The Highlands of Ethiopia Part 25

Down came the pagan host like the rus.h.i.+ng blast, and the stones flew far under the clatter of their hoofs. But they were fiercely met by the long-bladed spears of the Amhara, and every inch of ground was for once stoutly contested. The roar of the foaming cataract, which thundered within fifty yards of the battle-field, was lost in the hoa.r.s.e yells which rung through the air. The rocky bed proved for a time the scene of slaughter, and the turbid waters receiving numbers of dying and wounded wretches, hurried them to eternity. At length, each individual singling out his foe, the contest a.s.sumed the confused appearance of a chance medley. The sharp lance met with little opposition from the cotton robe; and deprived of other weapons. Christian and Galla, grappling stoutly together, fought with sword and knife, and in the fury of the moment, and in the excitement of the struggle, many rolled over the frowning scarp, clinging tightly together in the last embrace of death.

Medoko and his gallant sons were everywhere in the thickest of the fight. His shout, rising high over the storm, animated the faint-hearted, and his presence roused to new life and exertion the successful partisan. Many of the Amhara bands were already reeling from the repeated shock of the wild riders of the Hawash, when suddenly, in the very heat of the action, a large body of warriors, clothed in black mantles, and armed with long heavy spears, rushed down the hill on foot, and, prostrating themselves as they pa.s.sed the royal umbrellas, descended fresh into the arena. The fierce inhabitants of Mans had sped to the rescue from their hereditary estates, and their savage ferocity and reckless bravery was well known throughout the land. The relations and the household retainers of the rebel attempted to breast the storm, but they were scattered like autumnal leaves before the angry blast; and the chief arrived to the succour only to behold the spot strewed with the bodies of his stoutest partisans, and to witness his beloved son, the youthful Hailoo, sink before his eyes, transfixed by a dozen spear-blades. A panic seized the pagans; and, dismayed and broken-hearted, they fled tumultuously in every direction.

In vain Medoko performed the most incredible acts of valour--his voice had now lost its charm; and, crippled by a wound in his shoulder--his proud heart swelling with indignation--he at length perceived that the fortune of the day was not to be retrieved. Cutting his way single-handed through the squadrons of the enemy, he also gave the loose rein to his horse, and scoured over the hills.

The sun had reached the meridian when the hot pursuit commenced, and the arm of vengeance was not stayed until long after his sinking below the western horizon. Every Amhara spear was dripping in blood to the haft.

The stain of gore was on every cheek, and as the weary warrior returned from the ma.s.sacre, the chest of his jaded war-steed was ornamented with the cloth of the accursed Gentile, whose body he had left to the fangs of the wild beast.

After galloping for some miles with the few chiefs who had escaped from the fatal field, a short halt was allowed to refresh the horses, and Medoko proclaimed his intention of accompanying the party no further.

Asylum and a.s.sistance were offered in vain; the stout heart of the rebel had been quelled by the late heavy loss he had sustained, and for a time at least he bowed to the power of the monarch of Shoa. Short was the moment allowed for the explanation, and after a hurried parting and a hope for better days, the band mounted and pressed on.

Medoko and his surviving son Chara, now commenced the more difficult undertaking of threading their path back again among the advancing Amhara; but a perfect knowledge of the localities enabled them to take advantage of every hill and hollow. After many weary hours of anxiety they pa.s.sed the capital undiscovered, and urging their horses to speed, took the road to Ankober. The Bereza was swollen and unfordable, but their gallant steeds successfully breasted the rus.h.i.+ng waters. The king's watchmen had left their cold posts, in order to take shelter from the cutting blast, before the riders swept down the rocky defile of the Chaka, towards the wooded sides of Mamrat; and long ere the voice of the brotherhood had risen in the matin chant, the rebels had been formally admitted to sanctuary, and were safely reposing in the sacred monastery of Affaf Woira.

Volume Two, Chapter XVIII.

TRAGIC END OF MEDOKO.

In an open glade, at the foot of the great mountain range, stands the church of Affaf Woira, and the tenement of Abba Salama, its superior, enclosed by a rough stone wall. Numerous huts are scattered in cl.u.s.ters over a wooded eminence, which rises on the steep side of the river, and here the indolent brothers,

"Beneath the shade of melancholy boughs.

Lose and neglect the creeping hours of time."

An air of the most perfect repose usually pervades the scene. The inmates are alike indifferent to the blast of winter and to the cares of life. Majestic trees tower high overhead, yielding undisturbed protection to the vulture and the white ibis. The "monk of the wood,"

the Gureza ape, there displays his variegated coat floating in peace amongst the mossy branches; and whilst every breath from beneath wafts up the perfumed air, the lazy monk of the monastery, during the entire day, basks in the sun amidst the bright flowers of nature's growth, gazing in apathy on the sparkling stream which steals through the forest, half hid in a fringe of the willow and the bamboo.

But bustle and confusion for once disturbed this dreamy repose. The priests had been engaged in noisy choir, and the sacred drum had resounded since dawn of day. At length the portals of the hallowed edifice were thrown open, and the holy procession, under the thundering chorus of an Abyssinian psalm, moved over the bright greensward. The gay umbrellas of the church, rich in satin and silver, led the van, and the corpulent Superior, in his white cotton robes, followed the insignia, bestriding a sleek mule decked in metal chains and tinkling bells. At his side marched the bearers of the straight falchions, sheathed in scabbards of polished silver. A band of priests followed, with their heads swathed in folds of white cotton, and their persons wrapped in black woollen cloaks, profusely studded with blood-red crosses and other emblems of Christianity; and closing the procession strode two hundred stout dirty monks, clothed in the skin of the wild antelope, with their shaven heads enveloped in dark greasy cloths, each carrying in his hand a small iron cross, and joining the tribute of his l.u.s.ty throat to the deafening chant. Dell and dingle rung again as the psalm increased in violence, and the cavalcade, threading the intricacies of the wood, proceeded on its mission of mercy, to implore pardon for the rebel who had thrown himself on the protection of the monastery.

The conference with the monarch was long and stormy. The royal vengeance, though far from being appeased, was curbed by a fear of the Church, and more particularly so at the present juncture, when religious disputes regarding the two natures of Christ were beginning to excite an unusual ferment in many parts of the kingdom. An unwilling pardon was at length extorted, and the triumphant monks returned amidst the joyful acclamations of the female inhabitants of Shoa, whose shrill voices are raised on every possible occasion, and whose feelings were in the present instance enlisted in the behalf of their old favourite. The trip also would appear to have been profitable to the holy fathers, for it was currently reported that one half of the remaining wealth of Medoko was the stipulated price to be paid for this monastic intercession.

The nature of Abyssinian custom impels the humbled grandee to tempt again the slippery ladder of power; and disgraced for a time, the courtier, bending his neck to the misfortune, dances attendance on his capricious master until fickle fortune smiles upon his fallen condition.

Unless enjoying the favour of the monarch, and basking in the suns.h.i.+ne of the court, he is held of no account whatever; and the quiet retirement of country life is despised and detested by a race who are ignorant of its pleasures, and possess neither amus.e.m.e.nts nor intellectual resources.

The property and estates of Medoko had not been confiscated, and months rolled quietly along as day after day he took his station among the courtiers in waiting; but the eye of the monarch was turned in cold indifference upon his former favourite, and there were not wanting counsellors to whisper deeds of blood into his ear. Besides the father confessor, the haughty chief had other enemies who were chafed at the sight of the numerous band of well-equipped followers that Medoko still entertained upon his ample means. Many also had lost relations during the rebellion, and misfortune had not abated one atom of the imperious demeanour which ever characterised the chief.

The feast of Maskal was now approaching, and it being rumoured that honours and government were to be again bestowed upon "the murderer of the Amhara," as the rebel was denominated among the conspiring band, measures were taken to counteract the royal intention, if such had really been entertained. The most odious calumnies were industriously circulated; fresh accusations of disloyalty were daily carried to the palace; and the monarch, hourly a.s.sailed on every side, at length resolved to test the feelings of his va.s.sal, by the offer of an inferior post in the unhealthy country of Giddem.

For the last time the gallant chief at the head of his followers swept up the palace hill of Angollala, and leaving, according to the etiquette, his son Chara, together with his retainers, in the middle court-yard, where s.h.i.+elds and spears must be deposited, Medoko crossed the enclosure, and alone and unattended entered the inner wicket.

On the several faces of the inner square are the entrances to the princ.i.p.al buildings of the palace. The great hall of entertainment on one side faces the king's stables on the other, and the artificers'

workshops stand opposite the balcony of justice; but all are connected by stone walls and stout palisades, through which private wickets lead to the interior apartments. His Majesty had not yet taken his seat in public, but the usual throng of people were lounging about the yard, or seated on the rough bedsteads which line one corner, for the convenience of the great.

Medoko had hardly taken his solitary seat, when wreathed in smiles the father confessor approached his victim. Whispering in his ear the intentions of the king, he strongly advised him to reject the proposal with scorn; and no sooner had he ended than the four conspiring chiefs advanced from the interior, bearing the royal preferment to the country which was so thoroughly detested, and which had been hitherto offered only to men of low degree.

The royal presentation, although received with the impatient curl of the lip, and an indignant breathing from the distended nostril, was declined in courteous terms--"The slave of the king desires only to be near the person of his master." But far different was the insolent answer carried back to the monarch, whose superst.i.tious feelings were further irritated by the previous discourse and forebodings of the monk; for a black bullock had been discovered lying dead at the threshold of the gateway, portending that on that day an untimely fate awaited some one within the royal precincts.

For a time no word escaped the moody lip of the monarch. His features remained fixed and still; but a withering glance from his solitary eye shot over the band as he dismissed them from his presence with the cutting remark, "That they were all traitors alike, and lazy cravens to boot."

The hint was sufficient to Guffa Woosen, the _Dedj Agafari_, a man who stickled at no atrocity to gratify his master and to serve his own ends.

After a hurried and mysterious consultation with six others equally unprincipled as himself, they proceeded together into the outer court-yard. Approaching by degrees, the band surrounded the bed of the chief, who was lulled into fatal security by a message that the king was about to appear to receive in person the refusal of office in Giddem, and whilst bandying a joke about the frail tenure of the dungeons of Goncho, five long-bladed knives were suddenly sheathed to the hilt in his brawny back.

Undaunted to the death, Medoko reared himself with difficulty from his couch, and his good sword flashed instantaneously from the scabbard. He had been unwarily caught in the toils; but, like the wounded lion, he stood fiercely at bay, and some of the hunters paid dearly for their treacherous sport. In the hour of battle his sword had seldom required a second blow, and as the trenchant blade now fiercely descended into the neck of the chief conspirator, the head of Guffa Woosen for a moment drooped upon the shoulder, and in the next his lifeless trunk fell heavily to the ground. Again the ruddy steel gleamed overhead, but the energy was fast fleeting from the stout sinew, and Selunko, although marked for life with a desperate slash over the face, succeeded with the remnant of his cowardly ruffians in basely escaping from the scene. A general rush and scramble now ensued for the tops of walls and houses; and from these elevated places of security, savage yells proclaimed the perpetration of the dastardly deed. The king seized a double-barrelled gun from the wall, lest the mighty warrior should attempt to storm the harem; and a high tribute was paid to the single arm which had thus cleared the court.

Desperately wounded, the chief now staggered across the yard, fainting and falling more than once ere he reached the gateway. No doorkeeper remained to dispute the egress, and as yet none dared to cross the path of the stricken brave. One little enclosure alone separated him from his devoted followers, but his strength was fast sinking with the welling blood, and after swaying for a time from side to side, utterly exhausted, he fell, with a groan, upon his knee in the last pangs of death.

Tunkaiye, the great bulwark of the throne, was the first who recovered from the panic, and cautiously advancing with the chosen of the Amhara chivalry, he beheld through the wicket the situation of the chief.

Rus.h.i.+ng through the door, he dealt a blow from behind on the neck of the rec.u.mbent figure, and the head sunk to rise no more. One faint struggle of the right arm was alone to be distinguished, and one word was indistinctly murmured amidst the gurgling of the flowing blood; for the long knives of the a.s.sa.s.sins had penetrated into a brave heart, and the victory over the king's enemy had been already achieved.

Crowds now rushed to the spot, and the limbs were hacked to pieces by the miserable poltroons amidst the coa.r.s.est ribaldry and mirth. One wretch, as he thrust his crooked knife into the late brilliant eye, exclaimed, "How is it that my father now bears the bite without power to brush away the gnat?" and another, after succeeding with difficulty in hewing through the iron muscles of the stout arm, declared, with a laugh, that "the skin of an elephant was composed of less tough material."

Deprived of their weapons, and of the countenance of the mighty fallen, Medoko's son and followers surrendered on the first summons; and a dog, carrying off his father's hand, brushed past young Chara as he entered the murderous court-yard. Stones and sticks were still being expended on the remains of mortality which were strewed in every direction. All human resemblance had already been entirely effaced, and a deep pool of blood remained to mark the dire tragedy.

To this hour the stain is settled upon the spot; and it is daily before the eyes of the perpetrators of the outrage. The stern warrior is never mentioned within the precincts of the palace, and rich offerings are continually made to all the churches in the land, to dissipate the unpleasant dreams which too frequently haunt the royal couch. But although the name is now used amongst the Amhara only to still the unruly child, the gallant Medoko is the darling theme of the roving Galla. The heathen female draws the long tress across her flas.h.i.+ng eye at the recollection of his fate; and the chief yet thinks with respect of the brave spirit who could quell the feud and the intestine quarrel, and who had led the wild host with success, to spoil the dominions of the Christian despot.

Volume Two, Chapter XIX.

THE GALLA BORDERS--PROCLAMATION OF WAR.

Shortly after our departure from Ankober, a robbery was committed in the residency; and the delinquents having been duly traced out by the Lebas.h.i.+, were sent in chains to Angollala, and incarcerated in one of the palace court-yards. The princ.i.p.al party proved to be a slave of the king, aided and abetted by a scribe, who had been for some time employed in copying ma.n.u.scripts for Dr Roth; and the greater portion of the stolen property was shortly returned by the hands of the chief smith, who succeeded the disgraced page in the office of _baldoraba_.

"Strangers have visited me from a far country," was the message wherewith he was charged, "and whilst residing under my protection they have been plundered by my subjects. My name has become tarnished. I have beaten the culprits with sticks, and shall cut off the ears of the slave Wooseni, and sell him to the merchants of Hurrur."

Intercession, backed by presents, was successfully made with the king and queen, in behalf of the offender, a lad of ten years of age, and he was liberated after severe castigation. "G.o.d must be angry with me,"

sobbed the juvenile thief, who had once before been detected beneath a bed with a pair of scissors in his possession--"G.o.d _must_ be angry with me, for I have only twice attempted to rob, and on both occasions have I been punished."

Among the articles stolen, which consisted chiefly of beads, were sovereigns of William the Fourth and of Queen Victoria, and suspicions arising in the royal mind that these were not of gold, as a.s.serted by Lieutenant Barker, His Majesty proposed testing the metal by the ordeal of fire. A coin of the former reign was accordingly thrust into the forge, and having then been immersed in water, was broken with a chisel by the conclave of smiths. "Call you this English gold?" exclaimed the Negoos: "here then is a piece of Abyssinian gold for you,"--and throwing upon the ground the bra.s.s foil of a sword scabbard, he laughed immoderately. A fourpenny piece was then exhibited, as a somewhat more portable and commodious medium of exchange than blocks of fossil salt, and the figure on the obverse immediately elicited the inquiry whether the queens of England went forth with their armies to battle, since Britannia was equipped with spear and s.h.i.+eld, and was about to set a _sareti_ in her crown like the warrior king of the Amhara.

[The _sareti_ is a sprig of wild asparagus worn in Shoa as a token of victory, as will be seen presently.]

A quarrel of long standing between Ayto Melkoo and the commander-in-chief of the gun-men, who ranked among the foremost of the court sycophants, had been this day brought for adjustment before the royal tribunal. The award being found in favour of the appellant, the Master of the Horse, although a great favourite, was handcuffed, and imprisoned in the brewery, but after a few hours' durance he was set at large, and his punishment commuted to a fine of seven hundred and fifty pieces of salt. "It is of no consequence," he remarked somewhat unwisely, "I shall carry a _mamalacha_ to the `commander,' Captain Harris, and he will pay the amount for me."

This boast had given occasion to malicious insinuations on the part of his enemies, and after dark a confidential message was brought to me from the palace, to the effect that Ayto Melkoo stood suspected of concealing certain "pleasing things" understood to have been received from my hands. But this imputation, which, if confirmed, must have involved disgrace and confiscation of property, proved, fortunately for the accused, to have no foundation.

A better instance could scarcely have been adduced to ill.u.s.trate the fleeting and precarious nature of the despot's smiles. The mother of this tottering favourite, a native of Ambasel in the province of Lasta, was for many years the mistress of Hatze Yasoo, then Emperor of Gondar, on whose demise she became an inmate of the seraglio of Asfa Woosen.

Ayto Wadi, the distinguished Galla governor of Angollala, being thrown into prison by the latter monarch, contrived to solace himself with the presence of the lady, and the Master of the Horse was the result of the intrigue. No disgrace whatever attaching to his illegitimate origin, he was regarded in the light of a member of the royal family; and, being brought up in the palace, has succeeded during three several reigns in maintaining a position at court, which might now have been sacrificed by the clandestine possession of a dozen ells of English broad-cloth. The _amende_ was, nevertheless, made to him in the course of a few days, by the addition of another village to his landed possessions at Doba.

Such paltry proofs of espionage were invariably followed by some especial token of the royal goodwill, ushered in by a goat, or a jar of honey, as a peace-offering. In this instance, after the despot had been fully satisfied of the groundless nature of his surmises, I received a special invitation to accompany him the next day on a shooting excursion, a Galla ram, the size of a well-grown calf, having first been thrust into the tent by the bearer of the message--the dirty page Besabeh--who, as usual, composed himself to sleep in a corner after the due performance of his errand.

Sat.u.r.day, being the Jewish Sabbath, brings rest from all labour, and is invariably devoted by the king to excursions abroad. Starting on horseback at an early hour, a gallop of several miles led us across the Chacha, and over the border of the Galla dependencies, to an extensive, but narrow sheet of water, where an otter had lately been seen. "It has hands, and nails, and fingers like a man," observed the monarch gravely, "and a head like a black dog, and a skin like velvet; and it builds its house at the bottom of the river, and plucks gra.s.s, and washes it in the water; and all my people thought it was the devil, and would destroy them with strong medicine. Now is this animal found in your country, and how do they call its name?"

We amused ourselves by killing snipe, much to the entertainment of the monarch, who displayed little talent for shooting birds on the wing, and made no secret of many very unsportsmanlike ideas. Numerous ducks and geese soon arrested his attention. Drawing up with his retinue, and resting his weapon over the shoulder of an attendant to insure steady aim, he kept up a murderous fire with ball, shot, and slugs, during a full half hour. The weather was pa.s.sing cold, and ever and anon His Majesty blew his nose betwixt his thumb and fore-finger, and wiped them on the mantle of the governor of Bulga, who eagerly proffered it for acceptance. A serious diminution in the numerical strength of the feathered fools resulted in no attempt to take flight or even to s.h.i.+ft position. Incredible though it may appear, the living still paddled among the floating carca.s.ses of their slaughtered comrades, as if nothing had happened, until the destroyer, weary of persecuting the "unclean birds," which were not even taken out of the water, remounted and crossed the country at speed to a wide meadow, traversed by the serpentine Chacha.

Bald coots were here playing at hide-and-seek, whilst red-headed divers peeped warily forth for an instant, as the noisy cavalcade advanced.

The spoonbill, and the leather-necked ibis of Egyptian veneration, displayed their white plumage along the sedge-grown borders. The heron, the snakebird, and the redshank, waded through the shallow drifts; and geese, widgeon, teal, and mallard, rose whirring in the air at every step. But amidst all this inviting variety, the snowy egret was the object of the king's ambition; and although, after many unsuccessful attempts, he failed in adorning his head with her unsullied plumes, he retired perfectly satisfied with his skill as a rifleman, after a long stray shot had perforated the eye of an "_alata furda_." This is a gigantic slate-coloured crane, with eccentric red wattles; and several pairs that were marching over the mead had previously elicited most notable displays of gunmans.h.i.+p on the part of Ayto Berkie and others of the royal favourites.

Abogaz Maretch, with his feudal train of Ab.i.t.c.hu, joined the _cortege_ as it pa.s.sed Wona-badera, his seat of government. The treeless expanse pa.s.sed over--a type of the entire Galla territory north of Moolo-Falada, where forest land commences--consists of wide valleys clothed with a verdant carpet of gra.s.s, clover, and trefoil, which, from their redundant luxuriance, almost impede progress. Every little intersecting eminence is completely covered with flouris.h.i.+ng fields of barley and wheat, and crowned with villages fortified with strong stockades; and one ancient _woira_ excepted, whose venerable boughs formed in days gone by a trysting-place to the hostile pagans, not a single bush or tree was visible during the long ride.

An extensive barrier of loose stones hastily thrown up during the rebellion of Medoko, fortifies the south-eastern environs of Angollala; and although confessedly inferior to the great wall of China, it is calculated to offer temporary opposition to hors.e.m.e.n who are no Nimrods.

Some of the lower parts were cleared by Captain Graham and myself without the slightest difficulty, and much to His Majesty's amazement; but every attempt on the part of the Amhara to follow our example proved a complete failure. On our return we pa.s.sed through a palisaded wicket in this breastwork, which is dignified with the t.i.tle of "the King's Gate," and forms the scene of the few public executions that take place.

Chiefs and governors were also accorded the privilege of squeezing through with the crowned head, but followers and people of low degree were compelled by the stick of the doorkeeper to adopt a circuitous route over a belt of stony hills adjoining, which form a continuation of the defences.