Note 86 — Chapter XXI

The past and present condition of Ethiopia are so admirably described in the first two verses, chap. xviii. of Isaiah, and the prophecy so admirably fulfilled, that I cannot refrain from repeating them:—“Woe to the land shadowing with wings, which is beyond the rivers of Ethiopia: that sendeth ambassadors by the sea, even in vessels of bulrushes upon the waters, saying, Go, ye swift messengers, to a nation scattered and peeled, to a people terrible from their beginning hitherto; a nation meted out and trodden down, whose land the rivers have spoiled!” Can the expression “shadowing with wings” allude to the winged globe on all the edifices in Egypt and Ethiopia? Vessels of bulrushes are highly characteristic of a wild tribe in the interior, almost similar ones being used at the present day; but the “nation, terrible from the beginning, meted out and trodden down, whose land the rivers have spoiled,” can only be Ethiopia.