Many other most strange and wonderful things are in the Land of _Cathay,_ towards the North-east, and China towards the South-east, where are many of the most famous Kingdoms in the World, where most Arts, Plenty, and Curiosities are in such abundance, as might seem incredible, which hereafter I will relate, as I have briefly gathered from such Authors as have lived there. * * * * * CHAP. XVII. _How Captain_ Smith _escaped his Captivity; slew the_ Bashaw _of_ Nalbrits _in_ Cambia; _his Passage to_ Russia, Transilvania, _and the middest of_ Europe _to_ Africa. {MN-1} All the hope he had ever to be delivered from this Thraldom, was Only the love of _Tragabigzanda,_ who surely was ignorant of his bad usage; for although he had often debated the matter with some Christians, that had been there a long time Slaves, they could not find how to make an escape, by any reason or possibility; but God beyond Man's Expectation or Imagination helpeth his Servants, when they least think of help, as it hapned to him. So long he lived in this miserable Estate, as he became a Thresher at a grange in a great Field, more than a League from the _Timor's_ House; the _Bashaw,_ as he oft used to visit his Granges, visited him, and took occasion so to beat, spurn, and revile him, that forgetting all reason, he beat out the _Timor's_ Brains with his Threshing Bat, for they have no Flails; and seeing his Estate could be no worse than it was, clothed himself in his Clothes, hid his Body under the Straw, filled his Knapsack with Corn, shut the doors, mounted his Horse, and ran into the Desart at all adventure; two or three days, thus fearfully wandring he knew not whither, and well it was, he met not any to ask the way; being even as taking leave of this miserable World, {MN-2} God did direct him to the great way or Castragan, as they call it, which doth cross these large Territories, and generally known among them by these marks. * * * * * {MN-1} _How_ Smith _escaped his Captivity._ {MN-2} _Their Guides in those Countries._