Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile, Volume 4 (of 5): In the years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772 and 1773 — John Shaqi
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
A little before we came to the mouth of the pass, a soldier came
to us and asked who we were? and was answered, it was Yasine, Ayto
Confu's servant at Ras el Feel. To which it was replied, he knew no
such person. He was scarcely gone when another arrived with the same
question. I began to be impatient, as the sun was then growing very
hot; and answered, It was Yagoube, the white man, the king's friend
and servant. I was again answered, No such person could pass there.
The third time, being interrogated by one whom I knew to be Ayto
Confu's servant, Yasine answered, it is Yagoube, the king's governor
of Ras el Feel, with the slave Yasine, the moor, come to do the king
homage, and to die for him, if he commands, in the midst of his
enemies. We were answered, He is welcome: upon which the servant,
going back, brought a drum, and beat it upon the rock, crying, as in
a proclamation, "Yagoube is Governor of Ras el Feel, Commander of
the king's black horse, Lord of Geesh, and Gentleman of the king's
bed-chamber." Here this farce, the contrivance of Ayto Confu, ended.
With him were many more of the king's servants, my old acquaintances,
and we all sat down by a spring-well, under the shade of the rock, to
a hearty breakfast prepared for us by Ozoro Esther.
After this was finished with a great deal of chearfulness, and being
ready to get on horseback, we saw a man running towards us in great
speed, who, upon his arrival, asked us where the king was, and if
we were his Fit-Auraris? To this we made him no answer; but, laying
hold of him, obliged him to declare his errand. He said that he was
a servant of Negadé Ras Mahomet, of Dara, who had apprehended Ayto
Confu, brother of Guebra Mehedin, of whom I have spoken at large,
(never for any good) and that he had brought him along with him.
This miscreant, whom we had found out to be the principal actor and
persuader of the robbery of my house, while in a drunken frolic with
the wretched Socinios, was now in his way before the king, where,
if all his delinquency had been known, he would infallibly have
lost his eyes, his life, or both. He was nephew to the Iteghé, as
has been already mentioned, son to her brother Basha Eusebius, and
consequently cousin-german to Ayto Confu himself, who, with great
diffidence, asked me if I could pardon his cousin, and allow him to
be delivered out of Mahomet's hands, which, ill as he deserved of me,
I very readily complied with; for I would not for the world have had
it thought that I was the occasion of his death, after it had been so
often said, though falsely, that I had been the cause of that of his
brother. Mahomet delivered him to Confu and me, without hesitation,
and promised not to complain to Ras Michael; but he threatened, if
ever again he fell into his hands, that he would certainly put him to
death, which he well saw would not be very disagreeable to any of his
relations, provided it happened in the field, or any other way than by
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