Volume One—Chapter Forty One.

Probation at Alio Amba.

Slowly passed the days of fog, and the nights of dire discomfort, during the tedious detention which followed this unfortunate discovery. From the terrace commanding a boundless view over the desolate regions traversed, the overflowing channel of the Háwash, and the lakes Le Ado and Ailabello could each morning be perceived sparkling with increased lustre, as their fast-filling basins glittered like sheets of burnished silver under the rays of the rising sun. The industrious fleas continued their nocturnal persecutions, as if never to be sated with European blood; and a constant succession of clouds, which ascended the valley, drawing a grey cold curtain before the hoary head of Mamrat, proclaimed, amid prolonged peals of thunder, the commencement of the rainy season.

But each succeeding night and day brought no nearer prospect of release, and the change in the imperial resolves were scarcely less frequent than those which came over the towering face of the stronghold of his subterranean treasure. Remonstrances, penned with infinite labour and difficulty, were responded by endearing messages, garbled at the pleasure of those to whom they were confided; but the subtle excuse for the further delay of the desired audience was never wanting, and conjecture became exhausted in devising the true cause of the mortifying indifference displayed to the rich presents from “beyond the great sea.”

A desire on the part, of the despot to preserve due respect in the eyes of his lieges, and perhaps also to imbue the minds of his foreign visitors with a befitting sense of his importance, were the most probable motives. Under the existing disappointment, it afforded some consolation to remember that embassies of old to Northern Abyssinia had experienced similar treatment, and to know that delegates to Shoa from the courts of Gondar and Tigré are never presented to the king until weeks after their arrival—a custom originating probably in the more kindly feeling of allowing rest to the way-worn traveller at the close of a long and perilous journey, but perpetuated for less worthy considerations.

At length there came a pressing invitation to visit the monarch at Debra Berhán, coupled with an assurance that the Master of the Horse should be in attendance to escort the party. But no Master of the Horse was forthcoming at the time appointed, and the following day brought a pathetic billet from the palace—a tiny parchment scroll, enveloped in a sheet of wax, breathing in its contents regret and disappointment. “Son of my house, my heart longed to behold you, and I believed that you would come. As you appeared not, I passed the day in distress, fearing lest the waters should have carried you away, or that the mule had fallen on the road. I commanded Melkoo to wait and receive you, and to conduct you to me; but when I hoped to see you arrive, you stayed out. The mule returned; and when I inquired whither you were gone, they told me that you were left. I have committed the fault, in that I gave not orders that they should go down, and bring you.”

Meanwhile, the most vigorous attempts were made, on the part both of the Wulásma and of Ayto Wolda Hana, to exercise exclusive control over the baggage lodged at Alio Amba. Locks were placed upon the latches, and guards appointed over the doors of the houses wherein it was deposited—fully as much care being taken to preclude access on the part of those by whom it had been brought, as if His Christian Majesty had already become the bona fide proprietor. Repeated orders on the subject, obtained from the palace, were uniformly disregarded by the over-zealous functionaries, and it was only by force of arms that the repositories were finally burst open, and that charge of the contents could be resumed.

Neither were the persecutions of the gaunt governor of the town among the least of the evils to be endured, resulting as they did in consequences the most inconvenient. Specially appointed to entertain and provide for the wants of the guests, he supplied at the royal expense provisions alike inferior in quality and deficient in quantity, taking care at the same time that the king’s munificence should be in no wise compromised by purchases, for these he clandestinely prevented. His conduct might be traced to the same jealous feelings that pervaded the breast of his colleagues in office. In the despotic kingdom of Shoa, the sovereign can alone purchase coloured cloth or choice goods; and Ayto Kálama Work, who is entitled to a certain percentage upon all imports, having formed a tolerably shrewd estimate of the contents of the bales and boxes, believed that these would effectually clog the market, and that his dues would be no longer forthcoming. Resolved to extend the most unequivocal proofs of his discontent, he was pleased to assign to the surviving horses and mules of the foreigners a tract destitute of pasturage—one mulberry coloured steed only being pampered, because from size, colour, and appearance, it was assumed that he must be intended for the king. The continued drenching rain at night during the later marches, with the intense heat and general absence of water and forage throughout the whole pilgrimage, had sadly reduced the original number. Many more had dropped on the ascent from Fárri, and of those whose strength had enabled them to climb the more favoured mountains of Abyssinia, the tails of one half were now presented as evidences of their fate.

Among the very few incidents that occurred to break the monotony of the probationary sojourn was the arrival of the “Lebáshi,” the hereditary thief-catcher of the kingdom. For several hours the little town was in a state of confusion and dismay. Burglary had been committed—divers pieces of salt had been abstracted, and the appearance of the police-officer was not one whit more agreeable to the innocent than to the guilty.

A ring having been formed in the market-place by the crowded spectators, the diviner introduced his accomplice, a stolid-looking lad, who seated himself upon a bullock’s hide with an air of deep resignation. An intoxicating drug was, under many incantations, extracted from a mysterious leathern scrip, and thrown into a horn filled with new milk; and this potation, aided by several hurried inhalations of a certain narcotic, had the instantaneous effect of rendering the recipient stupidly frantic. Springing upon his feet, he dashed, foaming at the mouth, among the rabble, and without any respect to age or sex, dealt vigorously about him, until at length secured by a cord about the loins, when he dragged his master round and round from street to street, snuffling through the nose like a bear in the dark recesses of every house, and leaving unscrutinised no hole or corner.

After scraping for a considerable time with his nails under the foundation of a hut, wherein he suspected the delinquent to lurk, the imp entered, sprang upon the back of the proprietor, and became totally insensible. The man was forthwith arraigned before a tribunal of justice, at which Ayto Kálama Work presided; and although no evidence could be adduced, and he swore repeatedly to his innocence by the life of the king, he was sentenced by the just judges to pay forty pieces of salt. This fine was exactly double the amount alleged to have been stolen, and one fourth became the perquisite of the Lebáshi.

The services of the hereditary thief-catcher are in universal requisition. Should the property lost consist of live instead of dead stock, it not unfrequently happens that the disciple remains torpid upon the ground; when all parties concerned feel perfectly satisfied that the animal has either strayed or been destroyed by wild beasts, and the expenses attending the divination must be paid by the owner. With the design of testing the skill of the magician, the Negoos once upon a time commanded his confidential page to secrete certain articles of wearing apparel pertaining to the royal wardrobe, and after an investigation of four days, the proper individual being selected with becoming formality, the professional reputation of “him who catches” acquired a lustre which has since remained untarnished.

Many a weary hour was passed in listening to tales of real or counterfeit maladies, which were daily recounted in the hovel at Alio Amba. Witchcraft and the influence of the evil eye have firm possession of the mind of every inhabitant, and sufficiently diverting were the complaints laid to their door by those who sought amulets and talismans at the hand of the foreigners. A young Moslem damsel, whose fickle swain had deserted her, could never gaze on the moon that her heart went not pit-a-pat, whilst the tears streamed from her dark eyes; and a hoary veteran with one foot in the grave sought the restoration of rhetorical powers, which had formed the boast of his youth, but which had been destroyed by the pernicious gaze of a rival. “Of yore,” quoth he who introduced the patient, “this was a powerful orator; and when he lifted up his voice in the assembly, men marvelled as he spoke; but now, although his heart is still eloquent, his tongue is niggard of words.”

Equally hopeless was the case of an unfortunate slave-dealer, who crawled in search of relief to the abode of the king’s guests. A Galla of the Ittoo tribe had undertaken the removal of severe rheumatism, contracted on the road from Hurrur; to which end he administered a powerful narcotic, which rendered the patient insensible. Armed with a sharp creese he then proceeded to cut and slash in every direction, from the crown of the head to the sole of the foot; and when the mutilated victim awoke to a sense of his melancholy condition, the ruthless operator had disappeared. Scarred and seamed in every part of his body, he now presented the appearance of one who had been flayed alive, and the skin had so contracted over the gaps whence the flesh had been scooped, that, unless with extreme difficulty, he could neither eat, drink, nor speak. “My life is burdensome,” groaned the miserable picture of human calamity; “and it were better that I should die. I have bathed in the hot springs at Korári without deriving the slightest relief. You white men know every thing: give me something to heal me, for the love of Allah!”