e palm of his hand, then applied it close to his eye to
see what it was, and afterwards turned it several times with the point of
a pin (which he took out of his sleeve,) but could make nothing of it.
Whereupon I made a sign that he should place his hand on the ground. I
then took the purse, and, opening it, poured all the gold into his palm.
There were six Spanish pieces of four pistoles each, beside twenty or
thirty smaller coins. I saw him wet the tip of his little finger upon
his tongue, and take up one of my largest pieces, and then another; but
he seemed to be wholly ignorant what they were. He made me a sign to put
them again into my purse, and the purse again into my pocket, which,
after offering it to him several times, I thought it best to do.

The farmer, by this time, was convinced I must be a rational creature.
He spoke often to me; but the sound of his voice pierced my ears like
that of a water-mill, yet his words were articulate enough. I answered
as loud as I could in several languages, and he often laid his ear within
two yards of me: but all in vain, for we were wholly unintelligible to
each other. He then sent his servants to their work, and taking his
handkerchief out of his pocket, he doubled and spread it on his left
hand, which he placed flat on the ground with the palm upward, making me
a sign to step into it, as I could easily do, for it was not above a foot
in thickness. I thought it my part to obey, and, for fear of falling,
laid myself at full length upon the handkerchief, with the remainder of
which he lapped me up to the head for further security, and in this
manner carried me home to his house. There he called his wife, and
showed me to her; but she screamed and ran back, as women in England do
at the sight of a toad or a spider. However, when she had a while seen
my behaviour, and how well I observed the signs her husband made, she was
soon reconciled, and by degrees grew extremely tender of me.

It was about twelve at noon, and a servant brought in dinner. It was
only one substantial dish of meat (fit for the plain condition of a
husbandman,) in a dish of about four-and-twenty feet diameter. The
company were, the farmer and his wife, three children, and an old
grandmother. When they were sat down, the farmer placed me at some
distance from him on the table, which was thirty feet high from the
floor. I was in a terrible fright, and kept as far as I could from the
edge, for fea