(Máteb, i.e. Mark or token. The blue silk cord worn around the neck by the Christians of Shoa.)
“Why not?”
“How did I know? Have they cattle?”
“Abundance.”
“And sheep and goats?”
“Certainly.”
“And their Negoos, does he carry debaboch (Umbrellas of state), and make great zumachas (Military expeditions) with warriors like these?”—turning his oyster eyes, lighted with something like martial fire, towards the countless rabble in the rear. But the party thus interrogated could keep his temper no longer; and as the little hunch-backed father confessor rode jauntily up with a dirty page perched on the crupper of his mule, to volunteer a lesson in the noble art of equitation, he galloped off, exclaiming with a sneer—
“Like these, forsooth! One of Her Britannic Majesty’s regiments would in a single hour sweep from off the face of the earth the whole undisciplined mob that swells the train of the boasted descendant of King Solomon.”