An Historical Relation of the Island Ceylon in the East Indies: Together with an Account of the Detaining in Captivity the Author and Divers other Englishmen Now Living There, and of the Author's Miraculous EscapeKnox, Robert
History
An Historical Relation of the Island Ceylon in the East Indies: Together with an Account of the Detaining in Captivity the Author and Divers other Englishmen Now Living There, and of the Author's Miraculous Escape
Knox, Robert
Sri Lanka -- Description and travel -- Early works to 1800; Sri Lanka -- Social life and customs
[Their Conference and Entertainment.] We gave God thanks for his great
Mercies towards us, being then, as we did confess, in a far better
Condition than we could have expected. They were now no more like the
Prisoners I left them, but were become House keepers, and Knitters
of Caps and had changed their Habit from Breeches to Clouts like the
Chingulays. They entertained me with very good chear in their Houses
beyond what I did expect.
[He consults with his Countreymen for a future livelyhood.] My Money
at the same time almost gone, and Cloaths in the same condition,
it was high time for me now to take some course in hand to get
more. Therefore I took some advice with them about Knitting, my Boy
having Skill therein. Likewise they advised me to take my Victuals raw,
wherein they found great Profit. For all this while here being no signs
of releasing us, it concerned me now to bethink my self how I should
live for the future. For neither had I, any more than my Countreymen,
any allowance for Cloths, but Victuals only.
Having stayed here some two or three days, we did take leave of one
another, hoping to see one another oftner, since we knew each others
Habitations: and I departed to my House, having a Keeper with me.
[The difficulty he met with of having raw Rice.] By this time I began
to speak the Language of the Countrey. Whereby I was inabled the better
to speak my mind unto the People that brought me my Victuals. Which
Was henceforward not to boil my Rice, but to bring it raw according
to the quantity that the other English men had. This occasioned a
great deal of disputing and reasoning between us. They alledged,
That I was not as they, being the Captain's Son, and they but his
Servants, and therefore that it was ordered by the great Men at Court,
that my Victuals should be daily brought unto me, whereas they went
always from house to house for theirs: Neither was it fitting for
me, they said, to imploy my self in such an Inferior Office as to
dress my own Meat, being a Man that the King had notice of by Name,
and very suddenly before I should be aware of it, would send for me
into the Presence, where I should be highly promoted to some Place
of Honour. In the mean time, they told me, as pretending to give me
good counsel, That it was more for my credit and repute to have my
Provisions brought unto me ready Dressed as they were before.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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