CHELICUT. 
311 
this, when all hope began to be given up of an arrival from 
Mocha, Mr. Pearce was warned by a Somauli, then trading on 
the coast, '' to take care of his life," and shortly after he disco- 
vered, through his interpreter, that Kudoo, the Dola of the place, 
instigated by Alii Manda, had laid a plan to murder him, and, 
that it was proposed afterwards to sell the Abyssinians who had 
accompanied him for slaves ; each of whom, it was said, would 
have fetched an hundred dollars in Arabia. In consequence of 
this information, Mr. Pearce kept continually on his guard, and 
by his alertness fortunately frustrated an actual attempt that was 
made to destroy him. 
One rainy night, after he had retired to rest, and was supposed 
to be asleep, he heard the footsteps of a man cautiously moving 
near the place where he lay, and in a moment afterwards he 
observed the glimmering of a spear pointed at his breast ; but 
before the person who held it had time to strike, he rushed for- 
ward, and caught hold of it by the shaft, and drawing his own 
knife at the same time, was on the point of plunging it into the 
body of the assassin, when the intreaties of his attendants, alarmed 
by his moving, fortunately restrained his intentions. On a light 
being struck, it was discovered that the villain was Kudoo him- 
self, who, in a very suspicious way, pretended to turn oiF the 
whole affair as a joke, declaring that '' he only did it to try the 
courage of a white man." 
this nation in difficulties. During my stay at Mocha, Hadjee Sake, an Arab trader, 
brought two Englishmen to that place whom he had picked up at Lamo^ where, but for 
his charitable assistance, they must hare starved. These men had run away from an East 
Indiaman at Johanna, and had gained a passage to the African coast in a native boat. 
