We Agreed
With A Kinsman Of The Rajah, Or Governor, For Twenty Laries, Or
Shillings, To Conduct Us On The Remainder Of Our Journey.
We accordingly
departed on the 8th, and travelled ten c. to Gaundajaw, where we had
been robbed but for our guard.
The 9th we were twice set upon, and
obliged to give each time five laries to get free. We came to
Sarruna, a great town of the rajputs with a castle, fourteen coss
from Tatta. We visited the governor, Ragee Bouma, eldest son to sultan
Bulbul, who was lately captured by the Moguls and had his eyes pulled
out, yet had escaped about two months ago, and was now living in the
mountains inviting all his kindred to revenge. The Ragee treated me
kindly as a stranger, asking me many questions about my country. He
even made me sup with him, and gave me much wine, in which he so
heartily partook, that he stared again. A banian at this place told me
that Sir Robert Sherly had been much abused by the Portuguese and the
governor of Larry Bunder, having his house set on fire, and his men
much hurt in the night; and that on his arrival at Tatta, thirteen days
journey from thence, he had been unkindly used by the governor of that
city. He likewise told me of the great trade carried on at Tatta, and
that ships of 300 tons might be brought up to Larry Bunder; and advised
me to prevail upon Ragee Bouma to escort us to Tatta.
According to this bad advice, we hired the Ragee for forty laries to
escort us with fifty horsemen to the gates of Tatta. We departed from
Sarruna on the 11th January, and having travelled five coss we lay all
night by the side of a river. Departing at two next morning, the Ragee
led us in a direction quite different from our right road, and came
about daybreak into a thicket, where he made us all be disarmed and
bound, and immediately strangled the two merchants and their five men by
means of their camel ropes. After stripping them of all their clothes,
he caused their bodies to be flung into a hole dug on purpose. He then
took my horse and eighty rupees from me, and sent me and my men up the
mountains to his brothers, at the distance of twenty coss, where we
arrived on the 14th, and where I remained twenty days a close prisoner.
On the 7th February, an order came to send me to Parkar, the governor
of which place was of their kindred, and that I should be sent from
thence to Rhadunpoor; but I was plundered on the way of my clothes and
every thing else about me, my horse only being left me, which was not
worth taking away.
Arriving at Parkar on the 28th February, and finding the inhabitants
charitable, we were reduced to the necessity of begging victuals; and
actually procured four mahmoodies by that means, equal to as many
shillings.
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