to all the antient Iewes which would seeme better then their fellowes and not only obserued of the Pharises Essees and Hemerobaptists if such a Sect may be added At this time in Palestina many doe it not once but often in the day The Mahumetans obserue it The Iewes as a Iew hath written were so zealous herein that they would not eate with him that did eate with vnwashed hands and one of their holy men being inuited by such an host rose vp and went his way alleaging to him when he would haue recalled him that he must not eate the bread of him which had an euill eye and besides his meate was vncleane The Priests when they kept their courses in the Temple abstained from Wine and ate not of the Tithes before they had washed their whole body The Pharises and Essees composed themselues to this sanctitie the greater part of the Pharises and all the Essees abstained from Wine and both vsed daily washings especially before they ate And as many Heretikes professing themselues Christians retained many things of Iudaisme so these Hemerobaptists learned them this daily washing It seemeth by him that these were Christian rather then Iewish Heretikes And so were the Nazaraeans also which some reckon among the Iewish Sects who embraced the Gospell of Christ but would not relinquish their Iudaisme vnlesse wee say with Hierome that whiles they would be both Iewes and Christians they were neither Iewes nor Christians These Nazaraeans or Nazoraeans Scaliger affirmeth were meere Karraim Scripture Iewes but because of their obstinacie in the Law the first Councell of the Apostles determined against them As for the Nazarites of the old Testament Moses describeth them and their obseruations not to cut their haire not to drinke wine strong drinke c. Such was Sampson But these could be no Sect holding in euery thing the same doctrine with the Iewes and onely for a time were bound by vow to these Rites But for those Nazaraeans Epiphanius maketh them a Iewish Sect not without cause if such were their opinions as he describeth them Their dwelling was beyond Iordan in Gilead and Bashan as the fame goeth saith he by Nation Iewes and by obseruing many things like to the Iewes Herein they differed They did not eate any thing which had life they offered not sacrifice for they counted it vnlawful to Sacrifice or to eate flesh They disallowed the fiue books of Moses they indeed confessed Moses and the Fathers by him mentioned and that he had receiued the Law not this yet which is written but another Philastrius saith they accepted the Law and Prophets but placed all righteousnesse in carnall obseruation and nourishing the haire of their heads placed therein all their vertue professing to imitate Sampson who was called a Nazarite from whom the Pagans afterwards named their valiant men Hercules Next to these doth Epiphanius place the Ossens dwelling in Ituraea Moab and beyond the Salt or Dead Sea to these one Elixai in the time of Traian ioyned himselfe hee had a brother named Iexai Scaliger here and euery where acute saith that the Essens and Ossens are the same name as being written with the selfe-same Hebrew Letters differing onely in pronunciation as the Abyssynes pronounce Osrael Chrostos for Israel Christus And the Arabian Elxai and his brother Iexai were not proper names but the appellation of the Sect it selfe as hee proueth But they agreed not so well in profession as in name with the Essens for they were but an issue of those ancient Essens holding some things of theirs others of their owne as concerning the Worship of Angels reproued by the Apostles Coloss 2.21 In which the Essens and Ossens agreed and other things there mentioned Touch not taste not handle not and in worshipping of the Sunne whereof they were called Sampsaeans or Sunners Sun-men as Epiphanius interpreteth that name Those things wherein they differed were brought in by that Innouator who of this his Sect was called Elxai He was saith Epiphanius a Iew he ordained Salt and Water and Earth and Bread and Heauen and the Skie and the Winde to be sworne by in Diuine worship And sometimes he prescribed other seuen witnesses Heauen and Water and Spirits and the holy Angels of Prayer and Oyle and Salt and Earth He hated continencie and enioyned marriage of necessitie Many imaginations he hath as receiued by reuelation He teacheth Hypocrisie as in time of persecution to worship Idols so as they keepe their Conscience free And if they confesse any thing with their mouth but not in their heart Thus ancient is that Changeling Aequiuocation He bringeth his Author one Phineas of the stock of the ancienter Phineas the sonne of Eleazar who had worshipped Diana in Babylon to saue his life His followers esteeme him a secret vertue or power Vntill the time of Constantine Marthus and Marthana two women of his stocke remained in succession of his honour and were worshipped in that Countrey for gods because they were of his seede Marthus died a while since but Marthana still liueth Their spittle and other excrements of their body those Heretikes esteemed and reserued for Reliques to the cure of diseases which yet preuayled nothing He mentioneth Christ but it is vncertaine whether he meaneth the Lord Iesus Hee forbids praying to the East-ward and bids turne towards Ierusalem from all parts He detesteth Sacrifices as neuer offered by the Fathers He denieth the eating of flesh among the Iewes and the Altar and Fire as contrarie to God but water is fitting He describeth Christ after his measure foure and twentie Schaem in length that is foure-score and sixteene miles and the fourth part thereof in breadth to wit six Schaeni or foure and twentie miles besides the thicknesse and other fables He acknowledgeth a holy Ghost but of the female sexe like to Christ standing like a statue aboue the Clouds and in the midst of two mountains He bids none should seeke the interpretation but only say these things in prayer words which he had taken out of the Hebrew tongue as in part we haue found His prayer is this Abar anid moib nochiel daasim ani daasim nochile moib anid abar selam Thus Epiphanius relates it and thus construes I cannot say expoundeth although they like our deuout Catholiques needed no exposition Let the humilitie passe from my Fathers of their condemnation and conculcation and labour the conculcation in condemnation by my Fathers from the humility passed in the Apostleship of perfection Thus was Elxai with his followers opinionate otherwise Iewish Epiphanius speakes of his Sect else where often as when he mentioneth the Ebonites and the Sampsaeans This booke both the Ossees and Nazoraeans and Ebionites vsed The Sampsaeans had another booke they said of his brothers They acknowledge one God and worship him vsing certaine washings Some of them abstaine from liuing creatures and they will die for Elxai his posteritie
it selfe to the Portugall yoke And because we haue in this Chapter mentioned so many Wonders let this also haue place among if not aboue the rest which presently happened Whiles the Portugalls were busie in their Buildings a certaine Bengalan came to the Gouernour which had liued as hee affirmed three hundred thirtie fiue yeeres The old men of the Countrey testified That they had heard their Ancestors speake of his great age and himselfe had a sonne fourescore and tende yeeres old and not at all Booke-learned yet was a speaking Chronicle of those passed times His teeth had sometimes fallen out others growing in their places and his beard after it had beene very hoarie by degrees returned into his former blacknesse About an hundred yeeres before this time he had altered his Pagan Religion into the Arabian or Moorish For this his miraculous age the Sultans of Cambaya had allowed him a stipend to liue on the continuance of which he now sought and did obtaine of the Portugals Friar Ioano dos Santos cells a long story of one yet aliue Ann. 1605. of whom the Bishop of Cochin had sent men to inquire who by diligent search found that hee was then three hundred eightie yeeres old and had married eight times the father of many generations They say his teeth had thrice fallen out and thrice renewed his haire thrice hoary and as oft black againe Hee could tell of nineteene successiue Kings which reigned in Horan his Countrey in Bengala He was also borne a Gentile and after turned Moore and hoped he said to dye a Christian reioycing to see a picture of Saint Francis saying Such a man when he was twentie fiue yeeres old had foretold him this long life But to returne Mamudius successor to Badurius sought with all his forces to driue these new Lords out of Diu as Solyman had done before by a Nauie and Armie sent thither but both in vaine of which Wars Damianus à Goes hath written diuers Commentaries But this whole Countrey is now subiect to the Mogor It was in Alexanders time peopled by the Massani Sodrae or Sabracae Praestae and Sangadae as Ortelius hath placed them where Alexander as in diuers other places he had done erected a Citie of his owne name called Alexandria Daman another Key of this Bay and entrance of the Riuer Indus into the Sea fell to the Portugals share The Land of Cambaya is the fruitfullest in all India which causeth great traffique of Indians Portugals Persians Arabians Armenians c. The Guzarates or Cambayans are the subtillest Merchants in all those parts They haue amongst them many Histories of Darius and Alexander which sometime were Lords of this Indian Prouince The Portugals haue at diuers times conquered diuers of the chiefe Townes in this Kingdome some whereof they keepe still The women in Diu by Art dye their teeth black esteeming themselues so much the more beautifull and therefore go with their lips open to shew the blacknesse of their teeth drawing away the couer of their lips as if they were lip-lesse giuing the prize of Beautie to a double deformitie Blacknesse and a Mouth O Hellish wide When a Cambayan dyeth they burne his body and distribute the ashes vnto the foure Elements of which man consisteth part to the Fire part to the Ayre to the Water also and Earth their due portions as Balby hath obserued M. Patrike Copland Minister in the Dragon with Captaine Best writes that hee rode in this Countrey from Medhaphrabadh to Surat in a Coach drawne with Oxen which is the most ordinary though they haue goodly Horses He saw at once the goodliest Spring and Haruest that euer he had seene Fields joyning together whereof one was greene as a medow the other yellow as gold ready to be cut of Wheat and Rice All along goodly Villages full of trees yeelding Taddy the Palme of which after a new sweet Wine strengthning and fattening A Smith which loued his liquor said hee could wish no other wages but a pot of this Taddy alway at his girdle §. II. Of the Kingdomes of Decan OF the Decans we haue spoken before in the Mogol conquests Decan is the name of a Citie sixe leagues from which is a Hill out of which the Diamond is taken This Hill is kept with a Garrison and walled about Of the Decan Kingdomes Barros hath reported That about the yeere 1300. Sa Nosaradin reigned in Delly or Delin and inuaded the Kingdome of Canara which reacheth from the Riuer Bate North of Chaul vnto the Cape Comori and wonne much from the Ancestors of the King now termed of Bisnaga At his returne he left Habedsa his Lieutenant who added to the former Conquests gathering a Band of all mixtures Gentiles Moores Christians His sonne was confirmed in the Gouernment therefore called Decan and the people Decanins because of this confusion of so many Nations of which his Fathers and His forces consisted for Decanins signifies Bastards He shooke off alleageance to his Lord and acknowledged none Superiour Hee also much encreased his Dominions His name was Mamudsa Hee appointed eighteene Captaines or Commanders allotting to each seuerall Prouinces These Captaines hee made were but slaues that so hee might the easier hold them in subjection He commanded that each of them should build a Palace at Bedir his chiefe Citie and there reside certaine moneths in the yeere his sonne remayning there in perpetuall hostage These in processe of time grew fewer and therefore greater the King holding nothing but his Royall Citie all the Empire being in the hands of these slaues which when the Portugals came thither were no more but Sabay Niza-Malucco Madre Malucco Melic Verida Coge Mecadam the Abessine Eunuch and Cota Malucco The mightiest of them was Sabay Lord of Goa His sonne was Hidalcam Thus Barrius Garcias ab Horto writes That the Mogors had possessed the Kingdome of Delly but a certaine Bengalan rebelling against his Master slue him vsurped his State and by force of warre added this of Canara also to his Dominion he was called Xaholam This King made his sisters sonne his Successor who was much addicted to Forreiners He diuided his Kingdome into twelue parts or Prouinces ouer which he set so many Captaines Idalcam from Angidaua to Cifarda from thence to Negatona Nizamaluco Ouer Balaguate or the vp-hill Countrey for Bala in the Persian language signifieth The toppe and Guate a Hill Imadmaluco and Catalmaluco and Verido c. These all rebelled and captiued Daquem their King at Beder the chiefe Citie of Decan and shared his Kingdome amongst themselues and some Gentiles partners in the conspiracie They were all forreiners but Nizamaluco This and the other names before mentioned were Titles of Honour giuen them with their Offices by the King corrupted by the vulgar in pronouncing Idalcam is Adel-ham Adel in the Persian language signifieth Iustice Ham is the Tartarian appellation signifying a Prince or King which name might well
diuers places His Nobles about him neuer looke him in the face but sit cowring vpon their buttockes with their elbowes vpon their knees and their hands before their faces not looking vp till the King command them And when they depart out of his presence they turne not their backes vpon him Such reuerend regard doth that Negro King receiue of them The next yeere Master Iohn Lock went for Captaine into those parts to trade for Gold Graines and Elephants teeth And after that diuers Voyages were thither made by William Towerson who obserued at the Riuer of Saint Vincent strange trees with great leaues like great Dockes longer then that a man could reach the top of them and a kind of Pease by the Sea-side growing on the Sands like trees with stalkes seuen and twentie paces long Diuers of the women had brests exeeding long At the Cape Tres puntas they made him sweare by the water of the Sea that hee would not hurt them before they would trade with him King Abaan a Negro entertained our men kindly hee caused to bee brought a pot of Wine of Palme or Coco which they draw forth of trees as we haue elsewhere obserued but their Ceremonies in drinking are thus First they bring forth their pot of drinke and then make a hole in the ground and put some of the drinke into it and after that cast in the Earth againe and thereon set their pot and with a little thing made of a Gourd take out of the same drinke and put it vpon the ground in three places and in diuers places they haue certaine bunches of the pils of Palme-trees set in the ground before them and there they put in some drinke doing great reuerence in all places to the same Palme-trees All these Ceremonies done the King tooke a cup of Gold in which they put Wine and whiles hee dranke all the people cryed Abaan Abaan with certaine other words and then they gaue drinke to euery one The like Ceremonies they vse in all the Countrey In Benin the people goe naked till they be married and then are clothed from the waste to the knees Their bread is a kind of Rootes called Inamia which when it is well sodden may be preferred before ours They haue here great spouts of water falling out of the Aire which if they light on a ship doe endanger the same They fall like the pillars of Churches As for those Voyages to those parts made by Rutter Fenner Ingram or others I referre them to Master Hackluyts Collections One writeth That the King of Benin hath sixe hundred Wiues with all which twice a yeere he goeth in pompe the Gentlemen haue some of them fourescore some fourescore and ten the meanest ten or twelue At Cape de Lope Gonsalues some pray to the Sunne others to the Moone or to certaine trees or to the Earth esteeming it a great sinne to spit vpon it from whence they receiue their food Men and women inke their bodies putting thereon grease mixed with colour They will not drinke before they put out some and drinke not when they eate They offer their wiues to strangers The King keepeth his Daughters when they are growne for Wiues and the Queenes with like incestuous abomination vse their Sonnes They paint their bodies red vse Bananas dried in stead of bread and lay all their meates in a dish together About the Castle of Mina they are subiect to such Wormes as Master Ienkinson hath obserued to grow vpon men at Bognar in Bactria by drinking the water of the Riuer there which are an Ell long and must be pulled out by degrees euery day a little if they breake by the way it is very dangerous The torture they cause is vnspeakeable they breed in the armes and legges yea sometimes in the yard and cod one man hath had ten of them at one time The Inhabitants of Benin obserue Circumcision and some other Superstitions which may seeme Mahumetan but are more likely to bee ancient Ethnike Rites For many Countreyes of Africa admit Circumcision and yet know not or acknowlege not Mahumetisme but are either Christians as the Cophti Abassines or Gentiles they cut or rase the skinne with three lines drawne to their Nauell esteeming it necessary to saluation They will not easily doe iniury to any especially a stranger They haue Birds in such respect that it is deadly to any that shall hurt them And some are appointed to haue a peculiar care of them and to prouide them food which they doe in high Mountaynes where they lay meate for them which they come and eate Arthus writes That the Inhabitants of Guinea giue Religious respect vnto certaine trees And in the yeere one thousand fiue hundred ninetie eight certaine Hollanders cutting them and not ceasing at the perswasion of Negro's whose Superstitions in that case they derided it passed from words to blowes betwixt them the Dutchmen were forced to get them to their ships one of their company being slaine in the chase But the Murtherer was offered to the Hollanders to be punished which they refusing his Countrimen cut off his head and quartered his bodie bestowing the one as a monument of reuenge ouer the slaine parties graue the other on the Fowles vnburied Their trees are alway greene some haue leaues twice a yeere They seldome see the Sunne either rising or going downe by the space of halfe of an houre Their Winter beginneth in Aprill which yet is their time of Haruest Mays was brought thither out of America In Aprill May and Iune they haue much raine and the same very dangerous to the bodie and rotting the clothes if it bee not presently dryed It is often as warme as if it were sodden They haue some Snakes thirty foot long as much as sixe men can carrie they haue also a beast like a Crocodile called Lanhadi we haue spoken of the like about Pegu and Bengala which neuer goeth into the water Spiders as bigge as the Palme of ones hand which doe not spinne store of Cameleons Dogges woolly with sharpe snouts of diuers colours which cannot barke driuen to the Market as sheepe tied one to another blue Parrets many sorts of Apes blacke Flyes which seeme to burne In Senega some Snakes haue mouthes so wide that they swallo a whole sheepe without tearing they haue winged Dragons with tayles and long mouthes with many teeth being blue and greene which some Negros worship They boare a hole in the Palme-wine tree whence issueth a white iuyce first sweete and after by standing it becomes sowre and after by standing it becomes sowre It is somewhat like the Coco-tree The Palmita is without branches the fruit growes on the top which within is like Pomegranates full of graines without of a golden colour They buy Gentilitie with gifts a Dog a Sheepe a Cow in their creation is obserued much solemnitie They know not how to number their yeeres but seeme
their transitiue and forren effects are stinted and limitted to the modell and state of the Creature wherein the same effects are wrought Such an immanent worke we conceiue and name that Decree of GOD touching the Creation of the World with his prouident disposing all and euery part thereof according to the Counsel of his own will and especially touching the reasonable creatures Angels and Men in respect of their eternall state in Saluation or Damnation The outward works of GOD are in regard of Nature Creation and Prouidence in regard of Grace Redemption and Saluation in the fulnesse of time performed by our Emanuel GOD manifested in the flesh true GOD and perfect Man in the Vnitie of one Person without confusion conuersion or separation This is verie GOD and life eternall IESVS CHRIST the Sonne of GOD our Lord which was conceiued by the HOLY GHOST borne of the Virgin MARY suffered vnder Pontius Pilate who was crucified dead and buried descended into Hell rose againe the third day he ascended into Heauen where he sitteth at the right hand of GOD the Father Almightie from whence he shall come to iudge the quicke and dead And to such as are sonnes GOD doth also send the Spirit of his Sonne to renue and sanctifie them as children of the Father members of the Sonne Temples of the Spirit that they euen all the Elect may be one holy Catholike Church enioying the vnspeakeable priuiledges and heauenly prerogatiues of the Communion of Saints the Forgiuenesse of Sinnes the Resurrection of the Body and Euerlasting Life Euen so come LORD IESVS CHAP. II. Of the creation of the World THey which would without danger behold the Eclipse of the Sunne vse not to fixe their eyes directly vpon that bright eye of the World although by this case darkned but in water behold the same with more case and lesse perill How much fitter is it likewise for our tender eyes in beholding the light of that Light The Father of lights in whom is no darknesse to diuert our eyes from that brightnesse of glory and behold him as wee can in his workes The first of which in execution was the creation of the World plainly described by Moses in the booke of Genesis both for the Author matter manner and other circumstances Reason it selfe thus farre subscribing as appeareth in her Schollers the most of the Heathens and Philosophers in all ages That this World was made by a greater then the World In prouing this or illustrating the other a large field of discourse might be ministred neither doe I know any thing wherein a man may more improue the reuenewes of his learning or make greater shew with a little decking and pruning himselfe like Aesops Iay or Horace his Chough with borrowed feathers than in this matter of the Creation written of after their manner by so many Iewes Ethnickes Heretikes and Orthodoxe Christians For my part it shall be sufficient to write a little setting downe so much of the substance of this subiect as may make more plaine way and easier introduction into our ensuing History leauing such as are more studious of this knowledge to those which haue purposely handled this argument with Commentaries vpon Moses Text of which besides many moderne Writers some of which haue almost oppressed the Presse with their huge Volumes there are diuers of the Primitiue middle and decayed times of the Church a cloud indeed of Authors both for their number and the varietie of their opinions the most of them couering rather then discouering that Truth which can bee but one and more to beleeued in their confuting others then prouing their owne assertions Their store through this disagreeing is become a sore and burthen whiles we must consult with many and dare promise to our selues no surer footing yet cleauing as fast as we can to the letter imploring the assistance of the Creators Spirit let vs draw as neere as we may to the sense of Moses words the beginning whereof is In the beginning GOD created the Heauen and the Earth Wherein to omit the endlesse and diuers interpretations of others obtruding allegoricall anagogicall mysticall senses on the letter is expressed the Author of this worke to be GOD Elohim which word as is said is of the plurall number insinuating the holy Trinitie the Father as the Fountaine of all goodnesse the Sonne as the Wisdome of the Father the holy Ghost as the power of the Father and the Sonne concurring in this worke The action is creating or making of nothing to which is required a power supernaturall and infinite The Time was the beginning of time when as before there had neither been Time nor any other Creature The worke is called Heauen and Earth which some interpret all this bodily world heere propounded in the summe and after distinguished in parcells according to the sixe dayes seuerall workes Some vnderstand thereby the First matter which others apply only to the word Earth expounding Heauen to be that which is called Empyreum including also the spirituall and super-celestiall inhabitants Againe others whom I willingly follow extend the word Heauen to a larger signification therein comprehending those three Heauens which the Seriptures mention one whereof is this lower where the birds of the Heauen doe flye reaching from the Earth to the Sphere of the Moone the second the visible Planets and fixed Starres with the first Moueable the third called the Heauen of Heauens the third Heauen and Paradise of GOD together with all the Host of them By Earth they vnderstand this Globe consisting of Sea and Land with all the creatures therein The first Verse they hold to be a generall proposition of the Creation of all Creatures visible and inuisible perfected in sixe dayes as many places of Scripture testifie which as concerning the visible Moses handleth after particularly largely and plainly contenting himselfe with briefe mention of those inuisible creatures both good and bad as occasion is offered in the following parts of his Historie In the present he omitteth the particular description of their Creation lest some as Iewes and Heretikes haue done should take occasion to attribute the Creation to Angels as assistants or should by the excellencie of that Nature depainted in due colours be carryed to worshipping of Angels a superstition which men haue embraced towards the visible creatures farre in feriour both to Angels and themselues Moses proceedeth therefore to the description of the first matter and the creatures thereof framed and formed For touching those inuisible creatures both the Angels and their heauenly habitation howsoeuer they are circumscribed and haue their proper and most perfect substance yet according to the interpretation of Diuine their nature differeth from that of other creatures celestiall or terrestriall as not being made of that first matter whereof these consist Let vs therefore labour rather to be like the
whether she had not yet experience of the Nature of the Creatures or did admire so strange an accident and would satisfie her curious mind in the further tryall entertained discourse and was presently snared For though she held her to the Commandement yet the threatning annexed she did somewhat mince and extenuate What she seemed to lessen he feared not to annihilate and wholly disanull propounding not onely impunity but aduantage That they should be as Gods in the enriching of their minds with further knowledge This hee perswadeth by the equivocating in the name of the Tree the first equiuocation we read of otherwhere plainely tearmed a lye charging GOD with falshood and malignitie Thus he that abode not in the Truth himselfe but was a Man-slayer from the beginning and the Father of Lying which he no where else borrowed but had of his owne perswaded her by his great subtiltie first to doubt of GODS Truth in his Word the first particular sinne that euer mans heart entertained for the other were but occasions and inducements disobedience and vnthankefulnesse are more generall after that she vnlawfully lusted after this new knowledge bewitched with the pleasantnesse of the fruit to the taste and sight shee tooke and did eate and gaue to her husband likewise The highest power of the soule is first entrapped the lusting and sensible faculties follow after iustly plagued by a correspondent inward rebellion that the sense now ruleth the appetite and this the reason in our corrupt estate which hence proceeded Thus vnbeleefe brought forth vnthankefulnesse vnthankefulnesse pride from thence ambition and all that rabble of contempt of Gods Truth beleeuing the Deuils lies abuse of the Creatures to wanton lust Sacrilegious vsurping that which GOD had reserued scandalous prouocation of her husband with the murther bodily and ghostly of him her selfe and their whole posteritie for euer and whereas yet they had done so little seruice to GOD they offered almost their first fruits to the Deuill hauing Free-will to haue resisted if they would No maruell then if such a combination of so many sinnes in one wrung from the iustice of GOD such a multitude of iudgements on them and theirs in the defacing that goodly and glorious Image of GOD subiecting in stead thereof the Bodie to Sickenesse Colde Heate Nakednesse Hunger Thirst Stripes Wounds Death the Minde to Ignorance Doubtings Vanitie Phancies Phrenzies the Will to Vnstaiednesse Passion Perturbations the Whole Man is made a slaue to Sinne within him to the Deuill without whence he must expect Wages sutable to his Worke Death Spirituall Naturall and Eternall an infinite punishment for offending an infinite Maiesty Thus had they put out their light to obscure darkenesse and if they were not presently cast into vtter darkenesse it was GODS mercy not their merit which suspended the first and naturall death to preuent that second and eternal But spiritually the were euen already dead in sinnes as appeared by the accusations of their conscience whereof Moses saith The eyes of them both were opened and they knew that they were naked Conscience before Vertues keeper was now become Hels Harbenger then flashing lightnings in the face of their minds to shew that their nakednesse did now appeare filthy in GODS sight Lightnings indeed which could only lighten to terrifie not enlighten with instruction and comfort which sparke remaineth after the fire of Gods Image extinct by the mercifull prouidence of GOD in some to bee a bridle of Nature least they should runne into all excesse of vilanie and not leaue a face of the world in the world and to be to others by disposition and working of a higher and supernaturall Light a preparatiue to and a preseruatiue in that light of Life So much the greater is their sinne that seeke to flash out these flashings and whereas they cannot reade the booke of Scripture and will not reade the booke of the Creature labour to extinguish also this Light of Nature that with seared consciences they may more freely in darkenesse commit the workes of darkenesse And euen this did Adam seeke if GOD had not brought him out of his Owles neast For what could a Fig-leafe hide from GOD and did they thinke the innocent Trees would conspire with them to conceale Traytors Was there any darkenesse which was not Light to him Or could Breeches and Trees couer their Soules which receiued the first and worst nakednesse till which Nakednesse to the body was a Clothing of Beauty a Liuery of Bounty an Ensigne of Maiesty Such broken pits seeke they that forsake the Fountaine of liuing Waters And yet when GOD commeth into Iudgement and makes the winds to vsher him vnto his priuate Sessions in Paradise to those shiftlesse shifts they added worse impiously accusing GOD vncharitably charging one another to put from themselues that blame which thus claue faster to them A medicine worse then the disease or a disease in stead of a medicine is hypocrisie that will not see her owne sickenesse and seekes rather to couer then to cure to couer by charging others then recouer by discharging and discouering it selfe as if equitie pretended were not iniquitie doubled GOD proceedeth to sentence a sentence worthy of GOD shewing at once his infinite iustice in the punishment of sinne and no lesse infinite mercie to prouide an infinite price to redeeme vs by his infinite power bringing good out of euill and by his manifold Wisedome taking that wise one in his craftinesse who in the destruction of Man had sought GODS dishonour So good is it that euill should be when this Soueraigne goodnesse purposeth to effect his good will by wicked instruments out of their darkenesse producing his owne maruellous light as appeared in this worke of Sathan an aduersary intended to his despite in and by the promised Seede disposed to his glory The Serpent hath a bodily curse in his future bodily difficulties which still continue for his instrumentall and bodily imployment The old Serpent and spirituall Enemie hath a spirituall and eternall curse the breaking of his head by that Seede of the Woman that should once lead Captiuitie captiue Our Parents are cursed yet so as their curse is turned into a blessing all things working to the best In sorrow shal be the Womans conceptions but recompenced with the ioy which followeth and is as it were the Mid-wife in their trauell because of fruit borne into the World and more then recompenced in that they are saued by bearing of children if they continue in the faith and liue in holinesse with modestie Adam is set to labour not as before with delight but with paine and difficultie the Earth also being cursed for his sake yet by this narrow way by this crosse-way he is guided to Heauen the hope whereof was giuen him before Paradise was taken from him So true is it that in iudgement he remembreth mercy if we can learne to liue
Esay speake to the Princes of Sodome in his time and the people of Gomorrha in respect of that their wickednesse which suruiued them and hath fructified vnto vs among whom yet the Lord of Hoasts as with them hath reserued a small remnant from this worse plague then Sodoms brimstone a Reprobate sense The difference betwixt ours and them is that they were more open ours more close both in like height but not in like weight of wickednesse our darkenesse excelling theirs both in the sinne and in the punishment in as much as a greater light hath shined which we with hold in vnrighteousnesse And if you will haue the maine character of difference betwixt these and those the one are beastly Men the other are Deuils in the flesh First from a sparke of Hell Concupiscence guided by Sensuall Lust attended by Ease and Prosperitie and further inflamed and blowne by the Deuill an vnnaturall fire which stil beareth the name of Sodomie was kindled which gaue coales to a supernaturall flame rained by the LORD in Brimstone and fire from the LORD out of Heauen and burning euen to Hell againe the Alpha and Omega of wickednesse where they suffer saith Iude the vengeance of eternall fire This is written for our learning on whom the ends of the world are come their ashes being made an example vnto them that should after liue vngodly Let not any obiect the Preacher here and require the Historian seeing that Historie builds no castles in the ayre but preacheth both ciuill and diuine knowledge by examples of the passed vnto the present Ages And why should not I preach this which not my calling alone but the very place it selfe exacteth Discite iustitiam moniti is the quintessence of all Historie They being dead yet speake and the place of their buriall is a place to our memorie being turned into a Sea but a Dead Sea which couereth their sinnes that it may discouer ours which as astonished at their vnnaturalnesse hath forgotten her owne nature It drowneth the Earth which it should haue made as whilome it did fertile it staies it selfe with wonder and indignation and falling in a dead swowne sincketh downe with horrour not wakened not mooued with the windes blustering refusing the light of the Sunne the lappe of the Ocean the Commerce of strangers or familiarity of her owne and as it happeneth in deepe passions the colour goeth and commeth changing three times euery day it gaspeth foorth from her dying entrailes a stincking and noysome ayre to the neere dwellers pestiferous sometimes voyding as it were excrements both lighter ashes and grosse Asphaltum The neighbour fruits participate of this death promising to the eye toothsome and wholesome foode performing only smoake and ashes And thus hath out GOD shewed himselfe a consuming fire the LORD of anger to whom vengeance belongeth all Creatures mustering themselues in his sight and saying at his first call to execution Loe we are heere That which I haue said of these miracles still liuing in this dead-Sea is confirmed by testimonie of many h Authors Brocard telleth of those Trees with ashes growing vnder Engaddi by this Sea and a vapour rising out of the Sea which blasteth the neighbour-fruits and the slimie pits on the brinkes of the Sea which hee saw Neither strangers nor her owne haue accesse there where Fishes the naturall inhabitants of the Waters and Water-fowles the most vsuall ghests haue no entertainment and men or other heauie bodies cannot sinke Vespasian prooued this experiment by casting in some bound vnskilfull of swimming whom the waters surfetted with swallowing her owne spewed vp againe This is mentioned by Aristotle also who saith that the saltnesse there of is the cause why neyther man nor beast though bound can sinke in it nor any fish liue therein which yet in the salt-sea wee see no otherwise The Philosopher could see no further then reason nor all that neither but Moses guideth vs beyond Philosophie to diuine vengeance which thus subuerted Nature when men became vnnaturall The Lake Iosephus saith is fiue hundred and fourescore furlongs in length Plinie hath an hundred myles the breadth betweene sixe and fiue and twentie myles Strabo telleth of thirteene Cities still whereof Sodome was chiefe of threescore furlongs compasse wherof some were consumed by fire or swallowed by Earth-quakes and sulphurous Waters the rest forsaken some Remainders as bones of those carkasses then in his time continuing Vertomannus saith That there are the ruines of three Cities on the tops of three Hils and that the Earth is without water and barren and a greater miracle hath a kinde of bloody mixture somewhat like red waxe the depth of three or foure cubites The ruines of the Cities are there seene still Georgius Cedrenus in his Greeke History written aboue fiue hundred and fiftie yeeres since writeth that hee had seene this dead-Sea and reckoneth thereof these maruells That it produceth no quicke Creature that dead carkasses sinke therein a liuing man can scarcely diue vnder water lamps burning swimme but being put out they sinke there are fountaines of Bitumen allume also and salt but bitter and shining Where any fruit is found nothing is found but smoake The water thereof is holesome to such as vse it but differing from other waters in contrarie accidents Not long after his time Fulcherius Carnotensis in the beginning of the Westerne kingdome in these parts testifieth the vntolerable saltnesse of this sea from his owne taste And that neere the same is a hill which in diuers places thereof is likewise salt shining therewith like ice and hard as stone and ghesseth that the saltnesse of this sea proceedeth partly from that cause partly from the intercourse which vnder the earth it holdeth with the greater sea Compassing this lake on the South side we came to a Village which they say is Segor abounding with Dates where the Inhabitants were blacke And there saith he did I see apples on the trees which when I opened I found blacke and dustie within * The like is read Sap. 10.7 Of whose wickednesse euen to this day the waste Land that smoketh is a testimony and plants bearing fruits that neuer came to ripenesse and a standing pillar of Salt is a monument of an vnbeleeuing soule They left behind them to the World a memoriall of their foolishnesse c. And Moses Deut. 32.32 their vine is of the vine of Sodom and of the vine of Gomorrah their grapes are grapes of gall their clusters are bitter c. Which allegorie must haue his foundation in the naturall disposition of those places and fruits Later Trauellers as William Lithgow and I haue heard the like of Master Eldred which haue seene these parts say there are now no such fruits which may come to passe by that alteration which so long space may cause or else because they visited not those parts which Fulcherius mentions Lithgow addes that the water of this dead Sea contrarie
people withall In the death of Christ these died and had their consumption with his consummatum est the Iudicials remayning euer since dead the ceremonies deadly only they were as it were for their more honourable funerall after that their death detayned some time aboue ground and those ceremonies which before Christ were necessarie in the times of the Apostles till the Iewish Church might be instructed became indifferent but since meerely vnlawfull neither can it now but be sacrilegious to violate the sepulchres of the dead This Nation was diuided as is said alreadie into Tribes according to the number of Iacobs sonnes amongst whom Leui had no portion but the Lord was their portion they seruing at the Altar and liuing of the Altar but eight and fortie Cities with their suburbs assigned for their habitation amongst other Tribes that being so dispersed they might disperse also and preach the Law to the rest and were reckoned to that Tribe with which they dwelled and whereas others might not marrie for feare of alienation of their inheritances into another Tribe this of Leui either had or tooke libertie herein as Iudg. 19. and 2. Chron. 22. Ioiada married the Kings sister and thus Elizabeth wife of Zacharie the Priest might be Cousin to Marie the Mother of our Lord The number of twelue remayned yet entire in reckoning of these Tribes because Ioseph had a double portion and his sonnes Ephraim and Manasses made two Tribes Neither were they alone reckoned Israelites that naturally descended from some one of these twelue sonnes of Israel but such also of other Nations as embraced their Ceremonies and Religion being for distinction sake called Proselytes The Hebrew word which is interpreted a Proselyte signifieth extracted or drawne forth because they esteemed such drawne forth of Hell whom yet they made the children of Hell more then themselues in burthening their consciences not onely with those Ceremonies whereunto the Law and their Tradition tyed them but with diuers others also The name Proselite as Drusius affirmeth is either taken largely for any stranger or strictly for a conuert to their Religion A Proselyte was made with obseruation of three things Circumcision Baptisme or Washing and Oblation The first was a signe of the Couenant in which they were receiued the second as a badge of their cleannesse for all the Gentiles were vncleane the third for the atonement with GOD. This was while the Temple stood and now is not in force but whether Baptisme be still vsed I know not Hee ought to be circumcised in the presence of three And if by nature or accident he were before circumcised and wanted that fore-skin yet did they cut him there and made him bleede notwithstanding and when his wound was whole then before three witnesses was hee baptised in which ceremonie they couered the whole body with water This manner of baptising they vsed also in reconciling and receiuing penitents which had giuen scandall by notorious offences in token of repentance newnesse of life hauing first before this washing testified their humiliation by fasting and prayer Of this washing they were so scrupulous that Clemens Alexandrinus testifieth they were often washed in their beds A woman Proselite was admitted by Baptisme onely and the offering of two Turtles or two Pigeons Serarius sayth Baptisme and Circumcision are still required the like is written by P. Ricius and Munster who adde that when any desireth to become a Proselyte they propound to him the hardest things of the Law with the promises of future happinesse as of the Sabbath not eating fat c. with some penances that hee should not after say had I wist and they would seeme to bee willing by these meanes to driue them from their Religion as being corrupted by such new commers but Christ affirmeth otherwise §. III. Of the Hebrew Politie and ciuill Gouernement THe gouernement of this people was as Betramus thinketh before Iethro's aduice had brought in those Gouernours of thousands hundreds fifties and tens vnder seuentie Elders according to the number of persons which descended with Iacob into Egypt and that the seuentie assigned after to Moses for assistants in the gouernement were continued in their former office with further ratification and encrease of gifts and not newly instituted Yea this number hee sayth gouerned in Egypt howsoeuer Pharaohs tyrannie did afterward much eclipse their authoritie and were by Moses and Aaron assembled together Exod. 4.29 So that the thirteene Tribes consisted of seuerall Families according to the number of the chiefe heads thereof mentioned by Moses to which the thirteene Princes of the thirteene Tribes being annexed made vp the number His reasons let such as will learne of himselfe The gouernement in that time of Moses was mixt the Monarchy being in Moses but qualified with an Aristrocratie in these seuenty and the other Officers before mentioned a Democratie also appeared in the Assemblies so often mentioned In lighter matters the Chiliarchs Centurions Quinquagenarij and Decurions iudged in more weighty the seuenty Thus it continued in Ioshua's time till they had conquered and inhabited Cities And then each Citie had their Senate or Councell of the Chiliarchs and other Officers beforenamed proportionable to the greatnesse thereof Iosephus numbreth seuen Elders and two Leuites in euery City which seemeth more to agree with his time then this former Euen in Bethlehem the least of the thousands of Iuda Boaz assembled ten Elders about the matter of Ruth It seemeth that they had Leuites assisting in the iudgements and Tribunals as men learned in the Law and so we reade of the times of Dauid and Iehoshaphat But I had rather send my Reader for these things to the Scriptures and to the labors of Betramus and Sigonius from all which it is also apparant that the State was after Moses and Ioshua managed by Iudges of diuers Tribes not by Election nor inheritance succeeding in that Office but by appointment of God till they desired a king whereas before God was their king and by his Law partly partly by Oracle ruled the State being as some thinke an Aristocraty There were also in the times of these Iudges Princes of each Tribe and the heads of Families There was also a gouernement in each City by the Elders or Senate exercised in the Gates thereof as before is obserued They had accordingly their Councels or Assemblies either of the whole Nation or of a whole Tribe or of some one Citie The kingdome of Israel after it was diuided from the house of Dauid continued the like forme of gouernement as is most probable After the Captiuity it appeareth by the Histories of Hezra and Nehemiah that the chiefe sway was vnder the Lieutenant or Deputie of the Persian king according to commission from him Other Offices happily receiued some alteration in regard of their numbers and estate weaker and lesse then in those former times of prosperity so that what Iosephus
Anathema vpon Anathema That concerning their becomming Proselytes Drusius doubteth whether it may not bee translated that a stranger Cuthaean should not abide in Israel which is more likely The other had beene more impious their zeale to make Proselytes of all Nations is knowne To returne to Manasses Iosephus saith that the high Priests and the Elders put him from the Altar who therefore went to Sanballat his Father in law and told him that he loued his daughter well but would not for her lose his Priest-hood Sanballat replied that if he would retaine his daughter he would not onely maintayne him in his Priest-hood but procure him a high-Priests place and make him Prince of all his Prouince and would build a Temple like to that of Ierusalem in mount Garizim which looketh ouer Samaria higher then the other Hills and that with the consent of K. Darius Hereupon Manasses abode with him and many Priests and Israelites being intangled with like marriages reuolted to him and were maintayned by Sanballat But now Alexander preuailing against Darius Sanballat whose Religion was Policie rebelled and tooke part with Alexander and in reward thereof obtayned leaue to build his Temple whereof Manasses enioyed to him and his successors the Pontificall dignitie Then was the Circumcision diuided some as said the Samaritan woman worshipping in this Mountaine others at Ierusalem The zeale which the Samatitans had to their Temple appeared in the time of Ptolomaeus Philometor when at Alexandria Sabbaeus and Theodosius with their Samaritans contended with Andronicus and the Iewes these challenging to Ierusalem those to Garizim the lawful honor of a Temple both parties swearing by God and the King to bring proofe of their assertion out of the law and beseeching the King to do him to death that should not make his part good and thereupon the Samaritans failing in proofe were adiudged to punishment The Samaritans in the prosperitie of the Iewes professed themselues their kinsmen and allies in aduersitie disclaymed them and their God also as appeareth in their Epistle to Antiochus that figure of Antichrist and persecuter of the Iewish Religion in which they call themselues Sidonians dwelling in Sichem and say that moued by ancient superstition they had embraced the Feast of the Sabbath and building a Temple of a namelesse Deity had offered therein solemne Sacrifices whereas therefore their originall was Sidonian and not Iewish pleased him to enact that their Temple might beare name of Iupiter Graecanicus and they might liue after the Greekish Rites These things Antiochus easily granted This Sichem is called Sichar Io. 4.5 It was after that called Neapolis and lastly of the Colonie which Vespasian or Domitian placed there Flauia Caesarea Of that Colonie was it is Scaligers testimony Animal Euseb pag. 201. Iustin Martyr omnium Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum qui hodie extant vetustissimus which occasioned Epiphanius his error that of a Samaritan he became a Christian whereas he was neuer a Samaritan in Religion but only of this Samaritan Colonie In this were in the age of Beniamin one hundred Samaritans the words of Beniamin are worthy the inserting I came saith he to Samaria in which the Palace of Ahab is yet to be knowne a place very delectable with Springs Riuers Gardens c. and hath not one Iew inhabiting Two leagues from hence is Nables somtime called Sichem in mount Ephraim where are no Iews The Citie is situate betweene the hils of Garizim and Heball there are about a hundred Cuthaeans which obserue only the law of Moses They are called Samaritans they haue Priests of the posterity of Aaron which resteth in peace who marry not with any other but the men or women of their owne stock and are there commonly called Aaronites they sacrifice and burne their offerings in a Synagogue which they haue on Mount Garizim citing out of the law Thou shalt giue a blessing vpon the Mount Gerizim this say they is the house of the Sanctuarie and on the Paschall and other solemnities they Sacrifice on an Altar in Mount Garizim made of stones taken by the Israelites out of Iordan They boast themselues to be of the Tribe of Ephraim With them is the Sepulchre of Ioseph He addeth which Scaliger saith is a slender that they want three Letters He Cheth Ain whereas they reade the Pentateuch in so many and the same Letters in which Moses wrote them as Postel and Scaliger affirme and those which the Iewes vse are later counterfeits the example whereof Scaliger hath giuen vs in their Computation in the last Edition of his Emendation yea they are now also further from Idolatrie then the Iewes themselues howsoeuer in their Talmud and else where they brand them with false and odious imputations Beniamin also testifieth that they abstaine from pollution by the dead or bones the slaine and the Sepulchres And euery day when they goe into the Synagogue they put off their vsuall clothes and hauing washed their bodies with water put on other clothes sacred only to this purpose Beniamin found of these Cuthaeans two hundred in Caesarea at Benibera or new Ascalon three hundred and at Damascus foure hundred Hircanus by force tooke both Sichem and Garizim Two hundred yeeres after the foundation of this Temple as testifieth Iosephus hapned this desolation thereof The zeale yet continued as appeareth by many testimonies of Scripture The Iewes medled not with the Samaritanes which made the woman wonder that Christ asked drinke of a Samaritan Another time the Samaritans would not receiue him because his behauiour was as though he would goe to Ierusalem for which fact of theirs the sonnes of thunder would haue brought lightning from heauen vpon them And the Iewish despite could not obiect worse in their most venemous slander then Thou art a Samaritan This Ierusalem-iourney through the Samaritans countrey caused bloudie warres and slaughter betwixt the Galilaeans and them in the time of Cumanus to the destruction of many And before that in the daies of Pilate a cosining Prophet abused their zeale bidding them to assemble in mount Garizim with promise there to shew them the sacred vessels which said he Moses had there hidden Whereupon they seditiously assembling and besieging Tirabatha Pilate came vpon them with his forces and cut them in peeces Their opinions besides those aforesaid were that onely the fiue bookes of Moses were Canonicall Scripture the rest they receiued not They acknowledge not the Resurrection nor the Trinitie and in zeale of one GOD abandon all Idolatries which it seemeth was receiued of them after the building of the Temple and mixture with the Apostate Iewes the Scripture testifying otherwise of their former deuotions They wash themselues with Vrine when they come from any stranger being forsooth polluted And if they haue touched one of another Nation they diue themselues garments and all in water Such a prophanation is the touch of one of another faith They haue a dead corps
But of Beasts Birds Trees and Flowers those prominent Images which are made standing out are lawfull Otherwise of the Sunne Moone and Starres 45. No commoditie is to bee raised from Idols If a tree be planted neere an Image one may not sit vnder the shadow thereof nor passe vnder it if there bee any other way and if he must passe it must be running Things imployed to Idolatry may be vsed of vs if the Gentiles haue first prophaned them It is not lawfull to sell them Waxe or Frankincense especially at their Candlemasse Feast nor bookes to vse in their seruice Our women may not performe a Mid-wiues office to them nor nurse their children 65. Thou shalt doe no worke on the Seuenth day Nothing that belongeth to the getting of Food or Rayment It is vnlawfull to walke on the grasse lest thou pull it vp with thy feet or to hang any thing on the bough of a tree lest it breake or to eate an Apple plucked on the Sabbath especially if the tayle or woodden substance whereby it groweth be on it or to mount on a horse lest he bee galled or to goe into water lest thou wipe thy clothes which holdeth also if they be moystened with Wine or Oyle but not in a woman that giueth suck who may wipe her cloathes for the more puritie of her prayers The stopple of a Vessell if it be of Hempe or Flax may not be thrust in though it runne especially if any other Vessell be vnder To mixe Mustard-seed with wine or water to lay an Apple to the fire to roast to wash the bodie chiefely with hot water to sweate to wash the hands to doe any thing in priuate which may not bee publikely done but some say it is lawfull priuately to rubbe off the durt with his nayles from his cloathes which publikely hee may not To reade by a Light except two reade together To set sayle but if thou enter three dayes before it is not necessarie to goe forth on the Sabbath to be carryed in a Waggon though a Gentile driue it If fire happen on the Sabbath to carrie any thing out but thy food rayment and necessaries for that day and that wherein the holy Booke lyeth to put to pasture Horses or Asses coupled together to receiue any good by the Light or Fire which a Gentile hath made for the Iew otherwise if he did it for himselfe To play on any Instrument to make a bed to Number Measure Iudge or Marry lest they should write any thing To reade at home when others are at the Synagogue To speake of buying and selling which it seemeth they obserue not To visite Field or Garden To Runne Leape or tell Tales c. All these on the Sabbath day are vnlawfull For dangerous diseases it is lawfull to violate the Sabbath Such are the three first dayes after a womans trauell c. But of this see also the obseruation of their Sabbath It is not lawfull to walke out of the Citie but their limited space but within the Citie as farre as they will though it bee as big as Niniuie 120. It is forbidden to hurt the Seed-members of Man or Beast Neither Males nor Females may be gelded or spayed and yet wee may vse such Beasts 126. It is punishable to know kisse or embrace one which is forbidden by the Law Leuit. 18. Therefore our Masters haue forbidden to smile on such or vse any meanes or tokens of Lust Likewise they haue forbidden men to know their Wiues in the day-time vnlesse it bee in the darke or vnder some Couering The same is forbidden to a drunken man and to him which hateth his wife lest they get wicked Children betweene them Also to follow a woman in the streets but either to goe before or besides her And hee which is not married may not put his hand beneath his Nauell nor touch his flesh when he maketh water And because a man may not weare Womans attire neither may hee looke in a glasse because that is womanish 138. The fat may not bee eaten The fat of the Heart may but not that which is on the Inwards and Reines and Stomake and Guts and Bladder the rest may be eaten 176. If thy Brother bee poore thou mayest not abuse him to wit to base Offices as to vntie the shooe or to carrie Vessels to the Bath Concerning liberalitie to the poore they limit it at the fift part of a mans goods lest men should become poore by releeuing the poore 191. Thou mayest not lend to an Israelite on Vsurie nor borrow on Vsurie Nor be a witnesse or suretie in cases of Vsurie nor receiue any thing besides the principall especially on any Couenant going before 201. Hee that by constraint doth any thing worthy of Death although hee violate the Name of God ought not be slaine 213. Wicked men are not competent witnesses Hee is accounted wicked which transgresseth any Precept for which hee is worthy to be beaten A Theefe and a Robber is not sufficient to bee a witnesse after he hath made restitution Nor a Vsurer nor a Publicane nor he which is enriched by play nor Children till they haue beards except hee be twentie yeeres olde 222. The King ought not to multiply Wiues Our Masters say that the King may haue eighteene Wiues 225. If any of the seuen Canaanitish Nations shall come in the hands of a Iew hee ought to slay him 242. The Father or the Husband may disannull the vowes of their Children or Wiues And the Wise-men may release the vowes of those which repent of their vow A Sonne of thirteene yeeres and a day and a Daughter of twelue and a day if they be out of their Parents tuition haue power to vow A bastard may not marry an Israelites daughter to the tenth generation 308. Their are fiftie defects which make a Man or Beast vncapeable of Sacred Functions to bee either Sacrificer or Sacrifice fiue in the Eares three in the eye-lids eight in the eyes three in the nose sixe in the mouth twelue in the seed-vessels sixe in the hands and feete and in the bodie foure c. Besides there are foure-score and tenne defects in Man which are not in a Beast No defect vnlesse it bee outward maketh a man vnfit §. III. Of their affirmatiue Precepts 12. EVery one ought to teach his Sonne the Law Likewise his nephew and Wisemen their Disciples and he which is not taught it of his Father must learne it as he can He which teacheth another the written Law may receiue a reward but not for teaching the Traditionall 13. Rise before thine Elder That is saith R. Iosi a Wiseman although young in yeeres To him thou must rise when hee is foure cubites distant and when he is passed by thou mayest sit downe againe 16. The sinner must turne from his sinne vnto God And being returned he must say I beseech thee O
entering into the houses of the richer beg prouision for the Feast And if any be exceeding poore the Rabbines make him a licence to beg therein testifying of his honestie and Iewish saith wherewith hee wandereth through the Countrey visiting all the Iewes he can finde And if hee come to a place where are many Iewes hee sheweth his licence to the chiefe Rabbi or to the Clarke which calls men to the Synagogue or to the Elders or Ruler of the Synagogue which is as their Consull or to the Ouer-seers of the poore and craueth their fauour which granted hee standeth with two others at the doore of the Synagogue and beggeth or else those two goe from house to house and beg for him The like is done when a poore Iew hath a daughter marriageable to beg for her dowrie When poore Iewes trauell they may turne into another Iewes house where their prouerbe is the first day hee is a ghest the second a burthen the third a fugitiue The falling sicknesse is vsuall among the Iewes and they vse to imprecate it to each other in their anger as they also doe the plague In a generall pestilence they write in their Chamber strange characters and wonderfull names which they say are the names of the Pest-Angels And I once saw sayth our Author Adiridon Bediridon and so on the word Diridon riding on quite through the Alphabet written with great letters in their houses as a present remedie for the Plague The Leprie they haue seldome which may bee attributed to their dyet Now the Sword and Scepter is taken from them in stead of other penalties they inflict sharpe penances according to the nature of the crime Thus the Adulterer satisfieth for his hot lust in cold water wherein hee is inioyned to sit some winter dayes and if the water be frozen the Ice is cut and hee set therein vp to his chinne as long as an Egge is roasting In Summer time hee is set naked in an Ant-hill his nose and eares stopped and after washeth himselfe in cold water If the season bee neither cold not hot hee is inioyned a certaine kinde of fasting in which he may not eate any thing till night and then onely a little bread and water is allowed him and yet hee must after endure the Ant or water-penance In Médrasch is written that Adam sate vp to the nose in water an hundred and thirtie yeeres till he begate Seth for eating the forbidden fruit If the penance seeme lighter they enioyne him further to runne thorow a swarme of Bees and when the swelling of his bodie through their stinging is abated he must doe it againe and againe according to the measure of his offence If hee hath often that way offended hee is bound to endure that penance many yeeres yea sometimes a three yeeres fast together eating bread and water at supper otherwise nothing except hee rather chuse to redeeme this with fasting three whole dayes together in each yeere without tasting any refection at all as Queene Esther did When any hath lyen with a woman in her vncleannesse hee incurreth the penance of fortie dayes fast and twice or thrice euery of those dayes to receiue on his bare backe with a leather thong or girdle nine blowes to eate no flesh or hot meate nor drinke any wine but on the Sabbath If a man kisse or embrace his menstruous wife the case is alike A Robber is adiudged three yeeres banishment to wander three yeeres thorow the Cities where Iewes dwell crying aloud I am a Robber and suffer himselfe to bee beaten in manner aforesaid He may not eate flesh nor drinke wine nor cut the hayre off his head or beard hee must put on his change of garments and shirts vnwashed He may not wash himselfe euery moneth once he must couer his head hee must weare his arme wherewith he committed murther fastened to his necke with a chayne Some are enioyned that where they sleepe one night they may not sleepe the next that they may wander ouer the world like Cain Some are constrained to weare an yron brest-plate next their skinne and some to throw themselues downe before the doore of the Synagogue that they which goe in may treade on him That Iew which accuseth another before a Christian Magistrate is accounted a Traytor and neuer made reckoning of after But why doe I tyre the Reader to whom I feare I haue beene ouer-tedious But in this matter of Religion of whom is it fitter to protract discourse then of them whom the old world yeelded the only example of Truth and the present age a principall example of falsehood and superstition Let it not grieue the Reader to performe the last office of humanitie to our Iew and as hee hath seene his birth his Synagogue-Rites and home superstitions so to visit him on his Death-bed and helpe lay him in his graue and examine his hope of the Resurrection and of their Messias and wee will end our Pilgrimage in this Holy Land §. VII Of their visitation of the sicke And funerall rites WHen a man lieth sicke the Rabbines visit him and if he be rich order is taken for his Will and then they exhort him to perseuere constantly in their Faith They aske him if hee beleeue that the Messias is yet to come Hee maketh his confession on his bed saying I confesse before thee my God and Lord God of my parents Lord of all Creatures that my health and death is in thy hand I pray thee grant me recouery of my former health and heare my praier as thou didest Hezekiah in his sicknes And if the time of my death be come then grant that death may bee a remission of all my sinne which of ignorance or knowledge I haue committed euer since I was a man grant that I may haue my part in Paradise and the world to come which is reserued for the iust grant that I may know the Way of euerlasting life fill mee with the ioy of thy excellent countenance by thy right hand for euer and euer Blessed bee thou O GOD which hearest my prayer Thus they which refuse the merits of Christs death ascribe remission of sinnes to their owne When he giueth vp the ghost all the standers by rend their garments but in a certaine place of the same where they doe no great harme about a hand-breadth They lament the dead seuen dayes They presently after his death powre out all the water in the house into the streete they couer his face that it may no more bee seene they bow his thumb in his hand framing a resemblance of the Hebrew name Schaddai his other fingers are stretched out to testifie a forsaking of the world they wash him with hot water and hauing anointed his head with wine and the yolke of an Egge mixed together they put on him a white vestment which he vsed to weare on the Feast of Reconciliation When they carry him out of the house they
Fortresses of the Cities least they should be receptacles for conspiracie in translating people from one Countrie to another with other their practises and policies of state I purpose not to adde any more but refer the Reader to others Treatises But to present vnto you a Turke set forth in the ordinary Turkish disposition manners and fashions will not I thinke seeme tedious Thus therefore haue wee viewed him with others eyes They be generally well complexioned of good statures and full bodies proportionably compacted They nourish no haire about them but a locke on their crowne and on their faces onely esteeming it more cleanely and to bee better prepared for their superstitious washings But their beards they weare at full length the marke of their affected grauitie and token of freedome for slaues haue theirs shauen scoffing at Christians which cut or want them All of them weare on their heads white Shashes and Turbants the badge of their Religion as is the folding of the one and size of the other of their vocations and qualitie Shashes are long Towells of Callico wound about their heads Turbants are made like great Globes of Callico too and thwarted with rolles of the same hauing little copped caps on the top of greene or red veluet being onely worne by persons of ranke and he the greatest that weares the greatest except the Mufties which ouer-sizeth the Sultans Some Christians Turkising in fashion are permitted as a great fauour to weare white heads in the Citie The next that they weare is a smocke of Callico with ample sleeues much longer then their armes vnder this a paire of Calsouns of the same which reach to their ankles the rest naked their slip-shooes yellow or red picked at the toe and plated on the sole ouer all a halfe-sleeued coate girt vnto them with a Towell their necke all bare and this within doores is their Summer accoutrement Ouer all when they goe abroad they weare gownes buttoned before vngathered in the shoulders In the Winter they adde to the former Calsouns of cloth which about the small of the legge are sewed to short smooth buskins of leather without soles lining their gownes with Furres as they doe their coates They weare no gloues nor alter their fashions which except in richnesse are alike in all They retaine the old worlds custome in giuing change of garments one vest fitting all The Clergie goe much in greene as Mahomets colour whose kinsmen weare greene Shashes and are called Emers or Lords as doe their women also somewhat of greene on their heads an il-fauoured race seeming branded of God for their hereditarie presumption of holinesse from so vnholy a stocke If a Christian weare greene they will teare off his clothes if not beate him They carry no weapons about them in the Citie only they thrust vnder their girdles great crooked kniues of a dagger-like size in sheaths of mettall the hafts and sheaths sometimes richly set with stones They beare their bodies vpright of a stately gate and elated countenance In their familiar salutations they lay their hands on their bosomes and a little decline their bodies almost to the ground if to a Great man with kissing the hemme of his garment The ornaments of their heads they neuer put off vpon any occasion They affect cleanlinesse euen religiously neuer making water but they wash their hands and priuities this they doe secretly and couching reuiling the Christian or striking him for pissing against a wall This they doe also lest they should pollute their garment which might frustrate their prayers They neuer walke vp and downe for recreation nor vse any other exercise but shooting and then also sit on carpets in the shadow and send their slaues for their Arrowes These pierce deepe through Targets of Steele and pieces of Brasse two inches thicke the Bow for forme and length like the lath of a Crosse-bow of Buffolos Horne intermixed with sinewes of admirable workmanship Wrestling and rope-walking are professions not recreations Of Cardes and Dice they are happily ignorant at Chesse they will play all day long auoiding yet the hazard of money The better sort delight in Horses which are quickly jaded if held to a good round trot for amble they doe not in an indifferent iourney But they ride not so fast to put them to it They feed them in their stable with Barley which there is very cheape as onely seruing for that purpose They greatly reuerence their Parents and Superiours and the young the aged the left hand as they goe hath the prioritie of the right in that they are made Masters of the others sword and the chiefest place the furthest from the wall They liue brotherly together but come not except on speciall occasion in each others house and then but into the more publike parts thereof Their houses and furniture are meane hauing nothing on the inside but white walles except some speciall roome the roofes of many curiously seeled the greater part of the floore and that a little aduanced couered with carpets the cause they at entring put off their slip-shooes They lie on Matresses of Silke or stained Linnen with Bolsters of the same and Quilts sutable but much in their clothes as for lowsinesse which followes it is no great shame They haue neither Tables nor Stooles but sit crosse-legged on the floore all in a ring They haue a skinne spread before them in stead of a cloth The better sort sit about a round boord standing on a foot halfe a foot high and brimmed like a Charger Rice sod in the fat of Mutton is their ordinarie food Pottage also fried Eggs Pasties Tansies Flesh little in gobbits London spending as much flesh in one day as Constantinople in twentie Fish they haue in indifferent quantitie The Commons commonly feed on Herbes Rootes Onions Garlick Hodge-podges c. vile fare and at as vile rate in so great plentie They are attended by their slaues of which to haue many is to bee rich When one hath fed sufficiently he riseth and another takes his roome and so continue till all bee satisfied They eate three times a day but when they feast they sit all day long except they rise and exonerate nature forthwith returning They abstaine from Hoggs-flesh Bloud and that which dies alone except in necessitie Their vsuall drinke is water the richer infuse diuers confections Wine is prohibited but so greedily swallowed where they can get it that but few goe away vnled from the Embassadours table Our Beere they preferre before all other drinkes which would in all likelihood prooue exceedingly profitable to such as would bring it in amongst them where wine is forbidden and Barly is at nine pence a bushell They haue Coffa houses more common then Ale-houses with vs in or neere to which on benches in the street they will sit chatting most of the day drinking their Coffa so called of a berry it is made of as hot as they can indure it It is blacke as
which they shed no bloud nor eate flesh They haue many wiues of which the first married hath the first place and preheminence Here Marcus Paulus liued about a yeere Touching the Religion and Customes in Tanguth the reports of Caggi Memet in Ramusius who of late yeeres was in Campion are not much diferent He sayth That their Temples are made like the Christians capable of foure or fiue thousand persons In them are two Images of a man and woman lying in length fortie foot all of one piece or stone For which vse they haue Carts with fortie wheeles drawne of fiue or sixe hundred Horses and Mules two or three moneths iourney They haue also little Images with sixe or seuen heads and ten hands holding in each of them seuerall things as a Serpent Bird Flower c. They haue Monasteries wherein are men of holy life neuer comming forth but haue food carried them thither daily Their gates are walled vp and there are infinite of Frier-like companions passing to and fro in the Citie When any of their kindred die they mourne in white They haue Printing not much vnlike to that which is vsed in Europe and Artillerie on their walls very thicke as haue the Turkes All the Catayans and Idolaters are fordidden to depart out of their natiue Countrey They haue three Sciences Chimia Limia and Simia the first Alchymie the second to make enamoured the third Iugling or Magicke Succuit also is according to his report great and faire beautified with many Temples Their Rheubarbe they would not bestow the paines to gather but for the Merchants which from China Persia and other places fetch it from them at a cheape price Nor doe they in Tanguth vse it for Physike as we here but with other ingredients make perfumes thereof for their Idols and in some places they burne it in stead of other firing and giue it their Horses to eate They set more price by an herbe which they call Membroni cini medicinable for the eyes and another called Chiai Catai growing in Catay at Cacianfu admirable against very many diseases an ounce whereof they esteeme as good as a sacke of Rhubarbe whose description you may see at large according to the relation and picture of the said Chaggi in Ramusius for to adde that also they haue many Painters and one Countrey inhabited onely by them These Tanguthians are bearded as men in these parts especially some time of the yeere Northwards from Tanguth is the Plaine of BARGV in customes and manners like to the first Tartars confining with the Scythian Ocean fourescore dayes iourney from Ezina in the North parts of Tanguth and situate vnder the North starre Eastward of Tanguth somewhat inclining to the South is the Kingdome of Erginul addicted likewise to Ethnike superstitions wherein yet are some both Nestorians and Mahumetans Here are certaine wilde Bulls as big as Elephants with manes of white and fine haire like silke of which some they came and betwixt them and their tame Kine engender a race of strong and laborious Oxen. Here is found a beast also as big as a Goat of exquisite shape which euery full Moone hath an apostemation or swelling vnder the belly which the Hunters at that time chasing the said beast doe cut off and drie against the Sunne and it proueth the best Muske in the world The next Easterly Countrie is EGRIGAIA idolatrous and hauing some Christians of the Sect of Nestorius But Tenduc next adioyning was at that time gouerned by King George a Christian and a Priest of the posteritie of Presbyter Iohn subiect to the Grand Can. And the Gran Cans giue commonly their daughters in mariage to this generation and stocke of Presbyter Iohn The most part of the inhabitants are Christians some Idolaters and Mahumetans being there also There bee also that are called Argon descended of Ethnikes and Moores the wisest and properest men in those parts All the people from hence to Cathay are Christian Mahumetan and Gentile as themselues like best In Thebet the next Countrey the people in times past saith William de Rubruquis bestowed on their parents no other Sepulchre then their owne bowels and yet in part retaine it making fine cuppes of their deceased parents skuls that drinking out of them in the middest of their iolitie they may not forget their progenitors They haue much gold but hold it an high offence to imprison it as some doe with vs in Chests or Treasuries and therefore hauing satisfied necessitie they lay vp the rest in the earth fearing otherwise to offend GOD. Cambalu is in the Northeast parts of Cathay and fortie miles Westward from hence all which way is enriched with Palaces Vineyards and fruitfull Fields is Gouza a faire Citie and great with many Idoll-Monasteries Here the way parted leading Westward into Cathay and Southeastward vnto Mangi or China TANIFV and Cacianfu are Prouinces which tend Westward from hence inhabited with idolatrous Nations and here and there some of the Arabian and Christian profession full of Cities Cunchin and Sindinfu are Ethnikes as is Thebeth where they haue a brutish custome not to take a wife that is a Virgin and therefore when Merchants passe that way the mothers offer vnto them their daughters much striuing which of them may be the most effectuall bawde to her childe They taking to their pleasure such as they like gratifie them with some iewell or other present which on her mariage day shee weareth and shee which hath most of such presents bringeth the most accepted dowrie to her husband as testimonies of the great fauour of their Idols This Thebeth contained sometimes eight Kingdomes with many Cities but was now desolated by the Tartarians There are great Necromancers which by their infernall skils cause Thunders and Tempests They haue Dogges as bigge as Asses with which they catch wild Oxen all sorts of beasts CAINDV is an Heathenish Nation where in honour of their Idols they prostitute their wiues sisters and daughters to the lust of Trauellers which being entertained in the house the good man departeth and the woman setteth some token ouer the doore which there remaineth as long as this stallion-stranger for a signe to her husband not to returne till the guest be as well gone from her house as honesty from her heart and wit from his head They make money of salt as in Cathay of paper In Caraian also a large Prouince adioyning there are some Christians and Saracens but the most Ethnikes which are not discontented that other men should lie with their wiues if the women be willing CARAZAN is of like irreligion their soules captiuated to the Olde Serpent and their bodies endangered to mighty huge bodies of Serpents tenne paces long and tenne spannes thicke which that Countrey yeeldeth They keepe in their dennes in the day and in the night prey vpon Lyons Wolues and other Beasts which when they haue deuoured they resort to some water to drinke
as he did before with the like answere Igha Igha Igha Then he commanded them to kill fiue Ollens or great Deere continued singing still both he and they as before Then he tooke a sword of a Cubite and a span long I did mete it my selfe and put it into his belly halfe way and sometime lesse but no wound was to be seene they continuing their sweete song still Then he put the sword into the fire till it was warme and so thrust it into the slit of his shirt and thrust it thorow his body as I thought in at his Nauell and out at his fundament the point being out of his shirt behind I layd my finger vpon it Then he pulled out the sword and sate downe This being done they set a Kettle of water ouer the fire to heate and when the water doth seethe the Priest beginneth to sing againe they answering him For so long as the water was in seething they sate and sang not Then they made a thing being foure square and in height and squarenesse of a chaire and couered with a gowne very close the fore-part thereof for the hinder part stood to the Tents side Their Tents are round and are called Chome in their language The water still seething on the fire and this square seat being ready the Priest put off his shirt and the thing like a garland which was on his head with those things which couered his face and hee had on yet all this while a payre of hosen of Deere-skinnes with the hayre on which came vp to his buttockes So he went into the square seat and sate downe like a Taylor and sang with a strong voyce or hollowing Then they tooke a small line made of Deere-skinnes of foure fathomes long and with a small knot the Priest made it fast about his necke and vnder his left arme and gaue it to two men standing on each side of him which held the ends together Then the kettle of hot water was set before him in the square seat which seat they now couered with a gowne of broad cloth-without lining such as the Russes vse to weare Then the two men which did hold the end of the line still standing there began to draw and drew till they had drawne the ends of the line stiffe and together and then I heard a thing fall into the kettle of water which was before him in the Tent. I asked what it was and they answered his head shoulder and left arme which the line had cut off I meane the knot which I saw afterward drawne hard together Then I rose vp and would haue looked whether it were so or not but they layd hold on me and sayd that if they should see him with their bodily eyes they should liue no longer And the most part of them can speake the Russian tongue to be vnderstood and they took me to be a Russian Then they beganne to hollow with these words Oghaoo Oghaoo Oghaoo many times together in the meane while I saw a thing like a finger of a man two times together thrust thorow the gowne from the Priest I asked them that sate neere to me what it was that I saw and they sayd not his finger for he was yet dead and that which I saw appeare thorow the gowne was a beast but what beast they knew not nor would not tell And I looked vpon the gowne and there was no hole to be seene At last the Priest lifted vp his head with his shoulder and arme and all his body and came out to the fire Thus farre of their seruice which I saw during the space of certaine houres But how they doe worship their Idols that I saw not for they put vp their stuffe to remoue from that place where they lay And I went to him that serued their Priest and asked him what their God sayd to him when hee lay as dead Hee answered that his owne people doth not know neither is it for them to know for they must doe as he commanded William Pursgloue tolde mee of the like eyther iuggling or Magicall prankes practised by Samoyed-Coniurours or Priests whom they haue in great veneration They haue as hee reporteth certaine Images some in likenesse of a Man others of a Beare Wolfe c. which they be hang with the richest Furres they can get hiding them in Caues in the Woods for feare of the Russes who trauell those Countries to hunt after wild beasts as Sable Fox and Beuer who if they light vpon those furred Deities take away the Furres and bestow on them greater heat in fires Pustozera is in 68. degrees 50. minutes The inhabitants hold trade with other Samoieds which haue traffique with the Ougorians and Molgomsey for Sables blacke and white Foxes Beauers Downe Whales-Finnes The Russes malegning others that gaine which themselues find in the Samoied-trade traduced the English amongst them as Spies The Ozera or lake before the Towne was frozen ouer the thirteenth of October and so continued till the twentieth of May. Iosias Logan there obserued and the eleuenth of December hee could see but the way of the Sunne-beames on the thirteenth the beames but not the Sunne which on Christmas day he saw rising at South and by West and setting at South West and by South not wholy eleuated from the Horizon but all the way the nether part of the Sunne seeming iust and euen with it They found the harbor of Pechora full of Ice in Iuly the tide strong and dangerous The Towne of Pechora is small it hath three Churches the poore in the Spring and Summer time liue by catching Partridges Geese Duckes Swans salt the flesh and liue on them most of the Winter Sayling from Pustozera in August towards Nona Zimla they fastened themselues to a piece of Ice which caused their returne homewards The Samoieds know these vnknowne Desarts and can tell where the Mosse groweth wherewith they refresh their wearied Deere pitching their tents of Deere-skins neere the same Their wiues and daughters fetch wood sometimes tenne versts off they hang kettles on the fire with snow of which melted euery one drinkes a carouse When they haue supped they spread a Deeres skinne on the snow within the Tent. Whereon he resteth couered with his day-apparell Tenne or twelue of the boyes or maides watch the Deere to keepe them from Wolues or Beares making a great shout if they see any For two hundred and fifty sleds they pitch euery night three Tents The light of the Moone and snow helpe them in their trauels The Hollanders in the yeere 1494 sent to discouer a way to Cathay and China by the North-East which by Master Burrough Pet and Iacman Englishmen had beene long before in vaine attempted William Barents was the chiefe Pilot for this discouerie This yeere they sayled thorow the straits of Vaygats and thought themselues not farre short of the Riuer Ob The next yeere they returned for the
of diuers formes kept closely that none may see what others haue prouided till the Day These are made of Indian Reedes carued and gilded and on the Festiuall presented to the King who praiseth the most artificiall of them All that night huge lights of Waxe are burnt in honor of their Idoll whose Feast it is that all may see to haue accesse to him to which end the Citie gates are lest open But none may approach vnto him emptie-handed They haue a Feast of Watering celebrated in the old Citie where the King Queene and his Children with Rose-water sprinkle one another And all the Captaines likewise besprinkle each other that they seeme as wet as if they came out of a Riuer It is said of the last Kings Father that when the people were thus washing he would send amongst them an Elephant which slew many of them whereat he laughed the people lamented Another Feast they haue wherein they haue a triall of their Ships which can saile best this Feast lasteth a moneth A fifth Feast is called Giaitnosegienon in honor of a certaine Idoll They haue many other Feasts but these the most solemne Antony Correa a Portugall concluding a league with the King of Pegu the Kings Deputie caused the Articles of accord written in Portugall and Pegu-languages with golden Letters to bee read aloud and then rent the scrole and with a few leaues of an odoriferous tree caused the same to bee burned to ashes vpon which hee laid both hands of the Priest who in the Name of the King sware to those Articles These things being done with great attention and silence Correa loth in a superstitious fancie to defile Holy Writ with confirmation of an Oath to a Gentile sware on a Booke of amarous Sonnets to keepe inuiolable the said Articles In the yeere of our Lord 1585. the King of Aua rebelling as is before shewed the King of Pegu by single combate slew the Traytor The fight was on Elephants in which the Pegusians Elephant and the Auan Prince died The liuing Elephant was preferred to the place of the former but in fifteene dayes space let the beastlinesse of Men imitate the humanitie of a beast hee sorrowed so for his Master that nothing might comfort him And although hee had continually two seruants attending him and telling him of his amended estate vnder a mightier Master yet would he scarce cease to weepe or begin to eate till his fifteene dayes exequies were finished Bomferrus a Franciscan spent three yeeres in learning the Pegu's Language and Mysteries that hee might preach the Christian Religion amongst them but was soone forced to giue ouer and returne into India For they could not endure to heare any better Knowledge then they had This was Anno 1557. Crocodiles and Apes are accounted holy and sacred creatures for which cause Apes multiply exceedingly none taking them except for the vse of their Varelles or Temples where they tye them and keepe them with diligent respect And though the Crocodiles in the Town-ditch deuoure men daily yet in a blind zeale they will drinke no other water accounting this holy and account their soules certainly saued whose bodies are thus certainly lost and deuoured of those Beasts which sometimes are thirtie foot in length one of which Balby saw draw in a woman and not a day but some were said to be deuoured till the King caused one of those which was obserued to be most manslaying to be slaine The Kings subiect to the King of Pegu did their homage and presented themselues before him kneeling yea they not only kneeled to him but to his white Elephants also When the King dyeth they make two Ships with golden couers and betwixt them erect a golden Theatre in which they place the corpes applying thereto Musk and the most sweet Woods with other things and so set forth the same to Sea setting that Theatre or Pageant on fire In one of the Ships or Tallapois which sing till they thinke the bodie to bee consumed to ashes Then doe they make a masse or lumpe of these ashes and milke and commit the same to Sea in the Hauen of Sirian at an ebbing water The bones which remaine they carrie to another place and there erecting a Chappell doe burie the same therein After this they returne to the Palace and according to the accustomed Rites inaugurate the new King The father of that King whose Tragedie yee haue heard had his bones buried in Dogon In Iamahey or Iangoma fiue and twentie dayes iourney from Pegu when the people be sicke they make a vow to offer meat vnto the Deuil if they escape and when they be recouered they make a Banquet with many Pipes and Drummes and many other Instruments and dancing all the night Their friends bring them presents Cocos Figges Arreoues and other Fruits and with great dancing and reioycing they offer to the Deuill and say They giue the Deuill to eate and driue him out and to this end in their dancing they crie and hallow very loud Likewise when they be sicke a Tallipoy or two euery night doth sit by them and sing to please the Deuill that hee should not hurt them When one is dead hee is carryed vpon a great Frame as is said before of the Tallipoys made like a Tower with a couering all gilded made of Canes carried by fourteene or sixteene men with great Minstrelsie to a place out of the Towne and there is burned He is accompanied with all his friends and neighbours all Men and they giue to the Tallipoys or Priests many Matts and Cloth and then returne to the house where they feast it two dayes which being expired the Women accompanie the wife to the place where hee was burned and there spend a while in mourning Then doe they gather the pieces of bones which bee left vnburned and burie them and then returne to their houses The neere of kindred doe also shaue their heads both men and women CHAP. VI. Of Bengala and the parts adioyning and of the holy Riuer Ganges §. I. Of Bengala THe Kingdome of Bengala is very large and hath of Coast one hundred and twentie leagues and as much within Land Francis Fernandes measureth it from the Confines of the Kingdome of Ramu or Porto Grande to Palmerine ninetie miles beyond Porto Pequene in all six hundred miles long The Riuer Chaberis which some call Guenga and thinke to bee the ancient Ganges watereth it it is plentifull in Rice Wheat Sugar Ginger Long-pepper Cotton and Silke and enioyeth a very wholsome ayre The Inhabitants neere the shoare are for the most part Mahumetans and so also was the King before the Great Magore one likewise of his owne Sect conquered Him Gouro the seat Royall and Bengala are faire Cities Of this the Gulfe sometimes called Gangeticus now beareth name Golfo di Bengala Chatigan is also reckoned amongst their Cities They are a most subtile and wicked people and are
and all his Partakers hee was brought into his Fathers presence Echebar was past speech but made signes that hee should take the Royall Diademe and gird himselfe with the sword hanging at his beds head The Prince performed the solemne Iordam or Rite of Adoration with the head bowed to the Earth and his Father signing with his hand that hee should depart did so as did his Father presently after out of the world His body was carried on the shoulders of his Son and Nephew out of the towre where he lay the wall being broken after the fashion for passage and a new gate there erected and being brought into his Garden a league from thence was interred with small attendance neither the King nor his Nobles except Cossero and a few others wearing mourning habite So little was He in his West a little before the great Terrour of the East Eight dayes after Echebars death the Prince entred the Palace and seated himselfe in the Throne the people crying Pad iausa or Padasha lamat GOD saue the King His first endeauours were to giue contentment to the Mahumetans causing their Moschees to bee purged and their Rites to bee established yea hee tooke a new Name NVRDIN MOHAMAD IAHANVIR that is the Splendour of MAHOMETS Law Subduer of the World And by this Name IAHANVIR or as our Countrey-men lately come from thence pronounce it IAHANGERE hee is vsually called and not by his ancient Name SELIM In Aprill after his sonne rebelled and taking the Title of SVLTAN IA that is Sultan the King brought into his partie two Great Men and so went to Lahor which not being admitted entrance hee besieged eight dayes or as others say presented himselfe with his Forces about twelue thousand before it without any great hostilitie offered him His Father in person pursued him which being rumor'd so dismayed the sonne that he fled hauing euen then put some of the Kings men to rout For by a notable stratageme hee lost the day the aduerse Generall sending many with flying tales into the Princes Armie buzzing the neerenesse and Greatnesse of the Kings power and seconding the same like GIDEONS Policie with multitude of Trumpets and Drummes scarred them and notwithstanding the Princes gaine-saying hee was by his owne almost compelled to flight Hee tooke his way towards Cabul and being to passe a Riuer the Captaine of the place caused all Boats to be taken away and commanded the rowers that if the Prince came they should fasten the Boat as by mischance on a Shelfe or Iland of sand in the middle of the Riuer which being done they should seeme to call for helpe and so giue notice This was done and the Gouernour came and after due reuerence promising all fidelitie and securitie wherein hee was vnfaithfully faithfull brought Him into the Castle and sent the King word thereof who sent presently and brought Him in fetters together with his company The King bitterly checked him committed him to prison Some adde that hee sealed vp his eyes Others say that his eyes were put out But their eyes were not put in onely cares put on that say so for hee hath lately beene freed and hath the vse also of his eyes as I haue beene tolde from the eyes of diuers His two great Captaines had a strange punishment the one sowed vp close in an Oxe-skinne the other in an Asse-skinne both new flayed that drying they might withall straightly pinch in their Prisoners in a close and narrow Little-ease The next day they were carried through the Citie on Asses their faces to the taile-wards the one conspicuous with his Oxe-hornes the other with his Asses-eares The shame and ignominy so pierced one of them that hee fell downe dead his head was cut off and the pieces of his dismembred bodie were set vp in diuers places The other by way of fauour was permitted to haue water powred on his hide which brought a worse euill by the heate of so neere a Sunne causing a filthy stinke and multiplication of Vermine till at last his pardon was procured Two hundreth of the Princes Souldiers were set on both sides the way as hee should passe to be executed He caused his second Sonne to be proclaimed Prince as his Father had before transferred the Title from him to This his Son There was a famous Prophet of the Ethnikes named Goru esteemed there of his Sectaries as the Romish Pope is of the Popish Romanists with him as a man famous for Sanctimony did the Prince consult who in adulation adorned his head with a Diadem which in an Ethnike to a Mahumetan was strange but hee coloured it with the Gentilisme of the Princes Mother Vpon this Goru was committed but vpon promise by an Ethnike of 100000. pieces of Gold to bee payd to the King hee was pardoned Hee that vndertooke this hoped on the Kings pardon or that Goru would procure this summe which failing hee seized on all hee had not sparing his wife and children adding tortures also to extort money from him and taking away his meate thinking him rather a miser then a begger Thus in varietie of misery the flattering Prophet lost his life and his Suretie also thinking to escape by flight was taken and slaine his goods all confiscate This King at first made great shew of zeale to Mahomet which since is cooled and his Religion seemes to bee the same with Echebars Contrary to the Mahumetan practice hee delighteth much in Images as of CHRIST the Virgin and other Saints with which his chambers and publike roomes are stored and to all his Letters and Charters besides the Kings Seale addes the Images of CHRIST and the Holy Virgin engrauen in a paire of tongs as it were of Emeralds with which hee seales his Letters on both sides the pendent waxe The last newes that wee haue from the Iesuites of whom wee haue borrowed almost all the former Relations is of Captaine Hawkins comming to the Court and kind entertainment of the King who made him say they a Gentleman of foure hundred Horse and assigned him thirtie thousand Rupies stipend adding other reports of his pride obstinate heresie and supplantation by the Portugals with other things of Him and those of the Ascension were wracked partly true partly false I haue thought good to set before you in the next seruice some of Captaine Hawkins obseruations whiles hee staied there and after of other our Countrey-men which now haue a settled trade in these vast Dominions Obserue by the way that the Iesuites to the last doe accuse Captaine Hawkins of his obdurate heresie contrarie to the calumnies of some that say hee became deuoutly Popish at their perswasion §. III. The Relations of Captaine HAWKINS Embassador there MAster William Hawkins being Captaine in the Ship called the Hector after a long and tedious voyage from March 1607. to the foure and twentieth of August 1608. arriued at Surat subiect to the Mogor or Mogol so he calleth him and after much
beene expelled the Hospitall But alacke for pitie of so rufull an accident a Hawke had beene admitted thither for the cure of his lame legge which being whole hee inhospitally slue many of these co-hospitall weaker Fowles and was therefore expelled this Bird-Colledge by the Master thereof For Men they had not an Hospitall that were thus hospitall to Fowles They haue certaine Religious persons called Verteas which liue in a Colledge together and when I went to their House they were about fiftie in number They ware white cloth were bare-headed and shauen if that word might bee applied to them who pull off their haire on their heads and faces leauing onely a little on their crowne They liue on almes nor receiue they but the surplusage of the daily food of him that giueth them They are wiuelesse The Orders of their Sect are written in a booke of the Guzarates writing They drinke their water hot not for Physike but deuotion supposing that the water hath a Soule which they should slay if they dranke the same vnsodden For the same cause they beare in their hands certaine little brushes with which they sweepe the floore before they sit downe or walke lest they should kill the soule of some Worme or other small creature I saw their Prior thus doing The Generall of this Order is said to haue an hundred thousand men vnder his canonicall obedience and is newly chosen euery yeere I saw amongst them little boyes of eight or nine yeere old resembling the countenances of Europe rather then of India by their parents consecrated to this Order They had all in their mouth a cloth foure fingers broad let thorow both their eares in a hole and brought backe againe thorow their cares They would not shew me the cause but I perceiued it was lest some Gnat or Flie should enter thither and so bee slaine They teach that the world was made many hundred thousand yeeres agoe and that God did then send three and twentie Apostles and how hath sent the foure and twentieth in this third age two thousand yeeres since from which time they haue had writing which before they had not The same Author in another Epistle saith That the most of the Inhabitants of Cambaia are Banians They eat no flesh nor â—ill any thing yea they redeem the beasts and birds maymed or ficke and carry them to their Hospitals to be cured In Guzarat he had seene many Gioghi a religious Order of Monks which yeeld to none in Penance and Pouertie They go naked in cold weather they sleep on the dung-hils vpon an heape of ashes with which they couer their head and face I saw the place where one of these Gioghi kept in the middest of the Citie Amadeba to whom in conceit of holinesse resorted more numbers of people then to the shoares of Lisbon at the returne of the Indian Fleet. This Gioghi was sent for by the Prince Sultan Morad sonne of the Mogor and refused to come bidding that the Prince should come to him It is enough that I am holy or a Saint to this end Whereupon the Prince caused him to be apprehended and being soundly whipped to bee banished This people killeth not their Kine but nourisheth them as their mothers I saw at Amadeba when a Kow was ready to die they offered her fresh grasse and draue he Flies from her and some of them gaue this attendance two or three dayes after till shee was dead A league and a halfe from this Citie I saw a certaine Coemiterium or burying-place then which I had neuer seene a fairer sight wherein had beene buried one Cazis the Master of a King of Guzarat who had erected this fabrike and three other were buried in another Chappell The whole worke and pauement was of Marble contayning three Iles in one whereof I told foure hundred and fortie pillars with their chapiters and bases of Corinthian worke very royall and admirable On one side was a Lake greater then the Rozzio at Lisbon and that building was curiously framed with faire windowes to looke into the Lake Balbi telleth of a certaine Temple at Cape Bombain not farre from Chaul which is cut out of a Rocke ouer the said Temple growe many Tamarinds and vnder it is a Spring of running water whereof they can finde no bottome It is called Alefante is adorned with many Images a receptacle of Bats and supposed the worke of Alexander the Great as the period of his Peregrination And hereto agreeth the report of Arrianus in his Periplus of many memorials and monuments of Alexanders Expedition to these Parts as old Chappels Altars Camping-places and great Pits These hee mentioneth about Minnagara which Ortelius in his Map placeth here-away Linschoten affirmeth the same things of their Pythagorean errour and addeth that they sometimes buy Fowles or other beasts of the Portugals which meant to haue dressed them and let them flie or runne away In the High-wayes also and Woods they set pots with water and cast Corne or other graine vpon the ground to feed the Birds and Beasts and to omit their charitable Hospitals before mentioned if they take a Flea or a Louse they will not kill it but put it in some hole or corner in the wall and so let it goe and you can doe them no greater iniurie then to kill it in their presence which with all intreatie they will resist as being a hainous sin to take away the life of that to which God hath imparted both soule and body and where words will not preuaile they will offer money They eate no Radishes Onyons Garlike or any kind of Herbe that hath red colour in it nor Egges for they thinke there is bloud in them They drinke not Wine nor vse Vinegar but only Water They would rather starue then eat with any but their countrey-men as it happened when I sailed from Goa to Cochin with them in a Portugall Ship when they had spent all their store the timefalling out longer then they made account of they would not once touch our meat They wash themselues euery time they eate or ease themselues or make water Vnder their haire they haue a star vpon their foreheads which they rub euery morning with a little white Sanders tempered with water and three or foure graines of Rice among it which the Bramenes also do as a superstitious ceremony of their law They sit on the ground in their houses vpon Mats or Carpets and so they eate leauing their shooes which are piked and hooked at the doore for the which cause the heeles of their shooes are seldome pulled vp to saue labour of vndoing them The Moores amongst them will sometimes abuse the superstition of these Cambayans to their owne couetousnesse bringing some Worme Rat or Sparrow and threatning to kill the same so to prouoke them to redeeme the life thereof at some high price And likewise if a malefactor be condemned to death they will purchase his life
exceed the due and iust proportion of her owne Globositie and thereby no lesse to excell the highest eleuation as wee may tearme it of the Sea then the Cliffes and Shores doe those Waters which approach them And what needs a conceit of miracle in the very ordinary constitution and conseruation of Nature though all Nature if wee regard it as a Creation by supernall power bee nothing else but miracle Some indeed dreame of I know not what proportion of the Elements wherby they would haue the Water to exceed the Earth as before is said and it is true that the vpper face and vtter superficies of the Waters for ought that is knowne to the contrary is as great as that of the Earth But if wee compare the depth of the Waters with the Diameter of the Earth we shall find that in most places the one is not so many Fathoms as the other is Miles Yea whoeuer soundeth at such depth And whereas the Diameter of the Earth is by some reckoned 8 11. Miles and by some more who euer cast Line and Lead into the Sea to measure a thousand Fathom Yea in Scaligers opinion the Earth is so much greater then the Water that if the Mountaines were cast downe into these watry receptacles and the Earth brought into a perfect roundnesse there would no place in it be left for the Water Record recordeth not so much as he yet holds the Earth almost ten thousand times as great as the Sea and all other waters And if wee receiue the Iewish Tradition mentioned by our Apocrypha Esdras this may bee more probable for hee saith that euen in the vtter face of the Globe the Waters were gathered into a seuenth part and sixe parts of the Earth kept drie Some imagine a bottomlesse depth passing quite thorow the Earth through which the Moone being in the other Hemisphere causeth the heightning of the Tides no lesse then when she is present in ours Which gaue no small helpe also in their conceit in the generall Deluge which if it be true addes a greater proportion to the Sea then wee haue obserued But because little reason and no experience can be shewed for this Assertion I will not insist in refutation But that Deluge being caused by breaking vp the Fountaines below and violent Stormes from aboue confute that opinion that the Sea should be higher then the Earth which then might haue effected the Floud without either of those former causes But why doe I drowne my innocent Reader with my selfe in these Depths of the Sea which some measure by the height of Hills others resemble those extraordinarie Land-heights to extraordinarie Whirle-Pooles but seeing the Sea is Tenant to the Earth which hath as before we haue said remoued it selfe in some sort to make way and roome for it the more ordinarie height and eleuation of the one may seeme to answere the more ordinary depth and descending of the other These bottomes of the Sea haue also their diuersified shape and forme as it were of Hillockes Mountaynes Valleyes with the Accliuities and Decliuities of Places as in the Shelues Shallowes Rockes Ilands appeareth And as the Land is not onely higher then the Sea at the shore so is it apparant that in remote places from the Sea the Land doth besides the exorbitant swellings of Mountaynes in the ordinary leuell exceed the height of Maritine regions which thence receiue those Riuers which require descent all the way of their passage which in some is one thousand in some two thousand miles And therefore is it likely also that the Sea answers in like proportion it being obserued to grow shallower neere the shoare and differently deeper in the farther recesse of the Maine §. II. Of the Saltnesse and Motions of the Sea THe saltnesse of the Sea some ascribe to the first Creation some to the sweat of the Earth roasted with the Sunne some to the saltnesse of the Earth especially in Minerals of that nature some to adust vapours parly let fall on the Sea partly raysed from it to the brinks and face thereof some to the motion of the Sea some to vnder-earth or vnder-sea fires of bituminous nature causing both this saltnesse and the motion also of the Sea and some to the working of the Sunne which draweth out the purer and finer parts leauing the grosser and baser behind as in this little world of our bodies the purest parts of our nourishment being employed in and on the body the vrine and other excrements remaining doe detaine a saltnesse I will not determine this question as neither that of the Ebbing and Flowing of the Sea which some say is the breath of the world some the fires aforesaid boyling in and vnder the water some the waters in holes of the earth forced out by Spirits some the meeting of the East and West Ocean some ascribe it to the Moone naturally drawing water as the Load-stone Iron some to the variable light of the Moone a variable light they all giue vs They that send vs to God and his Decree in Nature haue said what is the true cause but not how it is by Naturall meanes effected Certaine it is that the Ocean and the Moone are companions in their motion vncertaine whether the Ocean hath a naturall power in it selfe or from the Moone so to moue which is made so much the more doubtfull by reason that they follow not the Moone in all places of the word alike Vertomanum writeth that in Cambaia the Tides are contrarie to the course they hold in these parts for they encrease not with the full but with the wane of the Moone and so the Sea-crabs doe likewise In the Iland of Socotora Don Iohn of Castro obserued many dayes and found contrary both to the Indian and our wont that when the Moone riseth it is high Sea and as the Moone ascends the Tide descends and ebbeth being dead-low water when the Moone is in the Meridian and this operation hee found continuall With vs also our highest Tides are two dayes after and not at the very Full and Change About Vaygats Stephen Borrough found it to flow by fits very vncertaine Scaliger saith that the full-Moones at Calicut cause the encrease of the water and at the mouth of Indus not farre thence in the same Sea the new-Moones But what exceeding difference of the Tides doe wee find in the Downes and other places on our owne Coasts both for time and quantitie that at once in the compasse of ones sight there should bee both floud ebbe and these differing in degrees and that on some places of our Coast it should rise one fathom in some two in the Thames three at or neere Bristoll ten and on some part of the French coast neere Saint Malos fifteene whereas our shoare ouer against it riseth but two The like differences may bee obserued betweene the Tyrrhene Sea and that on the opposite coast
inclosed Iewes THe Persian Gulfe hath left some remnants of Land extant the chiefe is Ormuz a famous Mart which the Moores there maintayned vnder the gouernment of a Moore after made tributarie to the Portugall which Nature hath made barren Industrie plentifull the more fertile Element yeelds barrennesse and sands the barrenner bringeth in a double wealth Pearles and Merchandise Iohn Newbury which sayled downe Euphrates to this Sea and so to Ormuz visiting Bagdet by the way which he saith is twentie or fiue and twentie miles Southward from old Babylon testifieth of the women in Ormuz that they slit the lower part of their eares more then two inches which hangeth downe to their chin This our Countrey-man dyed in this Trauels hauing trauelled to Constantinople into the blacke Sea and Danubius and through the Kingdomes of Poland and Persia the Indies and other parts of the World But for the description of the passage downe the Riuer Euphrates to the Persian Gulfe I know none which hath done it so exactly as Gasparo Balbi a Venetian which that way passed to Ormuz and India who relateth the same in the Diarie of his Trauels sometimes the Trunkes or Bodies of Trees vnder the water of this Riuer conspiring dangerous attempts sometimes Zelebe and other ouer-hanging Mountaynes threatning ruine and euen now seeming to swallow them in their darke-deuouring jawes sometimes the violence of some steeper Current as it were hurling them into a Whirle-poole alway the Arabians ready attending for prey and spoile One Citie or rather the carkasse of a Citie whereof onely the ruines are remayning stands on the left hand of this Riuer greater in his opinion then Cairo in Egypt the Mariners affirmed to him That by the report of the old men it had three hundred threescore and sixe gates from morning to noone with the helpe of the streame and foure Oares they could scarcely passe one side thereof This is called Elersi perhaps that which was anciently called Edessa Hee speakes of the Caraguoh inhabiting as they passed which agree neither with Turkes Moores nor Persians in their Sect but haue an Heresie by themselues Hee trauelled more then one whole day by one side of old Babylon from Felugia to Bagdad though the ground bee good yet saw hee neither Tree nor greene Herbe but all barren and seeming to retaine some markes of the Prophesies threatned by Esay against this place They which dwell heere and trauell from hence to Balsara carrie with them Pigeons whom they make their Letter-posts to Bagdad as they doe likewise betweene Ormuz and Balsara The coasts of Persia as they sayled in this Sea seemed as a parched Wildernesse without tree or grasse those few people which dwell there and in the Ilands of Lar and Cailon liue on flesh being in manner them selues transformed into the nature of Fishes so excellent swimmers are they that seeing a vessell in the Seas though stormie and tempestuous they will swimme to it fiue or sixe miles to begge almes They eate their fish with Rice hauing no Bread their Cats Hennes Dogges and other Creatures which they keepe haue no other dyet In the Iland of Bairen and those of Gonfiar they take the best Pearles in the world In Muscato threescore miles from Ormuz they dare not fish for them for Fishes which are as cruell to the Men as they to the innocent Oysters They hold that in Aprill the Oysters come to the top of the water and receiue the drops of Raine which then fall wherewith they returne to the bottome againe and therefore fish not till the end of Iuly because that substance is not before ripened and hard In sayling from Ormuz to Diu he saith they passed ouer a Bay of a hundred and thirtie leagues of water white like milke I haue seene an Extract of a Chronicle written by Pachaturunuras which raigned in Ormuz three hundred yeares agoe testifying that one Mahomet being King of Amen in Arabia Foelix pretending title to Persia built a Citie on the Continent of Hormuz which his posteritie held in succession of many generations It happened that King Cabadim flying from the King of Creman came to Iarum that is a Wood so they called this Iland which is almost all of Salt the Riuer being brackish from a salt Mountaine in the middest thereof and the sides of the Riuer white salt Yet there then grew thinne Woods Heere he built Ormuz which Albuquerk made tributarie to the Portugals being Lady of the Ilands thereabouts and principall Staple of Merchandize for those parts of the world Odoricus speaketh of the intollerable heate in those parts and Balby testifieth that neere Balsara many persons die of the extremitie of heat which happened to foure of their company which forced by heat and wearinesse sate downe and with a hot blast of winde were all smothered Ormuz is lately taken from the Portugals by the Persian In the Discourse of these Asian Seas and this Persian among the rest I thought it worthy relating which Luys de Vrreta in his Aetheopian Historie telleth of a certrine Iew though perhaps but a tale for a lyer such as hee hath beene euicted in his Aethiopian Storie loseth his credit where he speakes truth yet euen tales serue for mirth being intermixed with serious histories branded that they may be knowne for Rogues or Iesters Be it as it will he tels that this Iew trauelling alongst the shoare of this Persian Sea by some In-lets and Armes thereof which embay themselues within the Land saw the Sea loftie and swelling by force of the Windes and Tides seeming to threaten the higher Elements but euen now ready to swallow vp the Earth roaring out a loud defiance in such sort that the poore Iew was amazed and dreadfully feared therewith and this continued the space of some dayes whiles the Iew trauelled thereby But on the Saturday and Sabbath Superstition commanded the Iew and Nature the Hand-maid of Diuinitie enioyned the angrie Elements to rest a suddaine calme followed as if Waues and Windes would accompany the Iew in his deuotions and had forgotten their former furie and wonted nature to remember the sanctification of this Day The Iew hauing heard before that there was a Sabbaticall Riuer which some place in Aethiopia some in Phoenicia others they cannot tell where in a credulous fancie perswades himselfe that this Arme of the Sea was that Sabbaticall Streame and that he now saw the experiment of that relation with his eyes Fancie had no sooner affirmed but Superstition sware to the truth and Credulitie tickles him with gratulation of Diuine fauour to himselfe that had liued to see that blessed sight Rauished with this conceit hee fills his Budget full of the Sand which is of a more grosse and cleauing nature then in other places and carrieth it with him as a great treasure vnto the place of his habitation There hee tells his Countreymen that now the Messias would not be long before he came
other beasts wherevpon by the peoples entreatie who had learned the storie of him he was freed and the beast giuen him which followed him with a Line in the streets the people pointing and sayingt Hic est homo Medicus leonis Hic est leo hospes hominis One Elpis a Samian performed a cure on another Lion pulling a bone out of his throat at the Lions gaping and silent moane and in remembrance hereof built a Temple at his returne to Bacchus at Sango whom before hee had inuoked before in feare of a Lion Plinie and Solinus among other African beasts mention the Hyaena which some thinke to be Male one yeere and Female another by course This Aristotle denyes This beast hath no necke ioynt and therefore stirres not his necke but with bending about his whole body He will imitate humane voyce and drawing neere to the sheepe-coates hauing heard the name of some of the shepheards will call him and when hee comes deuoure him They tell that his eyes are diuersified with a thousand colours that the touch of his shaddow makes a dogge not able to barke By engendring with this beast the Lionesse brings forth a Crocuta of like qualities to the Hyaena Hee hath one continued tooth without diuision throughout his mouth Some thinke this Hyaena to bee the Lycanthropos or Man-wolfe some the Ciuet. Cat some a fable howsoeuer old and late Philosophers Physitians and Historians mention it Something perhaps told of it is fabulous But it is absurd to denie the eye-sight of so many witnesses He that will reade a pleasant storie of the taking them let him reade Buibequius his Epistles if an entire storie Banhinus his second booke De Hermaphroditis In Africa also are wilde Asses among which one Male hath many Females a iealous beast who for feare of after encroching bites off the stones of the young Males if the suspicious Female preuent him not by bringing forth in a close place where hee shall not finde it The like is told of Beuers which being hunted for the medicinable qualitie of their stones are said to bite them off when they are in danger to be taken paying that ransome for their liues It cannot be true that is reported of the Hyaeneum a stone found in the Hyaena's eye that being put vnder the tongue of a man bee shall foretell things to come except hee foretell this That no man will beleeue what our Authour before hath told The Libard is not hurtfull to men except they annoy him but killeth and eateth dogges Dabuh is the name of a simple and base creature like a Wolfe saue that his legges and feete are like to a mans so foolish that with a song and a taber they which know his haunt will bring him out of his den and captiue his eares with their musicke while another captiuateth his legs with a rope Scaliger thinkes this is the Hyaena which the Turkes call Zirtlan and take with a rope fastened to the legge he that goes in professing he is not there till they be there sure of him The Zebra of all Creatures for beautie and comelinesse is admirably pleasing resembling a Horse of exquisite composition but not all so swift all ouer-laid with partie-coloured Laces and gards from Head to Taile They liue in great Heards as I was told by my friend Andrew Battle who liued in the Kingdome of Congo many yeeres and for the space of some moneths liued on the flesh of this Beast which hee killed with his Peece For vpon some quarrell betwixt the Portugals among whom he was a Sergeant of a band and him he liued eight or nine moneths in the Woods where hee might haue view of hundreds together in Heards both of these and of Elephants So simple was the Zebra that when hee shot one he might shoot still they all standing still at gaze till three or foure of them were dead But more strange it seemed which he told me of a kinde of great Apes if they might so bee tearmed of the height of a man but twice as bigge in feature of their limbes with strength proportionable hairie all ouer otherwise altogether like Men and Women in their whole bodily shape except this that their legges had no calues They liued on such wilde fruits as the Trees and Woods yeelded and in the night time lodged on the Trees Hee was accompanied with two Negro-Boyes and they carried away one of them by a sudden surprise yet not hurting him as they vse not to doe any which they take except the Captiue doe then looke vpon them This slaue after a moneths life with them conueyed himselfe away againe to his Master Other Apes there are store and as Solinus reporteth Satyres with feete like Goates and Sphynges with brests like women and hairie whereof Pierius saith hee saw one at Verona and a kind of Conies also at the same time foure times as bigge as the ordinary and which is more incredible had each of them foure genitall members Philippo Pigafetta speaketh in his Relation of Congo of other Beasts in Africa as of the Tygre as fierce and cruell as Lions making prey of Man and Beast yet rather deuouring blacke men then white whose Mustachios are holden for mortall poyson and being giuen in meates cause men to die madde The Empalanga is somewhat like to an Oxe Their Sheepe and Goates neuer bring forth lesse then two and sometimes three or foure at a time They haue Wolues Foxes Deere Red and Fallow Roe-buckes Ciuet-cats Sables and Marterns The Riuer-horse seemes peculiar to Africa a beast somewhat resembling a Horse shorter-legged with great feet and a very great head with horrible teeth so fearefull by Land that a Child may affright them and in the Water as their proper element though their aliment be Grasse Corne in the blade and other like from the earth they are audacious and daring But of this and many other African Creatures too long heere to relate the Reader may informe himselfe more fully in my Voyages in Iobson Battell Santos Aluares Iohn Leo and others there published §. III. Of Crocadiles Serpents and other strange Creatures THey haue Snakes and Adders whereof some are called Imbumas fiue and twentie spannes long liuing in Land and Water not venemous but rauenous and lurke in Trees for which taking purpose Nature hath giuen it a litle horne or claw within two or three foot of the Taile waiting for their prey which hauing taken it deuoureth hornes hoofes and all although it bee a Hart. And then swolne with this so huge a meale it is as it were drunke and sleepie and vnweldie for the space of fiue or sixe dayes The Pagan Negroes roast and eate them as great dainties The biting of their Vipers killeth in foure and twentie houres space Africa for monsters in this kinde hath been famous as in the Roman historie appeareth Attilius Regulus the Romane Consul in the first Punicke
Warre at the Riuer Bagrada encountred with a huge Serpent and planted his Engines and Artillerie against the same whose skinne sent to Rome for a Monument was in length a hundred and twentie foot as Gellius out of Tubero reporteth The Scales armed it from all hurt by Darts or Arrowes and with the breath it killed many and had eaten many of the Souldiers before they could with a stone out of an Engine destroy this destroyer The Riuers of Niger Nilus Zaire and others haue store of Crocodiles whereof some are of an incredible bignesse and greedie deuourers thirtie foot long from an Egge lesse then a Goose-egge Aristotle saith that Crocodiles haue no tongues but I my selfe haue seene both great and little saith our Author dead and dryed in all which I found a tongue but very short flat and large Strange it is that they tell of the number of sixtie in this beast the age sixtie yeres the teeth joynts egges and dayes of laying and hatching being all numbred by sixtie The Crocodiles taile is as long as his body his feet with clawes his backe armed with scales almost impenitrable hee moueth onely his vpper jaw and that so wide that some of them are able to swallow an entire Heifer as some report They say also that the Female layes her Egges where Nilus will make an end of his flowing that yeere as if by secret Prouidence she diuined how farre the Riuer would rise In ingendring she lyes on her backe and through the shortnesse of her legs cannot turne her selfe on her belly but by the Males helpe from which being scarred by the clamours of some watching this opportunitie she is easily taken which they doe also by Pit-fals and other meanes Foure moneths together in the Winter they eate nothing they are thicke-sighted by Land and easier take their prey by water which is done by their tayle They are bold vpon the fearefull and fearefull vpon the bold yet a fearefull beast to encounter rising on his tayle with such Hellish iawes and Deuillish clawes ouer the assaylant as require an vndaunted spirit For which the Tentyrites were famous easily conquering them Authors tell of a little Bird which as he lyes gaping goes into his mouth and picks his indented teeth which he cannot deuoure by reason of her sharp feathers raysed like bristles when he offereth to shut his mouth on her the Ichneumon or Rat of Nilus is said to gape for this occasion of his gaping and then to runne into his belly and gnaw himselfe a passage out therefore worshipped of the Egyptians The Ichneumon is as big and as cleanly as a Cat snowted like a Ferret but without haire and blacke sharpe tooth'd round ear'd short legg'd long tayl'd supposed of both genders bought at Markets in Egypt to kill Mice and Rats They prey vpon all lesser Serpents destroy Crocodiles Egs and strangle all the Cats they meet with loue Poultrey cannot endure the wind their mouthes are so little they cannot bite any thing that is thicke Mount Atlas hath plenty of Dragons grosse of body slow of motion and in byting or touching incurably venemous The Desarts of Lybia haue in them many Hydra's Dubb is the name of a kind of great Lizard not venemous which neuer drinketh and if water bee put in his mouth he presently dyeth He is counted dainty meat and three dayes after hee is killed at the heat of the fire he moueth as if he had life In Congo is a kind of Dragons like in bighnesse to Rammes with wings hauing long tayles and chaps and diuers iawes of teeth of blue and greene colour painted like scales with two feet and feed on raw flesh The Pagan Negros pray to them as Gods for which cause the great Lords keepe them to make a gaine of the peoples deuotion which offer their gifts and Oblations The Chameleons are knowne among vs admirable for their Aerie sustinance although they also hunt and eat Flies and for the changeablenesse of their colours p into all as Theophrastus sayth but redde and white The Tarandus is a Beast some what resembling an Oxe in quantitie a Hart in shape the skin hard a finger thicke fit for shields haired like a Beare liuing as Theophrastus affirmeth in Sarmatia Solinus sayth in Aethiopia seldome seene of incredible changeablenesse to the colour of that which is next it The Polypus seemeth by his breath to change his colour his lungs extending almost through all his body which Aristotle testifieth he doth both for feare and hunting his prey adding the same qualitie of another fish called a Cuttell Another Serpent hath a rundle on his Taile like a Bell which also ringeth as it goeth But if any desire to know the varietie of these Serpents Solinus in his thirteenth Chapter will more fully satisfie him and Bellonius in his obseruations Manifold are these kindes of Serpents in Africa as the Cerastes which hath a little Coronet of foure hornes whereby he allureth the Birds vnto him lying hidden in the sands all but the head and so deuoureth them The Iaculi dart themselues from Trees on such Creatures as passe by The Amphisbena hath two heads the Taile also onerated I cannot say honored with a Head which causeth it to moue circularly with crooked windings a fit Embleme of popular sedition where the people will rule their Prince needs must their motion bee crooked when there are two heads and therefore none The Scythale is admirable in her varied Iacket The Dipsas kils those whom she stingeth with thirst The Hypanale with sleepe as befell to Cleopatra The Hemerois with vnstanchable bleeding The Prester with swelling And not to poison you with names of many other of these poysonfull Creatures the Basilisk is said to kill with her sight or hissing Galen describes it and so doe Solinus and others It is not halfe a foot long and hath three pointels Galen saith on the head or after Solinus strakes like a Mitre It blasteth the ground it toucheth the Herbes also and Trees and infecteth the Ayre so that Birds flying ouer fall dead It frayeth away other Serpents with the hissing It goeth vpright from the belly vpwards If any thing be slaine by it the same also proueth venemous to such as touch it Onely a Weasill kils it The Bergameni bought the carkasse of one of them at an incredible summe which they hung in their Temple which Apelles hand had made famous in a Net of Gold to preserue the same from Birds and Spiders The Catoblepas is said to be of like venemous nature alwayes going with her head into the ground her sight otherwise being deadly As for the Monsters that by mixt generations of vnlike kindnesse Nature vnnaturally produceth I leaue to others discourse Leuinus Lemnius tels that of the marrow in a Mans back-bone is ingendred a Serpent yea of an Egge which an old Cocke will lay after he is vnable to tread Hennes any longer is saith hee by the
Barbarie a Composition called Lafis The Cobtini is as foolish a Sect one of which shewed himselfe not many yeeres since at Algier mounted on a Reede with a Bridle and reynes of leather affirming that hee had ridden an hundred miles on that Horse in one night and was therefore highly reuerenced Somewhat also is said before of these African Sects in our Chapter of Fez Another occasion diuided Africa from other of the Mahumetane superstition For when Muauia and Iezid his Sonne were dead one Maruan seized on the Pontificalitie but Abdalan the sonne of Iezid expelled him Hee also had slaine Holem the sonne of Halea a little before whom the Arabians had proclaimed Caliph and therefore made the Maraunian stocke of which hee descended odious to the Arabians They therefore at Cufa chose Abdimely for the Saracenicall Soueraigne who was of Hali's posteritie which they call the Abazian stocke or family Hee sent Ciafa against Abdalan who fledde and was slaine Ciafa exercised all cruelties against all that Maraunian kindred drew Iezid out of his Sepulchre and burnt his carkasse and slaying all of that house cast their bodies to the Beasts and Fowles to be deuoured Whereupon one Abed Ramon of that familie some suppose him the Sonne of Muauias fled into Africa with great troupes of followers and partakers where the Saracens receiued him very honourably Barrius tels that Ciafa himselfe was Caliph and that he descended of Abaz of whom that stocke was called Abazian and that he tooke an oath at his Election to destroy the Maraunians which hee executed in manner as aforesaid by Abidela his kinsman and Generall To Abed Ramon resorted the Mahumetans in Africke who equalling his heart to his fortunes called himselfe Miralmuminin which is mis-pronounced Miramulim and signifieth the Prince of the beleeuers which he did in disgrace of the Abazians Some attribute the building of Marocco to him which others ascribe to Ioseph as before is said and some to some other Prince built as they say in emulation of Badget which the Easterne Calipha builded for the Metropolitan Citie of their Law and Empire Barrius addeth that he became a Nabuchodonosor to whip and scourge Spaine which Vlit his Sonne by Musa his Captaine wholly conquered in the time of Rhodericus But Pelagius soone after wich his Spanish forces began to make head against the Moores and recouered from them some Townes which Warre was continued with diuersitie of chance and change three hundred yeeres and more till Alphonsus the sixt tooke Toledo from them and for diuers good seruices which Don Henry had done him in these warres gaue him his Daughter in marriage and for her portion those parts which hee had taken from the Moores in Lusitania since called the Kingdome of Portugall with all that hee or his could Conquer from them Thus was the Kingdome of Portugall planted in the bloud of the Moores whereby it hath beene so fatned and hath so batned euer since that all their greatnesse hath risen from the others losse For they not onely cleered those parts of that Kingdome of them by an hereditary Warre but pursued them also into Africa where Iohn the first tooke Scuta from them so making way to his Posteritie to pierce further which happily they performed Alphonsus the fift Portugall tooke from them Tanger Arzila and Alcasare and others especially Emanuel wanne from them many Cities and a great part of Mauritania the Arabians not refusing the Portugals seruice till the Seriff arose in Africa as euen now was shewed and chased the Portugals thence Thus Spaine hath reuenged her selfe of the Mahumetan iniuries by her two Armes of Castle which at last draue them out of Granada and tooke diuers Townes in the Maine of Africa from them and King Philip now in our dayes hath expelled the remainders of that Race quite out of Spaine and Portugall which thus freed it selfe and burthened them by another course did yet more harme to the Mahumetan profession For Henry sonne of Iohn the first set forth Fleets to discouer the Coasts of Africa and the Ilands adiacent diuers of which were by the Portugals possessed and made way to the further discoueries and conquests of that Nation in Africa and India to these our dayes where they haue taken diuers Kingdomes and Cities from the Moores Of which other places of this Historie in part and the larger Relations of Barrius in his Decades of Osorius Maffaeus Marmol Arthus Iarrie and others are ample witnesses CHAP. XIII Of Biledulgerid and Sarra otherwise called Numidia and Libya WEe haue now I suppose wearied you with so long discourse of that part of Africa on this side Atlas but such is the difference of the Mindes wearinesse from that of the Body that this being wearied with one long iourney if the same be continued with a second it is more then tired the other after a tedious and irkesome way when another of another nature presents it selfe is thereby refreshed and the former wearinesse is with this varietie abated yea although it bee as this is from a better to a worse Euen the mounting vp this cold hill and thence to view the Atlantike Ocean on the West Southward and Eastward the Desarts will neither make the Soule breathlesse with the steepe ascent nor faint with so wide prospects of manifold Wildernesses this of barren Earth and that of bare Waters a third seeming to bee mixt of both a Sea without waters an Earth without soliditie a sand not to hazard Ships with her priuie ambushments but with open violence swallowing men and disdaining to hold a foot-print as a testimony of subiection a winde not breathing ayre but sometimes the higher Element in fiery heates and sometimes the lower in sandie showres once a Nature mocking Nature an order without order a constant inconstancie where it is Natures pastime to doe and vndoe to make Mountaines and Valleyes and Mountaines of Valleyes at pleasure Strange is the composition of these places but stranger is that of the Minde which feedes it selfe with the cruell hunger and satiates thirst with insatiable thirstinesse of these Desarts And whereas the body feareth to be drowned euen there where it as much feareth to want water in this sandie iourney the Soule modell of Diuinitie life of Humanitie feares no such accidents to it selfe but in a sweetnesse of varietie delights to suruey all that her first and Ancient inheritance howsoeuer since by sinne mortgaged and confiscated and being sequestred from all societies of Men can here discourse with GOD and Nature in the Desarts Hither now after so long a Preamble we bring you and at first present vnto your view Numidia where you shall bee feasted with Dates which haue giuen the name Biledulgerid that is Date-Region thereunto and before is made one entire part of seuen in our diuision of Africa Ludonicus Marmolius writes it Biledel Gerid Obserue by the way with Aldrete that this Numidia is that
Pilgrimage CHAP. VI. Relations of Aethiopia by GODIGNVS and other Authours lately published seeming more credible §. I. The seuerall Countreyes of Abassia Their Situation Inhabitants Riuers and Lakes IF I should haue left out the former Chapter for the vncertaine truth or certayne falshoods therein contayned some perhaps would eyther for the Pilgrims words or the Friers inuention haue desired it were it but as a Comedie to delight our tyred Reader For my selfe had my Intelligence so well serued me at first it had been easier then not to haue admitted then here now to haue omitted it I haue therefore suffered it still to enioy a place rather for your delight then credit and here would giue you those things that are more likely I hope I cannot warrant more true such as Nicolaus Godignus and others haue written some things being the same which before out of Aluares others are mentioned besides other things exacter or later And first of the Countrey it selfe Ioannes Gabriel Captayne of the Portugall Souldiers in these parts hath written that the Abassine Empire contayneth sixe and twentie Kingdomes in ancient right diuided in foureteene Regions eight of these Kingdome lye in successiue order from Swachen towards to West the first of which is Tigrai contayning seuenteene great Tracts vnder so many Lieutenants or Gouernours which rule all affaires of Peace and War The Turkes possesse the Sea parts the Saracens the Coast adioyning the Inland is inhabited promiscuously by Christians and Ethnicks They are blacke of hue deformed in shape in condition miserable of conditions wicked They haue goodly Riuers dryed vp in Summer where yet with little digging both water is found and fishes called Sagasi The next Kingdome to Tigrai is Daneali hauing the Red Sea on the East thence extending Westwards not farre nor fertile inhabited by Moores tributaries to the Abassine Angote Amara Boa Leca are foure Kingdomes inhabited by Christians only The seuenth Kingdome is very large of seuenteene Tracts partly inhabited by Ethnickes partly Christians it is called Abagamedri Dambea hath also Ethnickes mixed with Christians being but two Tracts On the other side of Dancali towards the Red Sea Aucaguerle trends alongst the Coast possessed by the Moores not subiect to the Abassine Adel followeth in twelue degrees Northerly in which is Zeila sometimes called Aualites a famous Mart the whole Kingdome is inhabited by Moores vnneighbourly Neighbours to the Abassines whence came Gradagna or Gradamar the Mahumetan King which had wel-nigh subdued all Aethiopia when the Portugals opposed themselues who after diuers ouerthrowes tooke him and cut off his head After this is Dahali which trendeth towardes Membaxas the Inhabitants some Christians some Ethnikes pay tribute to the Prete Oecie followeth more within land the Inhabitants Moores and Ethnikes subiect to the Abassine Arium and Fatigaer the next Kingdomes are Christian Zinger Ethnicke Rozanagum the sixteenth Kingdome is Christian but not subiect to the Abassine Empire From hence extend other Kingdomes towards the North Roxa of Ethnickes Goma of Christians and Ethnickes Such is Nerea a large Kingdome towards Monomotapa Zethe is inhabited by Ethnickes subiect to the Emperour The next are Conche and Mahaola small and altogether Ethnicke Goroma a great Kingdomoe of twenty Tracts Christians and Heathens almost wholly compassed by Nilus able for plenty to feed many Armies with which it is vsually infestect The Seedman followes the haruest man presently after the reaping sowes new Seed without other tillage The three last Kingdomes lye towards Egypt Damote Sua Iasculum through this euery Lent passe great troupes of Pilgrimes to Ierusalem The foureteene Regions or Prouinces I forbeare to mention Of all these Kingdomes at this day onely Tigrai Abagamedri Dambea and Goroma are obedient to the Abassine There are foure principall Riuers in this Aethiopia Taucea running from the South to the North the sandy Earth in the way continually stealing and vnderearth passages robbing him of the watery Tribute which he intendeth to the Sea neere it are high vnpassable Mountaynes inhabited by Abassine Iewes which still obserue the Mosaicall Law fierce and terrible to their Neighbours and could neuer be conquered by the Abassines The second Riuer is Oara exceeding Nilus in watery store which he bestoweth in like manner on the Countrey by which he passeth into the Zeilan Sea The waters are pleasant but the Abassine Christians will not drinke thereof because passing through the Countries of Mahumetans it yeelds them nourishment The third Riuer is Gabea which neere to Mombaza visits the Ocean The fourth is Nilus There are as many Lakes The first Aicha in Angote The second Dambeabahar that is the Sea of Dambea not farre from Gubbai where the Emperours in these times reside if they betake themselues out of their Tents into the City This Lake is sixty miles long and fiue and twenty broad receiues on one side the waters of Nilus is full of fishes and Riuer-horses which sometimes are dangerous to passengers two Iesuits in one of their Boates made of Rushes hardly escaping their assaults Many small Ilands are in this Lake in one of which is a Towre their Treasury and to which Malefactors are confined The third Lake is Zella in Oecie the fouth Xacala not farre from it §. II. Of the Soyle Fruits Creatures Seasons and Climate ANtonie Fernandes in an Epistle dated here in Iune 1610. numbreth aboue fortie Prouinces in Abassia but in substance agrees in the former The Soyle hee sayth is hollow and full of deepe Clifts in the midst of the plaine fields you shall often see steepe and high Rockes of solid stone which in time of warre serue them in stead of Forts The whole Region is full of Metals but neglected partly by the sloth of the Inhabitants partly for feare to bring Turkish Inuasions vpon them if such baits were discouered They take so much Iron only as they finde without digging on the face of the Earth Corne Herbes Trees are there in variety but these not excellent in their fruits except one the fruit whereof saues their liues by the vertue it hath against Wormes whereto this people is much subiect by their eating of raw flesh and therefore euery moneth purge themselues with this fruit they haue Peaches Pomegranates Citrons Indian Figges but not in great plenty They haue Hares Harts Goats Swine Elephants Camels Buffles Lions Panthers Tigres Rhinocerots and other like Beasts One so huge that a man on horsebacke may passe vpright vnder his belly feeding on leaues from the tops of trees and formed like a Camell Their Riuer-horses doe much harme to the fruits of the Earth being of Vast bodies and their mouth three quarters of a yard in the opening In the night they come forth and if the Husbandmen did not keepe diligent watch would doe extreme harme to the Corne they feed also on grasse In the water they are very fierce and like Dogges assault men and teare them They are so afraid of fire
the Islands of Africa from the Cape hitherwards §. I. Of Saint Helena Thomee Cape de Verd and diuers others betwixt them and of the weeds and calmes of those Seas ON this side the Cape is the Iland of S. Helena in 16 degrees and one quarter of Southerly latitude It is very high and hilly the name was giuen of the Saint on whose day it was discouered It hath in it store of goats hogs hens and other creatures which the Portugals haue there left to multiply for before there was none of them there also they haue planted Figs Oranges Limons and such like whereof the Vallies are full that it seemeth an earthly Paradise the Fruit growing all the yeere long They haue great store of Fish of which with crooked nayles they take great plenty the Rocks yeeld salt for the furthering of their prouision It seemes God hath planted it in conuenient place for the long and dangerous Indian Nauigations There the Portugals leaue their sicke which stay till other ships come the next yeere to take them It was neuer inhabited onely an Hermite dwelt there who vnder pretence of mortifying his flesh by penance butchered the flesh of the Goats and Bucks so fast for their skins that the King sent for him home and will suffer none to dwell there Abraham Kendall put in there about the yeere 1591. and left on shore one Segar a sicke man whom Edmund Parker eighteene moneths after found in good plight but their vnexpected comming as it seemeth so rauished his weake spirits with ioy that it distracted him and being otherwise of bodily constitution very wel he dyed eight dayes after The like I haue read of a Portugall in the same place In Iune 1613. the Dutch set vpon two Carricks in this roade but with ill successe one of their ships with nine and forty men being casually blown vp North-west from hence are the Iles of Ascension not inhabited Of Loanda nigh to or rather a piece of Congo is already spoken Ouer against the Cape of Lopo Gonsalues is the I le of Nobon and not farre from thence Saint Thomas an hundred and fourescore miles from the shore and so much also in compasse right vnder the Line At the first discouerie it was a Wood Now inhabited by Portugals and Negro's These liue an hundred and ten yeeres but few borne in Europe exceed fifty It is vnwholsome through exceeding heat vnto Europaeans especially which in December Ianuary and February can scarcely walk vp and downe for faintnesse In the middest is a wooddy Mountaine continually ouershadowed with a thicke cloud which so moistens the Trees that grow in great abundance thereon that from hence droppeth water sufficient for the watering of all their fields of Sugar-Canes They haue threescore and ten Ingenios or Sugar-houses each of which hath two or three hundred slaues belonging thereto They grind the Canes and boyle the iuice to make it into Sugar but by no meanes can they make it so white heere as in Madera and other places The refuse of their Canes they giue to their Hogs which are heere very many fat and delicate as the flesh of a Hen. They are some yeeres exceedingly plagued with Ants and also with Rats White men which liue there are visited two houres in euery eight or ten dayes with an Ague but strangers haue more shrewd entertainment and scarcely in twenty dayes with great care can shake off this Shaker The chiefe Citie is Pouoason an Episcopall Sea. The Negro's worke sixe dayes for their Masters and the seuenth day for themselues in setting and planting their seeds fruits and prouision Wheat heere sowne becommeth all blade without ripening any corne No fruit which hath a stone in it will heere prosper The town which hath about seuen hundred Families and the Castle was taken by the Hollanders 1599. The I le Del Principe was so called because the reuenues thereof were in times past allowed to the Prince of Portugall It standeth in three degrees of Northerly Latitude Iulian Glerehagen tooke the same An. 1598. The Iles of S. Matthew Santa Cruz S. Paul and Conception yeeld small matter of History Next to Cape Verde stand seuen Islands full of Birds empty of Inhabitants called Barbacene But those that are called the Iles of Cape Verde are nine situate betweene the Greene and White Capes Linschoten reckons ten They were first discouered by Antoni di Nolli a Genoway An. 1440. None of them are inhabited but the Isles of Iago and Del Fogo both which were taken An. 1596. by Sir Anth. Sherley who had one nights showre of Ashes from that Island of Fogo or Fuego or of Fire so called because it continually burneth which fell so thicke on their ship that you might write your name with your finger vpon the vpper decke Saint Iago was taken and burnt by Sir Francis Drake An. 1585. Braua and Bueua Vista haue brauer and goodlier names then Nature Maio yeeld salt in a Lake of two leagues long the Sun congealing and turning the waters into Salt From thence is passed into the Sea called Sargasso because it is couered with herbs like to the herbe Sargasso in the Portugall Wels not vnlike to Samper yellow of colour with empty Berries like Goose-berries but lesse which beginneth at twenty degrees and continueth till thirty foure farre off in the Sea for the ships in their going to India keeping neere the shore meet not with any The Sea seemeth as a greene field so thicke that a man cannot see the water and hindereth the ships passage except they haue a strong winde Ralph Wilson hath told vs of a new Iland discouered by the Salomon in 19. 34. to the South Anno 1612. The Coast of Africa is foure-hundred miles distant neither is any Iland neere saue that these weeds seeme to make many Ilands Thus doe men in ships behold the wonders of the Lord in the deepe no Land being nigh nor no ground to be found although it is thought to come from the ground Some thinke it growes on the Rocks and is thence beaten off by the Sea . And indeed all those Seas are full of wonders as they passe along the Coast toward the Indies Thomas Steuens complaineth of the continuall Thunders Lightnings and vnwholsome Rainos which there they met the raine-water if it stand a little conuerting presently to Wormes and filling the meat hanged vp with Wormes An herbe also swamme vpon the face of the waters like a Cocks Combe so venemous that it can scarce bee touched without perill Fishes called Sharkes most rauenous deuourers which had other sixe or seuen smaller fishes garded with blue and greene attending like Seruing-men Fishes also as big as a Herring with wings which doe not so much helpe them by flying to escape another greater fish that pursueth them by Sea as endanger them to a Sea-Fowle which waits that opportunitie Neither can it fly high or farre or
by the Queenes commandement in her Wardrobe of Robes and is still at Windsore to bee seene They went on shore and had some encounter with the Inhabitants which were of so fierce and terrible resolution that finding themselues wounded they leapt off the Rockes into the Sea rather then they would fall into the hands of the English The rest fled One woman with her child they tooke and brought away They had taken another of the Sauages before This Sauage in the ship seeing the Picture of his Countriman taken the yeere before thought him to be aliue and beganne to be offended that he would not answere him with wonder thinking that our men could make men liue and dye at their pleasure But strange were the gestures and behauiour of this man and the woman when they were brought together which were put into the same Cabbin and yet gaue such apparant signes of shamefastnesse and chastity as might bee a shame to Christians to come so farre short of them Where they could haue any Trade with the Sauages their manner of Traffique was to lay downe somewhat of theirs and goe their way expecting that our men should lay downe somewhat in lieu thereof and if they like of their Mart they come againe and take it otherwise they take away their owne and depart They made signes that their Catchoe or King was a man of higher stature then any of ours and that he was carried vpon mens shoulders They could not learne what became of the fiue men they lost the yeere before onely they found some of their apparell which made them thinke they were eaten They laded themselues with Ore and so returned And with fifteene Sayle the next yeere 1578. a third Voyage for Discouery was made by the said Captayne and Generall Hee went on shore the twentieth of Iune on Frisland which was named by them West England where they espyed certayne Tents and People like those of Meta Incognita The people fled and they found in their Tents a boxe of small nayles Red Herrings and Boords of Firre-tree well cut with other things artificially wrought whereby it appeareth that they are workmen themselues or haue trade with others Some of them were of opinion This was firme land with Meta Incognita or with Gronland whereunto the multitude of Ilands of Ice betweene that and Meta Incognita induced them In departing from hence the Salamander one of their Ships being vnder both her Courses and Bonets happened to strike on a great Whale with her full stemme with such a blow that the Ship stoode still and neither stirred forward nor backeward The Whale thereat made a great and hideous noyse and casting vp his body and tayle presently sanke vnder water Within two dayes they found a Whale dead which they supposed was this which the Salamander had stricken The second of Iuly they entred in with the Straits the entrance whereof was barred with Mountaines of Ice wherewith the Barke Dennis was sunke to the hinderance of their proiects For in it was drowned part of a house which they had intended to erect there for habitation The men were saued The other Ships were in very great danger the Seas mustering Armies of ycie souldiers to oppresse them vsing other naturall stratagems of Fogges and Snowes to further these cruell designes These ycie Ilands seeme to haue bin congealed in the winter further North in some Bayes or Riuers and with the Summers Sunne being loosed and broken out of their naturall prisons offer themselues to all outrages whereto the swift Currents and cold Windes will conduct them Strange it is to see their greatnesse some not lesse then halfe a mile about and fourescore fathomes aboue water besides the vnknowne depth beneath the vsuall rule being that onely the seuenth part is extant aboue the waues strange the multitude strange the deformed shapes if this be not more strange that they sometimes saue with killing and suffer men to moore their Anchors on them and to get vpon them to worke against them for the safegard of their Ships That bloody enemies should entertaine them with disports to walke leape shout fortie miles from any Land without any Vessell vnder them according to M. Bests Riddle and a hundred and ten miles from Land should present them with-running streames of fresh Waters able to driue a Mill. The Flood was there nine houres the Ebbe but three A strong Current ranne Westwards The people resemble much the Tartars or rather the Samoeds in apparell and manner of liuing It is colder here in 62. then 9. or 10. degrees more Northerly toward the Northeast which it seemeth comes to passe by the Windes East and Northeast which from the yce bring so intolerable a cold The people are excellent Archers a thing generall throughout America Besides Seales-skins they vse the skinnes of Deere Beares Foxes and Hares for apparell and the cases also of Fowles sowed together They weare in Summer the hairy side outward in Winter inward or else goe naked They shoote at the fish with their darts They kindle fire with rubbing one sticke against another They vse great blacke Dogs like Woolues to draw their Sleds and a lesse kinde to eate They haue very thin beards In the best of Summer they haue Haile and Snow sometimes a foote deepe which freezeth as it falles and the ground frozen three fathome deepe They haue great store of Fowle whereof our men killed in one day fifteen hundred They haue thicker skins and are thicker of Downe and Feathers then with vs and therefore must be flayed The Sunne was not absent aboue three houres and a halfe all which space it was very light so that they might see to write and reade Hence is it that those parts neere the Pole are habitable the continuance of the Sunnes presence in their Summer heating and warming with liuely cherishment all Creatures and in the Winter by his oblique motion leauing so long a twilight and the increased light of the Moone the Sunnes great and diligent Lieutenant the brightnesse of the Starres and whitenesse of the Snow not suffering them to be quite forlorne in darkenesse The Beasts Fowles and Fishes which these men kill are their houses bedding meat drinke hose thread shooes apparell and sayles and boates and almost all their riches Besides their eating all things raw they will eate grasse and shrubs like our kine and morsels of Ice to satisfy thirst They haue no hurtfull creeping things but Spiders and a kinde of Gnat is there very troublesome Timber they haue none growing but as the vndermining water doth supplant bring them from other places They are great Inchanters When their heads ake they tye a great stone with a string into a sticke and with certaine words effect that the stone with all a mans force wil not be lifted vp and sometimes seemes as light as a feather hoping thereby to haue help They made signes lying groueling with their faces vpon the ground
of fourteene foot or more in lesse and lesse proportions hee hath no teeth his meat hee sucketh his tongue is monstrous great of deformed forme like a Wool-sacke about eight Tunne weight and one part thereof vsed to this purpose yeeldeth from sixe to eleuen Hogs-heads of Oyle His food that Nature might teach the Greatest to be content with little , and that Greatnesse may be maintained without Rapine as in the Elephant and Whale the Greatest of Land-Creatures and Sea-monsters is grasse and weeds of the Sea and a kinde of water-worme like a Beetle whereof the Fins in his mouth hang full and sometimes little birds all which striking the water with his Tayle and making an Eddie hee gapes and receiueth into his mouth neither is any thing else Master Sherwin hath seene them opened and opened this vnto me found in their bellies This Great head hath little eyes like Apples very little bigger then the Eyes of an Oxe and a little throat not greater thâ—n for a mans fift to enter and that with huge bones on each side not admitting it to stretch wider His body is round fourteene or sixteene foot thicke his Pisle hangs from him as a Beasts in Generation they draw to shallow waters neere the shore and in the Act ioyne belly to belly as is also said of the Elephant In their engendering season much of that matter floteth on the water They are Swallow-tailed the extremes being twenty foot distant They haue but one yong at a time which is brought forth as in beasts Master Sherwin hath seene them in the belly being ripped about the bignesse but longer of a Hogs-head The Female hath two brests and teats with white milke in them not bigger then a mans head wherewith she suckleth the yong whereof she as the Mors also is very tender They killed one and could not get the yong one from it There hath been made seuen and twenty Tunne and a pipe of Oyle out of one Whale ordinarily sixteene Tunnes but much is wasted for haste in that store The English are growne as expert in this businesse as the Biscainer They neuer lost man in this action but one onely this last yeere §. VI. Of HVDSONS discoueries and death HEnry Hudson 1607. discouered further North toward the Pole then perhaps any before him He found himselfe in 80. deg. 23. minutes where they felt it hot and dranke water to coole their thirst They saw land as they thought to 82. and further on the shore they had Snow Morses teeth Deeres hornes Whale-bones and footing of other Beasts with a streame of fresh-water The next yeere 1608. he set forth on a Discouery to the North-east at which time they met as both himselfe and Iuet haue testified a Mermaid in the Sea seene by Thomas Hils and Robert Rainer Another voyage he made 1609. and coasted New-found-land and thence along to Cape Cod. His last and fatall voyage was 1610. which I mentioned in my former edition relating the same as Hesselius Gerardus had guided me by his card and reports who affirmeth that he followed the way which Captaine Winwood had beforc searched by Lumleys inlet in 61. degrees so passing thorow the strait to 50. c But hauing since met with better instructions both by the helpe of my painfull friend Master Hakluit to whose-labours these of mine are so much indebted and specially from Him who was a speciall setter forth of the voyage that learned and industrious Gentleman Sir Dudley Digges how willingly could I heere lose my selfe in a parenthesis of due praises to whom these studies haue seemed to descend by inheritance in diuers Descents improued by proper industry employed to publike good both at home and in Discoueries and Plantations abroad and for my particular but why should I vse words vnequall pay to him vnequall stay to thee from Him I say so great a furtherer of the North-west Discouerie and of your Discouerer the poore Pilgrim and his Pilgrimage hauing receiued full relations I haue beene bold with the Reader to insert this Voyage more largely In the yeare 1610. Sir Tho. Smith Sir Dudley Digges and Master Iohn Wostenholme with other their friends furnished out the said Henry Hudson to try if through any of those Inlets which Dauis saw but durst not enter on the Westerne side of Fretum Dauis any passage might be found to the other Ocean called the South-Sea There Barke was named the Discouerie They passed by Island and saw Mount Heela cast out fire a noted signe of foule weather towards others conceiue themselues and deceiue others with I know not what Purgatorie fables hereof confuted by Arngrin Ionas an Islander who reproueth this and many other dreames related by Authors saying that from the yeere 1558. to 1592. it neuer cast forth any flames they left the name to one harbour in Island Lousy Bay they had there a Bath hot enough to scald a fowle They raised Gronland the fourth of Iune and Desolation after that whence they plyed North-west among Ilands of Ice whereon they might runne and play and filled sweet water out of Ponds therein some of them a ground in sixe or seuen score fadome water and on diuers of them Beares and Partriches They gaue names to certaine Ilands of Gods mercy Prince Henries forland K. Iames his Cape Q. Annes Gape One morning in a Fogge they were carried by a set of the Tide from the N. E. into one of the Inlets aboue mentioned the depth whereof and plying forward of the Ice made Hudson hope it would proue a through-fare After he had sailed herein by his computation 300. leagues West he came to a small strait of two leagues ouer and very deepe water through which he passed betweene two Headlands which he called that on the South Cape Wostenholme the other to the N.W. Digges Iland in deg. 62. 44. minutes into a spacious Sea wherein he sayled aboue a hundred leagues South confidently proud that he had won the passage But finding at length by shole water that he was embayed he was much distracted therewith and committed many errours especially in resoluing to winter in that desolate place in such want of necessarie prouision The third of Nouember he moored his Barke in a small Coue where they had all vndoubtedly perished but that it pleased God to send them seuerall kinds of kinds of Fowle they killed of white Partridges aboue a hundred and twentie doozen These left them at the Spring and other succeeded in their Place Swan Goose Teale Ducke all easie to take besides the blessing of a Tree which in December blossomed with leaues greene and yellow of an Aromaticall sauour and being boyled yeelded an Oyly substance which proued an excellent Salue and the decoction being drunke proued as wholsome a Potion whereby they were cured of the Scorbute Sciaticas Crampes Conuulsions and other diseases which the coldnesse of the Climate bred in them At the opening of the yeere also there
Voyages relateth It is time for vs to passe beyond the Darien Straits vnto that other great Chersonesus or Peruvian AMERICA RELATIONS OF THE DISCOVERIES REGIONS AND RELIGIONS OF THE NEW WORLD OF CVMANA GVIANA BRASILL CHICA CHILI PERV AND OTHER REGIONS OF AMERICA PERWIANA AND OF their Religions THE NINTH BOOKE CHAP. I. Of the Southerne America and of the Countries on the Sea-coast betwixt Dariene and Cumana §. I. Of the great Riuers in these parts and of Dariene THis Peninsula of the New World extending it selfe into the South is in forme somewhat like to Africa and both to some huge Pyramis In this the Basis or ground is the Northerly part called Terra Fuma from whence it lesseneth it selfe by degrees as it draweth neerer the Magellan Straits where the top of this Spire may fitly bee placed On the East side it is washed with the North Ocean as it is termed On the West with that of the South called also the Peaceable It is supposed to haue sixteene thousand miles in compasse foure thousand in length the breadth is vnequall The Easterne part thereof betweene the Riuers Maragnon and Plata is challenged by the Portugals the rest by the Spaniard From the North to the South are ledges of Mountaines the tops whereof are said to be higher then that Birds will visit the bottomes yeeld the greatest Riuers in the World and which most enrich the Oceans store-house Orenoque Maragnon and Plata seeme to be the Indian Triumuiri Generals of those Riuer-Armies and Neptunes great Collectors of his watery tributes Orenoque for ships is nauigable a thousand miles for lesse Vessels two thousand in some places twentie miles broad in some thirtie Berreo affirmed to Sir Walter Raleigh That a hundred Riuers fell into it marching vnder his name and colours the least as bigge as Rio Grande one of the greatest Riuers or America It extendeth two thousand miles East and West and commandeth eight hundred miles North and South Plata taking vp all the streames in his way is so full swolne with his increased store that he seemeth rather with bigge lookes to bid defiance to the Ocean then to acknowledge homage opening his mouth fortie leagues wide as if he would deuoure the same and with his vomited abundance maketh the salt waters to recoyle following fresh in this pursuit till in salt sweates at last he melteth himselfe in the Combate Maragnon is farre greater whose water hauing furrowed a Channell of sixe thousand miles in the length of his winding passage couereth threescore and ten leagues in breadth and hideth his Bankes on both sides from him which sayleth in the middest of his proud Current making simple eyes beleeue that the Heauens alway descend to kisse and embrace his waues And sure our more-straitned world would so far be accessary to his aspiring as to style him with the royall title of Sea and not debase his greatnesse with the meaner name of a Riuer Giraua some what otherwise writeth of these Riuers that Plata called by the Indians Paranaguaeu as one should say a Riuer like a Sea is twenty fiue leagues in the mouth placed by him in thirty three degrees of Southerly latitude encreasing in the same time and manner as Nilus Maragnon hee saith is in the entrance fiue leagues and is not the same with Orellana so called of Francis Orella the the first Spaniard that sayled in it and Amazones of the fabulous reports as Giraua termeth them of such women there seene which hee sayth hath aboue fifty leagues of breadth in the mouth and is the greatest Riuer of the World called by some the fresh Sea running aboue fifteene hundred leagues vnder the Aequinoctiall Thus much Hee though lesse then others yet more then can bee paraleld in any other streames This Southerne halfe of America hath also at the Magellane Straits contracted and as it were shrunke in it selfe refusing to be extended further in so cold a Climate The manifold riches of Metals Beasts and other things in the beginning of the former Booke haue been declared and in this as occasion moueth shall bee further manifested The Men are the worst part as being in the greatest parts thereof inhumane and brutish The Spanish Townes in this great tract and their Founders are set downe by Pedro de Cieza Herera and others I rather intend Indian Superstitions then Spanish plantations in this part of my Pilgrimage Of the Townes of Nombre de Dios seuenteene leagues from Panama the one on the North Sea the other on the South and of Dariene wee last tooke our leaues as vncertaine whether to make them Mexican or Peruvian being borderers and set in the Confines betwixt both The moorish soyle muddie water and grosse Ayre conspire with the heauenly Bodies to make Dariene vnwholesome the myrie streame runneth or creepeth rather very slowly the water but sprinkled on the house-floore engendreth Toades and Wormes They haue in this Prouince of Dariene store of Crocodiles one of which kinde Cieza saith was found fine and twentie foot long Swine without tailes Cats with great tailes Beasts clouen-footed like Kine otherwise resembling Mules sauing their spacious eares and a trunke or snowt like an Elephant there are Leopards Lyons Tygres On the right and left hand of Dariene are found twenty Riuers which yeeld Gold The Men are of good stature thinne haired the Women weare Rings on their eares and noses with quaint ornaments on their lips The Lords marry as many Wiues as them listeth other men one or two They forsake change and sell their Wiues at pleasure They haue publike Stewes of women and of men also in many places without any discredit yea this priuiledgeth them from following the warres The yong Girles hauing conceiued eate certain herbs to cause abortion Their Lords and Priests consult of warres after they haue drunke the smoke of a certaine herbe The Women follow their husbands to the warres and know how to vse a Bow They all paint themselues in the warres They neede no Head-pieces for their heads are so hard that they will breake a Sword being smitten thereon Wounds receiued in warre are the badges of honour whereof they glory much and thereby enioy some Franchises They brand their prisoners and pull out one of their teeth before They will sell their children are excellent Swimmers both Men and Women accustoming themselues twice or thrice a day thereunto Their Priests are their Physicians and Masters of Ceremonies for which cause and because they haue conference with the Deuill they are much esteemed They haue no Temples nor Houses of deuotion The Deuill they honour much which in terrible shapes doth sometimes appeare vnto them as I saith Cieza haue heard some of them say They beleeue that there is one God in heauen to wit the Sunne and that the Moone is his wife and therefore worship these two Planets They worship the Deuill also and paint him in such
their Pagodes or Idoll Temples common to all but not of all equally affected some inclining in their deuotions to one Saint some to another of which Pagodes I haue seene many some of them for the materials and structure worth the gazing vpon and may well bee as they report the ancient works of great Kings within they are very darke as hauing no other lights but the doores and they stand alwayes open and prooue in some places the best Receptacles for Trauellers one small Roome onely reserued which the Bramene that keeps it will with small intreaty vnlock and shew a Synod of Brazen Saints gilded the tutelar Saint of the place being seated in most eminencie vnto which the Heathens themselues performe very little adoration wel knowing their substances and wanting those distinctions which some Christians find out to coozen themselues withall onely once a yeere on their Anniuersary day they keep their Festiuals and to some of them repaire many thousands of people as I my selfe haue seene some for deuotion and they fast 24. houres wash their bodies and burne Lamps within or as neere the Pagode as they can get some to see their friends children or kindred which will not faile to meet them in such a generall liberty others for profit as Pedlers to a great Faire the Whoores to dance Puppet-players and Tumblers with their exquisite tricks one whereof I will mention with the admiration of such as saw it or vnderstanding shall reade it A Tumbler fetching his run did the double Sommersel without touching the ground with any part of his body vntil he fel againe on his feet keeping his body in the aire vntil hee turned twice round a strange actiuity and with me and others which saw it shall not loose the wonder it carried with it Others bring charmed Snakes and Vipers in baskets which they let loose and with their hands put in againe piping vnto them and receiuing their attention very many Beggers there be and they practise seuerall wayes to moue compassion for such as haue not naturall defects as blindnesse lamenesse c. Some lie vpon Thornes with their naked bodies others lie buried in the ground all but their heads some all but their hands diuers other such trickes they put vpon the poore peoples charity whose reward is for the most part a handfull of Rice or a smal piece of mony that may be the halfe part of a farthing About midnight the Saint is drawne forth in Procession handsomely carted and well clothed with much clamour of Drummes Trumpets Hoboyes and such like that Country Musicke and very artificiall fire-workes wherein they haue a singular dexterity followed without order or distinctiō of place sex or person hauing circled their limits they draw him back againe and there leaue him without guard or regard vntil that time tweluemoneth come againe One Saint they haue and none of the least neither in their account whom they expresse by a plaine round stone not much vnlike the block of a high crowned Hat and their reason is because the incomprehensible subsistence of this Deity admits no certaine shape or description they liken it to him which hath the likenesse of nothing building thus a Temple as those of Athens an Image to the vnknowne God Foure Feasts in the yeere they celebrate to the Sea and in the Sea many people at those seasons resorting to the appointed places washing their bodies in the salt waues and receiuing the Bramenes benediction who being with them in the Sea poure water on their heads with his hands mumbling certain Orisons ouer them they know not what then takes their reward apply themselues to the next cōmers Where the great Pagodes are there are commonly many little ones which they report to be the worke of one day or no long time the Founder after some dreame or Satanicall suggestion vowing not to eat vntil it should be begun and finished and to some of these the Bramanes perswade the people there belongs some miraculous power I haue seene the Image of a man in black storie standing vpright not aboue a yard high vpon which if a whole bushel of Rice should be cast it would all stick vpon the Image and not one corne fal to the ground and this the country people had rather beleeue then part with so much Rice to practise it Another before whom if a man should eat out his tongue it would presently grow again yet had they rather venter for a blister in the relation then the whole tongue in the experiment These two I haue bin with a third I haue seene at distance as I trauelled that way whereof they report that whatsoeuer Milke Sharbol or faire water is brought thither by the deuout Visitant and poured into a little hole by the Saint he will take iust halfe would doe so if it were a Hecatombe of Hogsheads but takes no more though it be but a pint yet is fully satisfied and will receiue no more but it runs ouer the hole an excellent sociable quality and well becomming an Ale-house Kanne Another Saint they haue or rather Deuill for in their opinion it is a maligne Spirit and brings vpon them such diseases as befall them especially the small Poxe which fury the better to expresse they forme it a great angry woman hauing two heads and no doubt as many tongues with foure armes yet is she hospitable to strangers for in her house two other Englishmen and my selfe reposed part of one night for want of other harbour where whilst we staid the Founder told vs that to appease her angry Deity he built this house to her seruice and so the small Poxe ceassed in his Family others lesse able promise in their sicknesse if they may escape they will be hanged in her honour which with the two Englishmen formerly mentioned I went purposely to behold It hapned vpon a day it seemes marked in their Calender for her seruice and this exploit to which purpose they haue a long beame of timber placed on an axletree betwixt two wheeles like to the Brewers beames by which they draw water and can so let it downe rayse it vp vpon the vpper end whereof are tied two hooks vnto which the Vow obliged patient is fastened hauing first with a sharp Knife two holes cut thorow the skin and flesh of each shoulder thorow which the hooks are thrust and a Sword and Dagger put into his hands he is lift vp and drawne forward by the wheeles at least a quarter of a mile thus hanging in the aire and fencing with his weapons during which time the weight of his body so teareth the flesh and stretcheth the skin that it is strange it yeelds so much yet it is tough enough to hold them and after this manner were fourteene drawne one after another not once complayning during the time of their flight but being let
much of it is exported to Mocha and Arrecan and not a little drunke amongst themselues It is but weake yet sure more care in curing and making it vp would helpe that fault they onely dry the leaues in the Sun and vse it so without further sophistication These are the generall Commodities of this Countrey which are dispersed in some measure through the World but are best knowne in Indian Traffique and produce constantly certaine profit in their exportation to other parts to which purpose they build great Ships and good ones too considered in their burthen and materials but not comparable to ours for beautie conueniencie or defence some of them not lesse then 600. tunnes substantially built of very good timber and Iron whereof we haue had vpon some occasion good experience in careening the Globe Salomon and Clawe in the Riuer of Narsoporpeta With these their Ships they traffique ordinarily to Mocha in the Red Sea to Achijne vpon Sumatra to Arrecan Pegu and Tannassery on the other side the Gulfe and to many Ports alongst their owne Coasts as farre as Zeloan and the Cape Comorijne To Mocha they set sayle in Ianuary and returne in September or October following and thither the King sends yeerely a proportion of Rice as an Almes to be distributed amongst the Pilgrimes which resort to Mecha and Medina where their Prophet Mahomets Shrine is visited with much deuotion He sendeth also an Aduenture the proceed whereof is inuested in Arabian Horses which are returned not aboue sixe or eight in a Shippe whereof they make great account For in this Countrey there is no Race of good Horses Tobasco they send in great quantities many small Rocans to make Launces certaine sorts of Calicoes proper for Turbants Iron Steele Indico Beniamin and Gumme Lacke For which they returne some few watered Chamblets but the most part ready money in Sultannees or Rials of eight In September the Ships for Achijne Arrecan Pegu and Tannassery set all sayie for it is to be vnderstood that alongst this and all other Coasts of India the windes blow constantly trade sixe moneths one way and sixe moneths another which they call the Monsons alternately succeeding each other not missing to alter in Aprill and October onely variable towards their end so that taking the last of a Monson they set sayles and with a fore-winde arriue at their desired Hauen and there negotiating their Affaires they set sayle from thence in February or March following and with the like fauourable gale returne in Aprill vnto their owne Ports To Acheene they export much Steele and some Iron diuers sorts of Calicoes both white and painted and of late times when the Myne was first discouered store of Diamonds which were sold to great benefit from whence they returne Beniamin and Camphora of Barouse Pepper of Priaman and Tecoo Brimstone and all sorts of Porcellane and China Commodities if to be had to sell againe to profit To Arrecan they send store of Tobacco some Iron and few sorts of painted clothes and returne from thence some Gold and Gumme Lacke but most part Rice which they sell about Pallecat and that Coast of Narsinga To Pegu they export much Siluer in Rials of eight Cotton yarne and Beethyles dyed red with seueral sorts of paintings bring from thence the perfect Rubies Saphires which are dispersed through the World much Gold the best Gum Lack with some Tin Quicksiluer To Tannassery they carry red Cotton yarne red and white Beethyles paintings of seuerall sorts befitting that Countries weare and landing them at Tannassery carry them from thence to Syam fourteene dayes iourney ouer Land from whence by the like conueyance they bring all sorts of China Commodities as Porcellane Sattins Damaskes Lankeene Silke Lignum Aloes Beniamin of Camboia and great store of Tinne and a wood to die withall called Sapan wood the same we heere call Brasill Alongst their owne Coast they trade with smaller shipping lading Rice and other graine where it is cheapest selling it againe on the Coast of Bisnagar to great benefit taking children in exchange which cost not them aboue three or foure shillings a childe and they sell againe in Musulipatnam and other places for forty shillings And thus much shal suffice to haue written of this Kingdom wherein I haue been the more prolixe because my own knowledge fortified with almost fiue yeeres experience assureth me of the truth of what I haue written Where this Country endeth the Kingdome of Bengala beginneth subsisting at this time vnder the Monarchy of the Great Mogull which he ruleth by his Gouernours disposed into seuerall Prouinces whose powerfull Neighbourhood causeth the King of Golchonda to keepe constant Garisons which with the aduantage of Riuers and Deserts secureth him on that side of his Kingdome In this Countrey we are meere strangers the Coast is too dangerous and our shipping too great to aduenture them amongst so many shelfes and sands yet are we enformed by such as comes from thence and confirmed by the price and abundance of such things as that Countrey produceth that it is the most plentifull of all the East For once a yeere there ariueth at Musulipatnam a Fleet of small Vessels from thence of burden about twenty tunnes the plankes onely sowne together with Cairo a kinde of Cord made of the rinds of Coconuts and no Iron in or about them In which Barkes they bring Rice Butter Sugar Waxe Honey Gumme Lacke Long Pepper Callico Lawnes and diuers sorts or Cotton-cloth Raw Silke and Moga which is made of the barke of a certaine tree and very curious Quilts and Carpets stitched with this Moga all which considering the plenty of the place whereunto they bring them should come hither as we say of Coales carried to New-castle yet here they sell them to contented profit Many Portugals decayed in their estates or questioned for their liues resort hither liue here plentifully yet as banished men or Out-lawes without gouernment practice or almost profession of Religion to conclude it may truly be spoken of this Countrey as it is abusiuely of another Bengala bona terra mala gons It is the best Countrey peopled with the worst Nation of whom this repute runnes currant in India the men are all Theeues and the women Whoores Here the famous Ganges disimboqueth into the Sea fructifying it seemes the Countrey but little sanctifying the Inhabitants whereof I can speake very little as hauing alwayes liued at great distance from it onely I haue heard it is full of Crocodiles and so are most Riuers within the Gulfe where I haue seene many of immense bignesse which the Ferrimen that passe men and cattle ouer those Riuers know how to charme and then with safety ferry ouer the Passengers in the bodies of one or two Palmito trees ioyned and swimme ouer the Cattle the order of which charming hauing once seene I thought good to insert Beeing at a Riuers side and ready to passe it we espied
a very great Crocodile shewing himselfe aboue water and swimming downe the streame in our way whereupon the Ferriman entring the Riuer to the calues of his logs he stands vpon one of them muttering to himselfe certaine words and withall tying knots vpon a small Coard he held in his hand to the number of seuen which Coard hee left hanging on a bush thereby and confidently pusht vs and our Horses ouer the Crocodile lying all this while still in our sight not able as he said to open his iawes so hauing ferried vs ouer he made haste to returne and vntie the Coard affirming that if the Crocodile should be starued by the power of this Charme his Charme would from thenceforth lose its power and effect Arrecan borders vpon Bengala and participates in its plenty from whence there commeth yeerely shipping to the Coast of Choromandel The King is by Religion a Gentile but such a one as holdeth all meates and drinkes indifferent he marrieth constantly his owne sister and giueth for reason the first mens practice in the infancy of the World affirming that no Religion can deny that Adams Sons married Adams daughters He is very kind to Strangers giuing good respect and entertainment to Moores Persians and Arabians which liue in his Countrey professing publikely the practice of their Mahumetan Superstition Hee hath also diuers times inuited the Dutch and English to resort vnto his Countrey but the Dutch by good experience hauing had sometimes a Factory there the English not by their example but true knowledge of the little Trade and lesse benefit auoyd his importunity yet continue good correspondence with him and his people as knowing it a plentifull Country and not inconuenient to supply themselues with many necessaries if difference with other Nations should enforce them to that extremity Betwixt this King and the Mogull there is continuall Warre both by Sea and Land defensiue on the King of Arrecans part securing his owne Countrey that bordereth vpon Bengala From thence confronting in small skirmishes the opposite party but any set or great battle I haue not heard of to haue beene fought betwixt them In which warres he giueth so good entertainment to strangers that I haue knowne diuers Hollanders that hauing expired their couenanted time of seruice with the East Indian Company and so purchased then freedome haue gone to serue this King and receiued good countenance and content in his employment of them Pegu borders vpon Arrecan and is a most plentifull and temperate Country yet hardly recouered from the desolation where with warre plague and famine had within few former yeeres infested it which is most visible in the vast Country the Cities being alwayes first and best replenished , and that all other places may the better bee so it is death to export a woman from thence and certaine profit to bring them The King is a Gentile by his Religion agreeing in all points of opinion and pactice with the Kings of Arrecan Tannassery Syam all of them in probability receiuing their Rudiments from the Chineset who without question sometimes commanded those Countries their vicinity resemblance in Phisiognomy and conformity in many customes being my best reasons to goe along with these thus farre that are of opinion the Chineses sometimes Monarchised as farre as Madagascar The King which now reigneth was Nephew to the last notwithstanding he had children which this hath supprest and hath in his time recouered from the King of Syam what hee had enforced from his Predecessor amongst others the town and Kingdom of Zangomay and therein an Englishman named Thomas Samuel who not long before had beene sent from Syam by Master Lucas Anthonison to discouer the Trade of that Country by the sale of certaine goods sent along with him to that purpose which Thomas Samuell together with all other strangers was by the King taken from Zangomay and carried to Pegu where not long after Samuel dyed the King seising vpon what he had by Inuentory with purpose as by the sequell to giue account thereof to the lawfull Proprietors The Kingdome of Pegu beginng to bee better established Merchants of diuers Nations began to repaire thither againe about their negotiations where some of Musulipatnam by conference with Moores that were Samuels associates vnderstood his death and the Kings taking his goods into his hands with the probability of recouery if sought after which they making knowne to the English at their returne to Musulipatnam it happened that Master Lucas Anthonison who imployed Samuel from Syam to Zangomay was then Agent at Musulipatnam who apprehending this encouragement consulted with his assistants and resolued to send two English with a Letter and Present to the King and some small aduenture to beare the charge of the Voyage and make tryall of the Trade which tooke place and they embarquing at Musulipatnam the tenth of September arriued at Siriam the Port of Pegu the third of October following whose entertaynment I giue you in their owne words as I finde them written in their Letters to Musulipatnam The King hearing of our comming sent foure Galliots with Presents to the Ambassador and vnto vs sending vs word that he did much reioyce at our comming into his country These Gallies hauing 50 oares of a side with eight Noblemen in them caused our Ship to come to an anchor before the town of Siriam the 7. of October the King of Pegues Brother being chiefe Gouernour sending two Noblemen abord of our Ship writing our names our age of yeeres the cause of our cōming we assuring them that we were messengers sent from Musulipatnam by our chief Captain hauing a Present a Letter vnto the King which when his Highnesse shall be pleased to receiue shall vnderstand the effect of our businesse and the cause of our comming The tenth day of October wee were sent for on shoare by the Kings Brother who sitting in a large house of Bamboson in great state bedeckt with Iewels in his eares with Gold Rings with rich stones on his fingers being a white man and of very good vnderstanding demanding of vs the question the Noblemen before did and we answering him as wee did before because that our speeches should be found alwayes as one we gaue him at that time a fine for a Present to the intent that he might speake and write to the King his Brother in our behalfe that we might haue accesse vnto the King the sooner that our businesse might haue effect The eight of Nouember the King sent for vs and the Kings Brother prouided for vs a Beate with six men to rowe and also a Nobleman with vs to Pegu to be our Guard hauing Narsarcan and Hodges Ismael with vs vnto which Nobleman we gaue a Present for in this place heere is nothing to bee done or spoken or any busines performed without Bribes Gifts or Presents Arriuing in Pegu the eleuenth of Nouember hauing our Present with vs Bany Bram