"Speaking generally, and from the best authority, the alligators of the Mississippi are from twelve to twenty-four feet in length; their bodies are covered with horny plates or scales, which are impenetrable to a rifle ball, except about their heads, and just behind their fore legs, where they are vulnerable. The head of a full-grown alligator is more than three feet long. The eyes are small, and the whole head in the water appears at a distance like a piece of rotten floating wood. The upper jaw only moves, and this they raise so as to form a right angle with the lower one. They open their mouths while they lie basking in the sun, on the banks of rivers and creeks, and when filled with all manner of insects, they suddenly let fall their upper-jaw with surprising noise, and thus secure their prey. The tusks, which are not covered by any skin or lips, give the animal a frightful appearance. In the spring, which is their season for breeding, they make a most hideous and terrifying roar, resembling the sound of distant thunder.

"The alligator is an oviparous animal their nests, which are commonly built on the margin of some lake, creek, or river, at the distance of from fifteen to twenty yards from high water, are in the form of an obtuse cone, about four feet high, and from four to five in diameter at their basis. They are constructed with a sort of mortar, blended with grass and herbage. First they lay a floor of this composition, on which they deposit a layer of eggs; and upon this a stratum of their mortar, seven or eight inches thick, then another layer of eggs; and in this manner one stratum upon another, nearly to the top of the nest. They lay from one hundred to two hundred eggs in a post.

These are hatched by the heat of the sun, assisted by the fermentation of the vegetable mortar in which they are deposited. The female carefully watches her own nest of eggs till they are all hatched. She then takes her brood under her care, and leads them about the shores as a hen does her chickens, and is equally courageous in defending them in time of danger. When she lies basking on the warm banks with her brood around her, the young ones may be heard whining and crying in the manner of young infants. The old feed on the young alligators till they get so large that they cannot make a prey of them; so that, fortunately, but few of the brood survive the age of a year. They are fond of the flesh of dogs and hogs, which they devour whenever they have an opportunity. Their principal food is fish. They retire into their dens, which they form by burrowing far into the ground, commencing under water and working upwards, and there remain in a torpid state during the winter. The carrion-vulture also destroys multitudes of alligators, which would otherwise render the country uninhabitable.

"Much has been said of the crocodile lacrime, or deceitful tears. Returned to my boat and departed, I

carefully watched to discover whether the melancholy cries of my young alligators were accompanied with tears. I can assert they are not-nor does any moisture whatever fill the eye, though the plaints are piteous to the most distressing degree. Food appeases their distress. When they lament aloud I give them the entrails and livers of fowls, which they are most fond of, and they immediately cease. They are very vicious; they at times make a sudden snap at my fingers, and once

"N. B. The Abyssinian MS. histories are full of these instances, in which the great men, when disappointed in politics, retire to Waldubba, or other deserts, to live as monks. The distribution of goods and money made by the kings, when sick, to the churches, occurs in almost every reign. Before Yasous II. died, the Chronicle says, that he had given away every thing he had, in this way, except the crown on his head. When Joas was proclaimed, the Iteghe his grandmother wished to give a present to the poor, as usual at the beginning of a reign, which she could not do, until one of the nobles supplied her with a sum of money. There were only a few derims left in the treasury.

"

Abyssinian Harvests. They first sow barley from the end of April to the beginning of May, or later; that is, towards the first rains. This ripens in the rains in June; and is carried off the fields into the house, that it may not rot. Then they sow fitches, which likewise ripen in the rains after. In September they sow wheat, or teff, which is cut down in December; and, if they have water, they sow barley, or fitches, again in January. In Woggora (a very fertile province), there is seed-time, and harvest, and ploughing, in every month in the year; water being easily diverted to the grounds. The rent paid to the king for the ground is one-tenth of what they reap, yet, with all this, they are all poor; for a harvest, at a medium, is about twenty after one; and they sometimes, nay, very often, scarce reap the seed. They never manure the ground; and there are great quantities of rats and innumerable ants, that consume their corn at different, nay, at all periods of its growth. All their five harvests do not, in produce, equal one

Egyptian one; and they are at five times the labour. In the several villages, living, in general, is very miserable; and, in general, people of consideration scarcely know any other diet than teff bread and bouza. Whether this teff is black, or white, is the whole difference between the diet of master and servant.

"Abyssinian Dress. The principal part of the dress of the natives is a large cotton cloth, 24 peek (cubits) in length, and one and a half in. breadth, with a blue and yellow stripe round the bottom of it. This blue is not dyed; but the Surat blue cloths are unrivalled, and woven for this purpose; and the yellow they dye with suf, the yellow thistle. The best for ordinary wear costs 10 salts, or pataka, about 6s. 6d. English. It is called Kuara, as probably coming from that province. They are very beautiful and light. The other pieces of dress are breeches, which reach to their mid-thighs; and girt with a white girdle of cloth to the common people; but the better sort have red Indian cotton cloths for breeches; and silk, or worsted coloured girdles from the Levant. When they ride, they only hold their stirrups between their great and second toes. Even the king rides barefooted; and being used chiefly to mules, they are far inferior horsemen to the Arabs.

"Price of Gold. Gold, at a medium, sells for 10 pataka each wakea; or 10 derims, salt, at a medium 8 per pataka. The piece (of salt), speaking of identically, is called Kourman, but in estimation, or such a thing costs so many salts, they are called Amooli. These are the ordinary currency for the necessaries of life. For considerable purchases, gold is used; and there is great loss in cutting the wakea into derims, at least one in ten.

The

The gold is got by washing the earth in water, in wooden dishes. The grains that remain behind are put into a quill, melted down, and alloyed, probably by the Shangalla; for it is pale, and is never brought to market in its first form, but melted down into small rods, or ingots. In Joa's time a wakea was valued only at 8 patakas. Yasous Tanush, or the II. turned round, and reduced the Sennaar Shangalla; but they are now quite independent of Habbesh. Their fair is held at Buré in Damot.

"Weights and Measures. The wakea (or ounce), in Abyssinia, is considered as 10 derims, or drams, and 12 ounces make a litir, or rotal (pound). At Gondar, the capital of all Abyssinia, the wakea is 6 drams, 40 grains, Troy weight English, and divided into 10 drams of 40 grains. The small money is salt bricks, dug out of the mines at Dancali, near the myrrh country. Every wakea, in ordinary times, gives from 72 to 76 salts. In 1769, the wakea was 80 salts, and June 15th, 1771, the wakea sold at 34, but there was a great difference in the size of the bricks. These are little or not at all liable to waste, as M. Montesquieu supposes. Abyssinian gold at Mocha is 15 or 16 patakas when the Sennaar gold is 22, because the Agows, &c. alloy it with silver.

At Masuah, the current money is the Venetian sequin, the pataka, or queen's dollar, and half dollars. For small money are used grains of glass, called borjook, three of which make a chebir (Vid. Travels, Book V. Chap. ii.)

"Corn sold at Masuah for four patakas the ardeb, which contains about 24 measures of the country. Coffee, six rotol per pataka, sometimes ten or even 15 rotal. Honey, four cuba for a pataka, each quba

about two rotol, or somewhat less. Butter 20 rotol, for 14 pataka, anđ 3 harf. Civet, 13 pataka the wa kea. Wax, 4 pait. the franzola. Elephants' teeth, 35 rotol for 18 patt. Water, 1 paras the smallest jar, and 3 paras the largest. Abyssinian gold dust, 15 patt. per wakea, at Mocha. Dora, 12 measures for a pataka. The Venetian sequin goes for 24 patakas.

"The Abyssinian grain measure is the ardeb, which, at Gondar, contains 10 measures, called Madega, each equal to 12 ounces, Cairo weight. An ardeb of grain costs 2 derims, or 2 patakas; an ardeb of teff, the same; 6 or 8 ardebs of tocuso pay an ounce (wakea) of gold, or 10 derims.

"Servants Wages at Gondar. At Gondar a maid-servant receives 15 salts per annum, and is fed in the house. A man-servant is paid 4 pataka yearly, which correspond to 4 wakea, or ounces of gold, Abyssinian weight, and receives besides two loaves, or cakes of teff, for his support daily. If his master is good, he sometimes gives him a little flesh, lentiles, or vetches. He is not obliged to clothe him, but he sometimes gives him a pair of trowsers, which consist of about one-fourth of a yard of white cloth.

"With respect to carriage, &c. three bundles of wood, which are brought from Techagassa, three hours walking, cost a salt. The carriage of a jar, or manteca, full of wine, or honey, from Emfras, eight hours journey, pays a salt, of the weight of 3 faranzala, or so.

"Thirty-three teff bread cost a salt; the loaves are about three lines thick, and 18 inches diameter. A pair of shoes (pantufle). cost a salt. Eight and a quarter peeks of cloth is the least gift that can be offered in the country.

Bo

"To make this, they use tocusso simply; but sometimes they mix it with grain (wheat), or dora, or all three together; but in ordinary tocusso is best. A jar of tocusso, or of the three sorts of grain, contains as much as is sufficient to make two loaves, that are a tenth part of the whole jar; besides which, they use about half a rotol of Ghesh leaves.

"The first part of the process is to grind the tocusso, after which they take a fourth part of it, and knead it with water and leaven, as if to make bread. This they put in a jar to ferment for two days, at the end of which they make a good many thin large cakes, and dry them on the fire till they become as hard as a stone, then break them down into crumbs, and put them in a large vessel full of water, capable of hold ing six times the volume of the grain; or for one jar of grain, the vessel holds five of water, and one for the quantity of grain. At the same time that they put in the bruised bread, as above mentioned, into that quantity of water, the other things should be got ready to go in also. The grain ought to be fermented for two days, then dried in the sun, and afterwards ground into meal. The Ghesh leaves are ground likewise. The remainder of the meal,, or those three-fourths that were not used to make the. bread, must be put into a hollow oven, over a fire, with a small quantity of water, and constantly stirred with a stick, until it become a paste; and when the water is dried up, more is put in, constantly stirring the mass until it become black like a coal. The whole so prepared, the

crumbs, the mass, and the leaves are put together into the large jar, and let alone for a day, after which it is poured off, and preserved in jars, well stopped. At the end of seven or eight days, this liquor begins to be too strong, and is best when fresh, two or three days old.

66

Marriage. Marriage is not considered in Abyssinia as a sacrament, yet the church ordains some rules to be observed, in order that the man and the woman may be faithful towards one another. The ordinary method of marriage among people of condition, and among those who most fear God, is the following: The man, when he resolves to marry. a girl, sends some person to her father to ask his daughter in marriage. It seldom happens that she is refus ed; and when she is granted, the future husband is called into the girl's house, and an oath is taken recipro cally by the parties, that they will maintain due fidelity to one another. Then the father of the bride presents to the bridegroom the fortune that he will give: it consists of a particular sum of gold, some oxen, sheep, or horses, &c. according to the circumstances of the people. Then the bridegroom is obliged to find surety for the said goods; which is some one of his friends that presents himself, and becomes answerable for him in case he should wish to dismiss his wife, and be not able, through dissipation, or otherwise, to restore all that he has gotten..

"Further, at the time when they display the fortune of the bride, he husband is obliged to promise a certain sum of money, or an equivalent, in effects, to his wife, in case he should choose to abandon her, or separate himself from her. This must also be confirmed by an oath of the future husband, and of