Abyssinia — The Country and People 



95 



brought up to his court, five hundred 

 miles by caravan; 5'et, of course, he can- 

 not make use understandingly of more 

 than a few. I remember when first pre- 

 sented to him, as he sat in a doorwa}' 

 of the largest room in his residence, a 

 rather confused mass of presents ; Sevres 

 vases from the French Government, pho- 

 nograph boxes, sextants, and such ob- 

 jects were piled up behind him. He 

 received me by appointment, through 

 Colonel Harrington, who with his assist- 

 ant, Mr. Baird, had given me the hospi- 

 tality of their compound. The black, 

 kindly face indicated patience as well 

 as strength, and his manner was that of 

 quiet dignity. 



Following the well-established cus- 

 tom, I had with me a few gifts to present 

 to His Majest}^, who had sent me goats, 

 bread, and tej . Two large volumes, with 

 illustrations of scenes of our own coun- 

 try, of its cities, mountains, waterfalls, 

 etc., I offered in the hope of making 

 known the land of the free. Through 

 the ver}' excellent interpretation of a 

 young Abyssinian attached to the British 

 agency, I endeavored to explain the geo- 

 graphical relations of the United States 

 to the rest of the world, but I am quite 

 sure that I did not make a brilliant suc- 

 cess. The difference in time between 

 New York, which I mentioned as being 

 our biggest city , and Addis Abeba seemed 

 to interest His Majesty very much, but 

 not understandingly. 



Menelek seemed to have some appre- 

 ciation of the magnitude of the Brooklyn 

 Bridge and of the Capitol, yet the ab- 

 sence in his own language of any defined 

 measure of distance left me doubtful as 

 to whether, in spite of his unceasing 

 efforts to understand things European, 

 he is really able to mentally interpret 

 such gr^at dimensions. He has never 

 seen a house larger than his own, unless 

 possibly the neglected ruins of a con- 

 siderable building erected by the Portu- 

 guese about 300 years ago in Gondar, 

 once Abyssinia's capital. 



As the Abyssinian is unable to make 

 anything save the round hut, the royal 

 residence was built by East Indian car- 

 penters of rails wottled together and 

 more or less heavily covered with mud, 

 the roof being straw and mud thatch. 

 This palace or Gebi might pass for a 

 fairly comfortable country house, shabby 

 for want of paint. Nor has Menelek ever 

 seen a boat, save the sections of one of 

 poor Marchand's little flotilla lying cov- 

 ered up in front of the Gebi hundreds 

 of miles from any navigable water, tell- 

 ing in its mute, sad wa)^ of Fashoda, 

 that well-known story of bravery and 

 blundernig. 



What I most relied upon as clinching 

 in the royal mind a tolerably defined 

 idea of our country were the pictures of 

 some of our cotton-manufacturing es- 

 tablishments in New England. This I 

 described as the place where were manu- 

 factured practically all the cotton goods 

 which constitute the clothing of all of 

 his most advanced subjects. I had • 

 noted with surprise and pleasure in 

 Aden, Zeila, and Harar that American 

 cotton goods were the onlj^ cotton goods 

 in evidence. 



Referring to a map, I further ex- 

 plained that another English-speaking 

 countr)'- lies to our north, and that this 

 country was a part of Great Britain's 

 empire. So far as my object of instruc- 

 tion was concerned, I think in this point 

 I overdid it. This reference to Canada, 

 with my statement that all the people 

 in my country spoke English, coupled 

 with the fact that I came in a certain 

 sense under the wing of Colonel Har- 

 rington and accompanied by his inter- 

 preter, evidently left a blurred impres- 

 sion of my relation to the American 

 eagle. At any rate, when finally writ- 

 ten permission was given to me to go 

 into the unknown country to the north- 

 west, I was described as Mr. Crosb}^ 

 t/ie Englishman. 



The Emperor was clad in modest, even 

 severe, garb, the chief vestment being 



