Their
Horns Are So Large, The Inhabitants Use Them For Pitchers, And Each
Will Hold About Five Gallons.
One of these oxen, fat and ready to
be killed, may be bought at most for two crowns.
I have purchased
five sheep, or five goats with nine kids, for a piece of calico
worth about a crown.
The Abyssins have many sort of fowls both wild and tame; some of the
former we are yet unacquainted with: there is one of wonderful
beauty, which I have seen in no other place except Peru: it has
instead of a comb, a short horn upon its head, which is thick and
round, and open at the top. The feitan favez, or devil's horse,
looks at a distance like a man dressed in feathers; it walks with
abundance of majesty, till it finds itself pursued, and then takes
wing, and flies away. But amongst all their birds there is none
more remarkable than the moroc, or honey-bird, which is furnished by
nature with a peculiar instinct or faculty of discovering honey.
They have here multitudes of bees of various kinds; some are tame,
like ours, and form their combs in hives. Of the wild ones, some
place their honey in hollow trees, others hide it in holes in the
ground, which they cover so carefully, that though they are commonly
in the highway, they are seldom found, unless by the moroc's help,
which, when he has discovered any honey, repairs immediately to the
road side, and when he sees a traveller, sings, and claps his wings,
making many motions to invite him to follow him, and when he
perceives him coming, flies before him from tree to tree, till he
comes to the place where the bees have stored their treasure, and
then begins to sing melodiously.
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