Page:Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile - In the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, and 1773 volume 2.djvu/455

 and surprise the Agows, whole children they fell at Guba, to the Mahometans, who traffic there for gold and slaves, and get iron and coarse cotton-cloths in return. Their country is full of woods, and their manner of life the same as has been already described in speaking of the other tribes.

Geesa live close upon the Nile, to which river they give their own name. It is also called Geesa by the Agows, in the small district of Geesh where it rises from its source. They never have yet made peace with Abyssinia, are governed by the heads of families, and live separately for the sake of hunting, and, for this reason, are easily conquered. The men are naked; having a cotton rag only about their middle. The nights are very cold, and they lie round great-fires; but the fly is not so dangerous here as to the eastward, so that goats, in a small number, live here. Their arms are bows, lances, and arrows; large wooden clubs, with knobs, nearly as big as a man's head, at the end of them; their shields are oval. They worship the Nile, but no other river, as I have said before; it is called Geesa, which, in their language, signifies the first Maker, or Creator. They imagine its water is a cure for most diseases.

of the Geesa is Wumbarea, which reaches to Belay. The king fell first on the Geesa, part of whom he took, and the rest he dispersed. He then turned to the right through Wumbarea, and met with some resistance in the narrow passes in the mountains, in one of which Kasmati Kosté, (one of his principal officers) a man of low birth, but raised by his merit to his present rank, was slain by an arrow.