So you must know that when you leave the kingdom of Basma you come to
another kingdom called Samara, on the same Island.[NOTE 1] And in that
kingdom Messer Marco Polo was detained five months by the weather, which
would not allow of his going on. And I tell you that here again neither
the Pole-star nor the stars of the Maestro[NOTE 2] were to be seen, much
or little. The people here are wild Idolaters; they have a king who is
great and rich; but they also call themselves subjects of the Great Kaan.
When Messer Mark was detained on this Island five months by contrary
winds, [he landed with about 2000 men in his company; they dug large
ditches on the landward side to encompass the party, resting at either end
on the sea-haven, and within these ditches they made bulwarks or stockades
of timber] for fear of those brutes of man-eaters; [for there is great
store of wood there; and the Islanders having confidence in the party
supplied them with victuals and other things needful.] There is abundance
of fish to be had, the best in the world. The people have no wheat, but
live on rice. Nor have they any wine except such as I shall now describe.
You must know that they derive it from a certain kind of tree that they
have. When they want wine they cut a branch of this, and attach a great
pot to the stem of the tree at the place where the branch was cut; in a
day and a night they will find the pot filled. This wine is excellent
drink, and is got both white and red. [It is of such surpassing virtue
that it cures dropsy and tisick and spleen.] The trees resemble small
date-palms; ... and when cutting a branch no longer gives a flow of wine,
they water the root of the tree, and before long the branches again begin
to give out wine as before.[NOTE 3] They have also great quantities of
Indian nuts [as big as a man's head], which are good to eat when fresh;
[being sweet and savoury, and white as milk. The inside of the meat of the
nut is filled with a liquor like clear fresh water, but better to the
taste, and more delicate than wine or any other drink that ever existed.]
Now that we have done telling you about this kingdom, let us quit it, and
we will tell you of Dagroian.
When you leave the kingdom of Samara you come to another which is called
DAGROIAN. It is an independent kingdom, and has a language of its own. The
people are very wild, but they call themselves the subjects of the Great
Kaan. I will tell you a wicked custom of theirs.[NOTE 4]
When one of them is ill they send for their sorcerers, and put the
question to them, whether the sick man shall recover of his sickness or
no. If they say that he will recover, then they let him alone till he gets
better. But if the sorcerers foretell that the sick man is to die, the
friends send for certain judges of theirs to put to death him who has thus
been condemned by the sorcerers to die. These men come, and lay so many
clothes upon the sick man's mouth that they suffocate him. And when he is
dead they have him cooked, and gather together all the dead man's kin, and
eat him. And I assure you they do suck the very bones till not a particle
of marrow remains in them; for they say that if any nourishment remained
in the bones this would breed worms, and then the worms would die for want
of food, and the death of those worms would be laid to the charge of the
deceased man's soul. And so they eat him up stump and rump. And when they
have thus eaten him they collect his bones and put them in fine chests,
and carry them away, and place them in caverns among the mountains where
no beast nor other creature can get at them. And you must know also that
if they take prisoner a man of another country, and he cannot pay a ransom
in coin, they kill him and eat him straightway. It is a very evil custom
and a parlous.[NOTE 5]
Now that I have told you about this kingdom let us leave it, and I will
tell you of Lambri.
NOTE 1. - I have little doubt that in Marco's dictation the name was really
Samatra, and it is possible that we have a trace of this in the
Samarcha (for Samartha) of the Crusca MS.
The Shijarat Malayu has a legend, with a fictitious etymology, of the
foundation of the city and kingdom of Samudra, or SUMATRA, by Marah
Silu, a fisherman near Pasangan, who had acquired great wealth, as wealth
is got in fairy tales. The name is probably the Sanskrit Samudra, "the
sea." Possibly it may have been imitated from Dwara Samudra, at that time
a great state and city of Southern India. [We read in the Malay Annals,
Salalat al Salatin, translated by Mr. J.T. Thomson (Proc.R.G.S.
XX. p. 216): "Mara Silu ascended the eminence, when he saw an ant as big
as a cat; so he caught it, and ate it, and on the place he erected his
residence, which he named Samandara, which means Big Ant (Semut besar in
Malay)." - H.C.] Mara Silu having become King of Samudra was converted to
Islam, and took the name of Malik-al-Salih. He married the daughter of the
King of Parlak, by whom he had two sons; and to have a principality for
each he founded the city and kingdom of Pasei. Thus we have Marco's
three first kingdoms, Ferlec, Basma, and Samara, connected together in a
satisfactory manner in the Malayan story.
