^04 
MASSOWA. 
countryman on board as a brother, and it was interesting to ob- 
serve, with what respect and astonishment our sailors looked up 
to him in return, from the various accounts they had previously 
heard of the intrepidity with which he had surmounted so many 
dangers. He subsequently gave proofs of extraordinary activity ; 
and his knowledge of a ship, considering how long he had been 
absent from every thing of the kind, was very remarkable, for, 
though we had several excellent sailors on board, there was not 
a single person that could follow him aloft, owing to the rapidity 
with which he darted from one point of the ship to another. 
I was also glad to find that the cultivation of his mind had 
kept pace with the improvement of his bodily powers. To a 
complete knowledge of the language ofTigre, which is reckoned 
by the natives extremely difficult to acquire, he had added a 
tolerable share of the Amharic, and possessed so perfect an in- 
sight into the manners and feelings of the Abyssinians, that his 
assistance to me as an interpreter became invaluable. 
On the 11th, Abba Yusuph and a slave were sent to me 
by the Kaimakan, with a present of two bullocks and fifteen 
sheep, accompanied by a request that my first visit might be 
arranged for the following day. Accordingly, on the 12th, I left 
the ship and proceeded to the shore, under a salute of thirteen 
guns from the Marian, which was returned by the discharge 
of an old dismounted six-pounder, lying on the beach. On 
landing, I was conducted by about twenty Ascari to the Divan, 
where all the principal people on the island were assembled ; 
the Kaimakan, a respectable looking Turk, with somewhat 
of dignity in his manners, sitting in a retired corner, which 
