engineers were immediately set to work, to prepare the greatest engine they had.  It was a frame of wood, raised three inches from the ground, about seven feet long and four wide, moving upon twenty-two wheels.  The shout I heard was upon the arrival of this engine, which, it seems, set out in four hours after my landing.  It was brought parallel to me, as I lay.  But the principal difficulty was, to raise and place me in this vehicle.

Eighty poles, each of one foot high, were erected for this purpose, and very strong cords, of the bigness of packthread, were fastened by hooks to many bandages, which the workmen had girt round my neck, my hands, my body, and my legs.  Nine hundred of the strongest men were employed to draw up these cords by many pulleys fastened on the poles; and thus, in less than three hours, I was raised and slung into the engine, and tied fast.

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All this I was told; for, while the whole operation was performing, I lay in a profound sleep, by the force of that soporiferous medicine infused into my liquor.  Fifteen hundred of the emperor’s largest horses, each about four inches and a half high, were employed to draw me towards the metropolis, which, as I said, was half a mile distant.

About four hours after we began our journey, I awaked, by a very ridiculous accident; for, the carriage being stopt a while, to adjust something that was out of order, two or three of the young natives had the curiosity to see how I looked, when I was asleep.  They climbed up into the engine, and advancing very softly to my face, one of them, an officer in the guards, put the sharp end of his half-pike[11] a good way up into my left nostril, which tickled my nose like a straw, and made me sneeze violently; whereupon they stole off, unperceived, and it was three weeks before I knew the cause of my awaking so suddenly.

We made a long march the remaining part of the day, and rested at night with five hundred guards on each side of me, half with torches, and half with bows and arrows, ready to shoot me, if I should offer to stir.  The next morning, at sunrise, we continued our march, and arrived within two hundred yards of the city gates about noon.  The emperor, and all his court, came out to meet us; but his great officers would by no means suffer his majesty to endanger his person, by mounting on my body.

At the place where the carriage stopt, there stood an ancient temple, esteemed to be the largest in the whole kingdom, which, having been polluted some years before by an unnatural murder, was, according to the zeal of those people, looked upon as profane, and therefore had been applied to common use, and all the ornaments and furniture carried away.  In this edifice it was determined I should lodge.  The great gate, fronting to the north, was about four feet high, and almost two feet wide, through which I could easily creep.  On each side of the gate was a small window, not above six inches from the ground; into that on the left side the king’s smith conveyed four score and eleven chains, like those that hang to a lady’s watch in Europe, and almost as large, which were locked to my left leg with six-and-thirty padlocks.