Page:Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile - In the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, and 1773 volume 2.djvu/64

48 prince, hearing that Amda Sion, instead of returning, as was usual in the rainy season, into Abyssinia, had determined to continue to ravage his whole country, had not, on his part, been remiss in preparing means to resist him; and he had assembled, from every province, all the forces they could raise, to make one last effort against their common enemy.

, therefore, had scarcely retired from the destruction of Talab, when the king of Adel (become now desperate by being so long a spectator of the ruin of his kingdom) marched hastily to meet him, with much less precaution than his own situation, and the character of his enemy, required. Amda Sion, whose whole wish was to bring the Moors to an engagement as often as occasion presented, left off his plundering upon the first news that the king of Adel had taken the field, and, allowing him to choose the ground on which he was to fight, the next day he marched against him, having (as sure of victory) first detached bodies of horse to intercept those of the Moors that should fly when defeated; For no general was more provident than this king for the destruction of his enemy. He then led his troops against the king of Adel, and, spurring his horse, was already in the midst of the Moorish army before the most active of his soldiers had time to follow him. The Abyssinians, as usual, threw themselves like madmen upon the Moors, at the sight of the king's danger. The king of Adel was defeated with little resistance: that unfortunate prince himself was slain upon the spot, and the greatest part of his army destroyed (after they thought themselves safe) by the ambushes of fresh horse the king had placed in their rear before the battle.