Sir William Cornwallis Harris (continued 2)

“Honesty,” saith the Arab proverb, “is found only amongst poor fools.” The Bedouin has for ages been celebrated for his ingenuity and daring, and the African offset is nothing behind the parent stock. A Somauli thief is perhaps “the cunningest knave in the universe.” He has been known to cut away a pile of tobacco so as to leave to the merchant who reposed thereon, naught but the effigy of his own figure: and after entering through the roof of a house, the burglar has taken his exit through the door with chests of treasure, from the top of which the sleeping proprietor has been first hoisted, with his bed, by a tackle lowered through the aperture, and so left hanging until the morning!

Muffled in a Spanish mantilla, see the spouse of the bigoted Islám taking the air upon the crupper of a donkey, her fat face so scrupulously concealed, that nothing of it is visible save two sloe black eyes which glitter through perforations in the white veil, and impart a similitude to the horned owl. On the rude steps of the clustering habitations that she has passed, surrounded by rosy-cheeked urchins, are seated numerous dark-eyed and well-dressed Jewesses. Rachel, although discreet, and preserving the strictest decorum, is unveiled. Were it possible to prevail upon her to have recourse to daily ablution, in lieu of the hebdomadal immersion which celebrates her sabbath eve, her complexion would not be less fair than that of the native of Southern Europe; and in the well-chiselled features and aquiline profile of the brunette, are preserved all those marked peculiarities which in every part of the world distinguish the scattered daughters of Israël.

The children of the tribe of Judah are most completely identified with the soil of Aden, and may be regarded as the artisans and manufacturing population. Victims heretofore of the tyranny and intolerant persecution which the infidel has ever to expect at the hand of the true believer, they toiled and accumulated, but feared lest a display of the fruits of their labour should excite the cupidity of a rapacious master. Now their prospect has brightened, and the remnant of a mighty though fallen and dispersed people, no longer exists here in poverty and oppression, insulted and despised as they have always been in every part of the Eastern world; but in uninterrupted security ply their industrious occupation, and under British protection fearlessly practise those rites which have been religiously preserved from the time that their priests bore aloft the ark of the covenant. Stone slabs with Hebrew inscriptions mark the resting-place of the departed; schools witness the education of the rising generation; and men and women, arrayed in their holiday apparel, sit apart in the synagogue, to listen at each return of their sabbath to the law which had been read since “by way of the wilderness of the Red Sea” their fathers “went up harnessed out of the land of Egypt.”

Volume One—Chapter Four.

The Gibraltar of the East.

Aden, in its history and reverses, presents the type of many a mighty nation,—it flourished and has fallen. As it once stood, it was the maritime bulwark of Arabia Felix. So early as the reign of Constantine the Great, it was celebrated for its impregnable fortifications, its extended traffic, and its attractive ports. Here the camels of the Koreishites were laden with a precious cargo of aromatics. Here commerce first dawned; and little more than two centuries and a half have rolled away since the decayed city ranked among the most opulent emporia of the East. Its decline is only dated from the close of the illustrious reign of Suleïman the Magnificent; but the spider has since “weaved her web in the imperial palace, and the owl has stood sentinel upon the watch-tower.”

In the eyes of the true believer, the Cape is hallowed by the tradition that it was honoured with the preaching in person of that arch impostor, “the last of all the prophets,” who, with the sword in one hand and the Korán in the other, became the lawgiver of the Arabians, and the founder of an empire which in less than a century had spread itself from the Pyrenees to the Indus. Three hundred and sixty mosques once reared their proud heads, and eighty thousand inhabitants poured into the field, an army which accomplished the subjugation of El Yemen. This latter, famous from all antiquity for the happiness of its climate, its fertility and surpassing riches, became an independent kingdom at the period that Constantinople fell into the hands of Mahomet the Second. Aden frequently cast off its allegiance; and when the Turks, by means of their fleet built at Suez, rendered themselves masters of the northern coast of the Red Sea, they found the peninsula independent, under the Sultan of Foudthli. Turkey and Portugal, struggling for supremacy in the East, hotly contested its possession; but, being unable longer to maintain their rivalry, it finally reverted into the grasp of its ancient masters.

Great natural strength, improved by the substantial fortifications which had been carried by Sultán Selim completely round the zone of hills that engirds the town, now rendered it the fittest of all retreats for the piratical hordes of the desert; and the lawless sons of Ishmaël, scouring the adjacent waters, loaded their stronghold with booty. But after the loss of government, Aden could not be expected to retain its opulence. Its trade passed into the rival port of Mocha, and grinding oppression caused the removal of the wealthy. At the period of the British occupation, ninety dilapidated houses, giving shelter to six hundred impoverished souls, were all that remained to attest its ancient glories. The town lay spread out in ruin and desolation, and heaps of stone, mingled with bricks and rubbish, sternly pointed to the grave of the mosque and tall minaret.

Few fragments now survive the general decay, to record the high estate of the once populous metropolis, or reveal the magnificence it could formerly boast in works of public utility. The chief buildings are believed to have been situated ten miles inland, and to have been swallowed up by the ever rising, never ebbing, tide of the desert. The red brick conduit of Abd el Waháb can still be traced from the Durab el Horaïbi, whence it stretches to Bir Omheit, upwards of eight miles, across a now dilapidated bridge. Here are numerous wells, which supplied the reservoirs; but, “like the baseless fabric of a vision,” every vestige of an edifice has vanished.

Among the most perfect and conspicuous relics of the past are the laborious and costly means adopted to insure in so arid and burning a climate, a plentiful supply of water. In addition to the wells, three hundred in number, the remains of basins of great magnitude are found in various directions; and in the Valley of Tanks are a succession of hanging cisterns, formed by excavations in the limestone rock. These are lined with flights of steps, and supported by lofty buttresses of imperishable masonry, forming deep reservoirs of semi-elliptical form, which still blockade every channel in the mountain side, and once served to collect the precious drops from heaven, when showers doubtless fell more abundantly than at the present day.

In the extensive repositories for the dead, too, may be found assurances of the former population of Aden. Many of the countless tombs in the Turkish cemetery were of white marble, and bore on jasper tablets elaborately-sculptured inscriptions surmounted by the cap and turban; but the greater number of these pillared monuments have either disappeared or been overthrown. Of the evidences of Mohammadanism that once graced the city, nearly all lie buried from sight beneath heaps of accumulated rubbish and débris, the removal of portions of which has disclosed many curious coins of remote date. The minaret of Menáleh, and a tottering octagon of red brick, attached to the Jama el Musjid, lone survivors of the wreck, still point to the sky; and of the few mosques that have been spared by the destroying hand of time, the principal is that of the tutelar saint of the city, beneath the cupola of which, invested with a pall of crimson silk, and enshrined in the odour of sanctity, repose the venerated remains of Sheïkh Hydroos.

An excellent zig-zagged road, imperfectly paved, and raised in parts to the height of twenty feet, extends from the base to the summit of Jebel Shemshán, and, with some few of the disjointed watch-towers, has defied the ravages of centuries. Three enormous pieces of brass ordnance, pierced for a sixty-eight pound shot, and covered with Turkish inscriptions, were the chief symbols of the former strength of this eastern Gibraltar. These were transmitted to England, when their capture, shortly after the present accession, avenged an insult offered to her flag, and wreathed the first laurels around the brow of her youthful Queen.

In general aspect the Cape is not dissimilar from the volcanic islands in the Grecian Archipelago, and viewed from a distance it appears separated altogether from the mainland. The long dead flat of sand by which it is connected with the Arabian continent, rising on either beach scarcely two feet above high water mark, induces the belief that the promontory must on its first production in early ages have been insulated. According to the evidence of the present generation the sea is still receding, and the sand steadily accumulating, but the noble western bay will not be affected for many centuries. Though the glory of Aden may have fled, and her commerce become totally annihilated, her ports will long remain as nature formed them, excellent, capacious, and secure.

Important commercial advantages cannot fail to accrue from the occupation of so secure an entrepôt, which at any season of the year may be entered and quitted with equal facility. The readiest access is afforded to the rich provinces of Hadramaut and Yemen, famous for their coffee, their frankincense, and the variety of their gums, and abounding in honey and wax, of a quality which may vie with the produce of the hives of the Mediterranean. A lucrative market to the manufactures of India and Great Britain is also extended by the facilities attending communication with the African coast, south of Báb el Mandéb, where the high mountain ranges bordering upon the shore are clothed with trees producing myrrh, frankincense, and precious gums, whilst the valleys in the interior pour forth for export, sheep, ghee, drugs, dry hides, gold dust, civet, ivory, rhinoceros horns, peltries, and ostrich feathers, besides coffee of the choicest growth. A wide field is open for mercantile speculation, and it is not a little pleasant to contemplate the approaching improvement of Christian Abyssinia, and the civilisation of portions of Africa even more benighted and remote, through the medium of intercourse with British Arabia.

Under the flag of old England, Aden has enjoyed a degree of happiness and security never previously experienced, even in the days of her greatest glory, when she ranked among the foremost of commercial marts in the East, and when vessels from all the known quarters of the globe thronged her boasted roadstead. Emigrants from the interior as well as from the exterior of Hadramaut and Yemen, and from both shores of the Red Sea, are daily crowding within the walls to seek refuge from grinding oppression, and to free themselves from the galling burthen beneath which they have long groaned at the hand of insatiate native despots. The amazing increase of population and the crowded state of the bazaars form subject for high admiration. In the short space of three years the census has been augmented to twenty thousand souls; substantial dwellings are springing up in every direction, and at all the adjacent ports, hundreds of native merchants do but await the erection of permanent fortifications in earnest of intention to remain, to flock under the guns with their families and wealth. Emerging thus rapidly from ruin and degradation, the tide of lucrative commerce, both from Africa and Arabia, may be confidently expected to revert to its former channel. Blessed by a mild but firm government, the decayed mart, rescued from Arab tyranny and misrule, will doubtless shortly attain a pinnacle far eclipsing even its ancient opulence and renown; and Aden, as a free port, whilst she pours wealth into a now impoverished land, must ere long become the queen of the adjacent seas, and take rank among the most useful dependencies of the British crown.

Volume One—Chapter Five.

Voyage across the Gulf of Arabia.

Eight bells were “making it twelve o’clock” on the 15th of May, when the boatswain piped all hands on deck to weigh the anchor, and within a few minutes the Honourable Company’s Brig-of-war “Euphrates,” having the Embassy on board, and commanded by one of its members (Lieutenant Barker, Indian Navy), set her white sails, and, followed by three large native crafts freighted with horses and baggage, stood across the Arabian Gulf. A favourable breeze pressed her steadily through the yielding bosom of the ocean. The salt spray flew under her gallant bows; and as the hospitable cadjan roofs on Steamer Point, first in order, and then the jagged pinnacles forming the spider skeleton of Aden, sank gradually astern, each individual of the party destined to traverse the unknown wilds of Ethiopia, took the pilgrim’s vow that the razor should pass no more over his beard, until his foot had again rested on civilised shores—an event not unreasonably conjectured to be far distant for all, and for some destined never to be realised.

The breeze increasing, the low sandy promontory of Ras Bír on the African coast became visible during the forenoon of the following day; and before evening, notwithstanding a delay of some hours, caused by an accident to the mainyard of one of the tenders, which obliged her to be taken in tow, the brig was passing a group of eight coral islands, elevated about thirty feet above the level of the sea. The remainder of the fleet having parted company during the night, were now perceived standing directly for Mushahh, the nearest of these islets, situated at the mouth of the Gulf of Tajúra, and divided from the Danákil coast by a fathomless channel of seven miles. An iron messenger despatched to bring the convoy to, ricochetted over the blue water, kicking up a column of white spray at every bound, and before the smoke of the gun had cleared the bulwarks, a bald pate protruded between the rigging, was followed by the swarthy person of Aboo Bekr, of the Somauli tribe Aboo Salaam, and commonly styled Durábili, or “the Liar.” Nákhuda of a small trading craft which had been employed as a pilot boat during the recent trigonometrical survey of the coast, he was well-known to the officers of the “Euphrates,” and was ascertained to be at this moment charged with despatches for Aden, which, whether important or otherwise, had been during three days lying safely at anchor off the island, to admit of enhanced profits by the collection of a cargo of wood.

“Salaam aleikum!” exclaimed the old Palinurus as soon as his foot had touched the deck; “Hamdu-lillah! Praise be unto God! it is you, after all. When I saw those two crazy tubs in your van, I believed that it could not be my old ship, although it loomed so vastly like her; but the moment you took in your studding-sails to let Aboo Bekr come alongside, I knew it must be the Capitan Báshi. Kayf hálut, how fares it with your health?”

The welcome visitor was forthwith accommodated with a chair on the poop; into which having squeezed himself with difficulty, he drew up his knees to his scanty beard, inserted a cigar into his mouth as a quid, and, sipping tea like a finished washerwoman, instituted a train of inquiries relative to the position of affairs in the British possessions across the water.

“Tayyib, tayyib,” he ejaculated, when thoroughly satisfied that Cape Aden was not again in the hands of the Arabs. “Marhábba, it is well. All, too, is as it should be at Tajúra. Misunderstandings are adjusted, and the avaricious chieftains have at last, the Lord be praised! got all the dirt out of their bellies. Their palms have been judiciously tickled, and it only now remains to be seen whether the old sultán, who is fully as fond of money as his neighbours—or his ancient rival, Mohammad Ali, is to have the honour of forwarding the English to King Sáloo. My boy has just returned from Hábesh, and shall escort you. Abroo has been twice in Bombay, as you know, Capitan. You have only to tell me if he should misbehave, and I’ll trounce the young scamp soundly.”

Meanwhile the bold mountain outline of the land of promise, forming a worthy barrier to the unexplored treasures of the vast continent of Africa, had been rapidly emerging from obscurity, and the brown forbidding bluff, styled Ras Dukhán, “the smoking promontory,” in height about five or six hundred feet, was now on the starboard quarter; its abrupt summit, as usual, surmounted by a coronet of fleecy clouds, from which, if not from the thermal well at its base, this Cape has probably derived its appellation. The brig was already standing up the bay of Tajúra; but darkness overtaking her, it was resolved to lay to until daybreak; and a gun fired in intimation of approach was presently answered by a display of rockets and blue lights from the Honourable Company’s schooner “Constance,” riding at anchor in the harbour.

The Arabs lay claim to the invention of the compass; and Aboo Bekr, who believed himself in truth a second Anson, was provided with one, which must certainly have been the first ever constructed. Age having impaired the dilapidated needle, it was forced off its pivot by a quantity of pepper-corns, which are here considered highly efficacious in the restoration of decayed magnetic powers. From the native navigators in the Indian Ocean he had borrowed a primitive nautical instrument for determining the latitude; nor was he a little vain of his practical skill as an observer. Through a perforation in the centre of a plane of wood in size and shape like a playing card, was passed a knotted whipcord, and the distance from each knot was so regulated that the subtended angle should equal the altitude of the polar star at some frequented point on the coast. The knot having been placed between the teeth, and the lower margin of the plane brought in optical contact with the horizon, the position of Polaris must be observed with reference to the upper edge; when, if it be above, the desired haven is known to be to the southward—if below, to the northward, and the course is shaped accordingly.

“I’ll take you in this very night, Capitan Báshi, if you so please,” resumed the pilot, whose packet had by this time escaped his recollection altogether. “Only give me the order, and, praise be unto Allah! there is nothing that Aboo Bekr cannot do. My head, as you see, is bald, and I may perhaps be a little old-looking now, but wait until we get on shore, and my new wig is bent; Inshállah! I shall look like a child of five years among the youngest of them.”

“Now if we had but Long Ali of Zeyla on board,” continued the old man, whose merry tongue knew no rest; “if we had only Two-fathom Ali here, you would not make all these difficulties. When they want to lay out an anchor, they have nothing else to do but to hand it over to Ali, and he walks away with it into six or eight feet without any ado. I went once upon a time in the dark to grope for a berth on board of his buggalow, and stumbling over some one’s toes, inquired to whose legs they belonged; ‘All’s,’ was the reply. ‘And whose knees are these?’ said I, after walking half across the deck; ‘Ali’s.’ ‘And this head in the scuppers, pray whose is it?’ ‘Ali’s to be sure,’ growled a sleepy voice; ‘what do you want with it?’ ‘Subhán Allah, Ali again!’ I exclaimed; ‘then I must even look for stowage elsewhere.’”

Dawn of the 17th revealed the town of Tajúra, not a mile distant, on the verge of a broad expanse of blue water, over which a gossamer-like fleet of fishing catamarans already plied their busy craft. The tales of the dreary Teháma, of the suffocating Shimál, and of the desolate plains of the bloodthirsty Adaïel, were in that moment forgotten. Pleasure sparkled in every eye, and each heart bounded with exultation at the near prospect of fulfilling the benevolent schemes in design, and of adding one mite to the amelioration of Afric’s swart sons.

Those who are conversant with Burchell’s admirable illustration of an encampment of Cape farmers, with their gigantic waggons scattered about in picturesque confusion, will best understand the appearance of the group of primitive habitations that now presented itself on the sea-beach. Exceeding two hundred in number, and rudely constructed of frames of unhewn timber, arranged in a parabolic arch, and covered in with date matting, they resembled the white tilts of the Dutch boors, and collectively sheltered some twelve hundred inhabitants. The bold grey mountains, like a drop scene, limited the landscape, and, rising tier above tier, through coral limestone and basaltic trap, to the majestic Jebel Goodah, towering five thousand feet above the ocean, were enveloped in dirty red clouds, which imparted the aspect of a morning in the depth of winter. Verdant clumps of date and palm trees embosomed the only well of fresh water, around which numerous Bedouin females were drawing their daily supply of the precious fluid. These relieved the humble terraced mosque of whitewashed madrepore, whence the voice of the muezzin summoned the true believer to matin prayer; and a belt of green makanni, a dwarf species of mimosa with uniform umbrella tops, fringing the sandy shore, completed a pleasant contrast to the frowning blocks of barren black lava which fortify the Gibraltar whereupon the eye had last rested.

As the ship sailed into the harbour, the appearance of a large shark in her wake caused the tongue of the pilot again to “break adrift.” “A certain friend of mine,” said he, “Nákhuda of a craft almost as fast a sailer as my own, which is acknowledged to be the best in these seas, was once upon a time bound from this port to Mocha, with camels on board. When off Jebel Ján, the high table-land betwixt the Bay of Tajúra and the Red Sea, one of the beasts dying, was hove overboard. Up came a shark, ten times the size of that fellow, and swallowed the carcass, leaving one of the hinder legs protruding from his jaws; and before he had time to think where he was to find stowage for it, up came a second tremendous monster, and bolted his messmate, camel, leg, and all.”

In return for this anecdote, the old man was treated to the history of the two Kilkenny cats in the sawpit, which fought until nothing remained of either but the tail and a bit of the flue. “How could that be?” he retorted seriously, after turning the business over in his mind. “Now, Capitan Báshi, you are spinning yarns, but, by Allah, the story I have told you is as true as the holy Korán, and if you don’t choose to believe me, there are a dozen persons of unblemished veracity now in Tajúra, who are ready to vouch for its correctness.”

Volume One—Chapter Six.

Cast Anchor at Tajúra on the African Coast.

A scraggy, misshapen lad, claimed by Aboo Bekr as his own most dutiful nephew, now paddled alongside in a frail skiff, the devil dancing in his wicked eye; and having caught the end of a rope thrown by the doting uncle, he was on board in another instant.

During a former cruise of the “Euphrates,” this imp had contrived to pass on the purser a basket of half-hatched eggs, which he warranted “new laid,” but with which he was subsequently pelted over the gangway. On being greeted as “Sahib el bayzah,” “the master of the eggs,” and asked if he had not brought a fresh supply for sale, grinning archly, he dragged forward by the topknot a dull, stupid, little wretch—his messmate—whose heavy features formed the exact reverse of his own impudent animation. “Here,” he exclaimed, “is the identical young rascal of whom I told you I bought them; he actually stole the whole from under his mother’s hen, and then assured me that they were fresh.” “Why don’t you grow taller as well as sharper?” enquired the party upon whom the precocious child of the sea had imposed; “’tis now twelve months since you cheated me, and you are as diminutive a dwarf as ever.”

“How can any one thrive who is starved,” was the prompt reply; “were I to eat as immoderately as you do, I doubt not I should soon grow as corpulent.”

But the arrival of Ali Shermárki shortly changed this desultory conversation to weightier matters. This worthy old man, sheïkh of the Somauli tribe Aber Gerhájis, possessing great influence and consideration among the entire Danákil population of the coast, had been invited from Zeyla, his usual place of residence, to assist in the extensive preparations making for the journey of the Embassy; and he now represented the requisite number of camels to be on their way down from the mountains, if the assurances of the owners, upon whose word small reliance could be pieced, were to be implicitly believed.

Long faithfully attached to the British government, the sheikh’s first introduction arose out of a catastrophe which occurred many years ago—the loss of the merchant brig “Mary Anne” at Berbera, a sea-port on the Somauli coast, lying immediately opposite to the peninsula of Aden. Deserted from October till March, it becomes, throughout the residue of the year, one uninterrupted fair, frequented by ships from the Arabian shores, by rapacious Banians from India, and by caravans of wandering savages from all parts of the interior—a vast temporary city or encampment, populated by not fewer than fifty thousand souls, springing into existence as if by the magic aid of Aladdin’s lamp, and disappearing so suddenly, that within a single week, not one inhabitant is to be seen. Yet another six months, and the purse-proud merchant of Hurrur is again there, with his drove of comely slaves newly exported from the highlands of Abyssinia. There, too, is the wild pagan, displaying coffee, peltries, and precious gums from beyond Gurágue; and, punctual as ever, see the káfilah from the distant gurriahs of Amín and Ogáden, a nomade band, laden with ivory and ostrich plumes, and stained from head to foot, both in person and in garment, by the impalpable red dust traversed during the long march from the southward.

Religious prejudices on the part of the wily Hindoo precluding all traffic in live stock, the Somauli shepherd retains in his own hand the sale of his black-headed flocks; embarked with which in his frail bark of fifty tons, he stands boldly across the gulf, at seasons when the Arab fears even to creep along the coast of the Hejáz. All other trade, however, is engrossed by the subtle Banian, who divides the adductor pollicis of the right thumb, in order to increase the span by which his wares are to be measured; and he, during many years, has enjoyed, silently and unobserved, the enormous profits accruing from the riches annually poured out from the hidden regions of Africa. No form of government regulates the commerce; and, in the absence of imposts, barter is conducted solely through the medium of a native broker styled Abán, who, receiving a regulated percentage upon purchases and sales, is bound, at the risk of his own life, to protect his constituent from injury or outrage.

A vessel standing towards the coast proves a signal to all who gain their livelihood by this system, to swim off, and contest first arrival on board; the winner of the aquatic race, in accordance with ancient usage, being invariably received as her Abán. Thus it was that Ali Shermárki became agent to the “Mary Anne,” a small English merchantman from Mauritius, whose captain, imprudently landing with the greater portion of his crew, afforded to a party of knavish Somauli an opportunity to cut the cable, when she drifted on shore and was lost. Hoping by his influence to prevail upon the plunderers to desist, the Abán, then a younger man, exerted himself to gain the wreck, but he was repulsed by a shower of spears, and his boat was swamped. A savage rabble next beleaguered his dwelling, and imperiously demanded the persons of the officers and crew, in order to put them to death; but, true to his charge, Ali Shermárki stoutly resisted, and being severely wounded, succeeded with his blood in securing honourable terms, and preserving the lives for which he had made himself responsible. His zealous integrity was duly rewarded by the British Government, and a sword was presented in token of his gallantry, the display of the brilliant setting of which led to the narration of the foregoing history.

The passage from Aden had been made in forty-two hours. As the cable of the “Euphrates” ran through the hawse-holes, and the rest of the squadron feu into their places betwixt herself and the shore, she fired a salute of five guns; and, after considerable delay, a negro was perceived timidly advancing with a lighted brand from among a knot of grey-bearded elders, seated in deep consultation beneath the scanty foliage of an ancient date tree. A superannuated 4 Pr., honey-combed throughout its calibre, and mounted upon a rickety ship carriage, tottered on the beach—the sole piece of ordnance possessed by Sultán Mohammad ibn Mohammad, reputed ruler of all the Danákil tribes. It was, after much coaxing, persuaded to explode in reply to the compliment paid, and for some minutes afterwards, wreaths of white smoke continued to ascend from the chimney-like vent, as though the venerable engine had taken fire, and was being consumed internally.

The commander of the “Euphrates,” whose naval functions were now temporarily suspended, having long enjoyed the honour of a personal acquaintance with the potentate bearing the above pompous and high-sounding title, repaired forthwith to the palace, which consists of the stern moiety of the ill-starred “Mary Anne,” tastily erected, keel uppermost, in the middle of the town, to serve as an attic story. Letters of introduction from the political authorities at Aden, with many complimentary speeches, duly delivered, permission to land was solicited; and although the formidable array of shipping, whose guns, not two hundred yards distant, sullenly overlooked the royal lodge, had given birth to certain misgivings, the Sultán finally overcame his fears, and acquiesced in the arrangement. A spot of waste land, forming a common near the mosque, was pointed out as the site upon which to encamp, but the favour was granted with this express understanding, that the British Embassy should tarry in so enviable a situation, not one moment longer than the exigencies of the service imperatively demanded; a saving clause in the stipulation to which all parties heartily subscribed.

The bay in which the “Euphrates” now rode, styled, from its wonted smoothness, “Bahr el Bánateen,” “the sea of the two nymphs,” is a deep narrow estuary, bounded by a bold coast, and extending, in a south-westerly direction, about forty-five miles, when the Eesah and Danákil shores suddenly converge so as to form a straitened channel, which imparts the figure of an hour-glass. Barely three quarters of a mile across, this passage is divided by a barren rocky islet styled “Báb,” “the door,” as occupying the gateway to the inner bay of Góobut el Kharáb, “the basin of foulness.” The vortices formed by the strong tide setting through these confined apertures, assume a most dangerous aspect; and although the water in the bowl, whereof the longer axis measures twelve, and the shorter five miles, is so intensely salt as to create a smarting of the skin during immersion, mud adhering to the lead at one hundred fathoms, is perfectly sweet and fresh. Of four islets, two are rocks; Bood Ali, on the contrary, three hundred feet in height, and perfectly inaccessible, being thickly encrusted with earth and vegetable matter, whilst the sides of its nearest neighbour. Hood Ali, are bare, and present unequivocal traces of more recent volcanic action than are to be found in the surrounding débris.

Immediately outside the bay, on the Danákil coast, there issues from the rock below high water line, a spring which, at the flood tide, is completely effaced; but during the ebb is so intensely hot, that a crab is instantly destroyed and turned red by immersion. At the western extremity of Goobut el Kharáb, a cove three hundred yards in diameter, with sixteen fathoms water, is enclosed by precipitous volcanic cliffs, and the entrance barred by a narrow coral reef, which, at low tide, lies high and dry. In the waters of this recess is presented one of those strange phenomena which are not to be satisfactorily explained. Always ebbing, there is an underflow during even the flood tide; and usually glassy smooth, they become occasionally agitated by sudden ebullition, boiling up in whirlpools, which pour impetuously over the bar; whence the natives, persuaded that there exists a subterranean passage connected with the great Salt Lake, of which the sparkling expanse is visible from an intervening high belt of decomposing lava, term the cove “Mirsa good Ali,” “the source of the sea.”

Volume One—Chapter Seven.

Reception of the Embassy by the Sultán of the Sea-Port, and Return Visit to his Highness.

The first British camp with which the sea-port of Tajúra had been honoured since its foundation, raised its head on the afternoon of the 18th of May; when the Embassy, accompanied by the officers of both ships of war in the harbour, landed under a salute of seventeen guns from the “Euphrates,” (commanded by Lieutenant J. Young, I.N.,) and in a spacious crimson pavilion, erected as a hall of audience, received a visit of ceremony from the Sultán and his principal chiefs. A more unprincely object can scarcely be conceived than was presented in the imbecile, attenuated, and ghastly form of this most meagre potentate, who, as he tottered into the marquee, supported by a long witch-like wand, tendered his hideous bony claws to each of the party in succession, with all the repulsive coldness that characterises a Dankáli shake of the hand. An encourager of the staple manufactures of his own country, his decrepit frame was enveloped in a coarse cotton mantle, which, with a blue-checked wrapper about his loins, and an ample turban perched on the very apex of his shaven crown, was admirably in keeping with the harmony of dirt that pervaded the attire of his privy council and attendants. Projecting triangles of leather graced the toes of his rude sandals; a huge quarto Korán, slung over his bent shoulder, rested beneath the left arm, on the hilt of a brass-mounted creese, which was girded to the right side; and his illustrious person was further defended against evil influence by a zone and bandolier thickly studded with mystic amulets and most potent charms, extracted from the sacred book. Enfeebled by years, his deeply-furrowed countenance, bearing an ebony polish, was fringed by a straggling white beard, and it needed not the science of Lavater to detect, in the indifference of his dull leaden eye, and the puckered corners of his toothless mouth, the lines of cruelty, cunning, and sordid avarice.

His Highness’s haggard form was supported by the chief ministers of Church and State—Abdool Rahmán Sowáhil, the judge, civil, criminal, and ecclesiastic, and Hámed Bunaïto, the pursy Wazir, whose bodily circumference was in strict unison with the pomposity of his carriage. One Sáleh Shehém, too, occupied a prominent seat in the upper ranks—a wealthy slave-merchant, whose frightful deformities have ennobled him with the title of “Ashrem,” which being interpreted signifies, “he of the hare-lip.” This trio alone, of all the unwashed retinue, showed turbaned heads, every lesser satellite wearing either a natural or artificial full-bottomed peruke, graced with a yellow wooden skewer, something after the model of a salad fork, stuck erect in hair well stiffened with a goodly accumulation of sheep’s-tail fat, the rancid odour whereof was far from enhancing the agrémens of the interview. Izhák and Hajji Kásim, two elders of the blood-royal, with whom a much closer acquaintance was in store, were perfectly bald,—their patriarchal bearing and goodly presence affording no bad imitation of the scriptural illustrations by the old masters of the apostles Saint Peter and Saint Paul. True to his word, the wag Aboo Bekr, as full of pleasantries as ever, had donned a preposterous tawny wig, quaintly manufactured of the fleece of a sheep; and in his smirking, facetious physiognomy was found the principal relief to the scowling satanic glances of the ill-favoured rabble, dripping with tallow, and redolent of abominable smells, who crowded the tent to the choking of every doorway.

It having heretofore been the invariable maxim of the Sultán to exact a visit from the stranger before condescending to pay one himself, the departure from established rule in favour of the liege subjects of Her Britannic Majesty could not fail to prove eminently gratifying. Compliments of the most fulsome nature were bandied about with compound interest, as the coffee-cup passed round to the more distinguished of the Danákil guests. Promises of assistance the most specious were lavished by the authorities, in grateful acknowledgment whereof, Cachemire shawls, and Delhi embroidered scarfs of exquisite workmanship, were liberally distributed, and as greedily tucked under the dirty cloth of the avaricious recipients; and although, in accordance with the unpolished custom of the country, no sort of salutation was offered when the conference broke up, the filthy guests departed with a semblance of good humour, that had been observable in none at their first entrance.

Widely different was the mood of the son of Ali Abi, chief of the Rookhba, as he rushed into the pavilion on the exit of his rival, the hereditary Sultán of the Danákil. Lucifer, when gazing forth upon the newly created Paradise, and plotting the downfall of the sinless inmates of the garden of Eden, looked not half so fiend-like as Mohammad Ali, whilst, trembling with jealousy and rage, he demanded the reason of having been so insultingly omitted in the distribution of valuables? “Am I then a dog,” he continued, in the highest indignation, “and not worth the trouble of propitiating? whereas that old dotard yonder is to have his empty skull bound with rich shawls from India, and his powerless relatives decorated from head to foot. Inshállah, we shall see anon whether the Sultán of the sea-beach, or the son of Ali Abi, keeps the key of the road to Hábesh.”

Unlike the succession of every other government in the universe, the nominal sovereignty of the united tribes composing the Adaïel of Danákil nation, whereof Tajúra is the seat, is alternately vested in the Adáli and the Abli, a Sultán drawn from the one, being succeeded by his Wazir, who is invariably a member of the other, whilst the individual to fill the post vacated by the latter, is elected by suffrage from the family of the Sultán deceased. The town is besides the rendezvous of the petty chiefs of all the surrounding clans, who, to the number of eight or ten, claim an equal voice in the senate, and with about an hundred litigious followers each, make it their head-quarters during the greater portion of the year. Mohammad Ali is the principal of these, and his powerful tribe occupying a central position on the road to Abyssinia, he asserts the right to escort all parties proceeding thither—a right which the Sultán denies. The necessity of propitiating at one time, and in the same place, two rival savages, possessing equally the means of annoyance, whilst neither is sufficiently strong to afford protection against the interference of the other, rendered the negotiation one of considerable difficulty and delicacy; nor was it without a vast expenditure of honied words, that the ruffled temper of the malcontent was finally soothed, and he was persuaded to waive the assertion of his recognised claim, until a more suitable opportunity.

All the tents having been erected, the steeds landed and picketed in the rear, and the heterogeneous mass of property which strewed the sea-beach reduced to a something less chaotic state, a return visit to His Highness was paid in full uniform; and the cortège being swelled by the naval officers, an exceedingly gay procession of cocked hats, plumes, and gold lace, passed along the strand to the palace, under a befitting salute from the Brig of war. The lounging population were altogether lost in amazement at the sight of such magnificence—old and young, of both sexes, thronging the wayside, with features indicative of unequivocal admiration at the brilliancy of so unwonted a display.

The thunder of artillery, to which the nervous old Sultán does not conceal his insuperable aversion, still shook the unpretending couch whereon he quailed, as the procession entered the fragile tenement of stakes and matting which constituted the Divan; and which, without possessing any pretensions to exclude either sun or rain, proved just sufficiently large to include the entire party. A renewal of hand-shaking in its coldest form, and a repetition of yesterday’s compliments, and of yesterday’s promises mode only to be broken, was followed by a general sipping of coffee, prepared, not in the royal kitchen, but in the cuisine of the Embassy; and after being scrutinised during ten minutes of suffocating heat by numerous female eyes glistening through an infinity of chinks and perforations in the envious matting, the party returned, bearing as a costly token of His Highness’s regard, a cloth similar to that composing the royal mantle.

It did indeed, in this instance, form matter of heartfelt congratulation, that the regal custom was dispensed with, of investing the honoured guest with a garment from the imperial wardrobe! As the cavalcade, duly impressed with this sentiment, remounted at the gate of the thorn inclosure which fortifies the palace, the Sultana vouchsafed a glimpse of her bedizened person from the stern cabin window of the “Mary Anne”—the withered frame of the ancient beldame, embedded in spells, beads, amulets, and grease, forcibly reminding the spectator of the witch of Endor, and rendering her in very truth, a right seemly partner for her wrinkled lord.

Volume One—Chapter Eight.

Tajúra, “The City of the Slave-Merchant.”

In the heart of the peninsula of Arabia, environed on every side by rocky mountains, there stood, in the middle of the sixth century, a celebrated pagan shrine, that had been held in the most exalted veneration during fourteen hundred years. The edifice was believed to cover the hallowed remains of Ishmaël, the father of the wandering Bedouin, and it contained a certain sacred black stone, whereon the Patriarch Jacob saw the vision of angels ascending into heaven. On its site, according to the Arab tradition, Adam pitched his tent when expelled from the garden of Eden, and there died Eve, the partner of his fall, whose grave of green sods is shown to the present day, upon the barren shores of the Red Sea.

This shrine, of course, was none other than the famous temple of the Sun at Mecca, since so consecrated by the lawgiver of the Mohammadans, as to form the focus of attraction to every true believer. The extraordinary veneration it received in those early days, concentrating the tide of commerce, rendered it the absorbing mart of Eastern trade. Abyssinia at that period held in occupation the adjacent provinces of Arabia Felix, and Abrahah, the vicegerent of Yemen, conceiving the idea of diverting the channel to his own advantage, erected in the country of the Homerites a splendid Christian church, which, under the title of Keleïsa, he endowed with the same privileges, immunities, and emoluments, that had pertained, from all antiquity, to the shrine of Sabaean idolatry.

“If,” says Gibbon, “a Christian power had been maintained in Arabia, Mahomet must have been crushed in his cradle, and Abyssinia would have prevented a revolt which has changed the civil and religious aspect of the world.” But alarmed at the prospect of the desertion of their temple both by votaries and merchants, the Beni Koreish, who held the keys of the black stone in hereditary right, polluted the rival fane at Saana, which had no equal, saving the palace of the Hamyar kings, and was calculated to ensure the veneration of every pilgrim. Out of this sacrilege and affront arose the event celebrated in the Korán as “the war of the Elephant.” Mounted on a huge white elephant, Abrahah, surnamed El Ashrem, placing himself at the head of a vast army, proceeded to take revenge on the idolaters; but, misled by intelligence artfully given by Aboo Táleb, grandfather to the Apostle of God, he destroyed, instead of the Kaaba, a temple of Osiris at Taïef, and the first recorded appearance of the small-pox, shortly afterwards annihilated the Christian forces.

The wars that distracted all Arabia, between the Greeks and Persians in the first instance, and subsequently between Mahomet and the population in support of his divine mission, had greatly impaired the traffic carried on by general consent at the temple of Mecca. A caravan scarcely ever ventured forth by any road, that it was not plundered by the opposing partisans, and merchants as well as trade gradually departed south of the Arabian Gulf, to sea-ports which in earlier times had been the emporia of commerce with the East. Raheïta, Zeyla, Tajúra, and a number of other towns in the Indian Ocean, thus recovered their importance and their lost prosperity. The conquest of the Abyssinian territories in Arabia, drove every Ethiopian to the African shores. Little districts now grew into great consideration. Mara, Hadea, Aussa, and Adel, amongst other petty states, assumed unto themselves the title of kingdoms, and shortly acquired power and wealth eclipsing many of the more ancient monarchies.

The miserable town of Tajúra, “the city of the slave-merchant,” as it exists at the present day, demands no further description. It was for two years in the hands of the Turks, who occupied it after the taking of Massowah, and converted into a fort a venerable mosque, now in ruins, on the sea-beach near the palace. But no consistent chronicle, either of the capture or evacuation, is to be expected where every man is notorious equally as a boaster and a liar, and making himself the individual hero in every passage of arms, never foils to extol his own clan as immeasurably superior in valour to every other. The melancholy aspect of the place is but too well calculated to convey to the traveller a foretaste of the sufferings inseparable from a pilgrimage through any portion of the country denominated Adel; and each barbarian of the entire population of Tajúra will be found, on sad experience, a type of the Dankáli nation!

Bigoted Mohammadans, punctual to the call of the Muezzin, praying three times in excess of the exactions of the Prophet, often passing the entire night in the mosque, or sitting in council at its threshold; sedulously attentive to the outward forms of their creed, though few have sufficient energy to undertake a pilgrimage to the Kaaba, and content, like other hypocrites, with a rigid observance of externals—the Danákil rise from their devotions well primed with Moslem intolerance, and are perfectly ready to lie and cheat as occasion may offer. Unoccupied, and at a loss for honest employment, idlers without number sauntered about the pavilion at all times and seasons, entering at pleasure, and monopolising chairs and tables with the insolent independence which forms one of their most prominent features. Supported by a long staff, the ruffians gazed for hours together at the novel splendour of the equipage; and invariably disfigured by a large quid of tobacco adulterated with ashes, squirted the redundant saliva over the carpet, although squatted on the outside of the door, with ample space at command. But although thieves by profession on a grand scale, they fortunately contrived to keep their hands from picking and stealing; and notwithstanding that the tents were thus thronged from morning till night, and the sea-beach for many weary days was strewed with boxes and bales of truly tempting exterior, nothing whatever was abstracted.

The classic costume of the people of this sea-port consists of a white cotton robe, thrown carelessly over the shoulder, in the manner of the old Roman toga; a blue-checked kilt reaching to the knees, simply buckled about the waist by a leathern belt, which supports a most formidable creese, and a pair of rude undressed sandals to protect the feet of such as can afford the luxury. The plain round buckler and the broad-headed spear, without which few ever cross their threshold, renders the naturally graceful and manly figure of almost every individual a subject for the artist’s pencil; but the population are to a man filthy in the extreme, and the accumulated dirt upon their persons and apparel leaves a taint behind, that might readily be traced without the intervention of a bloodhound. Rancid mutton fat, an inch thick, frosts a bushy wig of cauliflower growth, which harbours myriads of vermin. Under the melting rays of a tropical sun, the grease pours copiously over the skin; and the use of water, except as a beverage, being a thing absolutely unheard-of, a Dankáli pollutes the atmosphere with an effluvium, such as is only to be encountered elsewhere in the purlieus of a tallow-chandler’s shop.

All are vain of scars, and desirous of displaying them; but little favour is shown for other outward ornament; and the miserly disposition which pervades the breast both of young and old, inducing an effort towards the concealment of property possessed, a paltry silver ring in the ear, a band of copper wire round the junction of the spear-blade with the shaft, or pewter mountings to the creese, form the sum total of decoration on the arms and persons even of the most extravagant. Fops in numbers are to be seen at Tajúra, who have called in the aid of moist quick-lime towards the conversion of the naturally jet black peruke to a most atrocious foxy red—when judicious frizzing, and the insertion of the wooden skewer, used for scratching, completes the resemblance to a carriage mop. But this novel process of dyeing, so contrary to that employed by civilised beaux, is only in fashion among the Somauli, who, in common with the Danákil dandies, employ, in lieu of a down pillow, a small wooden bolster, shaped like a crutch, which receives the neck, and during the hours of presumed uncomfortable repose, preserves the periwig from derangement.

Massy amulets in leathern envelopes, or entire Koráns in quarto or octavo, are borne on the unpurified person of almost every individual; and the ancient Arab remedy of swallowing the water in which passages from the holy book have been washed from the board or paper whereon they were inscribed, is in universal repute, as a sovereign medicine for every ailment to which frail flesh is heir—the firm of Sultán, Wazir and Kázi, who alone possess the privilege of wearing turbans, holding the monopoly, and driving a most profitable trade by the preparation of this simple, but potent specific. Large doses of melted sheep’s-tail fat are moreover swallowed on certain occasions; and a native Esculapius gave proof of the perfection to which the dentist’s art has attained at Tajúra, by dexterously detaching a carious tooth from the stubborn jaws of a submissive old woman, with the patent machinery of a rusty nail as a punch, struck with a heavy stone picked up on the sea-beach, where the operation was performed for the edification of the encampment. Applications were nevertheless frequent for European aid—a venerable priest numbering threescore years and ten, peremptorily demanding, in addition to a philter, the instantaneous removal of two obstinate cataracts, which had long dimmed his sight, and upon which he had vainly expended the teeth of half the mules in Tajúra, roasted, and reduced to an impalpable powder.

Education, to the extent of spelling the Korán, is general, and all speak Arabic as well as Dankáli; the lore of the most learned being however restricted to a smattering of the holy book, with a very confused idea of numerals, and ability to endite a scraggy Arabic letter, which, when completed with infinite labour, the writer is often puzzled to decipher. To the immortal honour of the Sultán be it here recorded, that although the oldest male inhabitant of Tajúra, he is a solitary instance of non-acquaintance with the alphabet. The swarthy cheek of every urchin who distinguishes himself by diligence or quickness, receives in token thereof, a dash of white chalk, a black streak in like manner disgracing the idle and stupid; but the pedagogue would appear to omit the residue of this oriental custom—the stuffing the mouths of the well-behaved with sugar-candy, which would doubtless prove a source of much greater enjoyment.

In the evening the ingenuous youth of the town, each armed with a creese in case of quarrel, convene in numbers on the common, to play a game which combines hockey and football; the residue of their time being spent in angling, when the juvenile Walton stands up to the chin in the salt sea, and employing his head as a substitute for the reel, spins out a dozen yards of line in a truly fisherman-like manner. Numbers spent the period of their relaxation from study in gaping with the adults at the door of the pavilion, whilst the magic effect of the magnet was exhibited, or fire produced from the human mouth by means of a promethean, here emphatically denominated “the devil.”

The softer sex of Tajúra, whilst young, possess a tolerable share of comeliness, and a pleasing expression withal; but they are speedily past the meridian of beauty. A close blue chemise, a plain leathern petticoat, or a cloth reaching to the ankles, and a liberal coat of lard over extravagantly braided ringlets, which are knotted with white beads, form the toilet of maid, wife, and widow. An occasional necklace of coloured beads falling over the sable bosom, a pendant of brass or silver wire of no ordinary dimensions in the ear, and large ivory bracelets or anklets, proclaim the besetting foible of the sex: but ornaments are by no means general. Mohammadan jealousy tends to the seclusion of the better order of females to a certain extent; but a marriage in high life, when the procession passed close to the encampment, afforded an opportunity not always enjoyed, of beholding the beauty and fashion of the place. The matrimonial shackles are here easily loosed; and the greater portion of the population being deeply engaged in the slave trade with the interior, have their rude houses filled with temporary wives, who are from time to time unceremoniously shipped for the Arabian market, in order that the funds accruing from the sale of their persons may be invested in new purchases.

Agriculture there is none. Every man is a merchant, and waxes sufficiently rich on his extensive slave exportations, to import from other climes the produce he requires. An extensive traffic is carried on with Aussa and Abyssinia, in which nearly all are engaged at some period of the year. Indian and Arabian manufactures, pewter, zinc, copper and brass wire, beads, and salt in large quantities, are at these inland marts exchanged for slaves, grain, ivory, and other produce of the interior,—salt and human beings forming, however, the chief articles of barter. Virgin Mary German crowns of Maria Theresa, 1780, as integrals, and strips of raw hide for sandal soles, as fractionals, form the currency of the sea-port; beads, buttons, mirrors, trinkets, empty bottles, snuff, and tobacco, for which latter there is an universal craving, being also received in exchange for the necessaries of life.

Avarice is the ruling passion—the salient point in the character of the Dankáli. His whole soul is engrossed in amassing wealth, whilst he is by nature indolent and lazy, and would fain acquire riches without treading the laborious uphill path towards their attainment. Miserly in disposition, there is not an individual of the whole community, from the Sultán downwards, who would not infinitely prefer the present receipt of two pieces of silver, to a promissory note for twenty at the expiration of a week, upon the very best security. “Trees attain not to their growth in a single day,” remarked Ali Shermárki, after remonstrating with the grasping ruler on his inordinate love of lucre—“take the tree as your text, and learn that property is only to be accumulated by slow degrees.”

“True,” retorted the old miser—“but, Sheikh, you must have lost sight of the fact, that my leaves are already withered, and that if I would be rich I have not a moment to lose.”

Volume One—Chapter Nine.

Foretaste of Danákil Knavery.

A share of thirty thousand German crowns, the annual profits accruing from the sale of three thousand human beings kidnapped in the interior, renders every native of Tajúra a man of competent independence. It is not, therefore, surprising that the usual rates of transport hire, added to a knowledge of the exigencies of the Embassy, should have produced in this avaricious, but indolence-loving race, no particular desire to bestir themselves. All are camel-owners to a greater or less extent; but the presence of so many interested parties tended not a little to increase the difficulties inseparable from dealings with so listless and dilatory a set of savages—it being of course requisite to consult the advantage of all, to which, as might be conjectured, all are most feelingly alive. The ashes of ancient feuds were still smoking on the arrival of the British; and notwithstanding that it was matter of notoriety that the amount disbursed at the time of departure for Shoa, would be diminished in the exact ratio of the delay experienced—and although, to judge from the surface, affairs looked prosperous enough towards the speedy completion of carriage, there was ever an adverse under-current setting; and the apathy of the savage feeding upon listless delays, the party were doomed for a weary fortnight to endure the merciless heat of the Tajúra sun, whose tardy departure was followed by a close muggy atmosphere, only occasionally alleviated by the bursting of a thunder-storm over the peak of Jebel Goodah, and to be perpetually deceived by the falsest promises, without being able to discover where to lay the blame. Bribes were lavished, increased hire acceded to, and camels repeatedly brought into the town; but day after day found the dupes to Danákil knavery still seated like shipwrecked mariners upon the shore, gazing in helpless melancholy at endless bales which strewed the strand, as if washed up by the waves of the fickle ocean.

During this tedious detention, which, as the sun shone fiercer and the close nights grew hotter with the rapidly advancing season, waxed daily more irksome and insupportable, and even threatened to arrest the journey altogether, the most conflicting accounts were received from various interested parties, of the actual extent of the Sultán’s jurisdiction, averred by himself to have no limits nearer than the frontier of Efát. His revenues were ascertained to be restricted to two hundred head of oxen, camels, sheep, and goats, paid annually by the adjacent Danákil tribes, and it was certain that he enjoyed circumscribed prerogatives, based upon ancient usage; but although nothing is done or undertaken, without his concurrence duly obtained, he possesses no discretion to punish disobedience of his will, and is precluded from acting in the most trivial matter without the consent in full conclave, of the majority of the chiefs. Possessing little or no power over his nominal subjects, he is merely a puppet, looked up to by the wild tribes as the head of the principal family—infirmity and utter imbecility of character rendering His Highness at the same time, little better than a laughing-stock.

Faithless and rapacious, his insatiable avarice induced him to take every extortionate advantage of the helpless party at his mercy, whilst his tottering sway debarred him the power of reserving to himself the exclusive right of pillage. Private as well as public kaláms were daily held for hours at the sacred threshold of the mosque, during which new schemes of villainy and plunder were devised; and date leaves were indolently plaited by a host of apathetic legislators, as the propriety of permitting the departure inland of the Christian Kafirs was fully discussed and deliberated over with all the vicious bigotry of the Moslem zealot.

In order to ascertain how far fraud and impertinence might be carried with impunity, a deputation of the artful elders beleaguered the pavilion during the dead of night, to complain, in no measured terms, that certain of the followers, regardless of orders, had been seen endeavouring, with beads and trinkets, to betray the virtue of females who drew water at the well—a tale which proved, on due inquiry instituted, to be, like other Danákil asseverations, devoid of the slightest truth or foundation. Not even a paltry water skin was to be purchased from a schoolboy under the disbursement of a silver fuloos, value four sterling shillings; and a courier, who had, at three times the established charge, been furnished on the security of the high and mighty Sultán, to convey to Ankóber a letter advising the King of Shoa of the advent of the Embassy, was, after being three entire days and nights in possession of his ill-gotten wealth, discovered to be still snug within his mat-house, in the bosom of his family.

The letter in question had fixed the day of departure, and had been written in the most public manner before the assembled chiefs, in order, if possible, to counteract in some measure the tissue of underplots hourly developing, and to demonstrate to the Danákil capacity, that, whether camels were forthcoming or not, the journey would positively be undertaken; and the nefarious detention of the document, after the receipt of such exorbitant hire, being perfectly in keeping with the outrageously unprincipled and underhand treatment experienced from the first moment of arrival, the Sultán was at last plainly informed that further shuffling and falsehood would avail him nothing; since, if carriage were not immediately furnished in accordance with the plausible agreement concluded, the heavy baggage would be reshipped for Cape Aden, and the party would advance in defiance of opposition, with ten camels that had been brought by sea from Zeyla, by the nephews of Sheïkh Shermárki. Mohammad Ali, too, was now heart and hand in the cause, and his jealous rival, on receipt of this unpleasant intimation, began plainly enough to perceive that his guests were in right earnest, and that the golden opportunity of filling his coffers was passing rapidly away.

The royal salute, fired alternately from the decks of the brig and the schooner, each tricked out in all her colours, with gay signal flags in honour of the natal day of her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen, enveloped the town during forty minutes in a dense white smoke, accompanied by a most unpleasant smell of gunpowder; and during the entire day the beach in front of the British encampment wore the semblance of a disturbed ant-hill. European and native—master and servant—the latter from every nation under the sun, Arab, Persian, Nubian, Armenian, Egyptian, Syrian, Greek, and Portuguese,—all in a state of most active bustle, were selecting light baggage for the approaching departure; whilst crowds of oily savages, squatted on their hams, looked on in smiling apathy at the heaps of valuable commodities that were tossing about the sands. Twenty-one British officers subsequently sate down to dinner in the crimson pavilion, and the health of Queen Victoria having been given with nine times nine, another salute bursting from the sides of the vessels of war, shook the frail town to its foundations, and re-echoed long and loud among the mountain-glens—flights of rockets ascending at short intervals to illumine the dark sky.

The deafening din of the 32 pound stern chaser of the “Constance,” which pointed directly towards the royal abode, proved too much for the nerves of the timid Sultán; and no sooner had the lights been extinguished, than his spectral figure, which ever shunned the day, glided into the tent unannounced, and ghostlike, muttered the agreeable intelligence that His Highness, after consulting the horoscope, and ascertaining beyond all doubt that the journey would prove propitious—a fact not previously determined—had come to the resolution, wise though late, of supplying the desired carriage without further delay, and deputing his own son as a safeguard through the tribes—services for which the apparition felt confident of receiving a suitable reward. The voice of the chieftains had become unanimous. At the last of a long succession of meetings convened for the purpose of taking the affair into full consideration, Abdool Rahmán, the Kázi, in his capacity of lawgiver, had risen from his seat in the assembly, and ably demonstrated to his mat-weaving audience, why all animosities and heart-burnings must be sunk in the general object of making money, and getting rid as expeditiously as possible of a party of Kafirs, whose guns, unshotted, threatened the destruction of the mosque of the true believer, and the total demolition of Tajúra. The Fátheh, being the first chapter of the holy Korán, was duly read, and the Danákil conclave with one voice vociferated a loud Ameen, even so let it be!

Volume One—Chapter Ten.

Long Adieu to the Unprincipled Sultán.

From this eventful epoch each sultry day did indeed bring a numerical accession to the beasts of burthen collected in the town; but they were owned of many and self-willed proprietors; were, generally speaking, of the most feeble description, melancholy contrasts to the gigantic and herculean dromedary of Egypt and Arabia; and no trifling delay was still in store through their arrival from distant pastures bare-backed, which involved the necessity of making up new furniture for the march. The Dankáli saddle is fortunately a simple contrivance; a mat composed of plaited date leaves thrown over the hump, supporting four sticks lashed together in couples, and kept clear of the spinal process by means of two rollers as pads, having been proved by centuries of experience to be not more light than efficient. Accoutrements completed, and camels ready for the march, other provoking excuses for delay were not wanting, to fill, even to overflowing, the measure of annoyance. The demise of a nephew of the Sultán—the protracted funeral obsequies of the deceased—and the almost nightly abstraction of one or more hired camels by the lurking Bedouin, all contributed their mite. At length however no further pretext could be devised, and nine loads being actually in motion towards Ambábo, the first halting ground on the road to the kingdom of Shoa, the schooner “Constance,” getting under weigh, stood up the bay of Tajúra, and cast anchor off the incipient camp, of which the position was denoted by a tall cluster of palms.

Endless objections being now provokingly raised to the shape, size, and weight of the boxes to be transported, it next became requisite to reduce the dimensions of the greater number, in the progress of which operation it was discovered that the hurry of transhipment at Aden had resulted in the substitution of several dozens of choice marasquino, for a similar number of cases, of equal size, freighted with round shot for the galloper-guns. The work in hand was one of no ordinary labour and difficulty; and, after all, its completion proved insufficient to satisfy the parties. One blockhead complained that his load was heavier than his neighbour’s, who had wisely risen earlier in the morning to make his selection; another, that his case, although confessedly light, was not of convenient size; one was too long, another not long enough, a third too deep, and a fourth too loosely packed. From earliest dawn, until final close of day, on a sandy beach, under a broiling sun, was this torment continued without intermission, until the 30th of May, when, by dint of coaxing, menacing, and bribing, every article had been removed saving an unwieldy hand-organ, at which every camel-owner had shaken his wig in turn, and a few stand of arms which had been removed from wooden cases, and repacked in mats and tarpaulins. A great hulking savage finally proposed to carry these latter, upon condition of their being transversely divided with a saw to suit the backs of his wretched hip-galled camels. “You are a tall man,” quoth Aboo Bekr drolly, “suppose we shorten you by the legs?”

“No, no,” cried the barbarian, “I’m flesh and blood, and shall be spoiled.”

“So will the contents of these cases, you offspring of an ass,” retorted the old pilot, “if you divide them.”

The almost insurmountable difficulties thus experienced in obtaining carriage, but now happily overcome, had so far delayed the advance of the Embassy, as to oblige it to cross the Teháma during the height of the fiery and unwholesome blast which, during the months of June and July, sweeps over that waterless tract from the south-west; and had moreover rendered it impossible to reach Abyssinia before the setting-in of the annual heavy rains, when the river Hawásh becomes impassable for weeks together. Independently of the natural apathy of the camel-owning population, the fact of the season of all intercourse with the interior, by Káfilah, having already passed away, rendered every one averse, under any consideration of gain, to so hazardous a journey. Grain was to be carried for the consumption of horses and mules during the passage of arid regions, where, during the hot season, neither vegetation nor water exists; and the wells and pools having notoriously failed in every part of the road, during three consecutive seasons of unusual drought, it was necessary to entertain a large proportion of transport for a supply of water sufficient to last both man and beast for two and three days at a time; whilst, neither grass nor green food remaining near the sea-shore, the hundred and seventy camels now forming the caravan, had been individually assembled from various grazing grounds, many miles distant in the interior.

A sufficient number of water-skins had fortunately been purchased at exorbitant prices to complete the equipment, together with mules for the conveyance of the European escort and artillery; and the greedy Sultán, besides receiving the lion’s share of the profits on all, had sold his own riding beast for three times its worth in solid silver. But the forage brought over from Aden being long since consumed, the whole were fed upon dates, and to the latest moment the greatest difficulty continued to exist in regard to followers. The services of neither Dankáli, Bedouin, nor Somauli, were obtainable at whatever wages; and the whole of the long train of live stock was consequently to be attended by a few worthless horse-keepers, enlisted at Aden, aided by a very limited number of volunteers from the shipping, whose indifferent characters gave ample promise of their subsequent misdeeds.

On the departure of the last load, a general begging commenced on a grand scale, on the part of all who flattered themselves that they had in the most remote manner been so fortunate as to render assistance during the protracted sojourn of the Kafirs. Many, whose claims were far from being apparent, after confessing themselves satisfied in propriis personis, modestly urged demands on behalf of their still more worthless neighbours; and in order to have any chance of passing in safety to the mountains with so long a line of camels, it was only prudent to propitiate each and all of this predatory hosts of locusts, before entering upon their lawless country.

With a feeling of pleasure akin to that experienced by Gil Blas, when he escaped from the robbers’ cave, the party at length bade adieu to Tajúra. Of all the various classes and denominations of men who inhabit the terrestrial globe, the half-civilised savages peopling this sea-port, are perhaps the most thoroughly odious and detestable. They have ingeniously contrived to lose every virtue wherewith the rude tribes to which they pertain, may once have been adorned; and having acquired nothing in exchange, save the vices of their more refined neighbours, the scale of abject degradation to which they are now reduced, can hardly descend lower. Under this sweeping and very just condemnation, the impotent Sultán, Mohammad ibn Mohammad, stands pre-eminently in relief; and the old miser’s rapacity continuing unsated up to the very latest moment, he clutched his long staff betwixt his skinny fingers, and hobbled forth from his den, resolved to squeeze yet another hundred dollars as a parting memento from his British victims. The European escort were in the act of mounting the mules already harnessed to the galloper-gun, which he had vainly persuaded himself could never be transported from the coast, since no camel-owner consented to take it, and repeated attempts that he had witnessed to yoke a pair of oxen to the limbers had proved unsuccessful, even after their stubborn noses were pierced. But mule harness had been ably manufactured to meet the exigency, and when his lustreless eyes beheld the party in horse artillery order, firmly seated in their saddles, and moving along the strand towards Ambábo—forgetting the vile errand upon which he had come, he involuntarily exclaimed, “In the name of Allah and the holy Prophet, whither are those fellows going?” “Raheen el Hábesh,” “to Abyssinia,” was the laconic reply that fell upon his astounded ears as the whips cracked merrily in succession; and His Highness was long after seen, still leaning on his slender crutch, and staring in idiotic vacancy after the departing cavalcade, as it disappeared under a cloud of dust from before his leaden gaze.

Volume One—Chapter Eleven.

Iniquitous Proceedings at Ambábo, and Understanding with the Ras El Káfilah.

The tall masts of the schooner of war, raking above the belt of dwarf jungle that skirts the tortuous coast, served as a beacon to the new camp, the distance of which from the town of Tajúra was less than four miles. A narrow footpath wound along the burning sands, across numerous water-courses from the impending mountain range of trachyte and porphyry, whose wooded base, thickly clothed with mimosa and euphorbia antiquorum, harboured swine, pigmy antelope, and guinea-fowl in abundance. Many large trees, uprooted by the wintry torrent, had been swept far out to sea, where in derision of the waves that buffet their dilapidated, stag-horn looking arms, they will long ride safely at anchor. The pelican of the wilderness soiled through the tossing surf, and files of Bedouin damsels, in greasy leathern petticoats, bending beneath a load of fuel from the adjacent hamlets, traversed the sultry strand; whilst a long train of wretched children, with streaming elf-like locks, who had been kidnapped in the unexplored interior, wended their weary way with a slave caravan, towards the sea-port, whence they were to be sold into foreign bondage.

An avenue through the trees presently revealed the white tent, occupying a sequestered nook on the course of a mountain stream near its junction with the shore. Here horses and mules were doing their utmost, by diligently cropping the scanty tufts of sun-burnt grass, to repair their recent long abstinence from forage, whilst the abbreviated tails of those which had been improved by mutilation, formed the jest of a group of grinning savages. Clumps of lofty fan palms, and date trees loaded with ripe orange-coloured fruit, still screened from view the village of Ambábo, the straggling Gothic roofed wigwams composing which have the same waggon-like appearance as the huts of Tajúra,—a similar style of architecture extending even to the unostentatious mosque, alone distinguishable from the surrounding edifices, by uncarved minarets of wood.

Greasy ragamuffins still intruding, here continued their teasing persecutions, and Mohammad Mohammad, the son, though not the heir to the throne of the Sultán, having been specially appointed by his disreputable sire to the important post of reporter and spy, unceremoniously occupied one of the chairs, to the exclusion of the lawful proprietor during the entire day. He however proved useful in so far that he was versed in the chronicle of Ambábo. The Nákhuda of one of his uncle’s buggalows having contrived a quarrel with a member of the tribe Hassóba, one of the manifold subdivisions of the Danákil, the man threw the gauntlet of defiance by cutting off the prow of the boat. Meeting shortly afterwards in deadly conflict, the insulted mariner slew his antagonist on the spot, and took refuge in the hills, until, tired of long concealment, and believing the affair to be consigned to oblivion, he ventured to settle with his family at Ambábo, and thus founded the present village; but after some years of repose, he was discovered by the relatives of the slain, and, as usual in all blood feuds, ultimately assassinated. Occupying a site proverbially unhealthy, and scourged during the rains by insupportable clouds of musquitoes, the miserable hamlet is but thinly peopled, and the Sheikh being on far from amicable terms with the authorities of Tajúra, it is likely soon to be abandoned in favour of some more eligible location.

A red savage, falsely representing himself to be one of the household of his Christian Majesty of Shoa, arrived during the afternoon from Ankóber, with letters for Aden, and having safely deposited his packet on board the “Constance,” was readily induced to return whence he came, with the Embassy. Déeni ibn Hámed, a liar of the first magnitude, but the only Dankáli who had voluntarily attached himself to the fortunes of the party, conceiving the arrival of this courier to afford an opening for the exercise of his talents which ought on no account to be neglected, immediately proceeded to tax his lively ingenuity in disclosing the contents of a document which he pretended had been received from Sáhela Selássie by the old ruffian from whose clutches his audience had just thankfully escaped; and the mass of gratuitous falsehoods that he contrived to string together with an unblushing front, must be admitted to reflect ample credit upon his fertile invention.

Lying appeared in fact to be the chosen occupation of this youthful warrior, who, however, unlike the mass of his compatriots, did possess some redeeming qualities, though they were by no means so conspicuous as his scars. The insuperable aversion to veracity which he evinced on every occasion, renders it difficult to determine what degree of credit may be attached to the tragic tale that he was pleased to connect with a deep gash over the temple, which distorted his vision; and if not received in a less honourable rencontre than he pretended, affords another to the ten thousand instances on record of the savage rancour with which blood feuds are prosecuted. “My maternal uncle, and a native of Zeyla,” said Déeni, “becoming embroiled, mutually unsheathed their creeses in mortal strife, fought desperately, and died. The brother of the latter sought my life in revenge, as being the nearest of kin; but after receiving this slash upon my forehead, and another on my arm, which I shall also carry to the grave, I closed, stabbed the Somauli villain to the heart with this good creese, and, glory be to God I divided his windpipe with his own sword.”

Profiting by the amiable example of the illustrious ruler of Tajúra, the Sheïkh of Ambábo, a most notable extortioner, resolved to put his chum to a sum of ready money beyond a shadow of doubt, placed a strong Bedouin guard over the only well; and although he had every reason to be satisfied with the success of his nefarious schemes, he did not possess sufficient gratitude to prevent the commission of a robbery during the night, which might have proved more serious than it did. Solace under all misfortunes and annoyances was, however, found in the arrival of Mohammad Ali on the 31st, with a welcome accession of camels for the carriage of water, which rendered certain the prospect of departure on the morrow, it having been distinctly promised by the Sultán, in return for a handsome pecuniary consideration, that his brother Izhák, who had been unanimously appointed Ras el Káfilah, his son, his nephew, and seven other persons of undoubted influence on the road, should be in readiness without fail, to escort the Embassy on the 1st of June, and that the reward of their services should be paid, ad valorem, upon safe arrival within the kingdom of Shoa.

Three hours after midnight, the galloper-gun, fired within the limits of the British camp as a summons to the drowsy camel-drivers to be up and doing, was echoed, according to previous agreement, by the long stern chaser of the “Constance,”—a signal to the “Euphrates,” still anchored off Tajúra, to thunder a farewell salute as the day dawned. The work of loading was merrily commenced—the tent went down—and camel after camel moved off towards Dullool; when, on the departure of the last string, it was observed with dismay that the ground was still strewed with baggage, for which carriage had unquestionably been paid and entertained, but for which none was forthcoming. The greasy proprietors were, after some search, discovered below the bushes, engaged in the operation of jerking mutton,—a process sufficiently nauseous in itself to repel any close advance; but persuasion and threats proved alike unavailing. Some had already sent their camels to graze at a distance; others insolently expressed their intention of doing so after the completion of their interesting work, and by far the greater number would vouchsafe no explanation whatever. At length the provoking riddle was solved by the arrival of a peremptory message from the Sultán, naming the price of the attendance of his brother with the promised escort, and modestly requesting that the amount might forthwith be disbursed, or the bargain must be considered null and void!

In this awkward dilemma, one of the party was immediately despatched to create a diversion among the Philistines, and to remonstrate against so gross a breach of good faith; whilst the residue, awaiting his tardy return, passed the sultry day beneath the mock shelter afforded by a low date bush, shifting position with the deceitful shadow, which, before any further tidings were received of the delinquent old Sultán and his ungovernable myrmidons, was cast full on the eastern side. At length the anxiously straining eye was relieved by the appearance of the messenger on his way back. After a world of trouble, he had succeeded in hunting out some of the elders, who, however, would only consent to accompany him on the payment of every stuiver of the demand made in the morning, and, quietly possessed of the dollars, they had thought proper to detain the escort.

Izhák, backed by Ibrahim Shehém, the most renowned warrior in the next ten tribes, sat as orator on the occasion. The demeanour of the Ras bordered closely on the insolent. A heavy load of impudence could be detected under his broad pudding face; and his desire to be impertinent was favoured in no small degree by the presence of heaps of valuable baggage lying at his mercy upon the ground. The deputation was received quite as coldly as their dishonest and most provoking behaviour demanded; a silence of several minutes affording to each, leisure to pick out his curly locks, and cool himself a little, the whole having walked out in the broiling sun, and become considerably excited withal. Distant inquiries were at length instituted relative to the august health of the Sultán and the royal family, which were stiffly responded to after the current Dankáli fashion, “Hamdu-lillah,” “thanks be unto God!”

The conference then opened with a bluster concerning the movement of the Káfilah from Ambábo without the presence, order, or consent of the Ras, who, after sneering at the attempt as a most unprecedented proceeding, and indulging in a very gratuitous tirade against Mohammad Ali, whom he styled in derision “the supplier of water,” and was anxious to make appear the only culprit on the occasion, added, in conclusion, that his own being “a house of mourning,” he had given up his intention of proceeding to Abyssinia, and had finally resolved to wash his hands of the business.

He was gravely answered that the caravan had started upon express orders given in consequence of a distinct understanding and pledge, purchased the preceding day of the Sultán and himself. He was reminded that every hire and remuneration for camels, guides, and escort, exorbitant though they were, had been paid in full at Tajúra; and was distinctly informed that if the terms of the agreement were not fully complied with, ere the night fell, the property of the British Government would be left on the ground, where it then lay, whilst the Embassy proceeded to Dullool, off which place the “Constance” had already anchored, reshipped all the baggage that had been sent to the advance camp, and set sail for Aden.

It was further added, that as the consequences of this step would rest upon the head of those who had entered into an express engagement, upon receipt of whatever terms they had demanded as the price of their services, it should be borne in mind that further offensive and unprincipled demonstrations might terminate in unpleasant results.

As the interpreter proceeded to unfold this high-toned remonstrance, Izhák was seen to fidget uneasily upon his hams, whilst he sought to conceal his agitation by tracing figures on the sand; and, as the last intimation fell upon his ear, seizing his sandal, he relieved his excited feelings by shovelling a pointed stick through the very centre of the leather. But the swaggering air which he had assumed had now entirely disappeared, and, after a hurried whispering consultation with his confederates, he declared that he had been toiling day and night in the service of the English; that he was perfectly ready to perform every thing required of him, and that, notwithstanding the recent calamity with which his family had been visited, and the dangerous illness of his mother, he would escort the Embassy in person, with trustworthy colleagues; that he would be responsible for all the property left at Ambábo, and only petition for two days’ grace to put his house in order before repairing to Dullool. This point being tardily accorded, he rose with Ali Shermárki, who had ridden in as mediator during the heat of the conference, and each offering his hand, in earnest of the matter being finally and amicably concluded in full accordance with the original stipulations of the covenant, set out on his return to Tajúra.

Volume One—Chapter Twelve.

Dullool—The Ras Unpleasantly Reminded of his Pledge—Sagállo and Warelissán.

Izhák’s absent camels, which had been kept close at hand pending the issue of this stormy debate, being now brought in, the ground was speedily cleared of the remaining baggage; and satisfied with the specious assurance of the Ras el Káfilah, that he would on no account tarry beyond nightfall of the following day, the party, relieved from their anxiety, mounted after five o’clock, and galloped seven miles along the sea-beach to the camp at Dullool,—the loose sand being so perforated and undermined in every part by the hermit crab, as to render the sieve-like road truly treacherous and unpleasant.

The grassy nook occupied by the tent was situated at the abutment of a spur from the wooded Jebel Goodah, evidently of volcanic origin, which gradually diminishes in height, until it terminates, one hundred yards from the shore, in a thick jungle of tamarisk and acacia, the former covered with salt crystals. Hornblende, in blocks, was scattered along the beach, and, wherever decomposed, it yielded fine glittering black sand, so heated under the noontide sun as to burn the naked foot. The movable camp of a horde of roving Bedouin shepherds, who, with very slender habitations, possess no fixed abode, was erected near the wells; and a quarrel with the followers, respecting the precious element, having already led to the drawing of creeses, silver was again in requisition to allay the impending storm.

The heat on the 2nd of June was almost insupportable; but the sultry day proved one of greater quiet than had fallen to the lot of the Embassy since its first landing. Late in the evening, when a cool sea-breeze had set in, Ali Shermárki rode into camp, and delivered a letter which had been slipped into his hand by the Sultán, appealing against the hardship of being left without remuneration for his diligent services, praying that his old heart might be made glad, and hoping that all might meet again ere death should call them—a wish responded to by no single individual of the British party.

Neither Izhák nor any of his followers made their appearance, notwithstanding that the redemption of the solemn promise passed was anxiously watched until midnight. At gun-fire the next morning, however, the arrival of the whole being reported, orders were issued to strike the tent, a measure which was doggedly opposed by the Ras el Káfilah, whose brow again darkened as he declared his resolution not to stir from Dullool until three of his camels, which were said to have strayed, should be recovered; and deaf alike to remonstrance or entreaty, he finally withdrew to a distance, taking his seat in sullen mood beneath a tree.

The schooner had meanwhile fished her anchor, and was now getting under weigh for the purpose of standing up within range of the next halting ground. The mules were harnessed to the gun, and the tent and baggage packed. Ali Shermárki was deputed to acquaint Izhák with these facts, and to intimate firmly, that unless the order to load were given without another moment’s delay, minute guns would be fired as a signal to bring up the brig from Tajúra, when the promise made yesterday by the English would be found more binding than those of the Danákil had hitherto proved. This menace had the desired effect, and after three hours of needless detention, the party commenced its third hot march along the sea-beach, whence the hills gradually recede. Bedouin goat-herds occupied many wells of fresh water, which were denoted by clumps of date trees entwined by flowering convolvuli, whose matted tendrils fix the movable sands of the shore; and late in the forenoon the camp was formed at the pool of Sagállo, only three miles from the former ground, but affording the last supply of water to be obtained for thirty more.

An extensive and beautiful prospect of the western portion of the Bay of Tajúra had now opened, bound in on all sides by a zone of precipitous mountains, in which the gate leading into Goobut el Kharáb was distinctly marked by a low black point, extending from the northern shore. The schooner’s services were volunteered to admit of a nearer inspection of the “basin of foulness;” but no sooner had she stood out to sea than signal guns fired from the camp announced the arrival of another packet from Shoa. The courier had been forty-four days on the journey, and the tidings he brought respecting the road, although highly satisfactory, added yet another instance to the many, of the small reliance that can be placed on information derived from the Danákil, who, even when disinterested, can rarely indeed be induced to utter a word of truth.

The strong party feeling entertained towards Mohammad Ali by the magnates of Tajúra, now vented itself in divers evil-minded and malicious hints, insinuating the defection of the absentee, who had been unavoidably detained by business, some hours after the last of the sea-port heroes had joined. “Where now is your friend Ali Mohammad?” “Where is the man who was to supply water on the road?” were the taunting interrogatories from the mouths of many; but come the son of Ali Abi did, to the confusion of his slanderers, long ere the sun had set, bringing secret intelligence that he had sent to engage an escort from his own tribe; and the whole party being now at last assembled, it was resolved in full conclave, that as not a drop of water could be procured for three stages in advance, the entire of the next day should be devoted to filling up the skins, which done, the caravan should resume its march by night—a manoeuvre that savoured strongly of a design to favour the clandestine return to Tajúra of certain of the escort, who had still domestic affairs to settle.

Thus far the conduct of the son of the Rookhba chief had formed a notable contrast to the proceedings of his backbiters. Whilst Izhák and his stubborn partisans had positively declined to move according to their agreement, unless a further most extravagant and unconscionable sum were paid in advance for their anticipated services, and had altogether assumed a bullying tone, coupled with a most impertinent and overbearing demeanour, this scion of a savage house that holds in its hands the avenues betwixt Shoa and Tajúra, and could at pleasure cut off communication with the coast, had never applied for aught save a trifling sum for the present maintenance of his family, and since the first éclaircissement, had, to the best of his ability, striven to render himself useful and agreeable to the party about to pass through his country.

A most unprofitable discussion, which was prolonged until eleven the following night, had for its object to persuade the transmission of baggage in advance to the Salt Lake, in consequence of the carried supply of water being, after all, considered insufficient for three days’ consumption. But the proposal was negatived upon prudent grounds, the honesty of the intentions by which it had been dictated, seeming at best, extremely questionable, and no one feeling disposed to trust the faithless guides further than they could be seen, with property of value.

Scarcely were the weary eyes of the party closed in sleep, than the long 32-pounder of the “Constance,” proclaiming the midnight hour, sounded to boot and saddle. The Babel-like clamour of loading was at length succeeded by a lull of voices, and the rumbling of the galloper wheels over the loose shingle, was alone heard in the still calm of the night, above the almost noiseless tread of the cushion-footed camels, which formed an interminable line. The road, lit by the full moon, shining brightly overhead, lay for the first two or three miles along the beach, and then, crossing numerous water-courses, struck over the southern shoulder of Jebel Goodah, the distance from whose lofty peak each march had reduced.

Blocks and boulders varying in size from an 18 pound shot, to that of Ossa piled upon Pelion, aided by deep chasms, gullies, and waterways, rendering the ascent one of equal toil and peril, cost the life of a camel, which fell over a precipice and dislocated the spine; whereupon the conscientious proprietor, disdaining to take further heed of the load, abandoned it unscrupulously by the wayside. Gáleylaféo, a singular and fearful chasm which was navigated in the first twilight, did not exceed sixty feet in width; its gloomy, perpendicular walls of columnar lava, towering one hundred and fifty feet overhead, and casting a deep deceitful shadow over the broken channel, half a mile in extent. Déeni, in his customary strain of amplification, had represented this frightful pass to be entered through a trap-door, in order to clear which it was necessary for a loaded camel to forget its staid demeanour, and bound from rock to rock like a mountain kid. The devil and all his angels were represented to hold midnight orgies in one of the most dismal of the many dark recesses; and the belief was fully confirmed by the whooping of a colony of baboons, disturbed by the wheels of the first piece of ordnance that had ever attempted the bumping passage.