ll four,
but I got immediately up, and walked slowly backward and forward, to let
those people see I had no intent to run away.

They all sate down in a circle about me, the better to observe my
motions. I pulled off my hat, and made a low bow toward the farmer. I
fell on my knees, and lifted up my hands and eyes, and spoke several
words as loud as I could; I took a purse of gold out of my pocket, and
humbly presented it to him. He received it on the palm of his hand, then
applied it close to his eye to see what it was, and afterward turned it
several times with the point of a pin (which he took out of his sleeve),
but could make nothing of it. Whereupon I made a sign that he should
place his hand on the ground. I then took the purse, and opening it,
poured all the gold into his palm. There were six Spanish pieces of four
pistoles[18] each, besides twenty or thirty smaller coins. I saw him wet
the tip of his little finger upon his tongue, and take up one of my
largest pieces, and then another; but he seemed to be wholly ignorant
what they were. He made me a sign to put them again into my purse, and
the purse again into my pocket, which, after offering to him several
times, I thought it best to do.

[Footnote 18: A _pistole_ is equivalent to about four dollars.]

The farmer, by this time, was convinced I must be a rational creature.
He spoke often to me; but the sound of his voice pierced my ears like
that of a water-mill, yet his words were articulate enough. I answered
as loud as I could in several languages, and he often laid his ear
within two yards of me; but all in vain, for we were wholly
unintelligible to each other. He then sent his servants to their work,
and taking his handkerchief out of his pocket, he that I desired his son
might be pardoned. The father complied, and the lad took his seat again,
whereupon I went to him, and kissed his hand, which my master took, and
made him stroke me gently with it.

In the midst of dinner my mistress' favorite cat leaped into her lap. I
heard a noise behind me like that of a dozen stocking-weavers at work;
and turning my head I found it proceeded from the purring of this
animal, who seemed to be three times larger than an ox, as I computed by
the view of her head and one of her paws, while her mistress was feeding
and stroking her. The fierceness of this creature's countenance
altogether discomposed me though I stood at the further end of the
table, above fifty foot of