SPOR T IN ABYSSINIA. 1 03 



the whole of Abyssinia, and, according to events that 

 are now taking place, this does not seem at all 

 improbable. 



An Abyssinian is thought a great deal of if he 

 goes to Jerusalem, and they always think that the 

 Turk is going to destroy the holy places and sweep 

 away the relics that are kept there. 



It may not be known to some of my readers that 

 the Queen of Sheba is supposed to have ruled over 

 Abyssinia, and at that time the country was evi- 

 dently a great deal more prosperous and civilised 

 than it is now. Elephants are said to have been used 

 as beasts of burden ; nowadays, the natives have not 

 the smallest idea of taming this most useful animal. 

 There exist large ruins of palaces both at Goujam and 

 at Gindar, which testify to the wealth and magnifi- 

 cence the conntrx' originally boasted of It seems to 

 me a great pity that a country which is comparatively 

 so near Europe, and with a good seaboard, should be 

 so completely lost to the world. What few Abyssinian 

 chiefs I saw always impressed upon mc that we, the 

 English, ought to come and live in the country. They 

 had formed, I am sure, a great opinion of England's 

 wealth and power from what they saw and also heard 

 of the Abyssinian expedition. I was told at Masso- 

 wah that an enormous quantity of material of different 

 sorts, that had been left behind after the war, quite 



