i 5 2 TRAVELS TO DISCOVER 



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CHAP. VI. 



Journey from Sire to Addergey^nd Tranfailions there. 



TH E province of Sire, properly fo called, reaches from 

 Axum to the Tacazze. The town of Sire is fituated on 

 the brink of a very fleep, narrow valley, and through this 

 the road lies which is almoft impaflable. In the midft of 

 this valley runs a brook bordered with palm-trees, fome of 

 which are grown to a confiderable fize, but bear no fruit ; 

 they were the firit we had feen in Abyffinia. 



The town of Sire is larger than that of Axum ; it is in 

 form of a half-moon fronting the plain, but its greateft 

 breadth is at the well end ; all the houfes are of clay, and 

 thatched ; the roofs are in form of cones, as, indeed, are all 

 in Abyffinia. Sire is famous for a manufacture of coarfe cot- 

 ton cloths, which pafs for current money through all the 

 province of Tigre, and are valued at a drachm, the tenth- 

 part of a wakea of gold, or near the value of an imperial 

 dollar each ; their breadth is a yard and quarter. Beildes 



thefe 



