together as possible to resist any extortion, or repel any attack that might be made by the different tribes we should meet with on the road. Ohmed Mahomed, therefore, consented to this arrangement, and we were detained at Dulhull another day in consequence. I noticed after Ohmed Mahomed’s arrival in camp, that great, and I thought very unnecessary, care was taken to guard me from any attack at night. My place being more securely shut in, and Ohmed Mahomed and his servants taking care to lie at the entrance, and around it. Ohmed had his reason for this, and I should not have slept very comfortably had I been then fully aware of the threats held out by the Debenee against any unfortunate Engreez travelling through their country, and of which I was only subsequently informed.

Our Kafilah during this day was increased by twenty-four camels, which made the total number, with the few that had gone on to the Bahr Assal, eighty-four, and we could muster altogether about forty fighting men; we had besides a few women and boys in company. Five Bedouins from the Hy Soumaulee tribe, who had been transacting some business in Tajourah, also accompanied us, and offered for five dollars each to be my personal guard on the road, and the rumours of intended attacks, and the evident anticipation of such by Ohmed Mahomed, made me agree to the proposal. Garahmee, Moosa Gra, Adam Burrah, Moomen, and Omah Suis were accordingly enlisted into my service.

It must be observed, that in the first instance in Tajourah, these men had been passed off to Mr. Cruttenden as being part of the escort of ten men which had been agreed upon should be provided, and for which Mr. Cruttenden had paid twenty-five dollars per man to Izaak and Cassim. I now learnt that besides the owners of the camels themselves, none had been so engaged to defend the property of the Mission, and that these Bedouins belonged to us no farther than I chose to engage them, and feeling the necessity of the case, I did not hesitate in coming to a conclusion upon the subject, protesting at the same time against the deception practised upon Mr. Cruttenden.

Subsequent events proved how greatly I was obliged to these men and their tribe for the protection they afforded me, and without their assistance I feel assured I could never have delivered the stores safe in Shoa, or have brought also along with me a quantity of other property belonging to the Mission that I found on the road, and which had been abandoned by the officers of the preceding division. Their fidelity to our engagement was also remarkable, considering the reported bad character of this people, which I must say was confirmed by my own observation; but as by the terms of our engagement they were to receive no money until our arrival in Abyssinia, it was their interest, of course, to be faithful to their charge, for in case of any accident preventing me or the stores reaching our destination, it was understood they were not to receive their pay.

I was a witness to-day of the barbarous manner in which the Dankalli brand the camel. It seems two different marks are required, both of which are made with a red-hot iron. One intimates the tribe of the owner, the other his private mark. Two camels had been purchased by another Ibrahim, a cousin of Ebin Izaak, a young quiet-looking fellow, and less violent in his manner than is usual among his countrymen; he, however, did not practise the less forbearance towards his new purchase, but proceeded at once to stamp them as his property. The fore legs of one of the camels being first secured by a strong leathern thong; another was afterwards fastened around the hind ones in a similar manner. A rope attached to the former was then made to run through the loop of the latter, and this being pulled by three or four men the feet were all drawn together, and the consequence was that the poor animal fell with tremendous force to the ground, uttering the most horrible cries. A piece of iron about half an inch thick, and some two feet long, being heated red-hot was then applied to the shoulder, nearly the whole length, and three successive marks were thus inflicted. The iron being heated afresh each time, remained until it was quite cold upon the skin, which curled up in a most sickening manner as the rude instrument was taken off. Three similar marks were also made upon the rump, after which the animal was liberated, and allowed to get up. I was glad there were only these two to be operated upon, for I never heard such bellowing shrieks that disturbed the camp during the operation, such only as camels can produce when suffering bodily pain.

A goat being killed to-day for my use, and all the meat not being required, it was cut into long strips, about an inch in thickness, and hung up in the sun to dry, being festooned about the sides of my hut, from the projecting ends of the saddle-staves, which assisted in forming the roof. Zaido set me to watch, that no hungry kite out of the number which were circling above us should pounce upon, and carry the meat away. I, however, amused myself more with their impudent stoops, and Zaido, on his return from watering his camels, found the goat’s flesh rapidly disappearing, more to the satisfaction of the birds than his own. What remained, however, being sufficiently dry, he hastily put into a large skin bag, which he tied up ready for loading on the morrow, our start being announced by public criers to take place next morning.

March 31st.—Zaido and Allee being busy loading the camels, I started with Ohmed Mahomed, and my body-guard on foot, leaving my mule to follow. Our road lay still along the sea-shore, the sand having become more shingly than before, and mixed with great quantities of broken shells, and rolled pieces of red and madrapore coral. I took the opportunity of bathing while the party I was with performed their ablutions, and repeated the morning prayers.

This was a very short march, the halting-place, Segallo, not being more than half an hour, or one and a-half miles from Dulhull. Ohmed Mahomed endeavoured to allay my disappointment by saying we should start again at night; but of course I did not believe him. I remained in my hut, which was made as usual, all day, not feeling very well; in the evening, however, I strolled from the low jungle that here skirts the sea, and in which our camp was made, to the beach, where I amused myself observing some sea-gulls that exhibited no little sagacity in the manner in which they obtained their food. All along the Bay of Tajourah the small hermit crab abounds, and formed, I should suppose, from what I saw, the principal prey of these birds. It would be a difficult thing to get at this kind of Crustacea, with all the means that seagulls can command; but instinct has taught them to have recourse to a method of unshelling the crabs that certainly I should not have thought of. Seizing the one they intend to operate upon, they fly up to the height of ten or twelve feet, and letting it drop it naturally falls on the heaviest, or topside of the shell. Before the little animal can recover itself, the gull has caught it again, and flying up with it the same height as before, he lets it drop a second time, and so he continues till the repeated falls have fractured the shell, and he gets at the animal without further trouble. It takes ten or twelve of these short flights to accomplish the object, but it never fails; and as the birds are certainly patterns of perseverance in their pursuit, they get, no doubt, a good living in this very singular manner. Besides this instance of their sagacity, I have seen gulls over and over again defeat the attempts of the hawk to pounce upon them, by making a very successful but very unusual flight for them, which was to vie with the hawk himself in the elevation he was obliged to take for the success of his swoop. In such cases they seek not to shun the butcher of their kind, but following him in each gyration he makes, afford him no opportunity of attack, and soon tire him out. I was called away from my musing occupation by Moosa, who came with a great deal of mystery to inform me of something that he was not quite able to tell me, but on returning with him to the camp, I found two boxes had been broken, during the short march from Dulhull, by falling from the back of the camel. I was requested to put them to rights, as driving nails was what the Dankalli did not understand. My carpentering amused them very much; and the job being settled to their satisfaction, I adjourned to my hut and turned in for the night.

April 1st.—We were up very early this morning, at least one hour before sunrise, and all started together for Daddahue, or Wadalissan, two different names that were given me for the next halt. I was desired to keep with the Kafilah, for fear of our being attacked, and also informed that it would be near mid-day before we should arrive at the encamping ground.

Our first hour’s march lay along the sea-shore, which was of the same character as yesterday, but I observed great quantities of sponge washed high upon the beach, and picked up some very good specimens. Pebbles of a beautiful opaline chalcedony were very common, and with the coral and rich pearly shells of some large bivalve, would have been sufficient foundation for an imaginative fancy to have here described a very bright pavement of fairy land.

Leaving the sea-coast, we entered a narrow gully, or dry bed of a stream, overhung by a thick jungle of different kinds of shrubs and bushes. The road thus naturally formed, was most wretched to travel upon, being strewed with blocks of black lava, of all shapes and sizes. We continued along its serpentine channel for nearly two hours; and it would have been useless to have endeavoured to find another road, for the surface of the adjoining country on either side was in a much worse condition; besides, the thick thorny bushes presented insurmountable obstacles in every direction save the watercourses we followed. We at length arrived at a gorge, or narrow pass, where it appeared as if the collected waters of some large reservoir had at a former period broken through a wall of lava, and thus escaped to the neighbouring sea, spreading over the intervening ground the debris of its forced passage. This remarkable looking spot was called Galla Lafue, from a tree of a very singular character, which abounds in this neighbourhood. It is about six feet high, its leaves thick, smooth, and fleshy, covered with a silvery down on the underside, and of a pale green above. It bore a large purple and white flower, the bark was of a light grey colour, and abounded with a white acid juice. That it was employed in any manner amongst the Dankalli for medicine, I could not learn. It only grows in the beds of temporary streams. I met with it first at Dulhull, on the sea-shore, and have seen it also in more elevated situations in Abyssinia.

The pass of Galla Lafue is not more than three hundred yards long, and winds between high perpendicular and flat-topped rocks of black lava. Its greatest width did not extend thirty yards. Gnawed bones were strewn about, on several parts, and on looking up I saw the low cave of a wild beast, whose traces were too recent to leave any doubt of it having only retired upon our approach. We soon emerged from this narrow ravine, and then passed along some broken ground of irregular heaps of boulders and stones, that reminded me of the bottom of some former lake, situated in a country where the fierce rush of water had only allowed the heavier debris of the surrounding rocks to accumulate; and of this character, I should imagine, was the bursting torrent that at last had made its escape through the pass of Galla Lafue into the sea.

The Kafilah did not proceed in the direction of the dry stony bed, but turning to the left hand, ascended the sloping banks, which at this point assumed a less precipitous character than immediately in the pass.

Some of the camel-drivers and Bedouins went, however, to pools of water in the neighbourhood, and filled their affaleetahs, small neatly-made kid-skin bags, one of which it is necessary every traveller should be provided with, and which, when not in use, is rolled closely up and carried, hanging from the handle of the shield. Mine hung from my saddle-bow, and I generally took care to have it filled before we started in the morning. To-day, however, as I walked with a crowd of the natives, I did not wait for my lagging mule, but refreshed myself, when thirsty, at the little cup-like depressions in the cellular blocks of lava that had been filled by a shower of rain the preceding night, but which had not extended to our camp at Seggallo. We crossed an extensive plain of loose volcanic stones, where we marched as if we were passing upon stepping-stones over some brook in England, and as this uneasy kind of walking was compulsory for some hours, it became very tiresome, and I felt a great relief when we came to a district which did afford a little more opportunity for some stunted and straggling mimosa-trees to bloom, but with a very melancholy dirty green verdure. Our path was here greatly improved, but just as I was congratulating myself upon the change, and thinking I should be able to continue walking another hour or two, we came upon the Kafilah, which had started the day before us from Dulhull, and to whose farther advance some obstacle had arisen. This induced Ohmed Mahomed, our Ras, to halt here also, and in the course of the day I was enabled to learn the cause of our detention, which had surprised me; for, but a short time before we halted, Ohmed had told me, with evident sincerity, that he intended us to proceed for two more hours.

The camels being unloaded, my hut was built as usual, into which I retired with some pleasure, the day having been exceedingly hot, and the long fatiguing march of at least five hours, had completely wearied me. I slept for two or three hours, when Ohmed Mahomed came and awakened me, to ask me to load my guns and pistols, as the Bedouins were collecting on the opposite height to oppose our farther progress. I always kept my carbine, and three waist-pistols in readiness for such anticipated occasions, but on this intimation I soon charged, in addition, a fowling-piece I had with me, and also produced two other holster pistols from my saddle-bags.

It was now nearly three o’clock, and a slight sea-breeze blowing over the land, cooled the air, whilst groups of our merchants and camel-drivers were performing their afternoon prayers. A valley at least three miles broad stretched from north to south as far as the eye could reach. From our low position, we could not see anything above the level line of the flat top parallel banks which, not sixty feet high, sloped gently into the plain below. The banks were of rough loose stones of a very large size, but the plain consisted of rich alluvial soil, which supported by its produce the flocks of one of the largest tribes in the neighbourhood of Tajourah, the Bursane Bedouins, and the fighting men of whom had now gathered for the purpose, as they avowed, of plundering the Kafilah, and destroying the white man who accompanied it.

As the prayers went on amongst our people, the loud whooping of the collecting tribe was answered by my Hy Soumaulee escort, who stood upon the slope on our right, and facing that upon which were our opponents. Garahmee, Moosa Gra, and Adam Burrah, spear and shield in hand, leaped round and round, yelling with every bound, and then with lesser jumps, seemed to trample upon the body of some fallen foe. Whilst jumping in this manner, Adam Burrah fell down, and rolling over and over, was very much bruised.

Ohmed Mahomed took measures in the first place to conciliate, if possible, the opposite party, and some half-bloods of the tribe among our Kafilah went for the purpose of effecting a treaty, but were unsuccessful, and on their return, they were followed by a cloud of the enemy, who now seemed to cover the whole further side of the valley. All this time I had kept out of sight at the express desire of Ohmed Mahomed; Zaido, Allee, and myself being left with the stores, every other member of the Kafilah, after the prayers had ended, having joined the Hy Soumaulee, were now sitting together in a large semicircle on a level spot that occurred upon the slope of the hill. I was anxiously watching the progress of events; for being some hundreds of yards from the men of the Kafilah I expected for a certainty being cut off by some rush of the whooping Bedouins, who, fast advancing, I could now see with my glass, from the inglorious position assigned to me; their bright spear-heads glistening in the sun, over the tops of the low jungle through which they were passing. At length they approached far too near to be pleasant to the feelings of Ohmed Mahomed, who had depended upon the mere rumour of my firearms deterring them from making an attack upon the Kafilah. At first it was not his policy for me to be seen, for fear the parade might be deemed by the suspicious and jealous natives as a kind of threat, and thus interfere with the pacific arrangements he contemplated, and was most willing to see effected, but finding that they had advanced within three or four hundred yards without any symptom of the usual halt, preliminary to overtures of peace, Ohmed Mahomed sprang to his feet, and brandished his spear in defiance, leaping and yelling to deter their nearer approach. His efforts were answered only by similar cries, and seeing this, he turned suddenly round, and called out for me, Zaido, and Allee to come immediately, and join them. I understood him and his position in a moment, so pointing to my pistols, I bade Allee bring them along with him, and taking a gun in each hand, with head uncovered, ran quickly up, and, as if inoculated with the same savage ferocity as my companions, yelled in a manner that delighted, and astonished even them. Adam Burrah, with a loud shout of welcome, came running to meet me, and seizing hold of my wrist, dragged me into the front rank with him, where, squatting down on his heels like the rest, he pulled me down by his side. Ohmed Mahomed now came and placed himself on my other side, told me that I must only fire when he placed his hand on my arm, and adding the word “kill” in Arabic, pointed with his spear to a tall young man who, with unparalleled boldness, had advanced to less than one hundred yards of us, and stood making some inquiries from one of the women of our Kafilah, unheeding the loud cries of “cutta, cutta” (go away, go away,) that my friends were shouting with all their might to drive him off. Excited by his insolent bearing, Adam Burrah at last started up from my side, and having called “cutta” several times without the young man deigning to take the least notice, he rushed towards him. On perceiving this, the man instantly dropped on to his heels, so that only his head and his poised spear could be seen above his shield, and coolly awaited the attack, but Adam, seeing his foe thus prepared, dropt to the ground himself in the same manner behind his shield, at the distance of about twenty yards, and both began sparring with their spears. Garahmee, Moosa, and others, called to Adam Burrah to come back, and Ohmed Mahomed, willing to avoid bloodshed, sprang after him, suddenly snatched away his spear, and thus disarmed, he was obliged, but very reluctantly, to return to my side.

Considering that this was to be the commencement of the fray, I had taken up my gun, and the man observing this, and the determined front our little band sustained, thought it best to imitate Adam Burrah, and slowly walked back to his now retiring countrymen, who had immediately, on seeing me and the bright glaring barrel of my long fowling-piece, with one consent turned, and began a slow retreat, in a long straggling line to their original position on the opposite height, where, squatting down, they assumed, like ourselves, an attitude of defence, as if influenced by a desire to oppose our passage through their country rather than to make a gratuitous attack, which was certainly their first intention, before being acted upon by the wholesome fear of “the villanous saltpetre.” Garahmee now appeared to have assumed the character of commander-in-chief of our forces, walking backwards and forwards between the two extremities of the little semicircle we formed. In one hand, he held a small twig, which he waved about most energetically, as he recited some long speech of a very fiercely-sounding character. Occasionally, he tapped upon the head any of the party who, tired of the sitting position, attempted to rest himself by standing up. This part of their tactics, I observed, was particularly insisted upon, and was done, I was told, with a view of preventing the enemy from obtaining a correct knowledge of the numbers of their opponents. Garahmee was a recognised authority, for in his directions a marshal with his baton would not have been more implicitly obeyed by his army, than was this half-naked savage with his little stick by his wild companions.

We did not stir from our position whilst the sun was up, but kept sitting in a very uncomfortable posture for me, some time even after it had set, when Ohmed Mahomed, touching my elbow, intimated I could go to my hut, for pointing to the men opposed to us, with a significant laugh, he said, “they are very good friends.” Zaido and Allee accompanied me to my hut, but the rest of the Kafilah remained in the same squatting position until after nine o’clock, by which time a peace had been made, and sworn to upon the Koran, between us and the Bedouins, a safe conduct being given to the Kafilah through their country, which extended to the Bahr assal, by a regular official-like document, drawn up in Arabic.

The present required by the chief was exceedingly moderate; three pieces of blue Surat cotton cloth to distribute among the tribe, being all that was asked for. At my request, one bag of rice was subsequently divided among some of the principal people, as an extraordinary present on the occasion of an Engreez coming into their country. All being settled most satisfactorily to myself, and to every one else, I got my rice supper, and slept the remainder of the night as soundly on the hard irregular surface of the rocky ground as if reposing on the softest couch. It is the excitement occasioned by scenes similar to the one I have endeavoured to describe, which gives a zest to desert life, besides the consciousness of having escaped a great peril attaches a value to existence itself of which we have had no previous idea, for, like health, it is sometimes held of little moment until we are on the eve of losing it for ever.

CHAPTER VII.

Leave Daddahue.—Journey through the Rah Issah to Bulhatoo, distance seven miles, general direction, W. S. W. and S.—Halt for the night.—Journey from Bulhatoo to Dafarrè, distance four miles, general direction, west by north.—Halt for the night.—Journey from Dafarrè to Aleek’shatan, distance five miles, general direction, south.—Journey from Aleek’shatan to Alephanta, distance, seven miles, general direction, west and south west.

April 2d.—Ohmed Mahomed had no wish to keep the Kafilah in a neighbourhood so populous. His store of tobacco would have been considerably diminished by such a stay, so he determined to push on this morning for the halting-place on the shores of the Goobat ul Khhrab, which we were to approach to-day, and take our last leave of the sea. Six camels of the Bursane Bedouins also joined our Kafilah, and during the march, the two or three good-tempered natives to whom they belonged, were laughed at, and laughed themselves at the effect a few weapons of the Jinn produced upon their tribe the night before.

The camels being loaded, we ascended the opposite side of the valley of Daddahue, and continued along the ridge in a parallel direction with the valley for nearly two hours, the road being over the same loose volcanic kind of stones as those of the preceding day’s march. I still persisted in walking with Ohmed Mahomed and the Hy Soumaulee, for my mule was so wretchedly slow, that I was much more fatigued sitting on the saddle than if I had walked all the way.

The road began now to descend into a deep ravine, four or five hundred feet below the level of the plain over which we had been marching. I sat on the edge of the more than perpendicular precipice which actually overhung the road beneath, whilst the opposite height, but a few feet higher, was not seventy yards distant. This pass was called the Rah Issah by the Dankalli, from its having been the spot, and one very well adapted for the purpose, where a rescue was effected by the Debenee tribe of a large herd of cattle, and many flocks that had been driven off their lands in a foray made by the Issah Soumaulee, a people who occupy the whole country that forms the southern border of the Bay of Tajourah, and extends inland without any well-defined division, as far as the plains of Error, the residence of the Wahama Dankalli. From the situation I had chosen, I had a good view of the camels as they wound along the several traverses of the rugged path to the narrow watercourse beneath, and many serious falls and considerable detentions occurred during the perilous descent; full two hours having elapsed before Ohmed Mahomed, myself, and the escort followed, for until the time that the Kafilah was safe below, I could see that an attack was apprehended from the Bursane people, even after all the ceremonial of the last night’s treaty.

Rah Issah is the dry bed of a torrent which only runs along it during the very uncertain season of the rains. It extends in a nearly direct line to Goobat ul Khhrab, where it expands into a broad open space, surrounded, except towards the gulf, by nearly perpendicular precipices of a crumbling greyish porphritic rock. In the Rah Issah, the overhanging cliffs threaten continually to roll down a torrent of loose stones upon the traveller below, and that they are thus constantly slipping, is proved by the immense quantity of loose debris scattered along the road. Our halt took place in the expanded termination of this ravine called Bulhatoo. Although we had been nearly four hours on the march, I do not think we travelled more than six miles. Here my shielding of boxes stood upon some exceedingly fine volcanic sand, so hot from the direct rays of the sun, that I can readily believe that the eggs of many birds which make their nests upon the ground in this country, are aided materially in incubation, if not altogether hatched by the heat of the sand alone, upon which the eggs are laid.

The water we obtained here was exactly similar to the celebrated chalybeate of Harrowgate, being strongly impregnated with sulphurated hydrogen. Ohmed Mahomed took me to a spot, wishing to know if I thought sweet water could be found where a patch of bright red earth broke through the darker covering of the sand. I found it was a beautiful and very tenacious clay, and was convinced if an attempt were made, an excellent spring of water would be met with. The labour, however, not suiting the inclination of my companions, and as I preferred drinking the chalybeate, we left the place undisturbed. Numerous dry thirsty looking senna shrubs dotted the plain; their yellow laburnum-like flowers, mocking by their glittering brightness, the dreary waste of sand and rock around. Grass there certainly was, in large and dispersed tufts of a coarse wire-like hay, rather than of the bright green, yielding blades, we so generally associate with the idea of turf. We remained here only one day and night, and I slept without any disturbance beyond the pealing laughter of the whole Kafilah, from a conversation kept up at the extreme ends of the camp by two of the merriest fellows in it, Adam Burrah and Omer Suis. After every one had retired to rest, each upon his plaited palm-leaf mat, and wrapped up in his body-cloth, these two commenced shouting out their repartees at the top of their voices, each remark being followed by bursts of laughter from the rest. I could hear Ohmed Mahomed, who lay at the entrance of my “bait,” as it was called, whispering suggestions to Adam Burrah, whilst I dare say, some other friend, aided Omer Suis in the same way, or else it is impossible to conceive how such a constant flow of wit could have kept the whole Kafilah, for hours together, awake with the laughter and noise.

April 3.—We were up at sunrise and away, ascending a low but steep eminence, along the ridge of which we travelled till half-past nine. On our road, we had a good view of the Goobat ul Khhrab, “The bad haven,” reposing in a dead calm, among the almost encircling hills of dark coloured volcanic rock which surround it. The road lay upon one long-extended sheet of lava reaching on one side to the gulf, where it suddenly terminated, and on the other, to where a narrow, but deeply water-cut ravine, had occasioned a sudden solution of its continuity in that direction. Here was our halting-place for the day, called Dafarrè, and on our arrival I descended into the ravine, which was in front of our encampment, in company with Garahmee and Moosa. These men, with great apparent attention, were anxious to find for me a cool retreat from the hot burning sun, and in a cave that smelt strongly of wild beasts I soon had my mat spread, my boots taken off, and all things prepared for a sleep, which Garahmee was very anxious I should indulge in after my long walk, for proud in the feeling of strength returned, which enabled me to keep up, untired, with the best walkers of the party, I still looked with contempt upon my mule. The only evil of my retreat I thought was, that it was too convenient, and before Garahmee and Moosa could well choose their positions on each side of me, some half dozen people of the Kafilah also came and took up their quarters in the cave. Garahmee would have had me retire to another and a better place, which he said he knew, and which was but a little beyond a turn in the course of the ravine, but as my boots were off, and I had commenced a conversation with such of the people of the Kafilah, who, like myself, understood a little Arabic, I determined to stay where I was, at which he went away, seemingly much displeased. Like Ibrahim Shaitan, however, under similar circumstances, he returned very soon, and, apparently, we were as good friends as before.

It is rather difficult to find a comfortable position when reposing upon loose uneven rock, but on reading over my notes under the date of to-day, I find that to save time and to secure comfort under similar circumstances again, I had noted down how to arrange things so as to obtain a tolerably easy bed. I remark, sagely enough, that I must not expect the pleasures of easy repose upon a couch which had the hard rock for a cushion, and only large stones for pillows, but that to make my resting-place as comfortable as it could be, I had placed my head resting between two large stones, employing another as a pillow, which I put under the arm of the side I lay upon, and one also behind the bend of my knees, whilst a heavy one for my feet to press against without fear of removing it, sustained me on the gentle slope of the floor of the cave. Thus I arranged myself for sleep, and slept well; and after some hours’ indulging in a confidence not often extended to the companions of my march who lay around, Zaido appeared to summon me to my hut for the night. Giving him my boots to carry, I collected my pistols, and followed him barefooted up the long unequal steps of huge stones that led from the cave to the summit of the steep precipitous side of the ravine. Having reached my “bait,” a large bowl of boiled rice, quite enough for the supper of a camel, was served up, mixed with nearly half-a-pint of ghee, or the liquid butter of the country.

March 4th.—We again started at the usual hour, sunrise, and marched five hours and a-half across the most tremendously rough country that can possibly be conceived, to be at all passable. Immediately after starting, we descended a narrow road, more like a steep staircase than anything else. It was not quite so convenient, but reminded me of the one by which we ascend the Monument, which is about as high as was this precipice. One by one, the camels slowly descended into a wide fissure-like valley, that extended to a similar wall of rock on the opposite side, and up which we had to ascend again. This fissured plain opened upon the crystalline shores of the Bahr Assal, or Salt Lake, of which we obtained a good view from the top of Muyah, the name of the precipice we had just descended. We were nearly an hour crossing the next plain of blown sand, which from its appearance I thought had probably been conveyed by the wind from the shores of the Bahr Assal; it was covered with the dry wiry grass before mentioned, and numerous plants of a species of colycinth. Before we reached the only passable place in the next ridge, we had to ascend a road which was so serpentine that frequently we had to turn, and proceed some distance with our faces looking in a direction towards Tajourah. In my notes I have remarked that this plain must have been the bottom of the old portion of the sea, which once connected the Bahr Assal with Goobat ul Khhrab, for I found in some places a sandstone, very light-coloured, and a cretaceous rock, in which I found traces of a spiral univalve and other shells.

After a long dreary march, during which we passed between and among certain broad and square chimney-like vents of volcanic vapours, (for I could account for their existence in no other way,) situated in the midst of an extensive field of black scoreaceous lava, at the eastern extremity of which, near Goobat ul Khhrab, was a small, but perfect and well-formed crater. We at length reached a small winding wada, or valley, in which were a few stunted doom palm-trees. Round the lower part of their trunks had collected the decaying remains of their own fan-like foliage, and the withered branches of some mimosa-trees, torn up by a temporary torrent, and thus arrested in their progress towards the Bahr Assal. Our road in this situation was along its dry bed, over coarse black volcanic sand, which seemed to be produced by the crumbling action of atmospherical causes upon the surrounding lava rocks. After following the direction of the watercourse for nearly an hour, we arrived at “Aleex’ Shaitan” (The Devil’s Water), where, to my great satisfaction, we halted for the day.

I was too fatigued to take a survey of the country, and sat down under a stunted mimosa-tree, over which I cast my black Arab cloak, to increase the shade. Garahmee and Moosa, whom I had noticed walking all the day together in earnest conversation, now came up, and desired me with apparent kindness to accompany them to a cave, situated about a quarter of a mile from the camp, and upon my not immediately complying Garahmee, affecting to suppose I did not understand him, went and brought Ohmed Mahomed, who, coming up, repeated the invitation to go to a “tihebe bait” (a good house), with him. I had no objection to proceed, so gathering myself up with no little difficulty, for I was very tired, we all went to another den of some wild beast, where scattered bones and other traces indicated its recent occupation. Ohmed Mahomed creeping in, for it was much less than the one at Dafarrè, remarked that there was but just room for me. As I expected he was going to remain, I pulled off my boots and belt, and laid them with my pistols down at some little distance from me, and should have gone immediately to sleep, had not Ohmed Mahomed, made preparations to depart, and told me, as he got out, that I must not sleep till Zaido came with my rice. This was quite an accidental observation, and so natural, that I only asked him to send Zaido quickly, and took up a position by placing myself at full length across the entrance of the cave, which was not above eight feet wide, so that Moosa and Garahmee, who had been squatting in their usual manner in front, could not conveniently come in.

Some moments after Ohmed Mahomed left, Garahmee, under pretence of stretching himself, laid down his spear, and turning round walked some little way until he could get a good view of the camp, towards which he looked with an inquisitive gaze, that told me at once I had been betrayed into this place for the purpose of assassination, and felt assured that a struggle for my life was now at hand. My heart beat thick, but I determined not to show the least feeling of mistrust until their game had begun; and placing myself a little more under cover of the roof of the cave, awaited the first signal of attack to seize my pistols, and defend myself as I best might. It may be astonishing to suppose how two men could so far overcome the fear of being instantly killed by my firearms; but Garahmee, who was a most cunning man, never dreamt that his son, as he used to call me, suspected in the least his design, so carelessly had I been accustomed to trust myself with him, and had been so deceived by his particularly mild and quiet deportment. His first step, after watching the occupation of the camp, was to endeavour to take Ohmed Mahomed’s place in the cave, but this I instantly objected to in a tone so suddenly harsh that he involuntarily started, and sat down again just at my feet, but outside the entrance. All this time Moosa had been sitting about five paces in front. His shield, held before him, concealed his whole body, a black face and bushy head of hair alone appearing above its upper edge; his spear was held perpendicularly, with its butt-end placed upon the earth, in the usual manner, when an attack is meditated.

Garahmee was evidently disconcerted by my refusal to admit him into the cave, and perhaps if I had assumed a greater apparent suspicion, he would have deferred his attempt until a more favourable opportunity; but seeing me seemingly undisturbed, he took his seat at my head, and asked peremptorily for some dollars; “and Moosa wants some too,” added he, turning and looking with an expression readily understood by the latter worthy, who instantly rose and taking the place just vacated by Garahmee, seconded the motion by holding out his hand for “nummo” (dollars). In my belt was the pouch made by Cruttenden for my watch, which I had carried in the vain expectation of making it serviceable in deciding the longitude of my halting-places, but perceiving the character of the people, had never brought it out for fear of exciting the cupidity of those around me. Its round form, however, as it lay in the pouch attached to my waist-belt, made an impression as if dollars were there concealed, as I afterwards learnt from Ohmed Mahomed, who assigned this as one reason for the attempt which had been made. Drawing the belt and pouch towards me, in the loops of which were still my pistols, I took one of them into my hand, and throwing myself as far back into the cave as I could, told them I had no dollars for them till I got to Abasha (Abyssinia), at the same time telling Moosa to go for Ohmed Mahomed and Ebin Izaak, as I could not talk to them in their language. They were taken rather aback at the strong position I had assumed, and the decided manner in which I had met the first step to an outrage; for amongst these people a demand for something always precedes the attack, to enable them to throw their victim, even if he suspect their object, off his guard, in the vain hope that he might be able to purchase peace by giving them what they ask for. Neither party, under present circumstances, now knew what farther to do. I, of course, had done sufficient for defence, and they found that they had too suddenly, for their purpose, laid themselves open to my suspicion; but Garahmee, with ready thought, on my telling Moosa a second time to go, volunteered to be the bearer of the message himself, and retiring, relieved me of his presence, and himself of the unpleasant feeling which must have arisen in his mind on having been so completely foiled, and seeing, besides, that I was perfectly aware of his intentions.

Aleex’ Shaitan was certainly the most unpleasant halting-place I staid at during my whole march, for the natural suspicion excited of plots being regularly formed for my assassination, made me not feel very comfortable, especially when, on retiring for the night, I found that Ohmed Mahomed, Zaido, and Allee, who generally slept around me, had left the camp to return to the precipice of Muyah, to bring up some camels that had been left there during the morning’s march, unable to come on with the rest of the Kafilah. The larger boxes with which these camels were loaded had been obliged to be taken off and carried, with a great deal of labour, by men down the narrow and winding descents which occurred on the road. I determined not to sleep until their return, and sat in my hut eating some very hard sea-biscuit, indulging occasionally in long pulls at my water-skin, the contents of which reminded me exactly of the muddy streams that in very rainy weather flows through the gutters of our streets at home. Having finished my light supper, I sat at the upper end of my box fortalice, resolutely resisting for some time the approach of sleep, until at length I found it impossible to keep my eyes open any longer, so without knowing exactly the time of my departure to the realms of Morpheus, I only awakened at the rude shake which Zaido gave my leg, when he called me up for the next day’s march.

April 5th.—We were on the march this morning by sunrise, our road continuing over broad fields of a thin stratum of black lava, overlaying a light-coloured and very finely-grained sandstone, beneath which was the same cretaceous formation with shells I had observed in several places yesterday. Dykes of a hard rock stood like high fences in a direction from east to west, and on one occasion we passed some distance actually along the interior of one, the centre of softer material having been denuded, leaving two thin walls of the outer and much harder stone.

After a short time, we came to the watering-place of Aleex’ Shaitan, which was a little to the left of our road, consisting of natural reservoirs, or pools of small dimensions, which contained some sweet, but very dirty water. A wada, or small valley, extended a short distance to the right, in which were larger and greener mimosa-trees than any I had met with before. I learnt that this was to have been our halting-place of yesterday, but that it was preoccupied by a Kafilah coming from Owssa to Tajourah, which was now passing us, and with whom an interchange of civilities and salutations took place.

In saluting each other, the Dankalli place the palms of their right hands together, and slowly slide them off again. A particular and very long form of greeting then takes place, a number of questions are asked in succession by one of the parties, and are replied to by a corresponding string of answers. The other party then asks his questions, is answered in the same manner, the right hands are again slided over each other, and the parties separate to encounter other friends. The greatest mistrust characterizes all their dealings with each other, and the hand grasped during the salutation, I was told was a certain signal of treachery, for numbers had been murdered by others standing by, whilst thus held by supposed friends.

The women, when they meet their male friends, put on an affectation of shyness, which, I suppose, passes amongst them for modesty. They take and hold the proffered hand in theirs for some time, carry it to their lips, and then taking each of the fingers, they press them in succession one by one. All this ceremonial I observed performed, even by a mother to her own son, who stood very majestically receiving this homage, as if it were nothing but his due.

The road now began to take the course of the valley, between high and barren hills of a sombre red colour, and of the same igneous origin with the whole of the surrounding country; white bands of chalk with shells lying upon and below layers of this rock, told of two different eras of volcanic energy, between the times of which the limestone stratum had been deposited in the estuary of a river that must here have entered the sea, and which was probably before the separation from the sea, of the salt lake of Assal. The shores of the latter, which, in a direct line, were not two miles distant, we were now approaching by a long circuitous ravine of some miles in length.

It must be kept in mind, that from the sea in the Goobat ul Khhrab to the Bahr Assal, the crow line would not be more than six miles, although from the rough and precipitous character of the fissured lava which intervenes, the journey of our Kafilah across occupied three days, from our halting-place on the gulf at Bulhatoo to Gunguntur, on the opposite side of the lake.

As the valley of Alephanta, which we were now entering, contracted suddenly, the bases of the conical hills on each side approached very near to each other, and around them in a most serpentine course our road now lay. Scarcely a trace of vegetation appeared to enliven this land of desolation; it was most truly “the valley of the shadow of death;” for at very short distances lay the bleaching half-eaten bones of the skeletons of camels and mules that had here found the last difficulty of the journey from Tajourah too much for their powers of endurance, and falling, had been deserted by their owners. The monarch of the place, a magnificent lion, stood on a small rocky ledge, about half way up one of the surrounding hills. He kept his face steadily turned towards the Kafilah, moving round as its long line marched silently past. My carabine was cocked in a moment, for I concluded that he was meditating an attack; but my companions intimated, that if we left him alone he would keep his distance, and not molest us. Once I gave the long-drawn death-halloo of the chase, but all the natives gathered hurriedly around me to prevent my repeating it; and I found that I had only succeeded in frightening them, without having had any other effect upon the lion but the slow lashing with his tail of his yellow sides, a movement that indicated anger rather than fear. He, however, respected our numbers, and we left him still gazing in his original position, until the last of the camels had placed the shoulder of a projecting hill between him and them. It was proposed, in order to shorten the distance, that I and a party of the Kafilah men, with Garahmee and Moosa, should take a short cut over the hills, rather than the much longer, though more pleasant road around their base; and as I wished to impress Garahmee, whose abilities as a plotter I began to think were of the first order, that I could still trust myself with him and his associates, and at the same time be determined to take care of myself, I made no objection to the proposal, but insisted upon walking the last in the line, affecting to wish that I might see the lion again, and get the opportunity of a shot at him. We followed a narrow path, ascending and descending the steep sides of numerous low conical-formed hills of large loose stones that occasionally detached themselves from under the feet, and went dashing with increasing velocity to a little secondary ridge of the debris, accumulating at the bottom. All around me were these hills of stones, treeless, shrubless, herbless; a greater impression of desolation never occurred to my mind, greater even than that produced by the widely-spreading open deserts of Arabia, or the long and dark valleys between the wave mountains of the seas to the south of the Cape, which, under a gloomy sky, struck me, I recollect, when I was amidst them, as more nearly allied to the character of human despair than anything I could have imagined in the physical world. This is the idea that dreary scenes are apt to suggest, and to which, perhaps, they owe that impress of horror with which we always contemplate them.

Two hours were occupied in passing through this valley “where the devil lies stoned.” It was likened, and very justly I should suppose, to one so called near Mecca, by a “hadji,” or pilgrim, who was returning to his tribe with us. We now saw in the distance the spot on the southern border of the lake, where the salt is broken and packed up for conveyance to Abyssinia; and on the broad extensive field of this purely white and glistening crystallized surface, a group of natives, busily engaged in collecting it with their camels and asses, reminding me of a scene not unlike one in the panorama of the Arctic voyages, representing the Esquimaux with their sledges and dogs upon the surface of the snow.

We soon descended the very gradual descent from the Alephanta Pass, through which we had just come, and commenced walking across one portion of the salt crust of the lake, which now extended in its full proportions before us. Its appearance was very novel, and I examined it with considerable interest, as it is a very remarkable feature of the country of Adal, and a most important one to the inhabitants, being the chief source of wealth and a great inducement to useful occupation to the different tribes who surround it for the distance of several days’ journey.