The Life and Adventures of Bruce, the African TravellerHead, Francis Bond, Sir
History
The Life and Adventures of Bruce, the African Traveller
Head, Francis Bond, Sir
Bruce, James, 1730-1794; Ethiopia -- Description and travel
"He said that I was mad, and held a consultation with his people for
about half an hour, after which he came in again, seemingly quite
another man, and said he would despatch us on the morrow, which was the
3d, and would send us that evening some provisions. And, indeed, we now
began to be in need, having only flour barely sufficient to make bread
for one meal next day. The miserable village on the cliff had nothing to
barter with us; and none from the five villages about the shum had come
near us, probably by his order. As he had softened his tone, so did I
mine. I gave him a small present, and he went away repeating his
promises. But all that evening passed without provision, and all next
day without his coming, so we got everything ready for our departure.
Our supper did not prevent our sleeping, as all our provisions was gone,
and we had tasted nothing all that day since our breakfast."
The country of the Shangalla lies forty miles to the northwest. All this
district from the Tacazzé is called Salent in the language of Tigré, and
Talent in Amharic.
On the 4th of February, at half past nine in the morning, they left
Addergey; "hunger pressing upon us," says Bruce, "we were prepared to do
it earlier, and for this we had been up since five in the morning; but
our loss of a mule obliged us, when we packed up our tent, to arrange
our baggage differently. While employed in making ready for our
departure, which was just at the dawn of day, a hyæna, unseen by any of
us, fastened upon one of Yasine's asses, and had almost pulled his tail
away. I was busied at gathering the tent-pins into a sack, and had
placed my musket and bayonet ready against a tree, as it is at that hour
and the close of the evening you are always to be on guard against
banditti. A boy, who was servant to Yasine, saw the hyæna first, and
flew to my musket. Yasine was disjoining the poles of the tent, and,
having one half of the largest in his hand, he ran to the assistance of
his ass, and in that moment the musket went off, luckily charged with
only one ball, which gave Yasine a flesh wound between the thumb and
fore-finger of his left hand. The boy instantly threw down the musket,
which had terrified the hyæna, and made him let go the ass; but he stood
ready to fight Yasine, who, not amusing himself with a choice of
weapons, gave him so rude a blow with the tent-pole upon his head, that
it felled him to the ground; others, with pikes, put an end to his life.
"We were then obliged to turn our cares towards the wounded. Yasine's
wound was soon seen to be a trifle; besides, he was a man not easily
alarmed on such occasions. But the poor ass was not so easily comforted.
The stump remained, the tail hanging by a piece of it, which we were
obliged to cut off. The next operation was actual cautery; but, as we
had made no bread for breakfast, our fire had been early out. We
therefore were obliged to tie the stump round with whip-cord till we
could get fire enough to heat an iron.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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