Travels into Turkey: Containing the most accurate account of the Turks, and neighbouring nations, their manners, customs, religion, superstition, policy, riches, coins, &c.Busbecq, Ogier Ghislain de
History
Travels into Turkey: Containing the most accurate account of the Turks, and neighbouring nations, their manners, customs, religion, superstition, policy, riches, coins, &c.
Busbecq, Ogier Ghislain de
Turkey -- Description and travel -- Early works to 1800
He is now sixty years of Age; and, for a Man of his Years, he enjoys a
moderate proportion of Health, and yet his Countenance doth discover,
that he carries about him some hidden Disease, ’tis thought a Gangrene,
or Ulcer, in the Thigh; yet at solemn Audiences of Ambassadors, he hath
a _Fucus_ to paint his Cheeks with, that he may appear sound and healthy
to them, and thereupon be more dreaded by foreign Princes, their Masters.
Methought, I discovered some such thing at my Dismission; for his
Countenance was as sour when I left him, as it was at my first Audience.
Having thus taken my leave, I began my Journey in the Month of _June_,
and the Heat thereof was so excessive, that it cast me into a Fever. ’Tis
true, it was a remiss and gentle one, yet it came every Day; to which was
added an Hoarseness, and Defluction of Rheum from the Head, and it held
me till I came to _Constantinople_.
The _Persian_ Embassador left _Amasia_ the self-same Day that I did,
and we went both out of the City the same way; for, (as I told you
before) there is but one Passage into, or out of, that Town, it is so
shut in by the circumjacent and unpassable Hills: But the Way quickly
doth divide into two, one to the _East_, which the _Persians_ took; and
another to the _West_. which was our Road. In the open Fields about
the Town, we saw the _Turkish_ Camp pitch’d, with abundance of Tents.
I shall not entertain you with the Stages of my Return, they being
the same with those of my Journey thither, only we made a little more
Speed, and sometimes rode two Day’s Journey in one. In fine, we came to
_Constantinople_, _June_ the 2d. You must needs think I had a troublesome
Journey of it, having such a Companion with me, as a _Quotidian Ague_,
all the way; so that, when I came thither, I was almost nothing but Skin
and Bone: Yet, lean as I was, when I came to rest, and by the advice of
_Quaquelben_, my Physician, used warm Baths, I quickly recovered. One
thing I observed in the method of my Cure, that, when I came out of the
warm Bath, he would sprinkle me over with cold Water, which, though it
were troublesome to me at the present, yet I found that it did me much
good.
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