This frontier warfare,
skilfully conducted by Mek Nimmur, was most advantageous to
Theodorus, the King of Abyssinia, as the defence of the boundary
was maintained against Egypt by a constant guerilla warfare. Upon
several occasions, expeditions on a large scale had been
organized against Mek Nimmur by the Governor-General of the
Soudan; but they had invariably failed, as he retreated to the
inaccessible mountains, where he had beaten them with loss, and
they had simply wreaked their vengeance by burning the deserted
villages of straw huts in the low lands, that a few dollars would
quickly rebuild. Mek Nimmur was a most unpleasant neighbour to
the Egyptian Government, and accordingly he was a great friend of
the King Theodorus; he was, in fact, a shield that protected the
heart of Abyssinia.
As I have already described, the Base were always at war with
everybody; and as Mek Nimmur and the Abyssinians were constantly
fighting with the Egyptians, the passage of the Atbara to the
east bank was the commencement of a territory where the sword and
lance represented the only law. The Hamran Arabs dared not
venture with their flocks farther east than Geera, on the
Settite, about twenty-five miles from Wat el Negur.
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