INTERVIEW WITH SLAVES. 425 



tired to think of going on to Aliu Amba directly, 

 but made up my mind to stay until an hour or two 

 before sunset, to arrive in that town just in time 

 for bed, and so escape the houseful of inquiring 

 friends, who would have thronged around me with 

 compliments and congratulations on my return. 



To amuse me some portion of the time, Mus- 

 culo introduced three of four slaves who had been 

 brought from the more interesting countries around 

 Shoa, and none of whom, as regards their political 

 relations with that country, demand a more parti- 

 cular notice than the Gallas. These appear to 

 surround Shoa on every side, except towards the 

 north, where the Amhara inhabitants of the 

 Argobba appear to have their country in that 

 direction, continuous with the Shoan province of 

 Efat; but even here a narrow belt of debateable 

 land, by the mutual jealousies of the rulers of the 

 two kingdoms, is left to the undisputed possession 

 of some unsettled Adal Galla tribes. 



I have several times, in the body of this work, 

 represented these people as being the mixed descend- 

 ants of the Dankalli and Shankalli people, and 

 although this descent has been modified in some 

 situations by contiguity to nations differing very con- 

 siderably, both physically and morally, from each 

 other, still all the numerous tribes that stretch on 

 the eastern side of the table land of Abyssinia, 

 from the neighbourhood of Massoah to an unknown 

 distance in the south, speak one language, and 



