The following description of the Tibbu applies, as though it had been originally told of them, to Walter Havenaught and the rest of the poor knights who, in the crusades, looked for booty and lordly domain. It applies no less to many a noble fighting cock from Germany east of the Elbe, and to many a ragged Polish gentleman. “They are men full of self-consciousness. They may be beggars, but they are no pariahs. Many a people under these circumstances would be thoroughly miserable and depressed; the Tibbu have steel in their nature. They are splendidly fitted to be robbers, warriors, and rulers. Even their system of robbery is imposing, although it is base as a jackal’s. These ragged Tibbus, fighting against extreme poverty and constantly on the verge of starvation, raise the most impudent claims with apparent or real belief in their validity. The right of the jackal, which regards the possessions of a stranger as common property, is the protection of greedy men against want. The insecurity of an all but perpetual state of war brings it about that life becomes an insistent challenge, and at the same time the reward of extortion!”[48] This phenomenon is in nowise limited to Eastern Africa, for it is said of the Abyssinian soldier: “Thus equipped he comes along. Proudly he looks down on every one: his is the land, and for him the peasant must work.”[49] Deeply as the aristocrat at all times despises the economic means and the peasants who employ it, he admits frankly his reliance on the political means. Honest war and “honest thievery”[G] are his occupation as a lord, are his good right. His right--except over those who belong to the same clique--extends just as far as his power. One finds this high praise of the political means nowhere so well stated as in the well-known Doric drinking song: “I have great treasures; the spear and the sword; Wherewith to guard my body, the bull hide shield well tried. With these I can plough, and harvest my crop, With these I can garner the sweet grape wine, By them I bear the name ‘Lord’ with my serfs. “But these never dare to bear spear and sword, Still less the guard of the body, the bull hide shield well tried. They lie at my feet stretched out on the ground, My hand is licked by them as by hounds, I am their Persian king--terrifying them by my name.”[50] [G] Compare this with the prevalent justification of “honest graft” in municipal or political contracts.--_Translator._ In these wanton lines is expressed the pride of warlike lords. The following verses, taken from an entirely different phase of civilization, show that the robber still has part in the warrior in spite of Christianity, the Peace of God, and the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation. These lines also praise the political means, but in its most crude form, simple robbery: