Page:Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile - In the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, and 1773 volume 3.djvu/514

490 time known to be true, and the fear of Ras Michael threatening Gondar every day, not a living soul was there but a monk belonging to the church itself, who kept the key. It was thought criminal to know what it was apparent Michael had wished to conceal. Petros no sooner saw his master's face than, saying, It is he! he ran off with all the speed possible: for my part, I was mocked at the indecent manner in which the body was exposed; it affected me more than the murder itself, for it appeared as if it had been thrown down upon the ground, the head, arms, and legs lying in all sorts of directions, and great part of his haunch and thigh bare. I desired the monk to lock the door, and come along with me to Petros's house. Petros was a merchant who sold carpets, and such sort of goods used in the country, which he brought from Cairo. It was full an hour before we could make him behave sensibly, or deliver me a small Persian carpet, such as Mahometans use to pray upon, that is about seven feet long and four feet broad, and a web of coarse muslin, which I bought of him. I told the priest (for Petros absolutely refused to return to the church) how to lay the body decently upon the carpet, and to cover his face and every part with the muslin cloth, which might be lifted when any body came to see the corpse.

priest received the carpet with great marks of satisfaction, and told me it was he who had challenged the murderers when carrying the body over the wall; that he knew them well, and suspected they had been about some mischief; and, upon hearing the king was missing the next day, he was firmly convinced it was his body that had been buried. Upon going also to the place early in the morn-