First Footsteps in East AfricaBurton, Richard Francis, Sir
History
First Footsteps in East Africa
Burton, Richard Francis, Sir
Harar -- Description and travel; Harari language; Horn of Africa -- Description and travel
Mohammed Gragne improved his victory by chasing the young Claudius over
Abyssinia, where nothing opposed the progress of his arms. At last the few
Portuguese survivors repaired to the Christian emperor, who was persuaded
to march an army against the King of Adel. Resolved to revenge their
general, the musqueteers demanded the post opposite Mohammed, and directed
all their efforts against the part where the Moslem Attila stood. His
fellow religionists still relate that when Gragne fell in action, his wife
Talwambara [19], the heroic daughter of Mahfuz, to prevent the destruction
and dispersion of the host of Islam, buried the corpse privately, and
caused a slave to personate the prince until a retreat to safe lands
enabled her to discover the stratagem to the nobles. [20]
Father Lobo tells a different tale. According to him, Peter Leon, a
marksman of low stature, but passing valiant, who had been servant to Don
Christopher, singled the Adel king out of the crowd, and shot him in the
head as he was encouraging his men. Mohammed was followed by his enemy
till he fell down dead: the Portuguese then alighting from his horse, cut
off one of his ears and rejoined his fellow-countrymen. The Moslems were
defeated with great slaughter, and an Abyssinian chief finding Gragne's
corpse upon the ground, presented the head to the Negush or Emperor,
claiming the honor of having slain his country's deadliest foe. Having
witnessed in silence this impudence, Peter asked whether the king had but
one ear, and produced the other from his pocket to the confusion of the
Abyssinian.
Thus perished, after fourteen years' uninterrupted fighting, the African
hero, who dashed to pieces the structure of 2500 years. Like the
"Kardillan" of the Holy Land, Mohammed Gragne is still the subject of many
a wild and grisly legend. And to the present day the people of Shoa retain
an inherited dread of the lowland Moslems.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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