Last Sunday the Prince Regent of Abyssinia, Ras Taffari Makonnen,
was crowned as Negus, or King, after twelve years of Regency. He became Regent in 1916 when the incompetent Yasu was dethroned and Judith, a grand-daughter of the famous Menelek, was made Empress. It was the ecclesiastical authorities who headed that revolution. They undoubtedly felt that yet another Moslem attack upon the immemorial Christian faith of Abyssinia was approaching. The chief sign was that Yasu himself had become a Moslem and wanted to help Turkey in the War. There have been many reports of disagreement between the Empress and the Regent. It is said that the Empress is reactionary, being amenable to the Abyssinian clergy, and that the new Negus is a Westernizer. The arrangement by which the Regent has been crowned marks, we may hope, an end of the conflict and opens up an epoch of progress for Abyssinia.
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