And among other things, he tells me
how the King of Syam seldom goes out without thirty or forty
thousand people with him, and not a word spoke, nor a hum or
cough in the whole company to be heard. He tells me the
punishment frequently there for malefactors, is cutting off the
crowns of their head; which they do very dexterously, leaving
their brains bare, which kills them presently. He told me what I
remember he hath once done heretofore; that every body is to lie
flat down at the coming by of the King and nobody to look upon
him upon pain of death. And that he and his fellows being
strangers, were invited to see the sport of taking of a wild
elephant; and they did only kneel, and look towards the King.
Their druggerman [Dragoman.] did desire them to fall down, for
otherwise he should suffer for their contempt of the King. The
sport being ended, a messenger comes from the King, which the
druggerman thought had been to have taken away his life. But it
was to enquire how the strangers liked the sport. The druggerman
answered, that they did cry it up to be the best that ever they
saw, and that they never heard of any Prince so great in every
thing as this King.
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