Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile, Volume 4 (of 5): In the years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772 and 1773Bruce, James
History
Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile, Volume 4 (of 5): In the years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772 and 1773
Bruce, James
Egypt -- Description and travel; Ethiopia -- Description and travel; Ethiopia -- History; Natural history -- Ethiopia; Nile River
On the 18th, about six in the morning, Erbab Gimbaro, coming down
to our tent, brought thirty loaves of Dora as before, and four of
wheat, for the journey; and we had already enough of honey, upon
which we breakfasted with the Erbab, who, to confirm the friendship,
took two or three glasses of strong spirits, which put him into
excellent humour. His son, too, that he might atone for his last
night's misbehaviour, brought a better camel than any we had seen, and
exchanged it for one of those that came yesterday in the evening. I,
on the other hand, gave him a cotton cloth, and some trifles, which
made him perfectly happy; and we parted in the most cordial friendship
possible, after having made a promise that, at my return, I should
stay a week at Sancaho to hunt the elephant and rhinoceros.
Before leaving Sancaho, I had an opportunity of verifying a fact
hitherto doubtful in natural history. Mr Hasselquist, the Swedish
traveller, when at Cairo, saw the skins of two giraffos stuffed, which
came from Sennaar. He gives as minute a description as possible he
could from seeing the skins only; but says nothing about the horns,
because I suppose he did not see them; on which account the doubt
remained undecided, whether the giraffo's horns were solid as the
deer's, and cast every year; or whether they were hollow, attached
to a core, or bone, like those of sheep, and consequently permanent.
The Count de Buffon conjectures them to be of this last kind, and so
I found them. They are twisted in all respects like the horns of an
antelope.
At ten minutes past eight we set out from Sancaho; but my people took
it into their heads, that, notwithstanding the fair behaviour of Erbab
Gimbaro, he intended to lay some ambush to cut us off, and rob us
on the way. For my part, I was very well satisfied of the contrary;
but this did not hinder them from forsaking the accustomed road, and
getting among a thick wood of canes; we were obliged to cut our way
out of them when our direction was west, or to the southward of west.
They were also afraid of Abd el Jileel.
At ten minutes past eleven we crossed the Bedowi, which we had passed
twice before; at half past eleven we crossed it again, travelling
southward; and a quarter after twelve we were so entangled with
woods, and so fatigued with cutting the way for our camels, that we
thought we should get no further. We had, however, continued till
three quarters past one in a direction south-east, at which time we
were not above five miles from Sancaho; and, at half past two, had
turned south-west on the banks of the large river Tokoor-Ohha, which
signifies the Black River. It comes from the mountains of Awassa on
the south-east, and, after winding considerably, it falls into the
Guangue, about eight miles from Guanjook.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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