one. By the same computation they provided me with sheets,
blankets, and coverlets, tolerable enough for one who had been so long
inured to hardships as I.

In the meantime the emperor held frequent councils, to debate what
course should be taken with me; and I was afterward assured by a
particular friend, a person of great quality, who was looked upon to be
as much in the secret as any, that the court was under many difficulties
concerning me. They apprehended my breaking loose; that my diet would be
very expensive, and might cause a famine. Sometimes they determined to
starve me, or at least to shoot me in the face and hands with poisoned
arrows, which would soon despatch me.

In the midst of these consultations, several officers of the army went
to the door of the great council-chamber, and two of them, being
admitted, gave an account of my behavior to the six criminals above
mentioned, which made so favorable an impression in the breast of his
majesty and the whole board in my behalf, that an imperial commission
was issued out obliging all the villages nine hundred yards round the
city to deliver in every morning six beeves, forty sheep, and other
victuals for my sustenance; together with a proportionable quantity of
bread, and wine, and other liquors; for the payment of which his majesty
gave orders upon his treasury. An establishment was also made of six
hundred persons to be my domestics, who had board wages allowed for
their maintenance, and tents built for them, very conveniently on each
side of my door. It was likewise ordered that three hundred tailors
should make me a suit of clothes, after the fashion of the country; that
six of his majesty's greatest scholars should be employed to instruct me
in their language; and, lastly, that the emperor's horses, and those of
the nobility, and troops of guard, should be frequently exercised in my
sight, to accustom themselves to me.

All these orders were duly put in execution; and in about three weeks I
made a great progress in learning their language; during which time the
emperor frequently honored me with his visits, and was pleased to assist
my masters in teaching me. We began already to converse together in some
sort: and the first words I learned were to express my desire that he
would please to give me my liberty; which I every day repeated on my
knees. His answer, as I could apprehend it, was, that this must be a
work of time, not to be thought on without th