Gabratagli was a cheery old man, wearing a tobe, a pair of white calico drawers, and an immense straw hat. He kept a piece of calico soaked in butter over his shaven skull, under his hat, “to keep his head cool,” as he said he was a martyr to neuralgia. He rode a white mule, and had an athletic soldier, dressed in calico drawers, constantly at hand with his drinking-cup and a mysterious bottle, which did not contain water. I took a great liking to this old man.
Gabratagli had travelled much, and had often visited Aden; and he asked me concerning the health of English officers whom he had met many years before, whose names I had never heard; and on my admitting this, he remarked, “If you don’t remember these you must be very young.” Before he left my camp he sent a mounted messenger to Harar with a letter from me to the Rás, and he asked me to stay at Jig-Jiga for three or four days till the answer should have had time to arrive.
It was not till nearly sunset that Banagúsé came over, bringing his whole force across the valley to my camp. I fired a salute as he came in, my men being very pleased, and thinking themselves great soldiers after the morning’s display. I insisted on his halting his people two hundred yards from camp, and bringing only twenty men with him; and to show him that I did not like his methods, I ordered my men to squat down in a circle round the door of my reception tent, and leading Banagúsé and a few chiefs through a lane of my men, I sat down among them with my loaded rifle leaning against a chair and my revolver on. The few soldiers whom Banagúsé brought with him were allowed to wander about the camp at will, one sentry keeping a watchful eye over them. They treat their long Remington rifles shamefully, leaning on them with the muzzles half buried in the earth. Their custom is to keep these rifles loaded while on the Somáli frontier, but not, I believe, in Harar.
I found Banagúsé very intelligent, and his features are well cut and regular, very unlike those of the coarse-featured soldiers. I noticed the Somális have much better features than the Abyssinian soldiers, and smaller hands and feet. I should think Banagúsé must have Arab blood in his veins; although polite, he was not at all disposed to be friendly to me; he knew that I had taken photographs of his stockade on my last visit while he was away, and complained of him to the British Government.