hu_,"
supra, p. 295) and the present post-road to Cambaluc.

CHAPTER XXII.

CONCERNING THE CITY OF CAMBALUC, AND ITS GREAT TRAFFIC AND POPULATION.

You must know that the city of Cambaluc hath such a multitude of houses,
and such a vast population inside the walls and outside, that it seems
quite past all possibility. There is a suburb outside each of the gates,
which are twelve in number;[NOTE 1] and these suburbs are so great that
they contain more people than the city itself [for the suburb of one gate
spreads in width till it meets the suburb of the next, whilst they extend
in length some three or four miles]. In those suburbs lodge the foreign
merchants and travellers, of whom there are always great numbers who have
come to bring presents to the Emperor, or to sell articles at Court, or
because the city affords so good a mart to attract traders. [There are in
each of the suburbs, to a distance of a mile from the city, numerous fine
hostelries[NOTE 2] for the lodgment of merchants from different parts of
the world, and a special hostelry is assigned to each description of
people, as if we should say there is one for the Lombards, another for the
Germans, and a third for the Frenchmen.] And thus there are as many good
houses outside of the city as inside, without counting those that belong
to the great lords and barons, which are very numerous.

[Illustration: Plain of Cambaluc; the City in the distance; from the Hills
on the north-west]

You must know that it is forbidden to bury any dead body inside the city.
If the body be that of an Idolater it is carried out beyond the city and
suburbs to a remote place assigned for the purpose, to be burnt. And if it
be of one belonging to a religion the custom of which is to bury, such as
the Christian, the Saracen, or what not, it is also carried out beyond the
suburbs to a distant place assigned for the purpose. And thus the city is
preserved in a better and more healthy state.

Moreover, no public woman resides inside the city, but all such abide
outside in the suburbs. And 'tis wonderful what a vast number of these
there are for the foreigners; it is a certain fact that there are more
than 20,000 of them living by prostitution. And that so many can live in
this way will show you how vast is the population.

[Guards patrol the city every night in parties of 30 or 40, looking out
for any persons who may be abroad at unseasonable hours, i.e. after the
great bel