■ 59 6 TRAVELS TO DISCOVER-. 



Bacuffa was thought: -to anfwer thefe expectations ; and, hi 

 the end, he was found to exceed them.:. Silent, fecret, and: 

 unfathomable in his defigns, furrouuded by ibldiers who 

 were his own flaves, and b^ new men of his own creation^ 

 he removed thofe tyrants who oppofed their fovereigns up- 

 on the fmalleft provocation. Confpiracy followed confpiracy, 

 and rebellion rebellion ; but all were defeated, as foon 

 as they had birth* by the fuperior activity and addrefs of r 

 the king. 



I have faid he was called Bacuffa by the Galla; but, in • 

 compliance with the cuftom of Abyffinia, already mentioned, , 

 he had affirmed Hill two other names, which were, Atzham s 

 Georgis, his name of baptifm,- and Adebar Segued, which > 

 means "reverenced by the towns or inhabited places of the 

 country," given him at his inauguration.-. As for that of 

 Bacuffa, which meant the inexorable^ it was the lefs difho- - 

 nourable from having been given him by impartial Gran- 

 gers from their own obfervation while he was yet in pri- 

 vate life ; his whole conduct afterwards {hewed how juftly. . 



The king has near his perfon an officer who is meant to 

 be his hiftoriographer. He is alfo keeper of his feal, and is 

 obliged to make a journal of the king's actions, good or bad, . 

 without comment of his own upon them. This, when the 

 king dies, or at leaft foon after, is delivered to the council, s 

 who read it over, and erafe every thing falfe in it ; whilft 

 they fupply any material fact that may have been omitted, , 

 whether purpofely or not. This would have been a very 

 dangerous book to have been kept in Bacuffa's time ; and, 

 accordingly, no perfon chofe ever to run that riik ; and the 

 king's particular behaviour afterwards had ftill. the fmv 



ther 



