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
"Early on the morning of Tuesday the 25th, Datah Mahomed invited me and
the elders of the Caffilah to his hut, where he supplied us liberally with
milk; clarified butter was then handed round, and the Tajoorians anointed
their bodies. After we had left his hut, he came to me, and in presence of
the Ras el Caffilah and Deeni said, 'You see I have treated you with great
honour, you must give me a mule and plenty of cloth, as all my people want
cloth. You have given me nothing as yet!' Seeing that I became rather
angry, and declared solemnly that I had given him the horse and Tobe, he
smiled and said, 'I know that, but I want a mule, my horse has been
stolen.'--I replied that I would see about it. He then asked for all my
blue cloth and my Arab 'Camblee' (blanket). My portmanteau being rather
the worse for wear--its upper leather was torn--he thrust in his fingers,
and said, with a most avaricious grin, 'What have you here?' I immediately
arose and exclaimed, 'You are not my father; the Wallasena told me you
would treat me kindly; this is not doing so.' He begged pardon and said,
'Do not be frightened, my son; I will take nothing from you but what you
give me freely. You think I am a bad man; people have been telling you ill
things about me. I am now an old man, and have given up such child's work
as plundering people.' It became, however, necessary to inquire of Datah
Mahomed what were his intentions with regard to myself. I found that I had
been deceived at Shoa; there it was asserted that he lived at Errur and
was brother to Bedar, one of the most powerful chiefs of the Adel, instead
of which it proved that he was not so highly connected, and that he
visited Errur only occasionally. Datah told me that his marriage feast
would last seven days, after which he would forward me to Doomi, where we
should find Bedar, who would send me either to Tajoorah or to Hurrur, as
he saw fit.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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