مسالك الابصار في ممالك الامصار 1.3

1.3

Dehli, which was one among them, has given its name to all the rest. It is both long and broad, and covers a space of about forty miles in circumference. The houses are built of stone and brick, and the roofs of wood. The floors are paved with a white stone, like marble. None of the houses are more than two stories high, and some only one. It is only in the palace of the Sultan that marble is used for pavement. But if I can believe the Shaikh Abu Bakr bin Khallal, this description applies only to the old houses of Dehli, for the new ones are built differently. According to the same informant, Dehli comprises an aggregate of twenty-one cities. Gardens extend on three sides of it, in a straight line for twelve thousand paces. The western side is not so furnished, because it borders on a mountain. Dehli contains a thousand colleges, one of which belongs to the Sháfi'ís, the rest to the Hanafís. In it there are about seventy hospitals, called Dáru-sh Shifá, or houses of cure. In the city, and those dependent upon it, the chapels and hermitages amount to 2,000. There are great monasteries, large open spaces, and numerous baths. The water used by the people is drawn from wells of little depth, seldom exceeding seven cubits. Hydraulic wheels are placed at their tops. The people drink rain-water, which is collected in large reservoirs constructed for that purpose, the distance across each of them being a bowshot, or even more.