Styled FACFUR, so great and puissant a prince,
that for vastness of wealth and number of subjects and extent of dominion,
there was hardly a greater in all the earth except the Great Kaan himself.
[NOTE 1] But the people of his land were anything rather than warriors;
all their delight was in women, and nought but women; and so it was above
all with the King himself, for he took thought of nothing else but women,
unless it were of charity to the poor.
In all his dominion there were no horses; nor were the people ever inured
to battle or arms, or military service of any kind. Yet the province of
Manzi is very strong by nature, and all the cities are encompassed by
sheets of water of great depth, and more than an arblast-shot in width; so
that the country never would have been lost, had the people but been
soldiers. But that is just what they were not; so lost it was.[NOTE 2]
Now it came to pass, in the year of Christ's incarnation, 1268, that the
Great Kaan, the same that now reigneth, despatched thither a Baron of his
whose name was BAYAN CHINCSAN, which is as much as to say "Bayan Hundred
Eyes." And you must know that the King of Manzi had found in his horoscope
that he never should lose his Kingdom except through a man that had an
hundred eyes; so he held himself assured in his position, for he could not
believe that any man in existence could have an hundred eyes.
