Page:Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile - In the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, and 1773 volume 4.djvu/300

 ed by a high outer-wall, which may have above an English mile of circumference. This outer precinct is all occupied by soldiers, labourers, and our dour servants; within this is another large court inclosed by walls likewise, in this the apartments are but of one storey, appropriated to the principal officers, priests, and servants. In this alter is the church, built by the present Itegé herself, and reckoned the richest in Abyssinia. They have large crosses of gold for their processions, and kettle-drums of silver. The altar is all covered with gold plates, all the gift of their magnificent patroness. The priests, too, were all rich, till Ras Michael seized, and applied part of their revenue to his own use, and that of the state, and thereby reduced them to a condition much more agreeable to the vows of poverty, which from pride they had made, than was their former one.

The third, or inner court, is reserved for the queen's own apartments, and such of the noble women as are her attendants, are unmarried, and make up her court. Behind the palace, higher up the hill, are houses of people of quality, chiefly her own relations. Above these the mountain rises very regularly, in form of a cone, covered with herbage to the very top; on the east side is the road from Walkayt; on the west from Kuara, and Ras el Feel; that is all the low country, or north of Abyssinia, bordering upon the Shangalla, through which lies the road to Sennaar.

It was the 26th of December 1771, at one o'clock in the afternoon, that I left Gondar. I had purposed to set out early in the morning, but was detained by the importunity of my friends. The king had delayed my setting out, by several orders sent me in the evening each day; and I plainly saw