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 Hawash 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 Adaiel, 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.
All stipulated for one day out of the thirty on which to drink _cosso_,
and during the other twenty-nine, few ever stirred without grumbling.
Honesty is not prominent among the Abyssinian virtues, and the lack of
it sometimes redounded to the discredit of the master. A youth who was
entrusted with a dollar to purchase sheep in the adjacent market,
ingeniously contrived to smuggle into the flock, two for which he had
not paid, being convinced that such an economical arrangement must prove
highly agreeable to his employers, and thus lead to his own advancement.
A hue and cry was raised on the discovery of the theft, and it required
some time to persuade the magisterial authorities that the goat-herd had
not been defrauded with the cognisance of the _bala-beit_. [Master of
the house.]
An _afero_, or janissary, had been specially appointed as a spy over the
actions of the foreigners, and he rendered himself sufficiently
obnoxious. Not satisfied with prying into the contents of boxes for the
information of the purveyor-general, his immediate superior, he reported
to the throne every the most minute circumstance that occurred; and
besides originating several ingenious falsehoods, was so indefatigable
in proclaiming us to be heretics, that he was shortly turned out of the
house in disgrace, with an order never to show his face again.
Ethiopia derived her faith from the fountain of Alexandria; but how is
her Christianity disfigured by folly and superstition! The intolerance
of the bigoted clergy, who rule with the iron hand of religious
ascendancy, soon proclaimed the British worse than Pagans, for the
non-observance of absurd fasts, and blasphemous doctrines; and the
inhabitants, priest-ridden to a degree, received their cue of behaviour
principally from their most despotic tyrant, the Church. Unquies, the
Comus or Bishop of Shoa, was the most open and undisguised in his
hostilities. Beset by evil thoughts at an early age, he imitated the
example set by the celebrated Origenes; and so much is he respected by
the monarch for his austerities and religious devotion, that His Majesty
invariably speaks of him as "the strong monk." To him was traced a
report that the Embassy were to be summarily expelled the country, in
consequence of the non-observance of the fasts prescribed by the
Ethiopic creed, and because a Great Lady, whose spies they were, was on
her way from the sea-coast, with a large military force, to overturn the
true religion, put the king to death, and assume possession of all
Abyssinia.
On the festival of the Holy Virgin, the cemetery was thrown open,
wherein rest the remains of Asfa Woosen, grandsire to Sahela Selassie.
It is a building adjoining the church of Saint Mary; and being anxious
to visit the mausoleum, I sent a message to the Lord Bishop, requesting
permission to do so. An insolent reply was returned, that since the
English were in the habit of drinking coffee and smoking tobacco, both
of which Mohammadan abominations are interdicted in Shoa upon religious
grounds, we could not be admitted within the precincts of the hallowed
edifice, as it would be polluted by the foot of a Gyptzi.
Nevertheless, we were permitted to attend Divine service in the less
inimical of the five churches of the capital, and offerings were made
according to the custom of the country. The cathedral of Saint Michael,
distinguished above all its compeers by a sort of Chinese lantern on the
apex, being invariably attended by the monarch, came first in order; and
after wading through the miry kennels that form the avenues of access,
our slippers were put off in accordance with Jewish prejudice, and
giving them in charge of a servant to prevent their being stolen, we
stepped over the threshold. The scowling eye of the bigoted and
ignorant priest sparkled with a gleam of unrepressed satisfaction at the
sight of a rich altar-cloth, glowing with silk and gold, which was now
unfolded to his gaze; and a smile of delight played around the corners
of his mouth, as the hard dollars rung in his avaricious palm.
A strange, though degrading and humiliating sight, rewarded the
admittance we had thus gained to the circular interior of the sacred
building. Coarse walls, only partially white-washed, rose in sombre
earth but a few feet overhead, and the suspended ostrich-egg--emblem of
heathenish idolatry--almost touched our heads as we were ushered in
succession to the seat of honour among the erudite. In a broad
verandah, strewed throughout with dirty wet rushes, were crowded the
blind, the halt, and the lame--an unwashed herd of sacred drones,
muffled in the skin of the _agazin_; but beyond this group of turbaned
monks and hireling beggars there was no congregation present.
The high-priest having proclaimed the munificence of the strangers,
pronounced his solemn benediction. Then arose a burst of praise the
most agonising and unearthly that ever resounded from dome dedicated to
Christian worship. No deep mellow chant from the chorister--no
soul-inspiring anthem, lifted the heart towards heaven. The Abyssinian
cathedral rang alone to the excruciating jar of most unmitigated
discord; and amid howling and screaming, each sightless orb was rolled
in the socket, and every mutilated limb convulsed with disgusting
vehemence. A certain revenue is attached to the performance of the
duty; and for one poor measure of black barley bread, the hired lungs
were taxed to extremity; but not the slightest attempt could be detected
at music or modulation; and the dissonant chink of the timbrel was ably
seconded by the cracked voice of the mercenary vocalist.
No liturgy followed the cessation of these hideous screams. The service
was at an end, and the _Alaka_, beckoning us to follow, led the way
round the edifice. The walls were adorned with a few shields, and with
miserable daubs representing the Madonna, the Holy Trinity _in caelo_,
the Father of Evil enveloped in flames, Saint Peter and Saint Paul,
Saint George and his green dragon, Saint Demetrius vanquishing the lion,
Saint Tekla Haimanot, Saint Balaam and his ass, the Patron Saint, and
every other saint in the Abyssinian calendar. But they boasted of no
sculptured monument raised to departed worth or genius--no proud banner
or trophy of heroic deeds--and no marble tablet to mark the quiet rest
of the soldier, the statesman, or the scholar. In the holy of holies,
which may be penetrated by none save the high-priest, is deposited the
sacred _tabot_, or ark of the faith, consecrated at Gondar by the
delegate of the Coptic patriarch; and around the veil that fell before
this mysterious emblem, there hung in triumph four sporting pictures,
from the pencil of Alken, which I had lately presented to His Majesty.
They represented the great Leicestershire steeple-chase; and Dick
Christian, with his head in a ditch, occupied by far the most prominent
niche in the boasted cathedral of Saint Michael!
Volume Two, Chapter III.