Page:Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile - In the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, and 1773 volume 4.djvu/217

Rh first circumstance that gave alarm was the appearance of the horse, but they were not taken for an enemy, but for Ayto Tesfos returning. Kefla Yasous now gave the signal to charge, by beating a kettle-drum, and every soldier fell upon the enemy nearest him. It is impossible to describe the confusion that followed, nor was it easy to distinguish enemies from friends, especially for us on horseback; only those that fled were reckoned enemies. The greatest execution done by the horse was breaking the jars of honey, butter, beer, wine, and flour, and gathering as many mules together as possible to drive them away. Few of the enemy came our way towards the plain, but most fled up the hill: in an instant the straw huts upon the rock were set on fire, and Kefla Yasous had ordered rather to destroy the provisions than the men, since there was no resistance. I passed a large tent, which I judged to be that of Ayto Tesfos, which our people immediately cut open; but, instead of an officer of consequence, we saw, by the light of a lamp, three or four naked men and women, totally overpowered with drink and sleep, lying helpless, like so many hogs, upon the ground, utterly unconscious of what was passing about them. Upon a large tin platter, on a bench, lay one of the large horns, perfectly drained of the spirits that it had contained; it was one of the most beautiful, for shape and colour, I ever had seen, though not one of the largest. This horn was all my booty that night. Upon my return to Britain, it was asked of me by Sir Thomas Dundas of Carse, to serve for a bugle-horn to the Fauconberg regiment, to which, as being partem sanguine, it was very properly adapted. That regiment being disbanded soon after, I know not further what came