with a great
aduantage, because that euery day in the weeke they haue a faire, now in
one place, and now in another, and I also hired a barke, and went vp and
downe the riuer and did my businesse, and so in the night I saw many
strange things. The kingdome of Bengala in times past hath bene as it were
in the power of Moores, neuerthelesse there is great store of Gentiles
among them; alwayes whereas I haue spoken of Gentiles, is to be vnderstood
Idolaters, and whereas I speak of Moores I meane Mahomets sect. [Sidenote:
A ceremony of the gentiles when they be dead.] Those people especially that
be within the land doe greatly worship the riuer of Ganges: for when any is
sicke, he is brought out of the countrey to the banke of the riuer, and
there they make him a small cottage of strawe, and euery day they wet him
with that water, whereof there are many that die, and when they are dead,
they make a heape of stickes and boughes and lay the dead bodie thereon,
and putting fire thereunto, they let the bodie alone vntill it be halfe
rosted, and then they take it off from the fire, and make an emptie iarre
fas about his necke, and so throw him into the riuer. These things euery
night as I passed vp and downe the riuer I saw for the space of two
moneths, as I passed to the fayres to buy my commodities with the
marchants. And this is the cause that the Portugales will not drinke of the
water of the riuer Ganges, yet to the sight it is more perfect and clearer
then the water of Nilus is. From the port Piqueno I went to Cochin, and
from Cochin to Malacca, from whence I departed for Pegu being eight hundred
miles distant. That voyage is woont to be made in fiue and twentie or
thirtie dayes, but we were foure moneths, and at the ende of three moneths
our ship was without victuals. The Pilot told vs that wee were by his
altitude not farre from a citie called Tanasary, in the kingdome of Pegu,
and these his words were not true, but we were (as it were) in the middle
of many Ilands, and many vninhabited rockes, and there were also some
Portugales that affirmed that they knew the land, and knewe also where the
citie of Tanasari was.

[Sidenote: Marchandise comming from Sion.] This citie of right belongeth to
the kingdome of Sion, which is situate on a great riuers side, which
commeth out of the kingdome of Sion: and where this riuer runneth into the
sea, there is a village called Mirgim, in whose harbour euery yeere there
lade some ships