Page:Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile - In the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, and 1773 volume 2.djvu/699

Rh Joas himself; and from the palace, attended by two hundred soldiers, and all the people of note in the town, he went straight to take possession of the house which is particularly appropriated to his office, and sat down in judgment with the doors open.

parties of soldiers had entered at several parts of the town, and begun to use that licence they had been accustomed to on their march, pilfering and plundering houses, or persons that seemed without protection. Upon the first complaints, as he rode through the town, he caused twelve of the delinquents to be apprehended, and hanged upon, trees in the streets, sitting upon his mule till he saw the execution performed. After he had arrived at his house, and was seated, these executions were followed by above fifty others in different quarters of Gondar. That same day he established four excellent officers in four quarters of the town. The first was Kefla Yasous, a man of the greatest worth, whom I shall frequently mention as a friend in the course of my history; the second, Billetana Gueta Welleta Michael, that is, first master of the household to the king. He had given that old officer that office, upon superseding Lubo the king's uncle, without any consent asked or given. He was a man of a very morose turn, with whom I was never connected. The third was Billetana Gueta Tecla, his sister's son, a man of very great worth and merit, who had the soft and gentle manners of Amhara joined to the determined courage of the Tigran.

took upon himself the charge of the fourth district. He did not pretend by this to erect a military