"I thank you, King Cacama, and I am glad, indeed, that it is my good fortune to behold so great and magnificent a king. I have come, as you have heard, from a far country, towards the rising sun; so far that it takes many months to traverse the sea which divides it from you; but had the distance been far greater than it is, I should have been more than repaid for the journey by the sight of you, and of this great city over which you rule." "And is it true that your people move about the sea in floating castles, and that they fight with weapons that make a noise like thunder, and can batter down walls at a distance of two miles?" "They can kill men at more than that distance, Sire, but for battering down walls they are used at shorter distances. The ships are, as you say, floating castles, and will carry hundreds of men, with provisions and stores for many months, besides merchandise and goods. These castles are armed with weapons such as you speak of, some of them carrying twenty or more; besides which each man carries a weapon of the same kind, but small and light in make, so that it can be carried on the shoulders. These weapons also make a great noise, though not comparable with that of the large pieces, which are called cannon." "And they have animals on which they sit, and which carry them at a speed far greater than that at which a man can run?" "That is so, Sire." "Of what color are they, and of what form?" "They are all colors: some are black, and some white, others brown, or gray, or roan, or bay." This answer seemed to surprise the king more than any other he had heard. All the beasts and birds with which he was acquainted were of the particular color which appertained to their species, and that the animals of any one kind should thus differ in so extraordinary degree from each other struck him as remarkable, indeed. Roger had always been fond of sketching, and had often whiled away dull hours on board ship with pencil and paintbrush; and his cousins at home had quite a collection of sketches that he made for them in, foreign parts. He now said: "If your Majesty will order that gentleman, who is at present taking my likeness, to hand me a sheet of paper and his brushes, I will endeavor to draw for your Majesty an outline of the animal I speak of, and which we call a horse." At the king's order the scribe at once handed the necessary materials to Roger, who in three or four minutes dashed off a spirited sketch of a horse, with a rider upon his back. The king was greatly struck with the representation. The Aztecs possessed the art of copying objects with a fair amount of accuracy, but the figures were stiff and wooden, without the slightest life or animation. To the king, then, this little sketch appeared almost supernatural. Here was before him an animal which looked alive, as if already in movement. He passed it to those next to him, and continued the conversation. "And the men fight on the backs of those animals?"