61.  All their arms, for both sea and land, are fire-bombs.  They have quantities of gunpowder, in the shape of loaves.  Their artillery, although not large, is poor.  They have also, and quite commonly poor, culverins and arquebuses, so that they depend mainly on their lances.  I am informed that they do not fear the arquebuses very much, because they themselves are so poor shots with them, and are amazed at seeing a hen or a pigeon killed with an arquebuse-shot.  They fear lances more than other weapons.

62.  The chief captains and the king never cut their finger-nails, and allow one to grow as long as the finger, and longer.  These go to war seated in chairs, carried on the shoulders of other men.  They frequently become intoxicated, and are very libidinous.  They guard their women very carefully.  The women also do not cut their finger-nails.  When daughters are born to people of rank, they compress the child’s feet by the toes, so that they cannot grow; and the girl cannot stand on them, but is always carried about seated.  For this reason, these women never leave the house.

63.  The men have as many wives as they can support.  They wear their hair long, gathered up on top of the head, as women dress their hair.

64.  None but a few principal people ever see the face of the king, and those only who are near him.  His face is always covered when he goes out, and he is accompanied by a numerous guard.

65.  The king resides in the province of Paquian, in a city called Quincay, mentioned by Marco Polo, the Venetian, [4] in his second book, and sixty-fourth chapter.  According to the account given by these, people, their country must have been ruled by the Tartars before Marco Polo made that voyage, because in his history he refers to the master of this city, and of others in the kingdom, as “the great Khan.”  I believe that the strange people and language must have changed the names of many of the provinces in his time.  Although he writes briefly, and in such a way that it seems but nonsense, still it is true that this city does exist; and, according to the statements of the Chinese, the name means in their language “City of Heaven,” as says Marco Polo.  This city of Quincay, as nearly as we can learn, seems to be somewhat less than five hundred leagues from Manila, which is to those living here as Cales and the mainland of Espana, and if more of our people could go in one virey, everything would be changed.  These people do not extol Quincay less than Marco Polo does.

66.  Marco Polo says that there are in that city Nestorian Christians.  The people here cannot pronounce the name, but claim that there are people in it from all over the world in great numbers.  The people there are very vicious, as are those in these islands, which are really an archipelago of China, and their inhabitants are one people with the Chinese—­as are those of Candia and of Constantinople, who are all Greeks.