Page:Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile - In the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, and 1773 volume 2.djvu/540

524 are mentioned in Elias's letter to the consul as having been in Abyssinia. He calls them those of the league of Michael and Samuel, of whom we shall speak afterwards. But, even though the French consul had ordered his nation to drive all the subjects of Sennaar from their houses and service, none of these missionaries were afraid to return and abide at Sennaar, because they knew the murder of the ambassador was the work of their own hands, and, without their instigation, would never have been committed.

unlucky messenger, Elias, was again about to enter Sennaar, when he received information that du Roule was assassinated. If he had fled hastily from this inauspicious place upon the murder of Yasous, his haste was now ten-fold, as he considered himself engaged in the same circumstances that had involved M. du Roule's attendants in his misfortunes.

king, upon hearing the account given by Elias of the melancholy fate of the ambassador at Sennaar, was so exasperated, that he gave immediate orders for recalling such of his troops as he had permitted to go to any considerable distance; and, in a council held for that purpose, he declared, that he considered the death of M. du Roule as an affront that immediately affected his crown and dignity. He was, therefore, determined not to pass it over, but to make the king of Sennaar sensible that he, as well as all the other kings upon earth, knew the necessity of observing the law of nations, and the bad consequence of perpetual retaliations that must follow the violation of it. In the mean time, thinking that the basha of Cairo was the cause of this, he wrote the following letter to him.