In the evening Barrakee, the young chief's tutor, proposed that we should go up to the top of a high-peaked hill close by, and see the country we were approaching. We rode up some distance, and at last had to get off our mules as the way became very steep. Certainly a more glorious view I never saw. To the north-west we could see the plains through which the Mareb runs, and to the south-west were the mountains among whose gorges that splendid river the Tackazzee flows; beyond the Tackazzee to the west, in fact in front of us, might be seen two mountains, one of which is of a very peculiar shape--these mark the province of Walkait. On the top of one of these mountains is a fort or stronghold which cannot be reached except by ropes--no human being can climb up to it. Due south of where we were standing lay crowded together that mass of mountains called the Siemien range, the tops of which, the natives informed us, were covered with snow the whole year round. This I cannot vouch for, as I certainly did not see any at that time; and I almost think, if there had been snow, it would have caught the rays of the setting sun, and it could have been seen quite distinctly. The Tackazzee rises in the Siemien from springs; at least, this I think and believe is the case, on the authority of an old servant we had with us, called Hadji Mahomet, who came from that part of the world. As we looked below us we could see the inmates of some huts that were clustered round the mountain engaged in celebrating a marriage. All the company were assembled in a large "das," or leafy bower, drinking and dancing, and every now and then a shot would be fired off in the air in celebration of the auspicious event. As I looked towards the distant view which lay before us I little thought that on my return journey I should be as anxious to get home as I was then to explore those regions. We waited till the sun set behind the mountains of Walkait, and then came down the hill and made for camp.
H. and I very much wished, before leaving the country, to try and get some black leopard skin, and some of the silver-mounted shields which are made at Adowa, and which are carried by the great chiefs of the country. K. said that if we wrote out an order and sent it to Adowa it would be attended to. I wrote out a couple of orders, one for the black leopard skins and the other for the shields, and we both signed them and got John to transcribe them into Amharic. While I was writing them he remarked that English writing was very quick and very different from writing Amharic, in which every letter has to be formed separately, in the same way as when we "print" with a pen in English.