as a guard, and to keep us from the wild hordes who rove from
place to place all through the land. Some of our men were Scots,
who had come out to trade here, and had great wealth, and I was
glad to join them, as it was by no means the first time that they
had been here.

We took five guides with us, and we all put our coin in one
purse, to buy food on the way, and to pay the men who took charge
of us. One of us we chose out for our chief, to take the lead in
case we should have to fight for our lives; and when the time
came, we had no small need of him. On the sides of all the roads,
we saw men who made pots, cups, pans, and such like ware, out of
a kind of earth, which is, in fact, the chief trade in this part
of the world.

One thing, the guide said he would show me, that was not to be
seen in all the world else (and this, in good sooth, I could not
sneer at, as I had done at most of the things I had seen here),
and this was a house that was built of a kind of ware, such as
most plates and cups are made of. "How big is it?" said I, "can
we take it on the back of a horse?" "On a horse!" said the guide,
"why, two score of men live in it." He then took us to it, and I
found that it was in truth a large house, built with lath and the
best ware that can be made out of earth. The sun shone hot on the
walls, which were quite white, hard, and smooth as glass, with
forms on them in blue paint. On the walls of the rooms were small
square tiles of the best ware, with red, blue, and green paint of
all shades and hues, in rare forms, done in good taste; and as
they use the same kind of earth to join the tiles with, you could
not see where the tiles met. The floors of the rooms were made of