Their Feet Are Round And As Broad As The Wooden Trenchers
Which Are In Ordinary Use, And Each Foot Has Five Round Hoofs Like Large
Oyster Shells.
The tail is about four spans long, like that of a
buffaloe, and is very thin of hair.
Elephants are of various sizes, some
18 spans or 14 spans high, and some have been seen as high as 16 spans;
but the females are larger than the males of the same age. Their gait is
slow and wallowing, so that those who are not used to ride upon them are
apt to become sick, as if they were at sea; but it is pleasant to ride a
young elephant, as their pace is soft and gentle like an ambling mule.
On mounting them, they stoop and bend their knee to assist the rider to
get up; but their keepers use no bridles or halters to guide them. When
they engender they retire into the most secret recesses of the woods,
from natural modesty, though some pretend that they copulate backwards.
The king of Narsinga exceeds in riches and dominion, all the princes I
have ever seen or heard of. In beauty and situation the city resembles
Milan, only that being on the slope of a hill it is not so level. Other
subject kingdoms lie round about it, even as Ausonia and Venice surround
Milan. The bramins or priests informed me that the king receives daily
of tribute from that city only the sum of 12,000 _pardaos_. He and his
subjects are idolaters, worshipping the devil like those of Calicut. He
maintains an army of many thousand men, and is continually at war with
his neighbours. The richer people wear a slender dress, somewhat like a
petticoat, not very long, and bind their heads with a fillet or broad
bandage, after the fashion of the Mahometans, but the common people go
almost entirely naked, covering only the parts of shame. The king wears
a cape or short cloak of cloth of gold on his shoulders, only two spans
long; and when he goes to war he wears a close vest of cotton, over
which is a cloak adorned with plates of gold, richly bordered with all
kinds of jewels and precious stones. The horse he rides on, including
the furniture or caparisons, is estimated to equal one of our cities in
value, being all over ornamented with jewels of great price. When be
goes a hunting, he is attended by other three kings, whose office it is
to bear him company wherever he goes. When he rides out or goes a
journey he is attended by 6000 horsemen; and from all that we have said,
and various other circumstances respecting his power, riches, and
magnificence, he certainly is to be accounted one of the greatest
sovereigns in the world. Besides the pieces already mentioned, named
_pardaos_, which are of gold, he coins silver money called _fano_, or
_fanams_, which are worth sixteen of our smallest copper money.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 77 of 441
Words from 39599 to 40103
of 230997
