TRAVELS IN ABYSSINIA. 
11 
©r an ass for a cow, the difference of value is made 
up in corn or salt. Hens and capons form the 
small coin in this traffic. Priests, friars, and nuns, 
are the principal dealers. 
After a short stay at Dobarwa, the travellers 
set out in the middle cf June, a period which only 
their extreme ignorance could have chosen. It is 
in this country " the fury of winter," every day 
being marked by tempests of rain and thunder. 
They found in their route a still more terrible 
plague, common to almost all Africa, that of locusts. 
These devouring insects reduce the country to a 
more completely ruined state, than if it were con- 
sumed by fire. If general, they would entirely depo- 
pulate Abyssinia ; but, fortunately, their ravages are 
usually confined to one province in one year. The 
people, when they see them, " become as dead 
" men," and cry out, " We are undone, for the 
" locusts come." The embassy met numbers of 
men and women going to other countries in search 
of food, which they could no longer find in their* 
native district. The Romish priests, however, 
undertook to deliver the country from this plague. 
They collected a number of the locusts, and made 
a solemn adjuration, that, within three hours, they 
should depart for the sea, the mountains, or the 
land of the Moors, and should let Christians alone. 
The locusts present were then dismissed, to carry 
this admonition to their brethren. Accordingly, 
