On the 20th, at six o’clock in the morning, we left our station at Lila, and about seven we began to ascend the hills, or eminences, which serve as the roots or skirts of the great mountain Taranta. The road was on each side bordered with nabca, or jujeb trees of great beauty, and sycamores perfectly deprived of their verdure and branches. We saw to-day plenty of game. The country here is everywhere deprived of the shade it would enjoy from these fine trees, by the barbarous axes of the Hazorta. We found everywhere immense flocks of antelopes; as also partridges of a small kind that willingly took refuge upon trees; neither of these seemed to consider us as enemies. The antelopes let us pass through their flocks, only removing to the right or to the left, or standing still and gazing upon us till we passed. But, as we were then on the confines of Tigrè, or rather on the territory of the Baharnagash, and as the Hazorta were in motion everywhere removing towards the coast, far from the dominions of the Abyssinians to which we were going, a friend of their own tribe, who had joined us for safety, knowing how little trust was to be put in his countrymen when moving in this contrary direction, advised us by no means to fire, or give any unnecessary indication of the spot where we were, till we gained the mountain of Taranta, at the foot of which we halted at nine in the morning. At half past two o’clock in the afternoon we began to ascend the mountain, through a most rocky, uneven road, if it can deserve the name, not only from its incredible steepness, but from the large holes and gullies made by the torrents, and the huge monstrous fragments of rocks which, loosened by the water, had been tumbled down into our way. It was with great difficulty we could creep up, each man carrying his knapsack and arms; but it seemed beyond the possibility of human strength to carry our baggage and instruments. Our tent, indeed, suffered nothing by its falls; but our telescopes, time-keeper, and quadrant, were to be treated in a more deliberate and tender manner. Our quadrant had hitherto been carried by eight men, four to relieve each other; but these were ready to give up the undertaking upon trial of the first few hundred yards. A number of expedients, such as trailing it on the ground, (all equally fatal to the instrument) were proposed. At last, as I was incomparably the strongest of the company, as well as the most interested, I, and a stranger Moor who had followed us, carried the head of it for about 400 yards over the most difficult and steepest part of the mountain, which before had been considered as impracticable by all.