However that be, and however distressing the situation of those princes, we cannot but be satisfied with it when we look to the neighbouring kingdom of Sennaar, or Nubia. There no mountain is trusted with the confinement of their princes, but, as soon as the father dies, the throats of all the collaterals, and all their descendents that can be laid hold of, are cut; and this is the case with all the black states in the desert west of Sennaar, Dar Fowr, Selé, and Bagirma.
Great exaggerations have been used in speaking of the military force of this kingdom. The largest army that ever was in the field (as far as I could be informed from the oldest officers) was that in the rebellion before the battle of Serbraxos. I believe, when they first encamped upon the lake Tzana, the rebel army altogether might amount to about 50,000 men. In about a fortnight afterwards, many had deserted; and I do not think (I only speak by hearsay) that, when the king marched out of Gondar, they were then above 30,000. I believe when Gojam joined, and it was known that Michael and his army were to be made prisoners, that the rebel army increased to above 60,000 men; cowards and brave, old and young, veteran soldiers and blackguards, all came to be spectators of that desirable event, which many of the wisest had despaired of living to see. I believe the king’s army never amounted to 26,000 men; and, by desertion and other causes, when we retreated to Gondar, I do not suppose the army was 16,000, mostly from the province of Tigré. Fasil, indeed, had not joined; and putting his army of 12,000 men, (I make no account of the wild Galla beyond the Nile) I do not imagine that any king of Abyssinia ever commanded 40,000 effective men at any time, or upon any cause whatever, exclusive of his household troops.
Their standards are large staves, surmounted at the top with a hollow ball; below this is a tube in which the staff is fixed; and immediately below the ball, a narrow stripe of silk made forked, or swallow-tailed, like a vane, and seldom much broader. In the war of Begemder we first saw colours like a flag hoisted for king Theodorus. They were red, about eight feet long and near three feet broad; but they never appeared but two days; and the success that attended their first appearance was such that did not bid fair to bring them into fashion.
The standards of the infantry have their flags painted two colours crossways—yellow, white, red, or green. The horse have all a lion upon their flag[97], some a red, some a green, and some a white lion. The black horse have a yellow lion, and over it a white star upon a red flag, alluding to two prophecies, the one, “Judah is a young lion,” and the other, “There shall come a star out of Judah.” This had been discontinued for want of cloth till the war of Begemder, when a large piece was found in Joas’s wardrobe, and was thought a certain omen of his victory, and of a long and vigorous reign. This piece of cloth was said to have been brought from Cairo by Yasous II. for the campaign of Sennaar, and, with the other standards and colours, was surrendered to the rebels when the king was made prisoner.
The king’s household troops should consist of about 8000 infantry, 2000 of which carry firelocks, and supply the place of archers; bows have been laid aside for near a hundred years, and are only now used by the Waito Shangalla, and some other barbarous inconsiderable nations.
These troops are divided into four companies, each under an officer called Shalaka, which answers to our colonel. Every twenty men have an officer, every fifty a second, and every hundred a third; that is, every twenty have one officer who commands them, but is commanded likewise by an officer who commands the fifty; so that there are three officers who command fifty men, six command a hundred, and thirty command five hundred, over whom is the Shalaka; and this body they call Bet, which signifies a house, or apartment, because each of them goes by the name of one of the king’s apartments. For example, there is an apartment called Anbasa Bet, or the lion’s house, and a regiment carrying that name has the charge of it, and their duty is at that apartment, or that part of the palace where it is; there is another called Jan Bet, or the elephant’s house, that gives the name to another regiment; another called Werk Sacala, or the gold house, which gives its name to another corps; and so on with the rest; as for the horse, I have spoken of them already.
There are four regiments, that seldom, if ever, amounted to 1600 men, which depend alone upon the king, and are all foreigners, at least the officers; these have the charge of his person while in the field. In times when the king is out of leading-strings, they amount to four or five thousand, and then oppress the country, for they have great privileges. At times when the king’s hands are weak, they are kept incomplete out of fear and jealousy, which was the case in my time;—these have been already sufficiently described.
Three proclamations are made before the king marches. The first is, “Buy your mules, get ready your provision, and pay your servants, for, after such a day, they that seek me here shall not find me.” The second is about a week after, or according as the exigency is pressing; this is, “Cut down the kantuffa in the four quarters of the world, for I do not know where I am going.” This kantuffa is a terrible thorn which very much molests the king and nobility in their march, by taking hold of their long hair, and the cotton cloth they are wrapped in. The third and last proclamation is, “I am encamped upon the Angrab, or Kahha; he that does not join me there, I will chastise him for seven years.” I was long in doubt what this term of seven years meant, till I recollected the jubilee-year of the Jews, with whom seven years was a prescription of offences, debts, and all trespasses.
The rains generally cease the eighth of September; a sickly season follows till they begin again about the 20th of October; they then continue pretty constant, but moderate in quantity, till Hedar St Michael, the eighth of November. All epidemic diseases cease with the end of these rains, and it is then the armies begin to march.