CHAP. X.
Leave Bamba, and continue our Journey southward—Fall in with Fasil’s Pagan Galla—Encamp on the Kelti.
At Bamba begins a valley full of small hills and trees, all brush-wood, none of them high enough for timber. On the right hand of the valley the hills slope gently up, the ground is firm, and grass short like sheep pasture; the hills on the left are steeper and more craggy, the lower part of the valley had been cleared of wood, and sown with different sorts of grain, by the industry of the inhabitants of the village of that name—industry that had served them to very little purpose, as the encampment of this wild army destroyed in one night every vestige of culture they had bestowed upon it.
Shalaka Woldo was not, to all appearance, a man to protect a stranger in the middle of a retreating army, disbanded as this was, and returning to very distant countries, perhaps never to be assembled again; yet this man was chosen by one that perfectly knew he was above all others capable of the trust he had reposed in him; he was about 55 years of age, was by birth an Agow, and had served Fasil’s father from his infancy, when Kasmati Eshté succeeded to the government of Damot, upon old Fasil’s death[121]; he had been his servant likewise, as had young Fasil, so they were both at one time fellow-domestics of Kasmati Eshté.
When Fasil had slain this nobleman, and succeeded to his father’s government of Damot, Shalaka Woldo was taken into his service as an old servant of his father; it seemed his merit had not entitled him to further advancement; he had no covering on his head, except long, bushy, black hair, which just began to be mingled with grey, but no beard, the defect of all his countrymen. He had a cotton cloth thrown about his shoulders in many different forms, occasionally as his fancy suggested to him; but, unless at night, laid it generally upon one of the mules, and walked himself, his body naked, his shoulders only covered with a goat’s skin in form of what the women call a tippet; he had also a pair of coarse cotton trowsers that reached to the middle of his thigh, and these were fastened at the waistband by a coarse cotton sash, or girdle, which went six or seven times about his waist, and in which he stuck a crooked knife, the blade about ten inches long, and three inches where broadest, which was the only weapon he wore, and served him to cut his meat, rather than for any weapon of offence or defence; for a man of consequence, as he was, could not suppose a possibility of danger while he was in the territory of his master. Sometimes he had a long pipe in his hand, being a great smoker; at other times, a stick of about three feet long, something thicker than one’s thumb, with which he dealt about him very liberally, either to man, woman, or beast, upon the slightest provocation; he was bare-legged and footed, and without any mule, but kept up with us easily at whatever pace we went. With all this he was exceedingly sagacious and cunning, and seemed to penetrate the meaning of our discourse, though spoke in a language of which he did not understand a syllable.
As for Shalaka Welled Amlac, he was a man whom I shall hereafter mention as having been recommended to me by Ayto Aylo soon after my coming to Gondar. I did not, however, choose to let Fasil know of this connection, for fear he might lead him to some gainful imposition for his own account in the course of my journey through Maitsha.
At a quarter past two o’clock of the 31st of October we halted for a little on the banks of the river Chergué, a small and not very rapid stream, which coming from the south-west, runs N. E. and loses itself in the lake Tzana. At three o’clock in the afternoon we passed the small river of Dingleber, and in a quarter of an hour after came to a village of that name situated upon the top of a rock, which we ascended; here the road comes close to the end of the lake, and between it and the rock is a very narrow pass through which all provisions from the Agows and Maitsha must go; when, therefore, there is any disturbance in the south part of the kingdom, this pass is always occupied to reduce Gondar to famine.
The village itself belongs to the office of Betwudet, and, since that office has been discontinued, it makes part of the revenue of the Ras; the language here is Falasha, though only used now by the Jews who go by that name: it was anciently the language of all the province of Dembea, which has here its southern boundary. The air of Dingleber is excellent, and the prospect one of the most beautiful in Abyssinia; on the one side you have a distinct view of the lake Tzana and all its islands; on the north, the peninsula of Gorgora, the former residence of the Jesuits, where too are the ruins of the king’s palace. On the north of the lake you have a distant prospect of Dara, and of the Nile crossing that lake, preserving distinctly the tract of its stream unmixed with the rest of the water, and issuing out to form what is called the second cataract at Alata, all places fixed in our mind by the memory of former distresses. On the south-east, we have a distant view of the flat country of Maitsha, for the most part covered with thick trees, and black like a forest; farther on the territory of Sacala, one of the districts of the Agows, near which are the fountains of the Nile, the object of all my wishes; and close behind this, the high mountains of Amid Amid, which surrounded them in two semicircles like a new moon, or amphitheatre, and seem by their shape to deserve the name of mountains of the moon, such as was given by antiquity to mountains, in the neighbourhood of which the Nile was supposed to rise.
At Dingleber I overtook my servants, who were disposed to stop there for that night. They had been very much oppressed by troops of wild Galla, who never having seen white men, could not refrain indulging a troublesome curiosity, without indeed doing any harm, or shewing any signs of insolence; this, however, did not hinder my servants from being terrified, as neither I nor any protector was near them. I resolved to avoid the like inconvenience, by proceeding further, as I knew the next day the main body of these savages would be up with us at Dingleber; and I rather wished to be at the point where our two roads separated, than pass a whole day in such company. It is true, I was under no sort of apprehension, for I perceived Fasil’s horse driven before us commanded all necessary respect, and Zor Woldo had no occasion to exert himself at all.
At four o’clock in the afternoon we left Dingleber, and at seven passed a great river; at eight in the evening we crossed two inconsiderable streams, and came to a collection of small villages, called Degwassa: here we entered into some narrow defiles between mountains, covered to the very top with herbage, and brushwood; it was a delightful night, and we were resolved to make the most of it. On every side of us we heard Guinea fowls, of which the woods here are full. At half past nine we halted a little, just leaving the narrow passes, and entering upon the plain. The district is called Sankraber. I found myself exceedingly fatigued, and slept a good half hour upon the ground.
At half past ten we began our journey anew, passing immediately the small village of Wainadega, famous for the decisive battle fought between king Claudius and the Moor Gragnè, where the latter was slain, and an end, for a time, put to the most disastrous war that ever Abyssinia was engaged in. At half after eleven we passed Guanguera on our left hand; it is a collection of many villages, at about ten miles distance; and at mid-night we had Degwassa on our right, and Guanguera on our left. At half past twelve we again rested at the side of a small river, of which I know not the name: we were now in the flat country of Maitsha, descending very gently southward. At three quarters past one in the morning of the first of November I alighted at two small villages, whose huts were but just finished, about 500 yards from the two trees that were in the front of our army, when, after passing the Nile at that dangerous ford near the Jemma, we offered Fasil battle at Limjour, which was the place we were now again come to, but in better health and spirits than before.