Alvarez's narrative. 
11 
cation. A great market is held at Dobarwa, 
where, as elsewhere in Abyssinia, every transac- 
tion is carried on by barter. If a goat is to be 
exchanged for an ass, or an ass for a cow, the dif- 
ference 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 of 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 lo- 
custs. These devouring insects reduce the coun- 
try to a more completely ruined state than if it 
were consumed by fire. If general, they would 
entirely depopulate 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 coun- 
try from this plague. They collected a number 
of the locusts, and made a solemn adjuration, 
that, within three hours, they should depart for 
