This Is The Site Of Darbiyah Kola,--Kola's Fort,--So
Called From Its Galla Queen.
It is said that this city and its neighbour
Aububah fought like certain cats in Kilkenny till both were "eaten up:"
the Gudabirsi fix the event at the period when their forefathers still
inhabited Bulhar on the coast,--about 300 years ago.
If the date be
correct, the substantial ruins have fought a stern fight with time.
Remnants of houses cumber the soil, and the carefully built wells are
filled with rubbish: the palace was pointed out to me with its walls of
stone and clay intersected by layers of woodwork. The mosque is a large
roofless building containing twelve square pillars of rude masonry, and
the Mihrab, or prayer niche, is denoted by a circular arch of tolerable
construction. But the voice of the Muezzin is hushed for ever, and
creepers now twine around the ruined fane. The scene was still and dreary
as the grave; for a mile and a half in length all was ruins--ruins--ruins.
Leaving this dead city, we rode towards the south-west between two rugged
hills of which the loftiest summit is called Wanauli. As usual they are
rich in thorns: the tall "Wadi" affords a gum useful to cloth-dyers, and
the leaves of the lofty Wumba are considered, after the Daum-palm, the
best material for mats. On the ground appeared the blue flowers of the
"Man" or "Himbah," a shrub resembling a potatoe: it bears a gay yellow
apple full of brown seeds which is not eaten by the Somal.
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