THE SOURCE OFTHENILE. 499 



conful's letters, tellmg him that Poncet was come with the 

 caravan for the purpofc of curing him ? 



Besides this, M. de Maillet faw Hagi Ali afterwards at 

 Cairo, wliere he reproached him with his cruel behaviour, 

 both to Poncet and to friar Juftin, another monk that had 

 come along with him from Ethiopia. Maillet then mull 

 have been fully inftru6led of Poncet's whole life and con- 

 verfation in Ethiopia, and needed not tlie Italian's fuppofed 

 communication to know whether or not he had been in E- 

 thiopia. Befides, Maillet makes ufe of him as the forerun- 

 ner of the other embalTy he was then preparing to Gondar, 

 and to that fame king Yafous, which would have been a 

 very ftrange ftep had he doubted of his having been there 

 Jbefore. 



Supposing all this not enough, flill we know he return^" 

 'ed by Jidda, and the conful correfponded with him there. 

 Now, how did he get from Bartcho to the Red Sea without 

 paffing the capital, and without the king's orders or know- 

 ledge? Who franked him at thofe number of dangerous 

 barriers at Woggora, Lamalmon, the Tacazz^, Kella, and 

 Adowa, where, though I had the authority of the king, I 

 could not fometimes pafs without calling force to my af- 

 fiilance? AVho freed him from the avarice of the Bahama- 

 gaih, and the much more formidable rapacity of that mur- 

 derer the Naybe, who, we have fcen in the hiflory of this 

 reign, attempted to plunder the king's own facStor Mufa, 

 though his mailer was within three days journey at the 

 head of an army that in a few hours could have effaced eve- 

 ry vellige of where Mamah liad flood ? All this, then, is a 

 ridiculous labrication of lies ; the work, as I have before 



3 R 2 faid. 



