This buried considerable portions of unburnt extremities of the pieces of ted, and as they continued smouldering underneath the fallen cover, the result was that, much to my surprise, Walderheros brought me back the basket full of beautifully close-grained shining black and very light pieces of charcoal. As Walderheros thought it was all quite natural and right, I made no other remark than merely asking him “if the people in Shoa ever made charcoal like that.” Having succeeded so well in this, it encouraged us to proceed, and I sent to Tinta to say, that on the morrow he must supply me with hand-mills and mortars to grind down and pulverize the other ingredients, sulphur and saltpetre, of which a large quantity of each had been brought to my house from Ankobar during the day. Both sulphur and saltpetre abound in Shoa, the former being obtained from the volcanic country immediately to the west of the Hawash, near Azbottee. From an extinct crater, nearly half a mile from our halting-place at Lee Adu, I had brought to me a piece of the purest sulphur, that required no farther process of refinement than the natural sublimation by which it had been deposited in the fissures of the cone. The Adal Bedouins who occupy that neighbourhood bring it to the Negoos of Shoa as a kind of tribute, and sometimes a demand is made upon them for a certain quantity, which is delivered in a few days, so plentifully is it found, to the Wallasmah Mahomed, who forwards it to the Negoos. Saltpetre is found in many places, both on the table-land of Shoa, and in the valley countries to the south and east. It is principally brought from Bulga, where the grey rubbly earth it forms is ploughed over, and the disturbed soil containing more than fifty per cent. of the salt is placed in immense earthenware jars containing water, in which, by frequent agitation, the saltpetre becomes suspended. The liquor is then decanted, and in large saucers allowed to evaporate, when the finest needle-formed crystals of the salt are formed. CHAPTER XVII. Determine to be cupped.--Mode of operating.--Medical knowledge of the Shoans.--Surgery.--Remarks upon their diseases and their remedies.--The cosso tree.--Mode of using the cosso.-- Other curative processes.--Manufacture of gunpowder.-- Success.--Health improving.