138 
A YTH. 
brooght down to it by the Troglodytes, or Bedowee, (vide Nat. 
Hist. p. 143) ; it is also in all probability the port often men- 
tioned by the Portuguese under the name of the harbour of 
Veila or Beila. Thermometer at mid-day 78°. 
December 9th. We got under way at sun-rise, and with a 
cool refreshing gale continued to coast along the shore. We 
passed the Abaiels, and steered our course inside the southern 
Island of Kudaly ; and at two in the afternoon came to an 
anchor oiF the village of Ayth. There scarcely can exist a worse 
place for anchorage than Ayth, the road lying perfectly open, 
and, when the wind blows from the southern quarter, a heavy 
sea running along the coast, which, as the ground is foul, makes 
the riding extremely dangerous. 
Soon after our arrival we sent a boat on shore and gained 
intelligence, that the gelve I had dispatched from Mocha still re- 
mained at Amphila, that Yunus was dead, (having, as was gene- 
rally reported, been poisoned) and that my messenger had failed in 
obtaining an intercourse with the Ras, owing to the interference 
of the Nayib of Massowa, and that the latter had sent down two 
armed dows to attempt the seizure of Yunus's boat and to prevent 
the English from opening a communication with Abyssinia by 
the way of Amphila. 
This information was given me by Wursum the son of Yunus, 
w ho on the death of his father had succeeded, according to the 
customs of the Somauli, to the command of the boat. This young 
man had come down to Ayth for the purpose of performing the 
last duties to his deceased father, who having married a woman 
of a Dankali tribe belonging to this village had, on his being 
