anyone, even if he had attacked them without provocation. And all the neighbouring people unite against the one (who refuses peace) for his destruction, as against a cruel and impious man. Whence it happens that they almost always enjoy quiet and repose. There is no robbery among them, and no murder. No one but his wives and children may speak to the king, except by means of canes, which they place to his ear from a distance, and whisper what they wish through them. They say that man, after his death, has no feeling, as he had none before his birth. They have small houses, built of logs and of earth, partly roofed with rubble, and partly with palm leaves, [Ædes habent exiles ex lignis & terra constructas, partim rudere, partim palmatis frondibus coopertas.] It is, though, quite certain that in Porne there are twenty thousand houses. They marry as many wives as they can afford, and live on food, which bird-fowling or fishing supplies them with. They make bread of rice, and a drink which drops from the severed branches of the palm, as we said before.
Some carry on traffic in the neighbouring islands, to which they go in junks; some devote themselves to hunting; some to fishing; and others to agriculture. They have dresses of cotton, and almost all the animals that we have, except the sheep, the ox, and the ass; but their horses are very small and feeble. The produce of camphor, of ginger, and of cinnamon, is great among them. Thence our men, having saluted this king, and heaped him with presents, directed their course to the Moluccas, which had been pointed out to them by the same king. They came to the shores of the island of Solo, where they heard that there were pearls as big as dove's eggs, and sometimes as hen's eggs, but which can only be fished up from the very deepest sea. Our men brought no large pearl, because the season of the year did not allow of the fishery. But they testify that they had taken an oyster in that region, the flesh of
