- E. [7] Probably An Error For 2000.

- E.

SECTION VIII.

_Contarini, after crossing European Sarmatia, arrives at Moscow, the capital of White Russia, and is presented to the Grand Duke._

After recommending ourselves to the protection of God, we continued our journey, through immense and terrible deserts, sometimes towards the north, and sometimes westerly[1], always resting at noon, and taking up our quarters for the night on the bare ground, without any protection against the weather. To prevent us from being surprized in the night by the wandering Tartars, outguards were placed every night in three directions around our resting-place. During the greater part of this long and dreary journey, we were very ill off for water both for ourselves and our cattle, and we never saw any wild animals. One day we saw about forty horses, which we were told had escaped from a caravan of merchants the year before. We fell in one day with a small horde of Tartars, having twenty waggons, but I was not able to learn where they were going. As our provisions decreased rapidly, we were forced to use the remainder very sparingly, and were consequently reduced to a very short allowance.

On the 22d of September 1475, we entered Russia, and discovered a few huts in the middle of a wood. On the inhabitants learning that Marcus, their countryman, was in our caravan, they came to see him that he might protect them from the Tartars, and brought him a present of honey and wax, a part of which he gave to us.

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