Volume 1
A collection of voyages and travels, some now first printed from original manuscripts, others now first published in English. To which is prefixed, an introductory discourse (supposed to be written by the celebrated Mr. Locke) intitled, the whole history of navigation from its original to this time / Illustrated with maps and cuts, curiously engraved.
- Awnsham Churchill
- Date:
- 1744-1746
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: A collection of voyages and travels, some now first printed from original manuscripts, others now first published in English. To which is prefixed, an introductory discourse (supposed to be written by the celebrated Mr. Locke) intitled, the whole history of navigation from its original to this time / Illustrated with maps and cuts, curiously engraved. Source: Wellcome Collection.
752/778 page 646
![Roe. would not fuffice me, and therefore I was forced to take order to buy the reft. The 22d I removed into my tents. The 25th I removed fix coftes, but ftaid the fol¬ lowing days for the caravan that was going from Agra to Surat to fend my papers with fafety. December the firft I removed four coftes to Ramfor, where the king had left the bodies of a hundred naked men, exe¬ cuted in the fields for robbing. The 2d feven coftes, the 3d refted becaufe of the rain, the 4th five coftes ; in the way this day I overtook a camel laden with three hundred mens heads, fent from Candahar by the governor as a prefent to the king, thefe men being in rebellion. The 5th five coftes, the 6th four, where I overtook the Todah king at a wall’d town call’d Tcdah, in the town de- pgft country I fVw fmce my landing •, br- cnoe ' ing a fair champaign, ar every cofte a vil¬ lage ; the foil fruitful in corn, cotton, and cattle. The 7th the king only removed from one fide to the other of the town, which was one of the bell built I ever faw in India, for fome houfes were two ftories high, and moft of them fuch as a pedlar might not fcorn- to keep fhop in, all co¬ ver’d with tile. It had been the feat of a Raja Rasbote before the conqueft of Ezbar Sha, and flood at the foot of a great rock very ftrong, had many excellent works of hew’d ftone about it, many ponds arch’d, vaulted, and defeents to them large and deep: By it was a delicate grove, two miles long and a quarter broad, planted on pur- pofe with mangoes, tamarinds, and other fruit-trees divided into walks, and full of little temples, and altars of pagods, and Indian idolatry, many fountains, wells and fiimmer houfes of carved ftone curioufly arch’d ; fo that a banifh’d Englijhman might have been content to live there. But it is a genera] obfervation, that all goes to ruin and deftruction •, for fince the propriety of all is come to the king, no man takes care of any thing in particular, fo that devaftati- on and the ipoils of war appear in every place without any reparation. The 8 th I was at the king’s Guzalcan, and found him fo near drunk that he made it up in half an hour, fo that I could move no bufinefs to him. The 9 th I took a view of the leskar, or The Mo- king’s camp, which is one of the greateft gui's camp wonders I e’er beheld, and chiefly for that I delcribed. faw jt fet Up anq ftnilfied in lefs than four hours, except fome of the great men, who have double fuits of tents, it being no lefs than twenty Englifn miles in compafs, the length fome ways three coftes including the lkirts : In the middle, where the ftreets are orderly, and tents joined, there are all forts of fhops, and fo regularly difpofed, that every man knows whither to go di¬ rectly for what he wants ; each man of 4 quality, and every trade being appointed how far from the king’s tents they fhall pitch, what ground they fhall take up, and on what fide, without ever alter¬ ing. All which as it lies together is al- moft equal to any town in Europe for greatnefs; but no man muft approach the royal atafekanha, or quarter, by a mufket- fhot every way; which is now fo ftridly obferved, that none are admitted but by name, and the time of the Durbar in the evening is omitted, and fpent in hunting, or hawking on pools by boat, in which the king takes wonderful delight, and his barges are removed on carts with him. He fits on the fides of thefe pools, which are often a mile or two over. At the Jar- ruco in the morning he is feen, but bufi¬ nefs, or fpeech prohibited, all being con¬ cluded at night in the Guzalcan, and there very often the opportunity is mifs’d, his majefty being overcome by the fumes of Bacchus. There was now a whifper at court about a new affinity of fultan Corforone and Afaph Chan, and great hope of the former’s liberty. I will find an opportunity to dif- courfe of it, becaufe the particulars are worth obferving, and the wifdom and goodnefs of the king appears above the malice of others ; and Normahall fulfils that obfervation, that a woman has always a great hand at court and in fa61 ion : She fhews they are not incapable of managing bufinefs. This will difeover a noble prince, an excellent wife, a faithful counfellor, a crafty ftep-mother, an ambitious fon, a cunning favourite, all reconciled by a pati¬ ent king, whofe heart was not underftood by any of all thofe. But this wiil require a peculiar place. The Englifh at Surat complained of ill ufage at this time, but their drunkennefs and other exorbitancies proceeding from it were fo great in that place, that it was rather wonderful they were fuffered to live. The 18th of this month of December I The Mo vifited the king, who having been at his Sul’s clia fports, and having all his game before him,nty* defir’d me to take my choice of the fowl and fifh, and then diftributed the remainder to the nobility. I found him fitting on his throne, and a beggar at his feet, a poor filly old man all ragged and patch’d, with a young rogue attending him. The coun¬ try abounds in this fort of profefs’d poor holy men, and they are held in great ve¬ neration j and in works of mortification, and voluntary fufferings, they outdo all that ever has been pretended either by he- reticks or idolaters. This miferable wretch cloathed in rags, crown’d with feathers, cover’d with afhes, his majefty talk’d with about an hour fo familiarly, and with fuch feeming kindnefs, that it muft needs argue an](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b30455042_0001_0752.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
