The mountain, or hill, on which the town is situated, is surrounded on every side by a deep valley, which has three outlets; the one to the south to Dembea, Maitsha, and the Agows; the second to the north-west towards Sennaar, over the high mountain Debra Tzai, or the Mountain of the Sun, at the root of which Koscam, the palace of the Iteghé, is situated, and the low countries of Walkayt and Waldubba; the third is to the north to Woggora, over the high mountain Lamalmon, and so on through Tigré to the Red Sea. The river Kahha, coming from the Mountain of the Sun, or Debra Tzai, runs through the valley, and covers all the south of the town; the Angrab, falling from Woggora, surrounds it on the N. N. E. These rivers join at the bottom of the hill, about a quarter of a mile south of the town.
Immediately upon the bank opposite to Gondar, on the other side of the river, is a large town of Mahometans of about a thousand houses. These are all active and laborious people; great part of them are employed in taking care of the king’s and nobility’s baggage and field-equipage, both when they take the field and when they return from it. They pitch and strike their tents with surprising facility and expedition; they load and conduct the mules and the baggage, and are formed into a body under proper officers, but never suffered, nor do they chuse, to fight on either side.
Gondar, by a number of observations of the sun and stars made by day and night, in the course of three years, with an astronomical quadrant of three feet radius, and two excellent telescopes, and by a mean of all their small differences, is in lat. 12° 34´ 30´´; and by many observations of the satellites of Jupiter, especially the first, both in their immersions and emersions during that period, I concluded its longitude to be 37° 33´ 0´´ east from the meridian of Greenwich.
It was the 4th of April 1770, at eight o’clock in the morning, when I set out from Gondar. We passed the Kahha, and the Mahometan town, and, about ten in the morning, we came to a considerable river called the Mogetch, which runs in a deep, rugged bed of flakey blue stones. We crossed it upon a very solid, good bridge of four arches, a convenience seldom to be met with in passing Abyssinian rivers, but very necessary on this, as, contrary to most of their streams, which become dry, or stand in pools, on the approach of the sun, the Mogetch runs constantly, by reason that its sources are in the highest hills of Woggora, where clouds break plentifully at all seasons of the year. In the rainy months it rolls a prodigious quantity of water into the lake Tzana, and would be absolutely unpassable to people bringing provision to the market, were it not for this bridge built by Facilidas; yet it is not judiciously placed, being close to the mountain’s foot, in the face of a torrent, where it runs strongest, and carries along with it stones of a prodigious size, which luckily, as yet, have injured no part of the bridge. The water of the river Mogetch is not wholesome, probably from the minerals, or stony particles it carries along with it, and the slatey strata over which it runs. We have many rivers of this quality in the Alps, especially between mount Cenis and Grenoble.
Delivered now from the strait and rugged country on the banks of the Mogetch, we entered into a very extensive plain, bounded on the east side by the mountains, and on the west by the large lake of Dembea, otherwise called the lake Tzana, or Bahar Tzana, the Sea of Tzana, which geographers have corrupted into the word Barcena. Rejoiced at last that I had elbow-room, I began the most laborious search for shrubs and herbs all over the plain, my servants on one side and I on the other, searching the country on each side of the road. It appeared to our warm imaginations, that the neighbourhood of such a lake, in so remote a part of the world, ought infallibly to produce something perfectly beautiful, or altogether new. In this, however, we were disappointed, as indeed we always were in meadows, and where grass grew so exuberantly as it did all over this plain.
At eleven o’clock we crossed the river Tedda; here the road divides: that branch to the east leads to Wechnè, in the wild, uncultivated territory of Belessen, famous for no production but that of honey.
We continued along the other branch of the road, which led south to Emfras. One mile distant on our left is the church of St George. About one o’clock we halted at the church Zingetch Mariam; and a few minutes after, we passed the river Gomara, a considerable stream rising in Belessen, which stands in pools during the dry weather, but had now begun to run; its course N. E. and S. W. across the plain, after which it falls into the lake Tzana.
At two we halted at Correva, a small village, beautifully situated on a gentle-rising ground, through which the road passes in view of the lake, and then again divides; one branch continuing south to Emfras, and so on to Foggora and Dara; the other to Mitraha, two small islands in the lake, lying S. W. from this at the distance of about four hours journey. The road from Correva to Emfras, for the first hour, is all in the plain; for the second, along the gentle slope of a mountain of no considerable height; and the remainder is upon a perfect flat, or along the lake Tzana.
The 5th of April, at five in the morning, we left our present station at Correva, where, though we had employed several hours in the search, we found very little remarkable of either plants or trees, being mostly of the kind we had already seen. We continued our road chiefly to the south, through the same sort of country, till we came to the foot of a mountain, or rather a hill, covered with bushes and thorny trees, chiefly the common acacia, but of no size, and seeming not to thrive. I pitched my tent here to search what that cover would produce. There were a great quantity of hares, which I could make no use of, the Abyssinians holding them in abhorrence, as thinking them unclean; but to make amends, I found great store of Guinea fowls, of the common grey kind we have in Europe, of which I shot, in a little time, above a score; and these, being perfectly lawful food, proved a very agreeable variety from the raw beef, butter, and honey, which we had lived upon hitherto, and which was to be our diet (it is not an unpleasant one, at least a part of it) till we reached Emfras.
At eight in the morning I passed through Tangouri, a considerable village. About a hundred yards on the right from this we have a finer prospect of the lake than even from Correva itself. This village is chiefly inhabited by Mahometans, whose occupation it is to go in caravans far to the south, on the other side of the Nile, through the several districts of Galla, to whom they carry beads and large needles, cohol, or Stibium, myrrh, coarse cloths made in Begemder, and pieces of blue cotton cloths from Surat, called Marowti. They are generally nearly a year absent, and bring in return slaves, civet, wax, hides, and cardomum in large beautiful pods; they bring likewise a great quantity of ginger, but that is from farther south, nearer Narea. It appears to me to be a poor trade, as far as I could compute it, considering the loss of time employed in it, the many accidents, extortions, and robberies these merchants meet with. Whether it would be ever worth while to follow it on another footing, and under another government, is what I am not qualified enough to say.