Now upon one of these days was it that Mr Kidder and I rid abroad upon an elephant, which beast’s paces are extreme disagreeable to them that han’t accustomed themselves thereto, so that when we came to dismounting by the means of a short ladder, I, being somewhat giddy, catched a slip, and fell to the ground. As it so chanced, I was not hurt in nowise, but only my watch, the which was sorely crushed and broken in the fall. And I was the more grieved at this, that the watch was a gift from Mr Martin, he having sent for it as far as to Swisse,[117] intending it for me on my return from Goa, and keeping it by him all the time wherein he knew not whether I were alive or dead, gave it to me before my going to Amidavat, and a mighty fine piece of workmanship it was, and cost him a great sum of money. I then lamenting loudly the loss of so precious a thing from among my possessions, when as we sat the next evening under the colonnade before our lodging, our friend the physician bid me take comfort, saying that there was a Christian prisoner in the court that was either a Frenchman or a Swisser, and was most cunning in mending of clocks and in all work of that kind. And I asking where I might find this person, he promised to direct him to me, and that as soon as might be. And being thus a little comforted, I put away the watch for the night, little dreaming into what company it should bring me. But the next day, towards noon, when I was in my own chamber, smoking that strange fashion of pipe that they call _hucca_,[118] I was disturbed by my servant Loll Duss, who come to say that the workman sent by the gentleman physician (this is their civil and respectful way in speaking of the doctor) was arrived and waited my pleasure. Then I bade Loll Duss carry him to the gallery, being minded myself to talk there with him as he worked, and learn through what strange turns of Fortune’s wheel he was come into such a plight. Going out to him, therefore, I found him a person of a very fine stature and an air of great nobility, though poorly apparelled in a Moorish habit, his eyes dark and piercing, his hair and beard long and untrimmed. And he receiving me with a prodigious low reverence, as elegant as any I had seen in my lord marquis his court at St Thomas, I felt myself moved to return his civility, and wondered what his quality might be. Showing him then the watch, and explaining how I had broke it, he sat down and took out his tools and set to work with great skill and diligence, I sitting by and watching him. “’Tis easy to see, sir, that you were bred to this trade,” says I to him at last in French. He left his work for a moment, and looked upon me with a smile. “Not precisely, sir,” says he, and said no more for the time; but shortly after, as though fearing he had been churlish, he observed--