ABYSSINIA 121 



experience in Abyssinia. Sent up to negotiate with 

 Ras Tessema Nado of Gore about the post at I tang, 

 he was treated in an outrageous manner by the Ras. 

 Kept running to and fro from the audience chamber, 

 he was at last permitted to approach. He would 

 have liked to mark his disapproval of the way that 

 he was treated by returning, but dared not do so, 

 for had his mission proved futile, his return in a 

 huff would have been put down to want of tact. 

 I may add that here, too, he travelled perforce as 

 meanly as a Greek trader. The present he was given 

 for the Ras was a three-guinea Winchester rifle. It 

 was received in withering silence. The Ras, however, 

 asked him to get him, on payment, some ammuni- 

 tion ; and to his surprise and, considering what 

 had already passed, his mortification, showed him 

 a stand of arms that would have made the mouth 

 of the best-equipped Nimrod water. I wonder what 

 happened to the Winchester ? 



He also told me that on his way to Gore he had 

 passed a Swiss who had been induced to come out to 

 reorganise Menelik's army. He was brought well 

 inland and left there dependant for his food on the 

 charity of a local sheikh, and unable to go either for- 

 ward or backward. 



I heard a great deal about Abyssinia, as it was pro- 

 posed to send me there to negotiate a real treaty with 

 this Ras, and I had just got my things together when I 

 received a wire to say that I was transferred to the 

 Bahr el Ghazal province, where an expedition was just 

 in course of preparation. 



