" They refused;
on that he said to them, "You are right; but let us return to the
mountain: it is better to die by the hands of Christians."
The surrender of the army, the storming of Magdala, the self-inflicted
death of Theodore, are too well-known facts for me to enlarge upon
them I entered the place shortly after it had been occupied by our
troops. One of the first objects that attracted my attention was
the dead body of Theodore. There was a smile on his lip--that happy
smile he so seldom wore of late: it gave an air of calm grandeur
to the features of one whose career had been so remarkable, whose
cruelties are almost unparalleled in history; but who at the last
hour seemed to have recalled the days of his youth, fought like a
brave man, and killed himself rather than surrender.
I remained that night in Magdala. It seemed passing strange to spend
a night as a free man in the same hut where I had been so long
confined a prisoner. English soldiers now guarded our former gaolers,
the queen was our guest, the dead body of Theodore lay in one of
our huts: in the short span of forty-eight hours our position had
so completely changed that it was difficult to realize it: at times
I was apprehensive of being the victim of a delusion. I was too
excited to sleep.
General Wilby, his aide-de-camp Captain Cappel, and his brigade-major
Major Hicks, shared my hut; hungry and tired they enjoyed quite as much as
I did, the simple Abyssinian dish of teps, the peppery sauce, and some tej,
which we ourselves went to fetch from the cellars in the royal buildings.
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