The embassy now halted, waiting for permission to enter the capital, and
taking up their quarters in a town three thousand feet above Furri, on the
frontier. The escort of the troop fired a salute on entering, and, as they
marched along, performed the war dance. A veteran capered before the ranks
with a drawn sword between his teeth, and the martial song was chorused by
three hundred Christian throats. The prospect from this elevated point
naturally struck the travellers with astonishment and admiration. The site
of the town is only one of the thousand cones into which the mountain side
is broken as it approaches the plain. The prospect over the plain was
boundless, and countless villages met the eye upon the mountain slope.
Wherever the plough could go, all was cultivated. Wheat, barley, Indian
corn, beans, peas, cotton, and oil plant, throve luxuriantly round every
hamlet. The regularly marked fields mounted in terraces to the height of
three or four thousand feet, becoming, in their boundaries, more and more
indistinct, until totally lost in the shadowy green side of Mamrat (the
Mother of Grace.)
This mountain is a wonder, shrouded in clouds whilst all was sunshine
below. It is clothed with a dense forest, and ascends to an elevation of
13,000 feet above the sea. Here are collected, for security, the treasures
of the monarch which have been amassing since the re-establishment of the
kingdom, one hundred and fifty years since.
After remaining some time in the market-place, the governor of the town
appeared, and conducted the mission to the house of an old Moslem woman,
where they were to lodge for the night. The names of the three daughters,
Major Harris observes, were worthy of the days of Prince Cherry and Fair
Star. They were Eve, Sweet Limes, and Sunbeam. The ladies vacated the
house with great good-humour; but it was low, intolerably filthy, and
without bedding or food. The unfortunate mission had thus to spend a night,
probably unequaled by their sufferings in the open field. Though so near
the equator, they felt the cold severely; rain set in with great violence,
pouring through the roof, and entering into the threshold. A fire was
indispensable, yet they were nearly suffocated with smoke; they were
devoured with insects, and in this torment and fever tossed till dawn. At
the arrival of morning they received the disappointing message, that the
king could not yet visit his capital, but that they might either seek him
among the mountains, or wait for him where they were.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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