messengers, to whom his servants behaved very insolently, we rose up in a body, left the village, and pitched a tent in the valley below.
This decisive step brought the old man, as was expected, to a sense of the impropriety of his conduct, and he presently afterwards came down the hill, attended by the head men of the place and fell down, cringing abjectly at my feet, until I reluctantly promised to forgive the transaction; but all their solicitations could not induce us to return to a house, where so little respect had been shewn to the laws of hospitality.
In the afternoon a bullock was brought, as a present from the village, and a profusion of maiz and bread. The old man himself returned to partake our good cheer in the evening, when, though he affected to be unwell and to have lost his appetite, he ate about two pounds of brind, and drank a proportionable quantity of maiz. This man possessed throughout the country the character of being particularly crafty, penurious and subtle; which qualities, together with his numerous family connexions, had contributed, more than his courage, towards raising him to the rank which he at that time enjoyed. His own family consisted of twenty-six sons, and about the same number of daughters. One of the former, a very acute and intelligent young man, had paid great attention, in the absence of the Baharnegash, to Mr. Pearce and Mr. Coffin, on their way down to the coast: in consequence, at parting, I gave him the present which had been intended for his father.
March 7th.—We struck our tents at five in the morning, and after proceeding about a mile southward, brought the hill of Cashaat to bear due east of us, at which point, instead of passing over the mountain which leads to Agamé, we turned off a little to the west, and travelled about eight miles through a wild 'barraka' or 'forest,' until we reached an agreeable station, by the side of a river called Seremai. This river shapes its course through the bottom of a small secluded valley, surrounded on every side by steep and rugged hills, in a nook of which, about a mile to the eastward, lay a large town called Logo, whence the surrounding district takes its name. It was at this time commanded by a rebellious chieftain,
