Dágo and his friends made a thousand objections, and the native officer in charge crowded the soldiers in front of the stone enclosure. Our caravan had meanwhile been quietly loading up the kit by our orders, but upon the camelmen trying to lead out the camels, they were stopped by the soldiers, each of whom carried his rifle loaded, with a few more cartridges held between the fingers of the left hand, taken out of the belt ready for instant use. One big Soudánese soldier stood across the entrance with his rifle at the “port.”
We now saw the intention of the Abyssinian leader, and, as it would never do for our Somális to suppose that we could be detained against our will, we decided to take the next step; and going up to Dágo, who was still sitting on the carpet inside the little hut, I threatened to complain to Rás Makunan, the Governor of Harar, if this attempt at our arrest should be persisted in.
Dágo said that we ourselves might go where we liked, but that our Somális, camels, and property must remain inside the enclosure. We refused this separation, and told the officials simply that we were going out. Some of the soldiers became excited, and began shouting, but were silenced.
Again I walked over to Dágo, and he said the caravan could not go without the order of the Rás; that it would take till to-morrow at noon for a horseman to go to Harar and get this order, and our party must be detained in custody till then.
I stayed talking to him for a moment, while my brother quietly told off an advance and rear-guard, passing the word round for each of our followers to mark his man, and to put a bullet into him should an attack be made upon us. I then finally told Dágo that we were going, and walked to the entrance, where my hunter Géli silently put into my hands the double four-bore elephant rifle, loaded in each barrel with fourteen drams of powder and fifty SSG slugs. This rifle, so loaded, scatters a good deal, and would have been quite equal to the occasion.
We had not mistaken our friend Dágo. The forces were exactly equal, not counting the Gildessa crowd, some of whom would have been for, and some against us, and seeing we were capable of carrying our point, and afraid of the great responsibility he would incur by using force, he called me back and consented to our leaving, with our men, our camels, and our baggage, provided I would write a letter to Rás Makunan, to state why we had come to Gildessa. With my brother and half a dozen men, all having their rifles ready, I entered Dágo’s hut, and we sat down on the carpets in a circle, and he pushed me a reed pen, ink, and paper.
I wrote a short note to the Rás in English, stating that we had come to examine caravan routes for the Aden authorities, and meant no harm. That we had also had some shooting, and wished to go to Zeila; and I begged him to accept, as an accompaniment to my letter, a pair of rhinoceros horns, those of one of the two cows I had shot in the Dih Wiyileh.
The Abyssinian Dágo said he was sure Makunan would be pleased at the trophy, which would be a very suitable compliment, because only important Abyssinians are allowed to be in possession of rhino horns. They make sword handles and drinking-cups of them; the latter are supposed to neutralise the effect of any poison poured into them. He sent our letter to Makunan at once by a mounted messenger, at the same time begging that we would wait encamped here till noon the next day, when the answer might be expected.
We said we could leave Gildessa whenever we chose, but that, as we wished to be on friendly terms with the local authorities, and to respect their rules, we would camp under the trees outside till the afternoon of the next day. We now marched out and camped half a mile to the north of the town, on the right bank of the river, at a spot where it was overlooked by some low hills from a distance of a hundred yards.
In the afternoon the Abyssinian officials took us into their own huts, in the town, and gave us tea, sitting on rugs. The soldiers also were very friendly, and, now that business was over, they forgot the late awkwardness, and tried to show us that they bore no ill-will, but had only tried to do what they believed to be their duty to Rás Makunan. In the evening I received them in my hut, giving them tea, which they seemed to prefer to coffee.