JOINING THE CARAVAN, 583

it was four months and some odd days before all things were got
together.

It was the beginning of February, our style, when we set out
from Pekin. My partner and the old pilot had gone express back
to the port where we had first put in, to dispose of some goods
which we had left there; and I, with a Chinese merchant, whom
I had some knowledge of at Nankin, and who came to Pekin on
his own affairs, went to Nankin, where I bought ninety pieces of
fine damasks, with about two hundred pieces of other very fine
silks, of several sorts, some mixed with gold, and had all these
brought to Pekin against my partner’s return. Besides this, we
bought a very large quantity of raw silk, and some other goods;
our cargo amounting in these goods only to about three thousand
five hundred pounds sterling; which, together with tea and some
fine calicoes, and three camel-loads of nutmegs and cloves, loaded
in all eighteen camels for our share, besides those we rode upon,
which, with two or three spare horses, and two horses loaded with
provisions, made us, in short, twenty-six camels and horses in our
retinue.

The company was very great, and, as near as I can remember,
made between three and four hundred horse, and upwards of a
hundred and twenty men, very well armed, and provided for all
events. For as the Hastern caravans are subject to be attacked
by the Arabs, so are these by the Tartars. But they are not al-
together so dangerous as the Arabs, nor so barbarous when they
prevail,

The company consisted of people of several nations, such as
Muscovites chiefly ; for there were above sixty of them who were
merchants or inhabitants of Moscow, though of them some were
Livonians, and, to our particular satisfaction, five of them were
Scots, who appeared also to be men of great experience in busi-
ness, and men of very good substance.

When we had travelled one day’s journey, the guides, who were
five in number, called all the gentlemen and merchants, that is
tosay, all the passengers, except the servants, to a great council,
as they called it. At this great council every one deposited a
certain quantity of. money to a common stock, for the necessary