immediate protection. Shortly afterwards he turned to me, and asked rather peremptorily for my hookah, holding out his hand at the same time to lay hold of it. This I immediately refused, on a private hint given me by Mr. Pearce; and Ayto Debib, on this occasion, assuming all the consequence which his situation conferred, reprimanded the Baharnegash for his boldness, explaining to him, that I was "the messenger of a sovereign whom the Ras considered as his own equal." All this made its due impression, and the chief shortly afterwards rose up hastily, calling out to his soldiers to follow him, adding in a lower tone, "it won't do, we had better let them alone." With these injunctions, his followers, after loitering about for a short time, complied, though on their going away they seemed to regard our packages, as I thought, with a wishful eye, that very evidently spoke their regret at being compelled to leave them unexamined.
Having thus happily got rid of these intruders, we ordered our mules to be prepared, and determined, notwithstanding the intense heat of the day, to proceed on our journey, as we felt that it would be by no means safe to pass the night in so unsettled a neighbourhood. Our road now lay to the S.S.W. through a wild and uncultivated country. We crossed the stream called Mai Belessan. Left the high hill of Amba Anvas on our right, and, after mounting a steep ascent, reached the village of Legóte, which in appearance somewhat resembled Dixan, where we procured accommodations for the night. The distance we had travelled from our last station may be computed at about eight miles; and from the top of the hill on which Legóte stands, we took in the evening a regular set of bearings.
March 8th.—At five in the morning we descended from Legóte, and soon afterwards crossed an extensive and well cultivated plain, to the left of which, as we proceeded southward, lay the mountain of Devra Damo, one of those distinguished fastnesses, which in the earliest periods of the Abyssinian history, served as a place of confinement for the younger branches of the family of the reigning sovereign. The reader will easily conceive, from the circumstance of my being a native of Lichfield,
