The hills of Efát present more rounded forms; their slopes are better cultivated, and their tops afford the most eligible positions for the abode of the Abyssinian farmer. During the rainy season, all the many rivers which at other times carry only sufficient water for the purposes of the cultivator, not only fill their deeply-excavated beds, but overflowing and inundating all the lower parts of the hills, would sweep off any of the fragile Abyssinian buildings within reach; but the soil, when saturated with humidity, becomes so heavy and compact as to be not easily washed away. The impetuosity of the mountain torrent undermines the fast-decomposing rock, and frequently brings down large boulders and loose stones, which, dashing against the sides of the ravine, are in no small degree instrumental to its destruction.
Not less important are the changes going on in the high range, since the time of their formation. Ice is of so uncommon occurrence, that we can scarcely attribute to it any considerable cooperation; but the action of water is materially assisted by occasional earthquakes. Gradual decomposition and decay has produced on the base, and produces still, conglomerates of various thickness and extent. The high plateau enjoys a thick coat of fertile black soil. Lakes, pools, morasses, and swamps, are frequent; the rivers of little fall have muddy and miry beds, which on that account become unfordable during the rains.
A few hot mineral wells are known and made use of in Efát and Giddem. Precious metals and precious stones have not yet been discovered; but of useful mineral products, iron, sulphur, and coal, are the principal. Iron ores are the riches of the high plateau, the oxy-hydrate being the best of them. Enclosed in the basalt, it comes to view only in the ravines, whence it is scraped out. From the western borders of the Adel country, and from the extinct volcanoes of Mentshar, is derived the small supply of native sulphur required; the pits are described as exceedingly copious. Coal-beds appear to extend along the whole of the eastern frontier of Shoa; but the combustible nature of the fossil is scarcely known in the country. Copper, tin, zinc, and salt, are all imported into Shoa; the Adaïel possessing the last commodity in abundance. The Shoan clay proves a very indifferent material for the manufacture of earthenware. Excellent quarries could be worked, but the primitive fashion of the dwellings is independent of the use of stone.
Botany.
The provinces that compose the kingdom of Shoa enjoy not only political but also natural and physical boundaries. From the luxuriant vegetation, or the parched-up desert of a tropical clime, we suddenly ascend to regions where the blessings of fertility are more equably diffused, and which serve as granaries to the inhabitants of the lowlands.
From the general nature of the rocks, it is obvious that the soil consists chiefly of decomposed feldspar, which requires abundance of water. Dews, rains, and springs, however, so moisten the mountain side, that artificial irrigation need be resorted to but on few localities. Along the foot of the hills, rude channels, dug out of the sandy or gravelly soil, conduct abundance of water to plantations at a distance from the river side; and, in these lower regions, periodical inundations supply the want of rain.—
It is an established fact, that the cryptogamic plants of cellular construction, are in different zones nearly the same. Under similar circumstances the same lichen covers the face of the rock in Europe as in the continents of the torrid zone, the same mould lines decaying matter, and the same fungus cleaves to bark and root. But, compared with the other orders of plants, the cellulars are most defective in numbers throughout Abyssinia, the peculiarities of the climate being very unfavourable to their development.
Every kind of parasitic plant is looked upon with a suspicious eye in Abyssinia; and those of the vascular orders furnish to the conjuring practitioner his principal remedies. But the mushrooms (Demastafi), the fungi and puff-balls (Ya arrogie siet phis), are believed to pollute the finger that touches them, and to be downright poison. Mould, of course, thrives exuberantly on every substance in so moist a climate as that of Shoa. The blight is but too well known; the Boletus igniarius grows abundantly in the forests; Parmeliae and other lichens cover rocks, or depend fantastically from the withered branches of gigantic trees. Mosses, however, are very scarce, and only of four kinds.
The vascular acotyledonic plants, the ferns, might likewise be expected in greater variety among the Abyssinian weeds than is actually the case. The deep recesses of the few remaining forests harbour some kinds which very closely resemble European forms, and belong to the genera Aspidium, Polypodium, Asplenium, Adiantum, Scolopendrium, Ophioglossum, and Pteris. No tree is among them, nor are the Abyssinians aware of the useful properties of the tribe. Adianthum Capillus Veneris is called in Amháric “Sera Besoo” i.e. much work—finely wrought.
Of the four orders into which the tribe of monocotyledonic plants is naturally subdivided, viz. the Grasses, the Lilies, the Orchides, and the Palms, the first undoubtedly deserves our principal attention, for it is by far the most numerous and important. The great elevation of the Abyssinian plains is so favourable for the cultivation of all Cerealia of the temperate zone, that they may rival the very best agricultural districts of Northern Europe, whilst the low country along the foot of the mountains produces some kinds of tropical grain, and would fully answer for the cultivation of rice, which at present is unknown in the country.