Seven Years in Southern Abyssinia

CAPTAIN HODSON was sent in 1914 to establish the first British Consulate in Southern Abyssinia, his immediate purpose being to safeguard the timid Boran tribes and the elephants of Kenya Colony against further raids across the border. His appointment was agreed to with some reluctance on the part of the Ethiopian government, partly because it was a reflection on that government's capacity to control the acts of its own peoples, but largely because of the ingrained and not altogether unfounded suspicion that all such appointments are symptomatic of the desire of Europeans to increase their influence in the last and only indigenous independent State in Africa. To add to Capt. Hodson's difficulties, he increased suspicion of his motives by having to enter Abyssinia from the south-the railway from Jubito to Addis Ababa was not then constructed-as there is a legend among the peoples of Abyssinia that it is from the south that the white man will eventually overrun their country. The fact that it took the author nearly six years to establish his consulate, although the ruler at Addis Ababa ostensibly favoured the project from the outset, is not a reflection upon his courage, negotiating skill, or determination, but an indication of the state of chaos of the country and the contempt for Europeans which existed.