154 THEODORE II. AND THE 



scourge, the judgment of God upon Abyssinia. As a sign of the new programme 

 of his reign he had engraved upon the carriages of his howitzers : " Theodore, 

 the scourge of the perverse." This strange idea destroyed the last scruples 

 which retained him on a fatal descent. During the retreat from Godjam the 

 army was subject to a threatening fermentation ; the secret agents of the Gualu 

 entered its rants, spoke to these men, overpowered by privations, of the abund" 

 ance which reigned at Djibela, of the rich cantonments of Godjam and of Damot. 

 Desertions also increased in spite of punishments without number, and the dis- 

 cipline becam* worse every day. To keep them, the ISTegus determined, under 

 various pretests, to give up the finest provinces of the empire to all the excesses 

 which an unbridled soldiery can commit. Sometimes it was not a raid upon 

 horses, mules, and stamped money, but usually a general and laconic order was 

 givea : '*eat everything." For three months, from March to June 1863, fourteen 

 provinces of an extent equal to that of Switzerland, were thus eaten one after the 

 either. The excuse which he gave for Dembla the jewel of the Abyssinian 

 crown, was that the inhabitants had allowed a mussulman chief to escape who 

 had been sent among them. It is related that when the plunderers returned to 

 the camp, the king, who was seated upon an eminence, recognized among the 

 booty the favourite mule of the ahonna Salama, who was living then upon his 

 lands in Dembla, and exclaimed : " Ah ! the robbers have pillaged without my 

 order my fine province of Dembla ! " while he shed some tears which deceived 

 nobody. 



Beghemda was in its turn sacked under the pretext that some insurgents of 

 Godjam, flying and disarmed, had found refuge in some village or other. It was 

 seed time, about the first of June, and the country ran the risk of being six 

 months later exposed to dreadful famine. The suffering of the people only 

 slightly affected Theodore II., and yet he was thus killing the hen that laid the 

 golden eggs, the country which had supported him and his troops during the 

 most powerful of the former rebellions. On the first Monday in June, the market 

 day of Devra-Tabor, a proclamation was issued. I hava furnished, said the 

 Negus to the peasants, those who concealed my enemies, and unhappily my 

 orders were exceeded; but I desire the happiness of my people, and I have eom- 

 manded that these things should not be renewed. Consequently I invite the 

 peasant to return to his plough, the merchant to his business, and all to return 

 in peace to their various occupations." This proclamation was welcomed with 

 transports of joy ; but it was soon seen that it was only an odious falsehood. 

 Two days afterwards, the news spread that the savage bands of ran Enghedda 

 had rushed like a torrent over Togara, Oauzaghie, charming countries, whose 

 name recalls to the traveller only pleasing impressions. This report was only 

 too well founded. The pillage extended to Terka ; the venerated sanctuary of 

 Baatha was not respected. 



The Negus, from his camps of Boxarghef and Isti, where dysentery and hard- 

 ships decimated his troops, continually directed rapid raids against the hostile 

 provinces. He went out generally at night, with 500 or 600 horsemen, after 

 having openly announced a raid which was never that which he really made; 

 he would march all night and in the morning would fall upon the enemy sur- 



