These statements about the kingdom of Cathay I learned from the mouth of this wanderer, for which their author must be responsible. For indeed it is quite possible, that, when I was asking him about Cathay, he might have been answering me about some other neighbouring country, and according to the proverb, when I was asking for a sickle, have answered me about a spade.
When I heard this story from him, I thought it well to ask, whether he had brought from any place he had visited any rare root, or fruit, or stone. ‘Nothing at all,’ said he, ‘except that I carry about this root for my own use, and if I chew and swallow the least particle of it, when I am suffering from languor or cold, I am stimulated and get warm.’ As he spoke he gave it me to taste, warning me at the same time that it must be used very sparingly. My physician, William Quacquelben, who was at that time still alive, tasted it, and from the heat with which it inflamed his mouth, pronounced it to be true Napellus or Aconite.[247]
This, I think, is the proper place to tell you of the miracle wrought by another Turkish pilgrim and monk. He went about in a shirt and white mantle reaching down to the feet, and let his hair grow long, so that he resembled the apostles as they are usually depicted by our painters. Under an engaging appearance was concealed the mind of an impostor; but the Turks venerated him as a man famous for his miracles. They urged my dragomans to bring him to me that I might see him. He dined with me, behaving soberly and modestly, and then went down into the courtyard of the house, and returned soon afterwards carrying a stone of enormous weight, with which he struck himself on his bare breast several blows that had well nigh felled an ox. Then he laid his hand on an iron which had been made white hot in a fire lighted for the purpose. He put this into his mouth, and turned it about in every direction so that his saliva hissed. The iron he took into his mouth was oblong, but thicker at either end and rectangular, and so heated by the fire that it was just like a glowing coal. When he had done this, he put the iron back in the fire and departed, after bidding me farewell, and receiving a present.
My servants, who were standing around, were astonished, except one who thought himself cleverer than the rest. ‘And why,’ said he, ‘you stupid fellows, do you wonder at this? Do you believe these things are done in reality; they are mere feats of legerdemain and optical delusions?’ Without more ado he seized the iron by the part that stood a good way out of the fire, to prove it could be handled without injury. But no sooner had he closed his hand, than he drew it back, with the palm and fingers so burnt that it was several days before he was well; an accident which was followed by great laughter from his fellow-servants, who asked him, ‘Whether he now believed it was hot, or was still incredulous?’ and invited him to touch it again.
The same Turk told me at dinner, that his abbot, a man renowned for the sanctity of his life and for his miracles, was accustomed to spread his cloak on the lake which adjoined his monastery, sit down on it, and so take a pleasant sail wherever he liked.[248] He also was in the habit of being tied to a sheep, which had been flayed and dressed, with his arms fastened to its fore, and his legs to its hind quarters, and being thrown in this condition into a heated oven, where he stayed till he gave orders for himself and the sheep to be taken out, when it was well roasted and fit to eat, and he none the worse.[249]
I don’t believe it, you will say; for the matter of that, neither do I! I only tell you what I heard; but as to the white hot iron, I saw it with my own eyes. Yet this feat is not so astonishing after all, as no doubt while he pretended to be looking for a stone in the court yard, he fortified his mouth against the fierceness of the fire by some medicament, such as you know have been discovered.[250] For I remember seeing a mountebank in the Piazza at Venice handle molten lead, and as it were wash his hands in it without injury.
I mentioned already that a few days before Roostem’s death the severity of my prison rules was relaxed. This was exceedingly agreeable to me, on account of the liberty of access to me which was thus granted to men of foreign and distant nations, from whom I received much information that amused me; but this pleasure was counterbalanced by an equal inconvenience, because my servants abused the privilege given them of going abroad, and often wandered about the city unescorted by Janissaries. The consequences were quarrels and disturbances with the Turks, which gave me a great deal of trouble; and, out of the many that happened, I will relate one as a specimen, from which you can imagine the others, that you may know everything about us.
Two of my servants crossed over to Pera without Janissaries, either because they were all out, or because they did not think they required their escort. One of them was my apothecary and the other my butler. Having finished their business in Pera, they hired a boat to return to Constantinople; but scarcely had they taken their seats in it, when there came a boy from the judge, or cadi, of that place, who ordered them to get out, and give up the boat to his master. My servants refused, and pointed out there were boats enough about for the cadi to cross in, and told him this one had already been engaged by them. However, he persevered, and tried to get them out by force. My men resisted, and that right stoutly, so that they soon came to blows. As all this was going on before the eyes of the judge, who was approaching, he could not restrain himself from running down to help the boy, who was a great favourite with him for reasons that need not be explained. But while he was carelessly rushing down the steps leading to the sea, which were slippery with ice (for it was winter), he missed his footing and would have tumbled into the sea—his feet were already wet with the water—had not his companions assisted him. The Turks gathered from all Pera, and an outcry was raised that Christians had laid violent hands on the judge, and all but drowned him in the sea. They seized my servants, and with great tumult dragged them before the voivode, or judge who tries capital charges. The sticks were got ready and their feet were inserted in the posts, for the purpose of administering the bastinado. One of my men, who was an Italian, being in a furious passion, never stopped shouting the whole time ‘Vour, chiopecklar, vour. Strike us, you dogs, strike us! ‘Tis we who have been wronged, and we have deserved no punishment. We are servants of the Emperor’s Ambassador. You will be punished by your Sultan when he knows of this.’ All this, in spite of his speaking in broken Turkish, his hearers could quite understand. One of the Turks among the rioters was amazed at his boldness and exclaimed, ‘Do you think this one-eyed fellow a human being?’ (for he had lost one eye), ‘believe me, he is no such thing, but belongs to the race of oneeyed Genies.’ The voivode however, who was himself struck by such courage, that he might not do more or less than was right, decided on sending them to Roostem unhurt. They went to him, accompanied by a great crowd of false witnesses, who had been procured to crush by their evidence those innocent men. The Turks think it an act of great piety to bear witness against a Christian; they do not wait to be asked but come unbidden, and obtrude themselves of their own accord, as happened on this occasion. Therefore they all exclaimed with one voice, ‘These robbers have dared to commit a most atrocious crime, and have knocked the judge down with their fists, and if they had not been stopped, they would have thrown him into the sea.’ My men denied these charges, and said they were accused unjustly, and then declared they were my servants. Roostem soon perceived that it was a case of false accusation; but to divert the anger of the excited multitude, he assumed a stern expression, and saying that he would punish them himself, ordered them to be taken to prison. The prison served as a fortress to my servants against the violence of the raging mob. Roostem then heard the evidence of those whom he considered worthy of credit, and found my servants were innocent, and that it was the judge that was to blame.
Through my dragomans I demanded the surrender of my servants. Roostem thought the matter important enough to be laid before the Council, saying he was afraid, that, if the Sultan should hear of it, he would suspect it was through the influence of money that the wrong the judge had sustained had been passed over. Already there existed some intimacy between me and Ali Pasha; and I expostulated with him in strong terms, through the same dragomans, and demanded that an end should be put to the persecution of my servants. Ali undertook the case and told me to set my mind at ease, as this trouble would soon be at an end. Roostem, however, was still shilly-shallying; he was always afraid to do me a kindness for fear of being suspected of receiving a bribe; on that account he would have preferred having the business settled on such terms, that the judge should be left no cause for complaint. He sent me word that it seemed to him to be the wisest plan to appease the judge by giving him some pieces of gold as a sop, and that five and twenty ducats would be enough for the purpose. I replied that I was obliged to him for his advice. If he told me, as a personal favour to himself, to throw fifty ducats into the sea, I would do so at once; but here it was not a question of money but of precedent, that was at stake. For if it were laid down as a rule, that whoever had injured my men, should, instead of being punished, be actually paid for doing so, I should soon come to the end of my purse. Whenever anyone’s dress began to get worn or torn, he would resolve to do my servants some harm, inasmuch as he would feel sure of getting paid for his trouble, and thus obtaining a new dress at my expense. Nothing could be more disgraceful than this or more injurious to my interests. Accordingly my servants were sent back, thanks, in a great measure, to the advocacy of Ali Pasha. But when the Venetian Baily[251] heard of it he sent for one of my dragomans, and begged him to tell him how much I had paid to settle the affair. ‘Not a penny,’ he replied. Then the Baily said, ‘If we had been concerned, I warrant you we should hardly have got out of it for 200 ducats.’ The man whom it cost most dear was this model of a judge, who was removed from office, because, according to their notion, a man is disgraced who has received a thrashing from a Christian, and this, by his own admission, had been the case with him.
You ask for news about the Spanish generals, telling me that there is a report in your neighbourhood that they owe their liberty to me. They were the following, viz., de Sandé, the commander of the land forces, and Leyva and Requesens, the admirals of the Neapolitan and Sicilian fleets. I will give you a short account of how I managed it.