And Albeit That It Have No Water, Yet Men
Find Therein And On The Banks Full Good Fish Of Other Manner Of
Kind And Shape, Than Men Find In Any Other Sea, And They Be Of
Right Good Taste And Delicious To Man's Meat.
And a three journeys long from that sea be great mountains, out of
the which goeth out a great flood that cometh out of Paradise.
And
it is full of precious stones, without any drop of water, and it
runneth through the desert on that one side, so that it maketh the
sea gravelly; and it beareth into that sea, and there it endeth.
And that flome runneth, also, three days in the week and bringeth
with him great stones and the rocks also therewith, and that great
plenty. And anon, as they be entered into the Gravelly Sea, they
be seen no more, but lost for evermore. And in those three days
that that river runneth, no man dare enter into it; but in the
other days men dare enter well enough.
Also beyond that flome, more upward to the deserts, is a great
plain all gravelly, between the mountains. And in that plain,
every day at the sun-rising, begin to grow small trees, and they
grow till mid-day, bearing fruit; but no man dare take of that
fruit, for it is a thing of faerie. And after mid-day, they
decrease and enter again into the earth, so that at the going down
of the sun they appear no more. And so they do, every day. And
that is a great marvel.
In that desert be many wild men, that be hideous to look on; for
they be horned, and they speak nought, but they grunt, as pigs.
And there is also great plenty of wild hounds. And there be many
popinjays, that they clepe psittakes their language. And they
speak of their proper nature, and salute men that go through the
deserts, and speak to them as apertly as though it were a man. And
they that speak well have a large tongue, and have five toes upon a
foot. And there be also of another manner, that have but three
toes upon a foot, and they speak not, or but little, for they can
not but cry.
This Emperor Prester John when he goeth into battle against any
other lord, he hath no banners borne before him; but he hath three
crosses of gold, fine, great and high, full of precious stones, and
every of those crosses be set in a chariot, full richly arrayed.
And for to keep every cross, be ordained 10,000 men of arms and
more than 100,000 men on foot, in manner as men would keep a
standard in our countries, when that we be in land of war. And
this number of folk is without the principal host and without wings
ordained for the battle. And when he hath no war, but rideth with
a privy meinie, then he hath borne before him but one cross of
tree, without painting and without gold or silver or precious
stones, in remembrance that Jesu Christ suffered death upon a cross
of tree.
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