MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. The natives are of a dark olive complexion; and the dress a light robe, bound with a sash, the head being covered with a kind of turban*. The houses are of a conic form, meanly built of clay, and covered with thatch; and even the churches are of a round form, encircled with a portico. Christianity seems to hold but a slight influence over the manners and morals, and the priests are little respected. Engaged in the constant suppression of insurrections, or in petty warfare with the surrounding states, particularly the Galas, who seem a tribe of the Jagas, the government of Abyssinia pays little attention to the progress of industry and civilization. After fifteen centuries of christianity, this country recals the image of the barbarous states of Europe in the seventh or eighth centuries. To some nations, particularly the negroes and savages of America, cruelty seems so familiar, and sympathy or compassion so utterly unknown, that the sufferings of another are not only unfelt, but viewed with an unaccountable kind of delight. Were it not for this unpleasant truth, the reports of some travellers would scarcely be credible, when they assure us that, at an Abyssinian banquet, the flesh is cut from the live oxen. Others however only affirm that the natives are fond of raw flesh, a taste not unknown to the people of Tibet, and other countries. Even religion sometimes bends before the influence of climate, and polygamy is not unknown among these christians; the kings in particular having frequently many wives and concubines. By a singular custom the wife is punished if the husband prove fidse. The only meal is commonly in the evening, and the abstinence of Lent is carefully preserved; nay, according to Alvarez, the clergy and monks only eat three times a week. The common beverages are mead and a kind of beerf. The negus, or king, for the title of emperor is ridiculous, is considered as the sole proprietor of the land, while private property is restricted to moveable goods.

Language. The language is regarded as an ancient offspring of the Arabic, and is divided into various dialects, among which the chief are the Tigrin or that of the province of Tigri, and the Amharic. The Galanic is also widely diffused, the Galas being a numerous adjacent people, who frequently disturb the public tranquillity. The Abyssinian language is illustrated by the labours of Ludolf, and several missionaries; and is probably nearly allied to the Coptic, the Egyptians passing from the north of ancient Arabia, and the Abyssinians from

the south.

Cities. The chief city in modern times is Gondar, situated upon a hill. According to Bruce it contains 10,000 families, that is about 50,000 souls; but in the time of Alvarez none of the cities were supposed to exceed fifteen hundred houses. The palace, or rather house of the negus, is at the west end. flanked with square towers, from the summit of which was a view of the southern country, as far as the lake of Tzana or Dembea. Axum, the ancient capital, is

• Poncet in Lockman, i. 230, &o. From a just enmity against the sanguinary and fanatical Portuguese missionaries, they detest the resemblance of a white complexion, and even shew an aversion to white grapes. Ib. 241. f Alvarez, fol. 200. Lobo, p. 54.

still known by extensive ruins, among which are many obelisks of granite, but without hieroglyphics. The other towns are few and unimportant. On the rock of Geshen, in the province of Amhara, were formerly confined the Abyssinian princes: and Abyssinia in general is remarkable for detached precipitous rocks, appearing at a distance like castles and towns, a feature also usual in New Granada, and other north-eastern parts of South America. The rock of Ambazel, in the same province, has also been dedicated to the same political purpose, both being near a small river, which flows into the Bahr el Azrek.

Manufactures Ann Commerce. The manufactures and commerce are of small consequence, the latter being chiefly confined to Masua on the Red Sea. The earthen ware is decent; but though Cosmo de Medici, among other artisans, sent manufactures of glass to the neguz, the Abyssinians still seem strangers to this, and many other common fabrics.

Climate Ann Seasons. The climate is attempered by the mountainous nature of the country. From April to September there are heavy rains; and in the dry season of the six succeeding months, the nights are cold. Alvarez has long ago remarked that the rise of the Nile in Egypt is occasioned by the violent rains, which, during the Rummer, deluge the southern regions; and he might perhaps have added the melting of the snows in the African alps, which give source to the real Nile the Bahr el Abiad; for as the Atlas is covered with perpetual snow, which also crowns the Andes under the equator, it is probable that the central ridge of Africa presents the same features, and that an ancient geographer might have been frozen to death in his torrid zone. Abyssinia is one of the most mountainous and precipitous countries in the world; but in a few vales the soil is black and fertile.

Rivers. The chief river is the Bahr el Azrek, or Abyssi nian Nile, which has a spiral origin like the Orinoco. The sources were, in the seventeenth century, accurately described by Payz, a Portuguese missionary, whose account was published by Kircher and Isaac Vossius, and has in our times been very minutely copied by Bruce, as Hartman has explained by printing the two accounts in parallel columns. The chief spring of the Bahr el Azrek is in a small hillock, situated in a marsh. The sources of the real Nile or Bahr el Abiad, in the alps of Kumri, remain to be explored. Receiving no auxiliary streams on its long progress through Egypt, the Nile is singularly narrow and shallow, when compared with other rivers of far shorter course. The Bahr el Azrek is styled by the Abyssinians Abawi, a name of uncertain origin; and is followed by the Tacuz or Tacuzzi the Astaboras of the ancients, as the Abawi is the Astapus*. Another considerable stream is the Maleg, which joins the Abawi after a parallel course on the west: this river Bruce has vainly endeavoured to confound with the Bahr el Abiad, or White River, which, as he might have learned from the map of D'Anville 1749, is 300 miles to

The Abawi presents a remarkable cataract at a place called Alata, rot far from its epress out of the lake of Tzana. The grand cataract of the Nile is in Nubia, latitude twenty-two degrees.

the west of Maleg; and receives the Abawi at about the same distance from its junction with the former river. Several tributary streams join the Abawi and the Tacuz Two other rivers, the Hanazo and the Hawash, flow in an opposite direction, towards the entrance of the Red Sea, but the first is said to be lost in the sands of Adel.

Lakes. The chief lake is that of Tzana, also called Dembea, from a circumjacent province. This lake is pervaded by the Nile in its circular progress, as the lake of Parima by the Orinoco, being about sixty British miles in length by half that breadth, but the extent differs greatly in the dry and wet seasons. Among other islands there is one in the midst called Tzana, which is said to have given name to the lake. In the southern extremity of the kingdom is the lake of Zawaja, a chief source of the Hawash; and among many smaller expanses of water may be named the lake of Haik, near the royal rocks of Geshen and Ambazel.

Mountains. The mountains of Abyssinia seem irregularly grouped, being at the junction of that chain which borders the western shores of the Red Sea, and of that far superior ridge which pervades central Africa from east to west in a North-west to south-east direction, giving source to the Nigir and the river of Senegal at one extremity, and at the other to the Gir and Nile. Hence on the east side of Abys sinia the ridges probably pass north and south, and in the southern part west and east. As in other high ranges of mountains there are three ranks, the chief elevations being in the middle. On the east of the kingdom are the heights of Taranta, and towards the centre the Lamalmon, while in the south is the Ganza. Ttllez idly asserts that the Abyssinian mountains are higher than the Alps or Pyrenees; he adds that the loftiest are those of Amhara and Samena, that is towards the centre of the kingdom, whence rivers flow in all directions. The precipices arc tremendous and truly alpine. Abyssinia presents a rich field of natural history.

Botany. The few scanty fragments of Abyssinian botany contained in the works of Ludolph, Lobo, and Bruce, are unfortunately our only materials for the flora of eastern Africa; nor can these be wholly depended upon, as two of the above authors wrote before the existence of scientific botany, and the third, besides his ignorance on this subject, seems too much disposed to aggrandise his brief catalogue by representing common plants as rare and even new species.

The sycamore fig, the erythryna corallodendron, the tamarind, the date, the coffee, a large tree used in bpat-building, called by Bruce rack, and two species of mimosa or acacia, though probably not the principal trees, are almost the only ones that have hitherto been described. The arborescent euphorbia are found on some of the dry mountains. A shrub called, in the language of the country, wooginoos, (the brucea antidysentcrica of Bruce and Gmelin,) is celebrated by the British traveller for its medicinal virtues in the disease of which it bears the name, and the cusso or banksia of Bruce, which seems to be a species of rhus, is mentioned by the same author as a powerful anthelmintic. A large esculent herbaceous plant analogous to the banana, called by Bruce ensete, is largely cultivated by the natives as a substitute for bread. The cyperus papyrus is found here in shallow plashes

as in Egypt; and the trees that yield the balsam of Gilead, and the myrrh, are represented by the above-mentioned traveller as natives of Abyssinia.

Zoology. The horses are small but spirited, as usual in alpine countries. Cattle and buffaloes are numerous. Among wild animals are the elephant, rhinoceros, lion, panther; and it is said the giraff or camelopardalis. The hyena is also frequent, and singularly bold and ferocious, so as even to haunt the streets of the capital in the night. The extirpation of these animals may be impossible in so mountainous a country, but the circumstance indicates a miserable defect of policy. There are also wild boars, gazels or antelopes, and numerous tribes of monkics, among which is the guereza delineated by Ludolf. The hippopotamus and crocodile swarm in the lakes and rivers. Equally numerous are the kinds of birds, among which is the golden eagle of great size, but water fowl are rare. The most remarkable insect is a large fly, from whose sting even the lion flies with trepidation.

Mineralogy. The mineralogy of this alpine country must be interesting, but it is neglected by the ignorant natives. Gold is found in the sand of the rivers, and in one or two provinces is observed on digging up trees. There are some slight mines in the provinces of Narea and Oamut. Fossil salt is found on the confines of Tigri. It is said that there are no gems, and that even the royal diadem is decorated with imitations: some assert that the Abyssinians neglect to search for gold or gems, lest the Turks should be instigated by the reported wealth to invade the country.

Natural Curiosities.

The chief natural curiosities are the alpine scenes, the precipitous detached rocks, the cataract of Alata, and the river Mureb in the north-east, which is said completely to sink uuder ground.

EGYPT.

EXTENT. ORIGINAL POPULATION.—PROGRESSIVE GEOGRAPHY.— RELIGION.GOVERNMENT.—POPULATION.-REVENUES. MAN

NERS AND CUSTOMS. LANGUAGE. CITIES.—CLIMATE.—FACE OF THE COUNTRY. RIVERS. LAKES.—MOUNTAINS. BOTANY—

ZOOLOGY.MINERALOGY.

Extent. THIS country celebrated from the earliest ages of antiquity, and recently a distinguished scene of British valour, both by sea and land, is about 500 miles in length from north to south, and, including the greater and lesser Oasis, about half that breadth. But this appearance is merely nominal; Egypt being in fact a narrow vale on both sides of the river Nile, bounded by parallel ridges of mountains or hills.

Original Population. It seems to have been originally peopled from the northern parts of Arabia, or from Syria: the Egyptians and Abyssinians having been in all ages wholly distinct from the native nations of Africa. A late intelligent traveller remarks* that the Copts, or original inhabitants have no resemblance of the negro features or form. The eyes are dark, and the hair often curled, but not in a greater degree than is occasionally seen among Europeans. "The nose is often aquiline, and though the lips be sometimes thick, by no means generally so, and on the whole a strong resemblance may be traced between the form of visage in the modern Copts, and that presented in the ancient mummies, paintings and statues. Their complexion, like that of the Arabs, is of a dusky brown; it is represented of the same colour in the paintings which I have sten in the tombs of Thebes." Volney had only to inspect a mummy, or a Copt, in order to confute his hypothesis that the Egyptians were negroes; but prejudice is worse than blindness; and the prejudices of ignorant philosophy are equal to those of any other fanaticism.

Proguessive Geography. The progressive geography and history of Egypt arc familiar to most readers; and the chief antiqui

Browne, p. 71.