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 from what he regarded as his rapacity, the traveller dreaded some new act of extortion, and obstinately refused his hospitality. He very soon repented this false step. It being nearly night, he proceeded, on quitting the custom-house, to the inn, or rather hovel, whither his valet had directed his effects to be conveyed after examination. Here he was sitting down, fatigued and dejected, disgusted with dirt and stench, and listening to the condolences of his Turkish travelling companions, when a janizary from the lieutenant of the commandant, the chief being absent, entered in search of his valet, with whom that important personage was desirous of holding a conference. In another hour the presence of the traveller himself was required; and when, in obedience to authority, he repaired to the fort, he found both the lieutenant and his own graceless servant drunk, and began to perceive that a plan for pillaging him had been concerted. The lieutenant now informed him, with as much gravity as the prodigious quantity of wine he had taken would permit, that all ecclesiastics who passed through Gonia were accustomed to pay two hundred ducats to his superior; and that he, therefore, as a member of that profession, for Chardin had thought proper to pass for a Capuchin, must deposite that sum in his hands for the commandant. It was in vain that the traveller now denied all claim to the clerical character, and acknowledged himself to be a merchant; merchant or priest, it was all the same to the lieutenant; what he wanted was the two hundred ducats, which, after much altercation, were reduced to one hundred; but this M. Chardin was compelled to pay, or submit to the punishment of the carcan, a species of portable stocks, through which the offender's head is put instead of his feet. The worst feature, however, of the whole affair was, that the drunken officer took it into his head to cause the present thus extorted to appear to be a voluntary gift; and again having