"Consul Plowden had been residing six years at Massowah when he heard that the Prince to whom he had been accredited, Ras Ali, had been defeated and dethroned by an adventurer, whose name, a few years before, had been unknown outside the boundaries of his native province. This was Lij Kâsa, better known by his adopted name of Theodore. He was born of an old family, in the mountainous region of Kwara, where the land begins to slope downwards towards the Blue Nile, and educated in a convent, where he learned to read, and acquired a considerable knowledge of the Scriptures. Kâsa's convent life was suddenly put an end to, when one of those marauding Galla bands, whose ravages are the curse of Abyssinia, attacked and plundered the monastery. From that time he himself took to the life of a freebooter. ... Adventurers flocked to his standard; his power continually increased; and in 1854 he defeated Ras Ali in a pitched battle, and made himself master of central Abyssinia." In 1855 he overthrew the ruler of Tigre. "He now resolved to assume a title commensurate with the wide extent of his dominion. In the church of Derezgye he had himself crowned by the Abuna as King of the Kings of Ethiopia, taking the name of Theodore, because an ancient tradition declared that a great monarch would some day arise in Abyssinia." Mr. Plowden now visited the new monarch, was impressed with admiration of his talents and character, and became his counsellor and friend. But in 1860 the English consul lost his life, while on a journey, and Theodore, embittered by several misfortunes, began to give rein to a savage temper. "The British Government, on hearing of the death of Plowden, immediately replaced him at Massowah by the appointment of Captain Cameron." The new Consul was well received, and was entrusted by the Abyssinian King with a letter addressed to the Queen of England, soliciting her friendship. The letter, duly despatched to its destination, was pigeon-holed in the Foreign Office at London, and no reply to it was ever made. Insulted and enraged by this treatment, and by other evidences of the indifference of the British Government to his overtures, King Theodore, in January, 1864, seized and imprisoned Consul Cameron with all his suite. About the same time he was still further offended by certain passages in a book on Abyssinia that had been published by a missionary named Stern. Stern and a fellow missionary, Rosenthal with the latter's wife, were lodged in prison, and subjected to flogging and torture. The first step taken by the British Government, when news of Consul Cameron's imprisonment reached England, was to send out a regular mission to Abyssinia, bearing a letter signed by the Queen, demanding the release of the captives. The mission, headed by a Syrian named Rassam, made