Page:Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile - In the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, and 1773 volume 2.djvu/666

650 mountain Samayat, though not the most inaccessible in Tigrè, was a place of great consequence and strength, when possessed by an army and officer such as Michael. To this natural fortress he carried all his valuable effects, occupied and obstructed all the avenues to it, and resolved there to abide his fortune. The king, with his army, sat down at the foot of the mountain; and, encircling it with troops, he ordered it to to be assaulted on four sides at once; on one, by Kasmati Ayo, governor of Begemder; on the second, by Kasmati Waragna; the third, by Kasmati Woldo; and the fourth, by Ras Welled de l'Oul. The king himself went round about to every place, giving his orders, encouraging his men, and fighting himself in the foremost ranks like a common soldier. The mountain was at length carried, with much bloodshed on both sides, and Michael was beat from every part of it but one, which, though not strong enough to hold out against the king's army, if well defended could not be carried without great loss of men.

Michael desired to capitulate. But, before he left the mountain and surrendered to the king, he desired that an officer of trust might be sent to him, because he had then upon the mountain a large collection of treasure, which he desired to keep for the king's use, otherwise it would be dissipated and lost in the hands of the common soldiers. The Ras sent two confidential officers, who took from the hands of Michael a prodigious sum of gold, the precise amount of which is not named. He then descended the mountain, carrying, as is the custom of the country for vanquished rebels, a stone upon his head, as confessing himself guilty of a capital crime. A violent storm of rain and wind prevented, for that day, his coming into the