WILLIAM DE RUBRUQUIS ad, j 



1253. I 



they spend all their coloured felt, in painting vines, trees, :, 



birds, and beastes thereupon. The sayd houses they ; 



make so large, that they conteine thirtie foote in breadth. \ 



For measuring once the breadth betweene the wheele-ruts 



of one of their cartes, I found it to be 20 feete over : and ^ 



when the house was upon the carte, it stretched over the i 



wheeles on each side five feete at the least. I told 22. , 



oxen in one teame, drawing an house upon a cart, eleven ] 



in one order according to the breadth of the carte, and ] 



eleven more before them : the axletree of the carte was of j 



an huge bignes like unto the mast of a ship. And a fellow i 



stood in the doore of the house, upon the forestall of the j 



carte driving forth the oxen. Moreover, they make j 



certaine fouresquare baskets of small slender wickers as I 



big as great chestes : and afterward, from one side to ) 



another, they frame an hollow lidde or cover of such like ; 



wickers, and make a doore in the fore side thereof. And | 



then they cover the sayd chest or little house with black ■ 



felt rubbed over with tallow or sheeps milke to keepe the ! 



raine from soaking through, which they decke likewise 



with painting or with feathers. And in such chests they i 



put their whole houshold stuffe & treasure. Also the ! 



same chests they do strongly bind upon other carts, \ 



which are drawen with camels, to ye end they may wade j 



through rivers. Neither do they at any time take down i 



the sayd chests from off their carts. When they take 



down their dwelling houses, they turne the doores alwayes ! 



to the South : & next of all they place the carts laden '\ 



with their chests, here & there, within half a stones cast of i 



ye house : insomuch that the house standeth between two ] 



ranks of carts, as it were, between two wals. The matrons J 



make for themselves most beautiful carts, which I am not ThebenefiteoJ j 



able to describe unto vour maiestie but by pictures onlie: ^P^^^^^^"^'^ 



rr 11-1 Mi-ii • 111- r stranse coun- 



ror 1 would right willingly have painted al things tor you, ^^.^^f^ \ 



had my skill bin ought in that art. One rich Moal or j 



Tartar hath 200. or 100. such cartes with chests. Duke | 



Baatu hath sixteene wives, every one of which hath one 



great house, besides other little houses, which they place ] 



235 ; 



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