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APPENDIX ILL

tians from undertaking this voyage, except in the month of August, alongwith the Turkish caravan, (composed of more than 100,000 souls,) withoutthe protection of which they would certainly lose their lives and property.

Having passed this dangerous desert on the first of September, weentered into the city of Suez, the first port in the Red Sea , where, throughthe recommendation of some Catholic merchants at Cairo , we procured apassage on the tenth, having to pay for this first embarkation 70 zequins,notwithstanding which we were confined in a place so miserably small,that we had scarcely room to lift up our heads. In this way we commencedour voyage, passed a lake named “ Pharoun” on the 14th, and on the 17thpaid our salutation at a distance to Mount Sinai; during which time ouronly food was biscuit, and our beverage stinking water full of vermin, forwhich, nauseous and disagreeable as it was, we were obliged to pay eightmedines, or baiocchi for a small cupful.

On the 4th of October we arrived at Jidda , where if we had not beenwarmly recommended by our Greek Catholics to a noble Turkish merchant,we should have sustained the most grievous hardships from the Greek schis-matics, who by some means or other having discovered our object inEthiopia , excited against us a great deal of murmuring among the Turks,having determined, at all hazards, to put a stop to the long journey we hadundertaken. But that which the hardened malice of false Christians en-deavoured to prevent, the divine providence brought about by means of theTurks themselves; so that after a short persecution, when we humbly askedthe Vizier license to proceed to the Island of Lohaia, he, to our greatdelight, not only gave his consent to our departure, but even accompa-nied it with a recommendation to the chief commanding that island,where we happily arrived on the 2d of November. Here we staid ten days,waiting for a passage to Massowa, where finally, after many travails andhardships, we got into port on the feast of St. Andrew’s day.

Being desirous of permission from the Emperor of Ethiopia to land,without which the Governor of the Island would permit no Christian to enterthat kingdom, we sent our humble petition, by two expresses, to court,and after eighty days journey, they returned with a gracious letter fromthe Emperor , accompanied moreover by two of his officers, thirty servants,and sixteen mules, to carry our baggage to the royal city of Gondar.