The moment we entered the castle of Orághzí, Kara Rejíb Aghá, the Courier of the great Vezír Kara Mustafa Páshá, with twenty horsemen arrived from Constantinople, and after having heard the sad story of the impossibility to take Assov, took letters from the Khán, and returned to Constantinople. I poor Evlíya entered the town of Bágcheseraï with the Khán, and was assigned a house there on the borders of the valley of Chúrúksú (rotten water) where I quietly passed the winter without travelling one step. But the Khán to prevent the Infidels sending reinforcements to the castle of Assov, made three excursions with between forty and fifty thousand horsemen even up to the guns of Assov, bringing back prisoners. His Vezír (the Kalgha Sultán) made also three expeditions into the interior of Russia, and returned with ten thousand slaves and a great deal of booty to Crimea. In the beginning of spring came Hassan Aghá the Chamberlain of the Sublime Porte bringing to the Khán twelve thousand ducats as boot-money, and an Imperial diploma commanding him to be ready to take the field, with the commencement of the fine season, against Assov. The Khán received the orders with all signs of submission and duty, the horses were put to feed in the meadows for forty days, after which the army broke up again to return to Assov, the garrison of which, weighing all the hardships of siege, their losses, and the impossibility of holding the fortress finally against the Ottoman power, abandoned it and fled with their arms and effects to different other Castles.