The Highlands of EthiopiaHarris, William Cornwallis, Sir
History
The Highlands of Ethiopia
Harris, William Cornwallis, Sir
Ethiopia -- Description and travel
All are vain of scars, and desirous of displaying them; but little
favour is shown for other outward ornament; and the miserly disposition
which pervades the breast both of young and old, inducing an effort
towards the concealment of property possessed, a paltry silver ring in
the ear, a band of copper wire round the junction of the spear-blade
with the shaft, or pewter mountings to the creese, form the sum total of
decoration on the arms and persons even of the most extravagant. Fops
in numbers are to be seen at Tajura, who have called in the aid of moist
quick-lime towards the conversion of the naturally jet black peruke to a
most atrocious foxy red--when judicious frizzing, and the insertion of
the wooden skewer, used for scratching, completes the resemblance to a
carriage mop. But this novel process of dyeing, so contrary to that
employed by civilised beaux, is only in fashion among the Somauli, who,
in common with the Danakil dandies, employ, in lieu of a down pillow, a
small wooden bolster, shaped like a crutch, which receives the neck, and
during the hours of presumed uncomfortable repose, preserves the periwig
from derangement.
Massy amulets in leathern envelopes, or entire Korans in quarto or
octavo, are borne on the unpurified person of almost every individual;
and the ancient Arab remedy of swallowing the water in which passages
from the holy book have been washed from the board or paper whereon they
were inscribed, is in universal repute, as a sovereign medicine for
every ailment to which frail flesh is heir--the firm of Sultan, Wazir
and Kazi, who alone possess the privilege of wearing turbans, holding
the monopoly, and driving a most profitable trade by the preparation of
this simple, but potent specific. Large doses of melted sheep's-tail
fat are moreover swallowed on certain occasions; and a native Esculapius
gave proof of the perfection to which the dentist's art has attained at
Tajura, by dexterously detaching a carious tooth from the stubborn jaws
of a submissive old woman, with the patent machinery of a rusty nail as
a punch, struck with a heavy stone picked up on the sea-beach, where the
operation was performed for the edification of the encampment.
Applications were nevertheless frequent for European aid--a venerable
priest numbering threescore years and ten, peremptorily demanding, in
addition to a philter, the instantaneous removal of two obstinate
cataracts, which had long dimmed his sight, and upon which he had vainly
expended the teeth of half the mules in Tajura, roasted, and reduced to
an impalpable powder.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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