The Highlands of EthiopiaHarris, William Cornwallis, Sir
History
The Highlands of Ethiopia
Harris, William Cornwallis, Sir
Ethiopia -- Description and travel
not pretending to dictate to the public as to which of these authorities
it shall prefer. I only state facts, and leave others to draw the
proper inference. The authority of Dr Krapf, however, at the court of
Shoa to me seems to be strangely and wilfully exaggerated. It was a
reflected authority, if I may so speak, that he exercised during the
residence of the Mission in the country; an authority based upon the
influence of the British Government, represented there for the time by
me. The amount of his personal influence was such that the slightest
accident sufficed to overthrow it. Had it been greater, his application
to return would have been listened to. It may no doubt be observed in
reply, that neither could my influence, which was fully exerted in his
behalf, have been very considerable. But the caprices of despotism are
not always to be accounted for, and they will serve to explain both the
missionary's want of success, and my own.
This subject has been artfully connected with the return of the Mission
from Shoa. It is said, that had we not retired, we should have been
forcibly expelled. I can certainly offer no proof that we should not;
but the probability is, that the king of Shoa would have been in no
hurry to dry up a constant source of profit to himself. It may, in
fact, be laid down as a general rule, that no Oriental despot ever
expels the giver of presents. It is the receiver of presents that he
regards as an eyesore, the man who is dependent on him for his daily
bread. The critic, however, has been "assured," that had we not
retired, we should "probably ere long" have been expelled. But to this
I reply, that probably we should not; and I call on him to state his
proofs of the "disrepute" into which he asserts we had fallen. I have
been "assured," that "probably" he has none to give, and "probably" this
assurance is correct; otherwise, I think he would have been too glad to
offer them. Be this as it may, the fact is, that we were not expelled,
but recalled by our own government, when it considered that the duties
for which I had been deputed, were fully accomplished.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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