Engedan went away on a gallop to join the king, and we proceeded after him, nor did we receive any other message either from the king or the Ras. We returned to Koscam, very little pleased with the reception we had met with. All the town was in a hurry and confusion; 30,000 men were encamped upon the Kahha; and the first horrid scene Michael exhibited there, was causing the eyes of twelve of the chiefs of the Galla, whom he had taken prisoners, to be pulled out, and the unfortunate sufferers turned out to the fields, to be devoured at night by the hyæna. Two of these I took under my care, who both recovered, and from them I learned many particulars of their country and manners. The next day, which was the 10th, the army marched into the town in triumph, and the Ras at the head of the troops of Tigrè. He was bareheaded; over his shoulders, and down to his back, hung a pallium, or cloak, of black velvet, with a silver fringe. A boy, by his right stirrup, held a silver wand of about five feet and a half long, much like the staves of our great officers at court. Behind him all the soldiers, who had slain an enemy and taken the spoils from them, had their lances and firelocks ornamented with small shreds of scarlet cloth, one piece for every man he had slain. Remarkable among all this multitude was Hagos, door-keeper of the Ras, whom we have mentioned in the war of Begemder. This man, always well-armed and well-mounted, had followed the wars of the Ras from his infancy, and had been so fortunate in this kind of single combat, that his whole lance and javelin, horse and person, were covered over with the shreds of scarlet cloth. At this last battle of Fagitta, Hagos is said to have slain eleven men with his own hand. Indeed there is nothing more fallacious than judging of a man’s courage by these marks of conquest. A good horseman, armed with a coat of mail, upon a strong, well-fed, well-winded horse, may, after a defeat, kill as many of these wretched, weary, naked fugitives, as he pleases, confining himself to those that are weakly, mounted upon tired horses, and covered only with goat’s-skins, or that are flying on foot. Behind came Gusho of Amhara, and Powussen, lately made governor of Begemder for his behaviour at the battle of Fagitta, where, as I have said, he pursued Fasil and his army for two days. The Ras had given him also a farther reward, his grand-daughter Ayabdar, lately recovered from the small-pox, and the only one of my patients that, neither by herself, her mother, nor her husband, ever made me the least return. Powussen was one of the twelve officers who, after being delivered to Lubo by the Galla, together with Mariam Barea, had fled to Michael’s tent, and were protected by him.