h century.

And the tale was marvelous, indeed, to the unaccustomed ears of
Europe,--a tale of innumerable populous cities and great rivers, a tale
of industry and thrift and glutted markets, above all a tale of
treasure. What was doubtless heard most eagerly and told again with most
verve were the accounts of cities with "walles of silver and bulwarkes
or towers of golde," palaces "entirely roofed with fine gold," lakes
full of pearls, of Indian princes wearing on their arms "gold and gems
worth a city's ransom." In that country, says Rubruquis, "whoever
wanteth golde, diggeth till he hath found some quantitie." Oderic tells
of a "most brave and sumptuous pallace" in Java, "one stayre being of
silver, and another of golde, throughout the whole building"; the rooms
were "paved all over with silver and gold, and all the wals upon the
inner side sealed over with plates of beaten gold; the roof of the
palace was of pure gold." As for the Grand Khan, he had, according to
Marco Polo, "such a quantity of plate, and of gold and silver in other
shapes, as no one ever before saw or heard tell of, or could believe."
And so freely did the returned traveler discourse of Kublai Khan's
millions of _saggi_ of revenue, that he was ever after known in Italy as
Ser Marco Milioni.

In contrast with this country, how small and inferior is Europe! Such is
the most general impression conveyed by the accounts of the travelers.
Do you think you have some powerful kings here?--they have always the
air of asking--some great rivers, populous and thriving cities? But I
tell you Europe is nothing. "The city of Quinsay," says Oderic, "hath
twelve principall gates; and about the distance of eight miles, on the
highway unto each one of the said gates, standeth a city as big by
estimation as Venice and Padua." And this trade of the Levant,
profitable as you think it, is but a small affair. On a single river in
China, the greatest in the world, "there is more wealth and merchandise
than on all the rivers and all the seas of Christendom put together." Of
that great wealth, very little, indeed, ever comes to the Levant: "for
one ship load of pepper that goes to Alexandria or elsewhere, destined
for Christendom, there come a hundred, aye and more too, to this haven
of Zaiton"; while the diamonds "that are brought to our part of the
world are only the refuse of the finer and larger stones; for the flower
of the diamonds, as well as of the larger pearls, ar