iv THROUGH SOMALILAND AND ABYSSINIA 
there will be apparent when it is realised that pastoral Soméli- 
land sends large supplies to this important station ; in the one item 
of mutton some sixty thousand sheep being sent over annually. 
The first and most remote cause of the present trouble may 
be looked for in our attempt to set up Harar, without further 
support, as an independent state after the Egyptian garrison 
left. 
Harar was an Arab state peopled by a mixed population of 
Arabs, Somalis, Gallas, and half-breeds, collectively called Hararis, 
the city itself garrisoned by Egypt. It was a magnificent high- 
land country of agricultural land and tropical forests, often rising 
to an elevation of some nine thousand feet, if not more ; its slopes 
descended on the east to Somaliland, and on the west to the 
great Hawash River depression; beyond was Shoa, one of the 
kingdoms of Abyssinia. : 
History tells us of conflicts between Christian Abyssinia and 
the Mahommedan state of Harar from time to time; but the 
pine-clad passes of entry from the Hawash were difficult to force 
and easily defended. Harar was safe and isolated, and the 
soldiers of Abyssinia and Harar alike were indifferently armed 
with spears, shields, and antiquated muskets. 
When Egypt proposed withdrawing from Harar in 1884, two 
separate missions were sent up from Aden to Harar to report on 
the military situation, and to facilitate the withdrawal of the 
Egyptian troops. 
Harar was practically in our hands, and it is conceivable that 
could later events have been foreseen, and considering its un- 
doubted commercial value, it might have remained under our 
influence. 
Though the fact was not likely to have been recognised in 
the state of our knowledge at the time, Harar offered a valuable 
buffer-state, which, if strengthened and supported, might have 
kept apart the well-armed Abyssinians, who are Christians, from 
the badly-armed Somalis, who are Mahommedans. But at that 
time the influx of arms had scarcely begun, and Abyssinian 
restlessness was not so apparent. 
Be that as it may, the British saw the Egyptians safely down 
to Zeyla, and set up an old Arab family government, that of 
the Emir Abdillahi, with a comparatively weak escort of Hararis, 
armed with muskets and rifles, to administer the state in place 
of the Egyptian authorities. 
The British officers returned, and the Zeyla expedition, sent 
