590 BUYING A CAMEL,

Once, however, a party of them came so near as to stand and
gaze at us; whether it was to consider what they should do,
whether attack us, or not attack us, that we knew not; but when
we were passed at some distance by them, we made a rear-guard
of forty men, and stood ready for them, letting the caravan pass
half a mile, or thereabouts, before us. But after a while they
marched off, only we found they saluted us with five arrows at their
parting, one of which wounded a horse so that it disabled him ;
and we left him the next day, poor creature, in great need of a
good farrier. We suppose they might shoot more arrows, which
might fall short of us; but we saw no more arrows or Tartars
that time.

We travelled near a month after this, the ways being not so bad
as at first, though still in the dominions of the Emperor of China,
but lay for the most part in villages, some of whiclr were fortified,
because of the incursions of the Tartars. When we came to one
of these towns (it was about two and a half days’ journey before we
were to come to the city Naum), I wanted to buy a camel, of which
there are plenty to be sold all the way upon that road, and of
horses also, such as they are, because, so many caravans coming
that way, they are often wanted. The person that I spoke to to
get me a camel would have gone and fetched it for me, but I, like
a fool, must be officious, and go myself along with him. The
place was about two miles out of the village, where, it seems, they
kept the camels and horses feeding under a guard.

I walked it on foot with my old pilot, being very desirous, for-
sooth, of a little variety. When we came to the place, it was a low
marshy ground, walled round with a stone wall, piled up dry,
without mortar or earth among it, like a park, with a little guard
of Chinese soldiers at the door. Having bought a camel, and
agreed for the price, I came away, and the Chinese man that went
with me led the camel; when on a sudden came up five Tartars
on horseback: two of them seized the fellow, and took the camel
from him, while the other three stepped up to me and my old
pilot, seeing us, as it were, unarmed; for I had no weapon about
me but my sword, which could but ill defend me against three
horsemen. The first that came up stopped short upon my draw-