Page:A voyage to Abyssinia (Salt).djvu/150

142 to go ashore on a strange coast, without sending, if possible, an interpreter with the party, and even then he should be particularly cautious in selecting for the service a steady officer, of mild conduct and conciliating manners, who would consider that, in seeking water merely, he was asking for an indulgence which, though apparently trifling in his estimation, might be of infinite importance to those with whom he had to communicate, while the men should at the same time be strictly enjoined not to stir from the side of their officer, nor to attempt laying their hands on the slightest article until some agreement should have been entered into with the natives, or some interchange of presents should have taken place. Were these circumstances more minutely attended to, and the peculiar prejudices and customs of the people more generally respected, I feel convinced, that the inhabitants of most countries would, in the first instance, be naturally inclined to treat strangers with hospitality; and accidents like those alluded to would prove of much rarer occurrence. These sentiments I have imbibed from frequent observation on the thoughtless and unguarded conduct of our seamen, and from remarking the extreme care and caution used by the natives of Africa themselves in opening a communication with tribes to which they had before been strangers; a particular instance of which I shall have occasion to describe in a subsequent visit to the Island of Howakil. The country round Amphila forms part of an extensive tract formerly termed the kingdom of Dankali, the sovereign of which was engaged at an early period in the wars carried on by the Kings of Hurrur and Adaiel against Abyssinia. The inhabitants are nearly allied by their habits and language to the Adaiel, and their respective territories lay contiguous, till the great inroad of the Galla, who, by advancing to the coast in the neighbourhood of Asab, completely separated them. Both the district and the people inhabiting it still retain the name of Dankali, but the latter is now subdivided into a great number of petty tribes, each ruled by its own peculiar chief. The tribe of greatest consequence is that of the Dumhoeta, who hold possession of the coast from Béluol to Aréna, besides considerable districts in the interior: