[Pramāṇa](https://indike.org/pramana/) › [Indian literature](https://indike.org/pramana/in) › [Dark Ages](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages) › [Travellers (1500–1858)](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel) › [Histoire de la dernière révolution des États du Grand Mogol](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.bernier) › [Travels in the Mogul Empire (Constable)](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.bernier~en-constable) › 3.4 # Travels in the Mogul Empire (Bernier) 3.4 Travels in the Mogul Empire (Constable) 3.4 - **Language:** English ### [3.4.1](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.bernier~en-constable.3.4.1) Such is the honourable traffic of this Great Christian King of Africa! The other ambassador was an Armenian and Christian merchant; born and married at Alep \[Aleppo\], and known in Ethiopia by the name of Murat. I saw him also at Moka, where he not only accommodated me with half his apartment, but gave me such advice as deterred me from visiting Ethiopia, as was observed at the commencement of this history. Murat is likewise sent every year to Moka for the same object as the Mahometan merchant, and always takes with him the annual presents from his master to the English and Dutch East-India Companies, and conveys those which they give in return to Gonder. ### [3.4.2](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.bernier~en-constable.3.4.2) The African Monarch, anxious that his ambassador should appear in a style suitable to the occasion, contributed liberally toward the expenses of the embassy. He presented them with thirty-two young slaves, boys and girls, to be sold at Moka; and the money raised by this happy expedient was to supply the expenses of the mission. A noble largess indeed! for let it be recollected that young slaves sell at Moka, one with another, at five-and-twenty or thirty crowns per head. Besides these, the Ethiopian King sent to the Great Mogol twenty-five choice slaves, nine or ten of whom were of a tender age and in a state to be made eunuchs. This was, to be sure, an appropriate donation from a Christian to a Prince! but then the Christianity of the Ethiopians differs greatly from ours. The ambassadors also took charge of other presents for the Great Mogol; fifteen horses, esteemed equal to those of Arabia, and a small species of mule, whose skin I have seen: no tiger is so beautifully marked, and no alachá of the Indies, or striped silken stuff, is more finely and variously streaked; a couple of elephants' teeth, of a size so prodigious that it required, it seems, the utmost exertion of a strong man to lift either of them from the ground; and lastly, the horn of an ox, filled with civet, which was indeed enormously large, for I measured the mouth of it at Dehly, and found that it exceeded half a foot in diameter. ### [3.4.3](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.bernier~en-constable.3.4.3) The ambassadors, thus royally and munificently provided, departed from Gonder, the capital city of Ethiopia, situated in the province of Dumbia. They traversed a desolate country, and were more than two months travelling to Beiloul, an out-of-the-way seaport, near Bab-el-Mandel and opposite to Moka. For reasons, which I shall perhaps disclose in the course of my narrative, they dared not take the usual and caravan road from Gonder to Arkiko, a journey easily performed in forty days. From Arkiko it is necessary to pass over to the island of Masouva, where the Grand Seigneur has a garrison. While waiting at Beiloul for a Moka vessel to cross the Red Sea, the party were in want of many of the necessaries of life, and some of the slaves died. On arriving at Moka, the ambassadors found that the market had been that year overstocked with slaves. The boys and girls, therefore, sold at a reduced price. As soon as their sale was effected, they pursued their voyage, embarking on board an Indian vessel bound to Sourate, where they arrived after a tolerable passage of five-and-twenty days. Several slaves, however, and many horses died; probably from want of proper nourishment, the funds of this pompous embassy being evidently insufficient to supply all its wants. The mule also died, but the skin was preserved. ### [3.4.4](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.bernier~en-constable.3.4.4) They had not been many hours on shore at Sourate when a certain rebel of Visapour, named Seva-Gi, entered the town, which he pillaged and burnt. The house of the ambassadors did not escape the general conflagration; and all their effects that they succeeded in rescuing from the flames, or the ravages of the enemy, were their credentials; a few slaves that Seva-Gi could not lay hold of, or whom he spared because they happened to be ill; their Ethiopian apparel, which he did not covet; the mule's skin, for which, I expect, he had no particular fancy; and the ox's horn that had already been emptied of its civet. ### [3.4.5](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.bernier~en-constable.3.4.5) These exalted individuals spoke in exaggerated terms of their sad misfortunes; but it was insinuated by the malicious Indians, who witnessed their deplorable condition on landing—without decent clothing, destitute of money or bills of exchange, and half famished—that the two ambassadors were, in fact, lucky people, who ought to number the ransacking of Sourate among the happiest events of their lives, since it saved them from the mortification of conducting their wretched presents as far as Dehli. Seva-Gi, the Indians said, had furnished these worthy representatives of the Ethiopian King with an admirable pretext for appearing like a couple of mendicants, and for soliciting the governor of Sourate to supply them with the means of living, and with money and carts to enable them to proceed to the capital. The attack upon Sourate had also covered their misdeeds, in disposing, for their own benefit, of the civet, and many of the slaves. ### [3.4.6](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.bernier~en-constable.3.4.6) My excellent friend Monsieur Adrican, chief of the Dutch factory, gave Murat, the Armenian, a letter of introduction to me, which he delivered into my hands at Dehli, without being aware that I had been his guest at Moka. It was an agreeable surprise to meet thus unexpectedly, after an absence of five or six years. I embraced my old friend with affection, and promised to render him all the service in my power. Yet, though my acquaintance among the courtiers was pretty extensive, I found it difficult to be useful to these empty-handed ambassadors. The mule's skin, and the ox's horn, wherein was kept arrack, or brandy extracted from raw sugar, of which they are excessively fond, constituted the whole of their presents; and the contempt which the absence of valuable presents would alone inspire was increased by their miserable appearance. They were seen about the streets without a paleky, clad in true Bedouin fashion, and followed by seven or eight bare-footed and bare-headed slaves, who had no raiment but a nasty strip of cloth passed between their buttocks, and the half of a ragged sheet over the left shoulder, which was carried under the right arm, in the manner of a summer cloak. Nor had the ambassadors any other carriage than a hired and broken-down cart; and they were without any horse except one belonging to our Missionary Father, and one of mine that they sometimes borrowed, and which they nearly killed. ### [3.4.7](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.bernier~en-constable.3.4.7) In vain did I for a long time exert myself in behalf of these despised personages; they were regarded as beggars, and could excite no interest. One day, however, when closeted with my Agah Danechmend-kan, who is minister for foreign affairs, I expatiated so successfully upon the grandeur of the Ethiopian Monarch, that Aureng-Zebe was induced to grant the ambassadors an audience, and to receive their letters. He presented both with a Ser-apah, or vest of brocade, a silken and embroidered girdle, and a turban of the same materials and workmanship; gave orders for their maintenance; and at an audience, when the Emperor gave them their congé, which soon took place, he invested each with another Ser-apah; and made them a present of six thousand roupies, equal at present to nearly three thousand crowns; but this money was unequally divided, the Mahometan receiving four thousand roupies, and Murat, because a Christian, only two thousand. ### [3.4.8](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.bernier~en-constable.3.4.8) Aureng-Zebe sent by them, as presents to their royal master, an extremely rich Ser-apah; two large cornets, or trumpets, of silver gilt; two silver kettle-drums; a poniard studded with rubies; and gold and silver roupies to the amount of about twenty thousand francs: hoping, as he kindly expressed it, that this last gift would be peculiarly acceptable, and considered a rarity; the King of Ethiopia not having any coined money in his country. The Mogol was well aware that not one of these roupies would be taken out of Hindoustan, and that the ambassadors would employ them in the purchase of useful commodities. It turned out just as he foresaw. They bought spices, fine cotton cloths, for shirts for the King and Queen, and for the King's only legitimate son, who is to succeed to the throne, alachas or silken stuffs striped, some with gold and some with silver, for vests and summer trousers; English broadcloths, scarlet and green, for a couple of abas, or Arabian vests, for their King; and lastly, quantities of cloth less fine in their texture for several ladies of the seraglio and their children. All these goods they were privileged, as ambassadors, to export without payment of duty. ### [3.4.9](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.bernier~en-constable.3.4.9) Notwithstanding all my friendship for Murat, there were three reasons why I almost repented of having exercised my influence in his behalf. The first was, that after he had promised to sell me his boy for fifty roupies, he sent word he would not part with the boy for less than three hundred. I felt almost disposed to give him his price, that I might have it in my power to say a father had sold me his own child. The lad was remarkably well made, and his skin of the clearest black; the nose was not flat, nor the lips thick, as is commonly the case among the Ethiopians. I was certainly angry with Murat for having violated his engagement. --- Source: [https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.bernier~en-constable.3.4](https://indike.org/pramana/in.darkages.travel.bernier~en-constable.3.4) · Pramāṇa