Breast and rives him up
to the navel, so that he dies on the spot [and the crows on seeing the
brute dead begin to caw, and then the huntsmen know that the serpent is
dead and come in search of him].
This then is the way these beasts are taken. Those who take them proceed
to extract the gall from the inside, and this sells at a great price; for
you must know it furnishes the material for a most precious medicine. Thus
if a person is bitten by a mad dog, and they give him but a small
pennyweight of this medicine to drink, he is cured in a moment. Again if a
woman is hard in labour they give her just such another dose and she is
delivered at once. Yet again if one has any disease like the itch, or it
may be worse, and applies a small quantity of this gall he shall speedily
be cured. So you see why it sells at such a high price.
They also sell the flesh of this serpent, for it is excellent eating, and
the people are very fond of it. And when these serpents are very hungry,
sometimes they will seek out the lairs of lions or bears or other large
wild beasts, and devour their cubs, without the sire and dam being able to
prevent it. Indeed if they catch the big ones themselves they devour them
too; they can make no resistance.[NOTE 3]
[Illustration: "Riding long like Frenchmen."
"Et encore sachie qe ceste gens chebauchent lonc come franchois."]
[Illustration: Suspension Bridge, neighbourhood of Tali]
In this province also are bred large and excellent horses which are taken
to India for sale. And you must know that the people dock two or three
joints of the tail from their horses, to prevent them from flipping their
riders, a thing which they consider very unseemly. They ride long like
Frenchmen, and wear armour of boiled leather, and carry spears and shields
and arblasts, and all their quarrels are poisoned.[NOTE 4] [And I was
told as a fact that many persons, especially those meditating mischief,
constantly carry this poison about with them, so that if by any chance
they should be taken, and be threatened with torture, to avoid this they
swallow the poison and so die speedily. But princes who are aware of this
keep ready dog's dung, which they cause the criminal instantly to swallow,
to make him vomit the poison. And thus they manage to cure those
scoundrels.]
I will tell you of a wicked thing they used to do before the Great Kaan
conquered them. If it chanced that a man of fine person or noble birth, or
some other quality that recommended him, came to lodge with those people,
then they would murder him by poison, or otherwise.
