Page:Africa by Élisée Reclus, Volume 1.djvu/273

 time of the invasion of Grafiheh. But on settling down they adopted many of the customs of the Amharinians, whom they had disjwssessed; abandoning their nomad life they became agriculturists and adopted the toga, although they retained their Mohammedan faith. In the northern part of WoUoland, on a rock {mssessing excellent natural defences, the King of Shoa has founded the stronghold of Woreilla, near the confines of Abyssinia properly so called. This place has become a very important market for exchanges between the two realms, and here the Emperor Johannes usually gives receptions to his vassals.

All the territory south-west and west of Shoa belongs also to the Ilm-Ormas, and possesses large collections of buildings almost worthy the name of towns. The barren northern slopes of Mount Hierer, or Jerrer, are covered with the huts of the large Mussulman village of Rogeh, or Rogieh, which, situated on one of the affluents of the Awash on the confines of Gurageh, in the territory of the Galla tribe of the Galen, has a large trade in coffee, and is still the chief slave-market in southern Abyssinia. This traffic is officially forbidden in the possessions of King Menelik, and the captives are not publicly exposed, but they are secretly sold and sent to the sea-ports, whence they are exported to Arabia or Egypt. In 1878, the explorers Chiarini and Cecchi found the "current price" of the Galla slave to vary from thirty or forty Maria-Theresa crown-pieces for a young and good-looking girl, to four for an old woman. All the inhabitants of Rogeh, numbering some 10,000, claim to be of Tigr^ stock, and are said to descend from two Mohammedans who immigrated some centuries ago. The plain of Finfini to the west, near the sources of the Awash, and at the mouth of a formidable gorge, is frequently selected by the sovereigns of Shoa as the rallying-point where the armies assemble for expeditions into the Galla country. Hot springs, at which the cattle drink, spout forth in the plain, and the neighbouring mountains furnish an iron ore from which nearly all the Shoa hardware is manufactured. The rocks in the vicinity are honeycombed with grottoes, one of which has several naves with elliptical vaults, separated from each other by square pillars which grow thinner towards the middle. These works of art, in a country now occupied by the miserable dwellings of the Katelo Gallas, are a standard by which the decadence of civilisation can be measured. On the solitary Mount Eudotto, west of the plain of Finfini, formerly stood a capital of the kingdom of Shoa, and here the tombs of its ancient kings are still to be seen. It is now the residence of a r&s, or chief. In this region, one of the most fertile in Abyssinia, the French explorer, Amoux, obtained from Menelik a grant of 250,000 acres of land, on which he intended to establish a European colony. When easy routes through the valley of the Awash are opened between it and Tajurah Bay, this region will doubtless become one of the most productive in Africa. Meanwhile the graftings of wild olives and the chinchona plantations are preparing the future wealth of the country. The King of Shoa has recently chosen as his residence the village of Dildilla, west of Finfini ; it is one of the temporary capitals of the kingdom, and is moreover placed in an excellent strategic position to watch over the Galla populations.

Beyond the Awash stretch the Galla republican confederations and small