AMBAKAUKO. 
248 
give orders for our proceeding in the afternoon up the steep hill 
on which the village stands. The reception we met with on our 
first arrival proved very satisfactory ; a house and provisions were 
supplied by the Shum of the district, and the people behaved 
with remarkable civility. 
After such treatment, the reader may readily conceive our 
astonishment and horror in the morning, at finding that one of 
our party, whom I had hired at Massowa, had been barbarously 
murdered during the night. He had gone out of the inclosure to 
seek for a draught of water, when he had been set upon by a 
gang of the villagers, and, being overpowered, had fallen a sacri- 
fice to their revenge. The brave fellow, undaunted by their 
numbers, had evidently fought with much desperation, and had 
wounded several of his antagonists, as appeared by the tracks of 
blood which were found in the morning, leading, from the spot 
where he had been killed, to the town. 
The Shum of the district, a respectable old man in appearance, 
denied all knowledge of the transaction, yet, as, the perpetrators 
could not be found, he was immediately tied to one of our boys 
by Debib, according to a singular practice which is universal 
throughout the country, and carried forward with us to answer 
for the death, before his superior the Baharnegash Subhart. In 
the mean time, while we proceeded on our journey, Debib rode 
across the country to visit his friend Shum Woldo, and to acquaint 
him with the occurrence ; and this chief, though himself a noto- 
rious marauder, not only expressed great abhorrence at the 
treachery of the act, but sent forw ard immediately a messenger to 
Baharnegash Subhart^ to declare, that if the murderers were not 
I i 
