LION OF JUDAH

Evening Star, Issue 22069, 1 July 1935, Page 11

LION OF JUDAH

ABYSSINIA’S RULER When the Queen of Sheba paid that famous visit to King Soloman she returned home with a son, and from that, son have descended all the Kings of Abyssinia. _ Such is the tradition. Abyssinia is Ethiopia—the name and country of the people mentioned frequently m the Old Testament (says the ‘ Sydney Morning Herald ’). (Can the Ethiopian , change his skin, or the leopard his spots?” said the prophet Jeremiah). Abyssinia is a name meaning “ mixed,” and has reference to the admixture of negro blood, but the complexion of the Ethiopian in the north is light brown to fair, shading towards the southern parts to sooty black. Emperor Haile Selassie is a small, light-brown man 41 years of age. He was crowned in 1930, amidst great splendour of ceremony, with the titles, “King of Kings of - Ethiopia,’ “ Conquering Lion of Judah,” and “ Elected of God.” He is an educated man full of modern ideas, right up to date in world affairs and reputed a good diplomat. He is shrewd and able, and fully realises the position of his country, hemmed in as it is by European Powers with vital interests to maintain, and is trying to bring his people to an understanding with education. He has around him foreign experts - in various factors and sends some of his young noblemen to Europe and America for education. Belgians have been training his soldiers in modern arms. The Abyssinians are Christaius. They were converted by St. Frumentius in the fourth century and have remained over since of. the Coptic faith, the earliest sect of‘the Christian denominations, and one to which all the Christian world adhered until the rise of the Church of Rome. St. Frumentius was consecrated Bishop of Abyssinia by the Patriach Athanasius of Alexandria. They are fierce and warlike, loving fight, and in the present state of affairs only too ready to remember Adowa, the battle, in 1896, in which an Italian army was annihilated. Many of them, knowing little of aeroplanes, gas, and modern weapons or science, are living much as they did a thousand years ago, the nation having been almost isolated from the world behind its arid deserts and in its mountains divided up into sections—petty kingdoms—by rivers and huge ravines. It is a strange mixture of feudalism fand modernism in this age. Haile Selassie gave them a Constitution and a bicameral Legislature in 1931. THE LAST ANACHRONISM. Abyssinia of all the countries of Africa, has held out against European exploitation, but now the force of the world’s progress is closing around an anachronism, and the harassed Emperor, with finances at a low ebb, is applying his knowledge and capabilities to a people still in a feudal state, its conditions yet standing largely on a basis of slavery and serfdom, Haile Selassie’s proclamation when he became Emperor was said to have been given out in 70 languages for the benefit of his subjects. When he went to London and Paris some years ago he took a number of his barons with him. It was safer that way. These turbulent lords are powerful, and the history of Abyssinia is one of internecine warfare. It is a remarkable country in a remarkable position. Surrounding it are Italian Eritrea on the Red Sea, Italian Somaliland on the south, with French and British Somaliland on the Gulf of Aden, and the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan and Kenya on the other side, and so without access to the sea. _ Italy wants a railway through Abyssinia to connect her two territories, and Britain wants a hold on a lake in the Abyssinian mountains, where is actually the source of prosperity for Egypt and the Sudan —the waters of the Blue Nile which carry down the .rich silt—France holds railway concessions. Abyssinia is rich and desirable, a. tempting field for exploitation. It has a varied climate for production, and water in plenty, the raintall being unfailing. In the hotter parts it grows sugar cane, coffee, tobacco, and other things. In its middle zone it has wheat, maize, and crops of temperate climes, and in the higher regions there are good pastures. Minerals are also obtainable, including iron, coal, and gold. Yet its total imports amount to less, that £1,000,000, and its exports are worth not much more in the markets abroad. The largest city, Addis Ababa, has a population of about 40,000; the next, Harar, about 25,000. A “ DIFFICULT ” TERRITORY. This brief survey is useful in understanding the position of Abyssinia and the matter that now been referred to the arbitrators through the League of Nations. Italy’s military task is a formidable one, should it come to a struggle, notwithstanding the modern rosonrscs of warfare. Abyssinia shoots up abruptly to a plateau on the northern part (some mountain peaks rise to 15,000 ft); Where there _ is not mountainous country there is arid desert, 300 miles and more_ to be crossed. The heat of the ravines is suffocating and pestilential; the Red Sea heat needs no describing. Haile Selassie can count on a million men, and reports have it that every petty ruler would be ready with his hordes to repel the foreign encroachment if necessary. The world is watching Abyssinia with absorbed interest, and on its ruler, Haile Selassie, “Conquering Lion of Judah.” lies the great burden of the future whatever inc results of the arbitration may be.