“And Samuel told all the words of the Lord unto the people that asked of him a king. And he said, This will be the manner of the king that shall reign over you: he will take your sons, and appoint them for himself, for his chariots, and to be his horsemen; and some shall run before his chariots. And he will appoint him captains over thousands, and captains over fifties; and will set them to ear his ground, and to reap his harvest, and to make his instruments of war, and instruments of his chariots. And he will take your daughters to be confectionaries, to be cooks, and to be bakers. And he will take your fields, and your vineyards, and your olive-yards, even the best of them, and give them to his servants. And he will take the tenth of your seed, and of your vineyards, and give to his officers and to his servants. And he will take your men-servants, and your maid-servants, and your goodliest young men, and your asses, and put them to his work. He will take the tenth of your sheep: and ye shall be his servants. And ye shall cry out in that day because of your King which ye shall have chosen; and the Lord shall not hear you in that day.” Samuel very probably spoke from a knowledge of the customs and practices of the kingly courts in the countries surrounding Judea; and in that case the principles of home policy which direct the Sovereign of Shoa in governing his people, appear to have come down to him from a very remote time; nor can the unfair balance of power we observe between him and his people be charged to his own cunning and selfish intrigues. With the prejudices inseparable from his education as a king, he always feels jealous of his prerogative and of his power, and the threatened diminishment in the extent of either arouses his attention immediately. He is perfectly aware that man’s nature will not allow him to submit entirely to the arbitrary rule of even the most just superior, and that some spirits will always be springing up among his subjects, the more numerous the greater the opportunities may be, and who will endeavour to escape from the bondage to which they have been born. It is just possible to conceive the relation between the monarch of Shoa and his people by comparison with the state and condition of the household of some rich and powerful nobleman in England; with this difference, that in the latter case it is optional on the part of the dependents to continue their servitude; whilst the Negoos possesses the stronger hold upon the services and property of his subjects, and consequently a greater power of exercising his will, because they have no means of removing themselves away from his power. If opportunities of escaping from this authority were afforded by allowing free intercourse with other countries, this would at once destroy that principle of dependence which is the foundation of the kingly power in Shoa, and which is perfectly understood to be so by the Negoos, and every Shoan is also well aware of the fact.