580 SOMETHING TO GLADDEN THE HEART.

five servants more attending at a distance. If he fed them meaner
than he was fed himself, the spice excepted, they must fare very
coarsely indeed.

As for our mandarin, with whom we travelled, he was respected
like a king; surrounded always with his gentlemen, and attended
in all his appearances with such pomp that I saw little of him but
ata distance. But this I observed, that there was not a horse in
his retinue, but that our carriers’ pack-horses in England seem to
me to look much better; but they were so covered with equipage,
mantles, trappings, and such like trumpery, that you cannot see
whether they are fat or lean. In a word, we could see scarce any-
thing but their feet and their heads.

I was now light-hearted, and all my trouble and perplexity
that I have given an account of being over, I had no anxious
thoughts about me, which made this journey the pleasanter to
me; nor had any ill accident attended me, only in the passing
or fording a small river, my horse fell, and made me free of the
country, as they call it, that is to say, threw me in. The place
was not deep, but it wetted me all over. I mention it because it
spoiled my pocket-book, wherein I had set down the names of
several people and places, which I had occasion to remember; and
which, not taking due care of, the leaves rotted, and the words
were never after to be read, to my great loss as to the names of
some places I touched at in this voyage.

At length we arrived at Pekin. I had nobody with me but the
youth whom my nephew, the captain, had given me to attend me
as a servant, and who proved very trusty and diligent; and my
partner had nobody with him but one servant, who was a kins-
man. As for the Portuguese pilot, he being desirous to see the
court, we gave him his passage—that is to say, bore his charges
for his company, and to use him as an interpreter; for he under-
stood the language of the country, and spoke good French, and a
little English. And, indeed, this old man was a most useful
implement to us everywhere; for we had not been above a week
at Pekin when he came laughing. “ Ah, Seignior Inglese,” says
he, “I have something to tell you will make your heart glad.”
“My heart glad,” says I. “ What can that be? I don’t