Residence in Ankóber.

But darkness now reigned within our cheerless abode. Candles that will burn for more than ten minutes together, or afford light sufficient either to read or write, are luxuries which have no existence in so primitive and benighted a land; and strips of old cotton rag dipped in unpurified bees’ wax, forming, like most other good things in the empire, a royal monopoly, are doled out by the purveyor-general to the favoured few with but a niggard hand; whilst the absence of glass or other transparent substance, and the continued presence of rain, sleet, clouds, and fog thicker than the steam of a wash-house, rendered it for some time difficult to admit the scanty light of heaven during its fitful visits through the overcast atmosphere.

Wood, too, belongs exclusively to the despot, and is far from being abundant in the timberless realm; but packing cases, as they became empty, were furnished with a sheet of oiled parchment, and these admirable substitutes for glazed sashes, were, in defiance of exhortations not to deface the king’s walls, inserted therein from time to time. A chafing dish, raised upon a high mud pedestal, at length cheered the long dreary evenings, although the wet sodden fuel yielded a very feeble blaze, whilst its dense smoke, choking the chimneyless room, covered walls and roof with soot. Last, but not least among our improvements, were tallow dips, which we manufactured of the fat tail of the Ethiopian sheep, and these afforded us sufficient light by which to retire to bed, where fleas, revived by the unwonted warmth of English blankets, denied all rest.

The low moaning of the storm behind Mamrat, and the distant growl of the thunder, usually ushered in the night. There was a sound as of the surf breaking over a rocky shore, and before many minutes the hurricane was at its height. Crashing reverberations of thunder rattled among the serrated cliffs, whilst the gates of heaven poured forth a deluge, which rendered every lane and footpath throughout the town, ankle deep in running water.

Often after one of those falls of rain so common in tropical countries, the face of the lowlands for fifty miles would be concealed under an impenetrable fog. The spectator rode upon a sea of billowy clouds which rolled beneath his foot, lashing with their spray the dark islands formed by the peaks of the higher mountains: and beyond, in the hot Adel plain might be seen the Háwash winding through the distance, until melted into the limits of the horizon. As the great bank ascended, all around became wet and clammy to the touch; and the mist, although sluggish and slow to move, was of a nature so keenly searching, that in defiance of all muffling, it seemed to penetrate to our very bones.

Together with those privations which are common to a residence among all savage nations, there are many which Abyssinia claims exclusively as her own; nor, if viewed only as a place of abode, does the country possess aught save the salubrity of the climate to counterbalance its manifold discomforts and disadvantages. Although in the midst of abundance, we experienced the utmost difficulty in obtaining the most common necessaries of existence—bread, meat, and water; and notwithstanding that a sufficiency of wheat to sustain life for an entire year may be purchased for one German crown, yet where the stranger is concerned, the grain, without the assistance of the monarch, can scarcely be converted into the staff of life—the process entailing all the petty worry and annoyance which in other lands are solely undertaken and performed by menials.

In a kingdom where the inhabitants are solely dependent upon the exertions of slaves, the difficulties are increased ten-fold to those who are obliged to employ hired domestics. The markets are at a great distance from the capital, and held at long intervals; nor are they ever so well supplied as to admit of the requisite weekly stock being purchased at any individual place. Hence much trouble and inconvenience arose from the necessity of dispatching messengers simultaneously to the various remote bazaars; and very great difficulty was experienced in preserving even the small number of live stock required for consumption in a country where all the surrounding meadows pertain alike to the crown, and where labour is so difficult to be procured.

Whilst porters are not to be obtained unless through a direct mandate from the king, the unwillingness of mule-owners to hire their cattle at the existing low rate, the displeasure and heartburning of the authorities if a larger bribe were offered, the badness of the roads, and the steepness of the hills, all combine to render it a perplexing matter to dispense with this species of service. On the other hand, the greatest difficulty is experienced in providing for a permanent establishment of baggage-horses with their attendants, owing to the existing necessity of distributing them in small lots among the limited private grazing grounds in the vicinity, whence, when wanted, they are not to be obtained without infinite difficulty.

Every arrangement, however minute in detail, or trivial in importance, here demands a sacrifice of time and temper in a tedious and lengthy conference, which, in accordance with the custom of the country, must be carried on by the principal persons engaged in the transaction. No article is readily to be purchased, nor can any thing, how trifling soever, be accorded without the royal mandate, and when that is at last obtained, the applicant would appear to be further than ever removed from the realisation of his object. “It is done,” is the mode of signifying that a request is granted, and the despot believes that to will is to accomplish; but whilst his commands are usually obeyed more to the letter than in the spirit in which they have been given, his public officers embrace every opportunity of consulting the interests of the privy purse, to the stranger’s disadvantage.

In utter abhorrence of the country and its inhabitants, the Moslem servants who accompanied the Embassy from India all took their departure, willing rather to brave the dangers and difficulties of a long journey through the inhospitable deserts of the Ada?el, than to prolong a hateful sojourn in Abyssinia. One half of the number were murdered on the way down, and the places of all long remained empty. In any part of the world it would be difficult to find domestics inferior to their Christian successors. The consumption of brundo, or raw beef, and the sleeping off a surfeit which, in its progress towards stupor, exhilarated them to positive intoxication, formed the sum total of their services; yet every idle noisy vagabond who was in the receipt of four pieces of salt per mensem, with the promise of a new cloth annually, value three shillings and nine-pence sterling, held himself entitled to a permanent place before the drawingroom fire.