18 VISIT TO WALLASMAH. 



to obtain for me the expected note. When he 

 returned, he brought me an order to go to the 

 Wallasmah myself, as he wanted to see me ; and who 

 occupied a house upon one of the little eminences 

 opposite to mine. I was not long in presenting 

 myself in obedience to this summons, and found 

 that gentleman sitting upon a large oxskin 

 spread upon the ground, paring his toe nails 

 with an old pocket knife. As I came round 

 the low stone fence against which he leaned, he 

 cast his eyes upon me, and growled a very sinister 

 kind of salutation, asking me in broken Arabic 

 how I did. I now requested him to give me the 

 letter from Ankobar, but he only shook his head. 

 I asked to see the messenger, and with a chuckle 

 of triumphant cunning, he pointed with the open 

 knife to the fastened door of an outhouse, an action 

 which I readily interpreted to mean, " He is there, 

 in prison." I did not say a word more, but walked 

 away in high dudgeon, overturning a rude Abys- 

 sinian who, with spear and shield pushed against 

 me, as if to prevent my exit when I made my way 

 out through a little wicket in the stick enclosure 

 that surrounded the house. 



The worst of my situation was, that I had no 

 friends near, all the Hy Soumaulee and Tajourah 

 people being according to custom, obliged to 

 locate themselves during their stay in Shoa, in a 

 little town called Channo, situated about two 

 miles to the north-east of Farree, where they are 



