AD. THE ENGLISH VOYAGES 



1253. 



exalting it, if they can, above all the whole towne besides. 

 And by the same pole all men may knowe, that there 

 stands the temple of their idoles, These rites and cere- 

 monies aforesayd be common unto all idolaters in those 

 parts. Going upon a time towardes the foresayd idole- 

 temple, I found certain priests sitting in the outward 

 portal. And those which I sawe, seemed unto me, by 

 their shaven beards, as if they had bene French men. 

 They wore certaine ornaments upon their heads made of 

 paper. The priestes of the foresaide Jugures doe use such 

 attire whithersoever they goe. They are alwaies in their 

 safiron coloured jackets, which be very straight being 

 laced or buttened from the bosome right downe, after the 

 French fashion. And they have a cloake upon their left 

 shoulder descending before and behind under their right 

 arme, like unto a deacon carying the houssel-boxe in time 

 Paper. of lent. Their letters or kind of writing the Tartars did 



5o do the receive. They begin to write at the top of their paper 

 people of China Jj-^wing their lines right downe : and so they reade and 

 ^dravchz their ^'^^^iply their lines from the left hand to the right. They 

 lines perpendi- doe use certaine papers and characters in their magical 

 cularly down- practises. Whereupon their temples are full of such short 

 ward, '^ not scroules hanged round about them. Aso Mangu-Can 

 ^th^U^hthand ^^^^ ^^^^^ letters unto your Majestie written in the 

 to the leftc. language of the Moals or Tartars, and in the foresayd 

 hand or letter of the Jugures. They burne their dead 

 according to the anncient custome, and lay up the ashes in 

 the top of a Pyramis. Now, after I had sit a while by the 

 foresaid priests, and entred into their temple and scene 

 many of their images both great and small, I demanded of 

 them what they beleeved concerning God } And they 

 answered : We beleeve that there is onely one God. And 

 I demaunded farther : Whether do you beleve that he is 

 a spirit, or some bodily substance } They saide : We 

 beleeve that he is a spirite. Then said I : Doe you 

 beleeve that God ever tooke mans nature upon him .^ 

 They answered : Noe. And againe I said : Sithence ye 

 beleeve that he is a spirit, to what end doe you make so 



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