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Volume One—Chapter Forty One.
Probation at Alio Amba.

Slowly passed the days of fog, and the nights of dire discomfort, during the tedious detention which followed this unfortunate discovery. From the terrace commanding a boundless view over the desolate regions traversed, the overflowing channel of the Háwash, and the lakes Le Ado and Ailabello could each morning be perceived sparkling with increased lustre, as their fast-filling basins glittered like sheets of burnished silver under the rays of the rising sun. The industrious fleas continued their nocturnal persecutions, as if never to be sated with European blood; and a constant succession of clouds, which ascended the valley, drawing a grey cold curtain before the hoary head of Mamrat, proclaimed, amid prolonged peals of thunder, the commencement of the rainy season.

But each succeeding night and day brought no nearer prospect of release, and the change in the imperial resolves were scarcely less frequent than those which came over the towering face of the stronghold of his subterranean treasure. Remonstrances, penned with infinite labour and difficulty, were responded by endearing messages, garbled at the pleasure of those to whom they were confided; but the subtle excuse for the further delay of the desired audience was never wanting, and conjecture became exhausted in devising the true cause of the mortifying indifference displayed to the rich presents from “beyond the great sea.”

A desire on the part, of the despot to preserve due respect in the eyes of his lieges, and perhaps also to imbue the minds of his foreign visitors with a befitting sense of his importance, were the most probable motives. Under the existing disappointment, it afforded some consolation to remember that embassies of old to Northern Abyssinia had experienced similar treatment, and to know that delegates to Shoa from the courts of Gondar and Tigré are never presented to the king until weeks after their arrival—a custom originating probably in the more kindly feeling of allowing rest to the way-worn traveller at the close of a long and perilous journey, but perpetuated for less worthy considerations.

At length there came a pressing invitation to visit the monarch at Debra Berhán, coupled with an assurance that the Master of the Horse should be in attendance to escort the party. But no Master of the Horse was forthcoming at the time appointed, and the following day brought a pathetic billet from the palace—a tiny parchment scroll, enveloped in a sheet of wax, breathing in its contents regret and disappointment. “Son of my house, my heart longed to behold you, and I believed that you would come. As you appeared not, I passed the day in distress, fearing lest the waters should have carried you away, or that the mule had fallen on the road. I commanded Melkoo to wait and receive you, and to conduct you to me; but when I hoped to see you arrive, you stayed out. The mule returned; and when I inquired whither you were gone, they told me that you were left. I have committed the fault, in that I gave not orders that they should go down, and bring you.”

Meanwhile, the most vigorous attempts were made, on the part both of the Wulásma and of Ayto Wolda Hana, to exercise exclusive control over the baggage lodged at Alio Amba. Locks were placed upon the latches, and guards appointed over the doors of the houses wherein it was deposited—fully as much care being taken to preclude access on the part of those by whom it had been brought, as if His Christian Majesty had already become the bona fide proprietor. Repeated orders on the subject, obtained from the palace, were uniformly disregarded by the over-zealous functionaries, and it was only by force of arms that the repositories were finally burst open, and that charge of the contents could be resumed.

Neither were the persecutions of the gaunt governor of the town among the least of the evils to be endured, resulting as they did in consequences the most inconvenient. Specially appointed to entertain and provide for the wants of the guests, he supplied at the royal expense provisions alike inferior in quality and deficient in quantity, taking care at the same time that the king’s munificence should be in no wise compromised by purchases, for these he clandestinely prevented. His conduct might be traced to the same jealous feelings that pervaded the breast of his colleagues in office. In the despotic kingdom of Shoa, the sovereign can alone purchase coloured cloth or choice goods; and Ayto Kálama Work, who is entitled to a certain percentage upon all imports, having formed a tolerably shrewd estimate of the contents of the bales and boxes, believed that these would effectually clog the market, and that his dues would be no longer forthcoming. Resolved to extend the most unequivocal proofs of his discontent, he was pleased to assign to the surviving horses and mules of the foreigners a tract destitute of pasturage—one mulberry coloured steed only being pampered, because from size, colour, and appearance, it was assumed that he must be intended for the king. The continued drenching rain at night during the later marches, with the intense heat and general absence of ............
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