Tih SOURCE. OF THE NTLE. 4.39 
ready, and mounted on horfeback, that we might join them. 
Yet it was a thing appeared to us {carcely poflible, that Fa- 
fil fhould beat Ras Michael fo eafily, and with fo fhort a re- 
fiftance.. 
We had not gone far in the plain before we had a figlit 
ef the enemy, to our very great furprife and no fmall 
comfort. A multitude of deer, buffaloes, boars, and va- 
rious other wild beafts, had’ been alarmed by the noife 
and daily advancing of the army, and gradually driven be- 
fore them. The country was all overgrown with wild oats, 
a great many of the villages having been burnt the year be- 
fore the inhabitants had abandoned: them; inthis fhelter 
the wild beafts had taken up their abodes in very great num- 
bers. When the army pointed towards Karcagna.to the 
left, the filence and folitude on the oppofite fide made them. 
turn to the right to where the Nile makes a fem1-circle, the 
Jemma being behind them, and much overflowed. When: 
the army, therefore, inftead of marching fouth and by eatft 
towards Samfeen, had turned their courfe north-weft, their _ 
faces towards Gondar, they had fallen in with thefe innu-— 
merable herds of deer and.other beafts, who, confined be- 
tween. the Nile, the Jemma, and the lake, had'no way to re-. 
turn but that by which they had come. Thefe animals,. 
finding men in every: direction in which they attempted 
to pafs, became defperate with fear, and, not knowing what 
courfe to take, fell a prey to the troops. The foldiers, hap- 
py in an occafion of procuring animal food; prefently fell. 
to firing wherever the beafts appeared; every loaded gun 
was difcharged upon them, and this continued for very near 
an hour. A numerous flock of the largeft deer met us juft. 
in. the face, and feemed fo defperate, that they had every 
appearance 
