Travels in India (Tavernier) 32.3.1

32.3.1

In due course M. des Marests arrived at Ispahan, and having first addressed himself to the Rev. Capuchin Fathers, they brought him to my lodging, where I offered him a room, with a place at my table. He made some sojourn at Ispahan, during which he made acquaintance with the English and Dutch, who manifested a high regard for him, as he well deserved. But it happened one day that, his curiosity having made him undertake too rash an adventure, he nearly brought destruction on himself, and with himself on all the Franks at Ispahan. Near the caravansardi where we lodged is a large bath to which men and women go by turns on certain days, and where the Queen of Bijapur, during her sojourn at Ispahan on her return from Mecca, was very fond of going to talk with the wives of the Franks, because the garden of her house was in contact with the bath where they generally went. The Sieur des Marests, passionately desiring to see what passed there amongst these women, satisfied his curiosity by means of a crevice which he had observed in the roof of the bath, where he went sometimes; and mounting from outside upon this roof, which was flat, and such as I have described in my accounts of the Seraglio and of Persia—by a hidden way which adjoined the caravansardi where we were dwelling, he lay down on his stomach and saw by this crevice, without being himself perceived, that which he so much desired to behold.