Of certaine trees yeelding meale, honey, and poyson.

NEERE unto the said Iland is another countrey called Panten, or Tathalamasin.1 And the king of the same countrey hath many Ilands under his dominion. In this land there are trees yeelding meale, hony, & wine & the most deadly poison in all ye whole world: for against it there is but one only remedy: & that is this: if any man hath taken of ye poyson, & would be delivered from the danger thereof, let him temper the dung of a man in water, & so drinke a good quantitie thereof, & it expels the poyson immediatly, making it to avoid at the fundament. Meale is produced out of the said trees after this maner. They be mighty huge trees and when they are cut with an axe by the ground, there issueth out of the stock a certain licour like unto gumme, which they take and put into bags made of leaues, laying them for 15 days together abroad in the sunne, & at the end of those 15 dayes, when the said licour is throughly parched, it becometh meale. Then they steepe it first in sea water, washing it afterward with fresh water, and so it is made very good & savorie paste, whereof they make either meat or bread, as they thinke good. Of which bread I my selfe did eate, & it is fayrer without & somewhat browne within. By this countrey is the sea called Mare mortuum, which runneth continually Southward, into ye which whosoever falleth in (is) never seene after. In this countrey also are found canes of an incredible length, namely of 60 paces high or more, & they are as bigge as trees. Other canes there be also called Cassan,2 which overspread the earth like grasse, & out of euery knot of them spring foorth certaine branches, which are continued upon the ground almost for the space of a mile. In the said canes there are found certaine stones, one of which stones, whosoever carryeth about with him, cannot be wounded with any yron: & therefore the men of that countrey for the most part, carry such stones with them, whithersoever they goe. Many also cause one of the armes of their children, while they are yong, to be launced, putting one of the said stones into the wound, healing also, and closing up the said wound with the powder of a certaine fish (the name whereof I do not know) which powder doth immediatly consolidate and cure the said wounde. And by the virtue of these stones the people aforesaid doe for the most part triumph both on sea and land. Howbeit there is one kinde of stratageme, which the enemies of this nation, knowing the vertue of the sayd stones, doe practise against them: namely, they provide themselues armour of yron or steele against their arrowes, & weapons also poisoned with the poyson of trees & they carry in their hands wooden stakes most sharpe and hard pointed, as if they were yron: likewise they shoot arrowes without yron heads, & so they confound and slay some of their unarmed foes trusting too securely unto the vertue of their stones. Also of the foresayd canes called Cassan they make sayles for their ships, and litel houses, and many other necessaries. From thence after many dayes travell, I arrived at another kingdome called Campa, a most beautiful and rich countrey, & abounding with all kind of victuals: the king whereof, at my being there, had so many wives & concubines, that he had 300 sonnes & daughters by them. This king hath 10004 tame Elephants, which are kept even as we keepe droves of oxen or flocks of sheepe in pasture.

1:  Query, The Tathsiaulu of Marco Polo, or Thibet.

2:  An exaggeration for bamboos.