II
The forest kingdom of Abyssinia lies on a high and isolated plateau lifted above the tropical greenery of equatorial Africa; its slopes are steep, and its approaches mountainous and difficult. Once arrived on the heights, the traveller finds himself on a kind of land island with its own temperature, mountain-top climate, its own forest bred of the strange union of the fierce equatorial sun and the cool heights, and its own island people dwelling aloof in space and time. Though dark skinned, these folk are not negroes, but some Hamitic folk with a strong infusion of Jewish blood.
Their kingdom is one of the oldest in the world; their rulers claim descent from a son of Solomon and the queen of Sheba. Converted centuries ago from primitive Judaism to the Christianity of the African mind, this singular mingling of the testaments under the sun of Africa produced a kind of Jewish Christianity unique in the Christian world.
A forest land spread over mountains, a land thronged with black folk carrying burdens through mountain jungles, a land of lions roaring in the night, a land of spring rains and flooded water courses, a land of great feudal nobles clad in bright robes and riding with bare feet in the stirrup, a land of Biblical blood justice, Christian wonder-workings, wars and rumours of wars, a land whose sun beat through trees like a vast and terrible white sword, a land where almost the first thing seen by Bruce was the stuffed skin of a malefactor swinging from a tree.
The Laird of Kinnaird had arrived at the court of Saul, King of Israel. It was all there, the battles, the adventure, the death, the colour, and the cruelty. The head of the state was Ras Michael, governor of Tigre, the seventy-year-old soldier and intriguer who had assassinated one king, poisoned another and was now ruling in the name of a third. Like men coming one after the other to try a feat of strength, great feudal nobles and confederacies gathered together to thrust him from power; there were constant battles and new confederacies, and then the slinking hyenas carrying off human carrion in the night of forest shadows, brilliant stars and the odour of the battlefield. And in the morning priests, who wore the robes of the priests of Solomon, marching in company to sacrifice to the Sun.
The journey from the coast to Gondar, the capital of Abyssinia, took Bruce and his young Italian companion ninety-five days. Both made the journey wearing white Moorish robes.
Save for three Franciscan friars, of whose fate nothing is known, and of a certain French surgeon, no European had been seen in Abyssinia for close upon two hundred years. Bruce’s arrival had a decidedly dramatic quality. An epidemic of the smallpox had fallen upon the land; the nobles lay dying; the great houses trembled for their sons. Suddenly at the end of the caravan road had appeared the tall Laird of Kinnaird in his character of an observer and wandering physician.
A European and a wise man in their midst! It is the finger of Heaven! An attendant comes begging him to visit Ras Michael’s son, the young warrior Ayto Consu, who is dying of the plague.
Into the great dark den of the African palace walks the tall man who looked the Dey of Algiers squarely in the eye; he hears uneasy breathing in the half-darkness, and sees a magnificent youth tossing about on a bed of animal skins. A woman of extraordinary beauty and stateliness approaches; it is the Ozoro Esther, old Ras Michael’s young wife, and young mother of the warrior lad. This Biblical queen, this great lady of the ancient court of Israel, was to be Bruce’s unfailing friend and kind protectress.
Bruce opens the doors and windows, fumigates the rooms with incense and myrrh, and washes them with vinegar and warm water. The young prince passes the crisis of the plague, and lives.