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Updated: May 20, 2025
"Steady, my lads!" he cried, in a warning voice, after a quick glance round the square to see that we had made all proper preparations to give our friends the Somalis a hospitable reception. "Are you ready, Mr Shrapnell?" "Aye, aye, sir," replied `Gunnery Jack' instanter, "all ready!"
It houses a large population mysteriously, for it is of slight extent. Then on the borders of town are the two great native villages one belonging to the Somalis, and the other hospitably accommodating the swarms of caravan porters and their families.
"We'll look about a little and then I'll decide what to do. I don't want to raise any false alarm." They turned back to the main avenue. The crowds still surged up and down, and the tumult seemed as harsh and discordant as ever, but the place had nevertheless undergone a change since they had left it a short time before. Little bartering was going on, and but few Arabs and Somalis were to be seen.
"Oliver, of the Magpie, whom I saw at Suakin, told me there was a rumour of the Somalis running cargoes of arms, which they pick up somewhere in the German protectorate, to supply Osman Digna's forces for a fresh campaign that has been planned by the Arabs against us along the whole coast."
His ideas of earthly Paradise centre round the cafés of Aden, where his countrymen are numerous and where wages are so high that six grown Somalis can batten in well-fed ease on the earnings of a seventh, who keeps on till he wants a holiday and then "goes sick" and sends another of the syndicate to replace him.
A formal flower garden lay immediately about it, and a very tall flag pole had been planted in front. A hundred feet away the garden dropped off steep to one of the deep river canyons. Two white-robed Somalis appeared on the veranda to inform us that McMillan was off on safari.
"Don't delay a moment," shouted Sir Arthur; "prepare for the defense, colonel, and see that the steamer is ready in case it comes to the worst." The governor's condition was now truly pitiable. He was trembling with fright. "There is indeed but little time," said Guy. "There is danger at your very door. I see many Arabs and Somalis in the town."
The following "observations accompanying a substance procured near Aden, and used by the Somalis to poison their arrows," by F. S. Arnott, Esq., M.D., will be read with interest. "In February 1853, Dr. Arnott had forwarded to him a watery extract prepared from the root of a tree, described as 'Wabie, a toxicodendron from the Somali country on the Habr Gerhajis range of the Goolies mountains.
Then he relieved his feelings by objurgating the panic-stricken Somalis, whose superstitious minds interpreted the appearance of the air-borne host as a sure indication of war. He was in the midst of an eloquent outburst when his employer summoned him. "How far is it to the next oasis?" came the dreaded query. Abdur Kad'r, shrewd judge of men, knew that he must be explicit.
Presently, however, a grand hurrah went up on the left, where the Somalis had made their last stand. It was a cheer such as British bluejackets alone can give; and then we saw the Union Jack run up on the top of a big bungalow in the centre of the town, the only hut or building that had escaped destruction in the general conflagration.
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