they put to it a little green ginger, pepper, and butter, and this is the ordinary way of their dreffing it, and fo 'tis very good.

Sometimes they boil pieces of flesh, or hens, and other fowl, cut in pieces in their rice, which difh they call pillaw as they order it, they make it a very excellent, and a very well-tafted food.

Once my Lord Ambaffador had an entertainment there by Afaph Chan, who invited him to dinner (and this was the only refpect in that kind he ever had, while he was in EaftIndia.) That Afaph Chan was a man made by his great alliances the greatest subject and favourite in all that empire; for his fifter was the Mogul's most beloved wife, and his daughter was married unto Sultan Caroon the Prince, and very much beloved by him. But of all thefe, more afterward.

The Afaph Chan entertained my Lord Ambaffador in a very spacious and a very beautiful tent, where none of his followers befides myfelf faw or tafted of that entertainment.

That tent was kept full of a very pleasant perfume; in which fcents the King and grandees there take very much delight. The floor of the tent was firft covered all over with very rich and large carpets, which were covered again in the places where our dinner ftood with other good carpets, made of stitcht leather, to preferve them which were richer ; and thefe were covered again with pure white 0 2 and

and fine callico cloths; and all thefe covered with very many dishes of filver; but for the greater part of thofe filver dishes, they are not larger than our largest trencher-plates, the brims of all of them gilt.

We fat in that large room as it were in a triangle; the Ambaffador on Afaph Chan's right hand, a good distance from him; and myself below; all of us on the ground, as they there all do when they eat, with our faces looking each to the other, and every one of us had his feveral mefs. The Ambassador had more dishes by ten, and I lefs by ten, than our entertainer had; yet for my part I had fifty dishes. They were all fet before us at once, and little paths left betwixt them, that our entertainer's fervants (for only they waited) might come and reach them to us one after another, and fo they did; fo that I tafted of all fet before me, and of most did but taste, though all of them tafted very well.

Now of the provifion itself; for our larger dishes, they were filled with rice, dreffed as before defcribed; and this rice was presented to us, fome of it white, in its own proper colour, fome of it made yellow with faffron, some of it was made green, and fome of it put into a purple colour; but by what ingredient I know not; but this I am fure, that it all tafted very well: And with rice thus ordered, feveral of our dishes were furnished; and very many more of them with flesh of feveral kinds,

and

and with hens and other forts of fowl cut in pieces, as before I obferved in their Indian cookery.

To these we had many jellies and culices; rice ground to flour, then boiled, and after sweeten'd with fugar-candy and rofe-water, to be eaten cold. The flour of rice, mingled with fweet almonds, made as fmall as they could, and with fome of the most fleshy parts of hens, ftewed with it, and after, the flesh so beaten into pieces, that it could not be difcerned, all made fweet with rofe-water and fugar-candy, and fcented with Ambergrease; this was another of our dishes, and a most luscious one, which the Portuguese call mangee real, food for a King. Many other dishes we had, made up in cakes, of feveral forms, of the finest of the wheat flour, mingled with almonds and fugar- candy, whereof fome were fcented, and fome not. To these potatoes excellently well dreffed; and to them divers fallads of the curious fruits of that country, some preserved in fugar, and others raw; and to these many roots candied, almonds blanched, raisons of the fun, prunellas, and I know not what, of all enough to make up the number of dishes before named; and with these quelque chofe was that entertainment made up.

And it was better a great deal, than if it had confifted of full and heaped up dishes, fuch as are fometimes amongst us provided for great and profufe entertainments. Our bread

0 3

was

was of very good excellent wheat, made up very white and light, in round cakes; and for our drink, fome of it was brew'd, for ought I know, ever fince Noah's flood, that good innocent water, being all the drink there commonly used, (as before) and in those hot climates (it being better digested there than in other parts) it is very sweet, and allays thirst better than any other liquor can, and therefore better pleaseth, and agreeth better with every man that comes and lives there, than any other drink.

At this entertainment we fat long, and much longer than we could with ease crosslegged; but all confidered, our feast in that place was better than Apicius, that famous Epicure of Rome, with all his witty glut tony (for fo Paterculus calls it, ingeniofa gula) could have made with all provifions had from the earth, air, and fea..

My Lord Ambaffador obferved not that uneafy way of fitting at his meat, but in his own house had tables and chairs, &c. he was ferved altogether in plate, and had an English and an Indian cook to drefs his diet, which was very plentiful and cheap likewife; so that by reafon of the great variety of provifions there, his weekly account for his house-keeping came but to little.

The meaner fort of people there eat rice boiled with green ginger and a little pepper, after which they put butter into it, which is

their principal dish, and but feldom eaten by them; but their ordinary food is not made of the flour of wheat, but of a coarfe well tafted grain, made up in round broad and thick cakes, which they bake upon their thin iron plates, (before fpoken of) which they carry with them when they travel from place to place; when they have bak'd thofe cakes, they put a little batter on them, and doubtless the poor people find this a very hearty food, for they who live moft upon it, are as ftrong as they could be if they had their diet out of the King's Kitchen. I fhall here fay no more of this, but proceed to speak,

SECTION XI.

Of the Civilities of this People of their Cómpliments, and of their Habits.

A

ND here the people in general (as before was observed) are as civil to ftran gers as they are to their own countrymen; for they use when they meet one another, or when they meet ftrangers, to bow their heads, or to lay their right hands on their breasts, and to bow their bodies as they pafs, faluting them further with many well-wishes.

They use not to uncover their heads at all, as we do in our falutes, (from which custom of ours, the Turks borrow, this imprecation