ernors of the maritime country, in six years. This
disposition increased with his years, and perhaps he intended to force
some alteration in the religion of the country; which indeed
sufficiently appears by his sending Alvarez and Bermudez as his
ambassadors to the Pope.--_Purchas_.]

King David sent an army against the king of Zeyla; but when the Turks
began to shoot their calivers or arquebusses, among the Abyssinians, by
which some of them were slain, they were seized with an universal panic
and took flight. Proud of this victory, the king of Zeyla overrun the
country, accompanied by a great number of Abyssinians, and advanced
into that part of the south, towards Magadoxa and Melinda, where the
vast treasures of the former kings of Abyssinia were secured on the top
of an almost inaccessible mountain. Seeing every day the Abyssinians
revolting to the Moors, David gathered a new army with which be marched
against _Gradamet_ and joined battle, but was again completely defeated,
chiefly, by means of the Turkish musqueteers: On which David withdrew to
a strong post on a mountain, where in a few days he died, in the year
1539. After this great victory Gradamet marched immediately to the
mountain where the treasure was deposited, which he assaulted and took,
gaining possession of the largest treasure that ever was known in the
world. On the death of David, those of the nobles who had continued to
adhere to him, elected his eldest son in his stead, who was a young man
under age; and that nothing might be wanting to assist the ruin of the
kingdom, already almost irrecoverably reduced by the Moors, another
party of the nobles appointed a different son of the late king to
succeed to the throne. In this hopeless condition of his affairs, the
unfortunate youth, having to contend at the same time against foreign
invasion and domestic division, withdrew for personal safety to the
mountain of the Jews.

In the interior of Abyssinia there is a very large and high mountain
which can only be ascended by one very difficult path, and on its summit
there is a large plain, having abundance of springs, with numerous
cattle, and even some cultivation. The inhabitants of this mountain
observe the law of Moses. Though I have carefully inquired, I could
never learn how this people came into Abyssinia, and wherefore they have
never descended from their mountain to mix with the other inhabitants of
the country. The young king received a friendly