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During eight entire days I hardly eat any thing, so that if we had been two days longer on the water, I verily believe I had died. But, thanks be to God, I presently mended after coming to Basora.
He has also by his letter informed you how he sold these things, whereof I say nothing, neither having seen the account nor demanded it; for, ever since our coming hither, he has been constantly occupied about the dispatch of the ship and about our voyage, and I likewise in purchasing things here to carry to Basora and India.
I went from Basora to Ormus, down the gulf of Persia, in a ship made of boards sewed together with cayro, which is a thread made of the husks of coco-nuts, and having certain canes, or leaves, or straw, sewed upon the seams between the boards, so that these vessels leak very much.
When there is great store of water in Tigris you may goe from Babylon to Basora in 8 or 9 dayes: if there be small store it will cost you the more dayes. Basora in times past was vnder the Arabians, but now is subiecte to the Turke. But some of them the Turke cannot subdue, for that they holde certaine Ilandes in the riuer Euphrates which the Turke cannot winne of them.
They wear large blue gowns; their wives having their ears and noses full of copper and silver rings, and wear copper rings on their legs. Basora is near the head of the gulf of Persia, and drives a great trade in spiceries and drugs, which come from Ormus.
From Basora I went up the Euphrates and Tigris to Babylon or Bagdat, being drawn up most of the way by the strength of men, hauling by a long rope. From Bagdat I went by land to Mosul, which stands near the scite of the ancient Nineveh, which is all ruinated and destroyed. From Mosul I travelled to Merdin in Armenia, where a people called Cordies or Curds now dwell.
From Babylon I embarked in one of those small vessels which ply upon the Tigris between Babylon and Basora, which are built after the manner of foists or galliots, having a speron and a covered poop. They use no pumps, being so well daubed with pitch as effectually to exclude the water. This pitch they have from a great plain near the city of Heit on the Euphrates, two days journey from Babylon.
This may be accounted for, as the tower stands in a very large plain, and with its surrounding ruins forms the only perceptible object; so that from a distance the tower and the mountains formed of its ruins make a greater shew than it is found to be on coming near. Of Basora.
All the commodities I brought to this place had been well sold, if this trouble had not come upon us. You shall do well to send a messenger in all speed by land from Basora to Aleppo, to give notice of this mischance, even though it may cost 30 or 40 crowns, that we may be the sooner released, and I shall thereby be the better able to recover again what is now like to be lost.
It is abundantly supplied with corn, rice, and dates, from the surrounding country. At Basora I shipped myself for Ormuz, to which I sailed through the Persian gulf 600 miles, which is the distance between Basora and Ormuz.
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