Page:Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile - In the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, and 1773 volume 2.djvu/330

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cotton cloths, stibium, beads, and incense, are the articles with which their foreign trade to Angola, and the kingdoms on the Atlantic, is carried on.

The Nareans are exceedingly brave. Though they have been conquered, and driven out of the low country, it has, been by multitudes — nation after nation pouring in upon them with a number of horse to which they are perfect, strangers: But now, confined to the mountains, and surrounded by their marshes and woods, they despise all further attempts of the Galla, and drive them from their frontiers whenever they approach too near.

In these skirmishes, or in small robbing parties, those Nareans are taken, whom the Mahometan merchants sell at Gondar. At Constantinople, India, or Cairo, the women are more esteemed as slaves than those of any other part of the world, and the men are reckoned faithful, active, and intelligent. Both sexes are remarkable for a chearful, kind disposition, and, if properly treated, soon attach themselves inviolably to their masters. The language of Narea and Caffa is peculiar to that country, and is not a dialect of any neighbouring nation,

Antonio Fernandes in this journey, seeking to go to India by Melinda in company with Fecur Egzie ambassador, passed through this country; but none of the Jesuits ever went to Narea with a view of converting the people, at which I have been often surprised. There was enough of gold and ignorance to have allured them. That softness and simplicity of manners for which the Nareans are remarkable, their affection for their mailers and superiors, and firm at-