On the evening of the 28th, as Bruce and his party were in the vicinity of a very thick wood, they were suddenly surrounded by a multitude of men armed with lances, shields, slings, and clubs. A volley of stones having been thrown by these people, Bruce ordered a couple of shots to be fired over their heads. This hint they seemed perfectly to understand, but, retreating to the top of a hill farther off, they continued whooping, shrieking, and making violent gesticulations; when Bruce sent a message to them by a woman, that, if they continued to show the smallest sign of aggression, he would burn their town, and put every one of them to the sword. This bravado had its effect, and a very submissive answer was returned. For five days Bruce steadily pursued his journey through a rugged country covered with thick woods. On the 2d of January, 1772, he approached the town of Tcherkin, and pitched his tent in the market-place, which appeared like a beautiful lawn, shaded with fine old trees of an enormous growth, and watered by a limpid brook, that ran over pebbles as white as snow. As soon as he reached the town, a man waited on him to say that he was the servant of Ayto Confu, and that he had orders to conduct Bruce into the presence of his master. He accordingly followed to a house built on the edge of a precipice, where he was startled, and most agreeably, by being introduced to Ozoro Esther, whom he found sitting on an ottoman or couch, with the beautiful Tecla Mariam at her feet. "Ozoro Esther!" exclaimed Bruce, "I cannot speak for surprise; what is the meaning of your having left Gondar to come into this wilderness?" "There is nothing so strange in it," she replied; "the troops of Begemder having taken away my husband, Ras Michael, God knows where, and, therefore, being now a single woman, I am resolved to go to Jerusalem to pray for my husband, to die there, and to be buried in the Holy Sepulchre. You would not stay with us, so we are going with you. Is there anything surprising in all this?" "But tell me truly," said Tecla Mariam, "you that know everything by peeping and poring through those long glasses, did not you learn by the stars that we were to meet you here?" "Madam," answered Bruce, "if there was one star in the firmament that had announced to me such agreeable news, I should have relapsed into the idolatry of this country, and worshipped that star for the rest of my life." Breakfast now appeared; the conversation took a natural and very lively turn. Bruce learned that the king, from gratitude to Ras Michael, had given some villages to Ozoro Esther, and that her son Ayto Confu, who happened to be going to Tcherkin to hunt, had offered to put her in possession of her new property.