The Life and Adventures of Bruce, the African Traveller

by Sir Francis Bond Head

"The hyænas this night devoured one of the best of our mules. They are here in great plenty, and so are lions; the roaring and grumbling of the latter in the part of the wood nearest our tent greatly disturbed our beasts, and prevented them from eating their provender. I lengthened the strings of my tent, and placed the beasts between them. The white ropes and the tremulous motion made by the impression of the wind frightened the lions from coming near us. I had procured from Janni two small brass bells, such as the mules carry. I had tied these to the storm-strings of the tent, where their noise, no doubt, greatly contributed to our beasts' safety from these ravenous yet cautious animals, so that we never saw them; but the noise they made, and perhaps their smell, so terrified the mules, that in the morning they were drenched in sweat, as if they had been a long journey.

"The brutish hyæna was not so to be deterred. I shot one of them dead on the night of the 31st of January, and on the 2d of February I fired at another, so near that I was confident of killing him. Whether the balls had fallen out, or that I had really missed him with the first barrel, I know not, but he gave a snarl and a kind of bark upon the first shot, advancing upon me as if unhurt. The second shot, however, took effect, and laid him without motion on the ground. Yasine and his men killed another with a pike; and such was their determined coolness, that they stalked round about us with the familiarity of a dog, or any other domestic animal brought up with man."

But they were still more incommoded by a smaller enemy, a black ant about an inch long, which demolished the carpets, cutting them into shreds, also part of the lining of the tent, and every bag or sack they could find. Their bite causes considerable inflammation, and the pain is greater than that which arises from the bite of a scorpion: they are called gundan.

On the 1st of February the shum of the place sent his people to value Brace's merchandise, that he might pay custom. "I humoured them," says Bruce, "so far as to open the cases where were the telescopes and quadrant, or, indeed, rather showed them open, as they were not shut, from the observation I had been making. They could only wonder at things they had never before seen.

"On the 2d of February the shum came himself, and a violent altercation ensued. He insisted upon Michael's defeat. I told him the contrary news were true, and begged him to beware lest it should be told to the ras upon his return that he had propagated such a falsehood. I told him also that we had advice that the ras's servants were now waiting for us at Lamalmon, and insisted upon his suffering us to depart."

"He said that I was mad, and held a consultation with his people for about half an hour, after which he came in again, seemingly quite another man, and said he would despatch us on the morrow, which was the 3d, and would send us that evening some provisions. And, indeed, we now began to be in need, having only flour barely sufficient to make bread for one meal next day. The miserable village on the cliff had nothing to barter with us; and none from the five villages about the shum had come near us, probably by his order. As he had softened his tone, so did I mine. I gave him a small present, and he went away repeating his promises. But all that evening passed without provision, and all next day without his coming, so we got everything ready for our departure. Our supper did not prevent our sleeping, as all our provisions was gone, and we had tasted nothing all that day since our breakfast."

The country of the Shangalla lies forty miles to the northwest. All this district from the Tacazzé is called Salent in the language of Tigré, and Talent in Amharic.

On the 4th of February, at half past nine in the morning, they left Addergey; "hunger pressing upon us," says Bruce, "we were prepared to do it earlier, and for this we had been up since five in the morning; but our loss of a mule obliged us, when we packed up our tent, to arrange our baggage differently. While employed in making ready for our departure, which was just at the dawn of day, a hyæna, unseen by any of us, fastened upon one of Yasine's asses, and had almost pulled his tail away. I was busied at gathering the tent-pins into a sack, and had placed my musket and bayonet ready against a tree, as it is at that hour and the close of the evening you are always to be on guard against banditti. A boy, who was servant to Yasine, saw the hyæna first, and flew to my musket. Yasine was disjoining the poles of the tent, and, having one half of the largest in his hand, he ran to the assistance of his ass, and in that moment the musket went off, luckily charged with only one ball, which gave Yasine a flesh wound between the thumb and fore-finger of his left hand. The boy instantly threw down the musket, which had terrified the hyæna, and made him let go the ass; but he stood ready to fight Yasine, who, not amusing himself with a choice of weapons, gave him so rude a blow with the tent-pole upon his head, that it felled him to the ground; others, with pikes, put an end to his life.

"We were then obliged to turn our cares towards the wounded. Yasine's wound was soon seen to be a trifle; besides, he was a man not easily alarmed on such occasions. But the poor ass was not so easily comforted. The stump remained, the tail hanging by a piece of it, which we were obliged to cut off. The next operation was actual cautery; but, as we had made no bread for breakfast, our fire had been early out. We therefore were obliged to tie the stump round with whip-cord till we could get fire enough to heat an iron.