[1:] Conveniences.
CAP. LXVI.
Of the land named Cathay and of the great riches thereof.
AND from thence men go uppon a river that men call Ceremosan, and this river goeth throughe Cathay[1] & doth many times harme when it waxeth great. Cathay is a faire countrey & rich, ful of goods and merchandises, thether come marchauntes everye yeare for to fetch spices and other marchandises more commonly than they do in other countreys. And ye shall understand that marchaunts that come from Venice or from Gene or from other places of Lombardy, or of Italy, they go by sea and land, xi monthes and more or they may come to Cathay.
[1:] Northern China.
CAP. LXVII.
Of a great citie named Cadon therein is the great Caanes palaice and sege.
IN the province of Cathay towards the East, is an olde citie & beside that citie the Tartariens have made an other citie that men call Cadon,[1] yt hathe xii[2] gates, and betwene eche two gates is a great myle, so those two cities the olde and the new is round about xx myle. In this citie is the palaice and sege of ye great Caane in a full faire place and great, of which the wals about is two myle, and within that are many fayre places, and in the gardeyne of that palaice is a right greate hill on the which is an other palaice, and it is the fayrest that may bee founde in any place, and all about that hyll are many trees berynge divers fruites, and about that hyll is a great dyche, and there nere are many rivers on eche syde, and in those are many wylde foules that he may take and not go out of the palayce. Within ye hall of that palaice are xxiiii pillers of gold and all the walks are covered with rych skynnes of beastes that men call Panthera.
Those are fayre beastes and well smelling and of the smell of those skynnes, none evyll smell may come to the palayce, those skynnes are as redde as bloude, and they shine so against the Sonne that a man can scarcely beholde them and those skynnes are estemed there as much as golde.