"Osgood presented three reels of motion picture film showing a typical American City, crowded streets, skyscrapers and street cars - for the Ras has his own projector - Fuertes made him a present of a book of his own painting - 'The Birds of North America', and Osgood remarked that those gifts were not exactly what could be called 'royal'; that they were inexpensive, small things to present to the ruler of a great country, but they were the only gifts we had brought. Tafari Makonnen flashed a delightful smile:
'The thought you have given to their selection makes them of great value'.
A courtier of the gallant days of Francis First could not have said anything neater or more to the point. The Ras impressed us as being extraordinary clever: He must be, or he never could hold that unenlightened country together."
(Taken from "Savage Abyssinia", James Baum,
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